The Lion of Freedom comes from his den;
we'll rally around him, again and again;
We'll crown him with laurel, our champion to be:
O' Connor the patriot: for sweet Liberty!
Published in the Northern Star 11th September 1840.
Cork born Chartist leader to be remembered at the Spirit of Mother Jones Festival 2017. Updated DECEMBER 2024.
Born on 18th July 1796 at Connorville close to Ballineen in Co Cork, Feargus O’ Connor was the son of Roger O’Connor (1762 – 1835) and Wilhelmina Bowen. Both his father and more famous uncle, Arthur (1763 – 1852) (a barrister, former MP and High Sheriff of Cork) were arrested in 1798 for activities connected to the United Irishmen. Arthur was exiled to France, where Bonaparte welcomed him as an official representative of the Irish people. Roger’s family were also dispersed for some time as a result of his ongoing brushes with the law.
After some teenage adventures in England and Ireland, Feargus acquired Fort Robert, Dromidiclogh near Ballineen in West Cork from his uncle Robert Longfield Connor in 1820 and worked the attached farm alongside over one hundred of his tenants. At this time, rural areas of County Cork were hotbeds of Whiteboy actions led by the infamous and mysterious Captain Rock and O’Connor may have become mixed up in these activities. He had also addressed his first public meeting at the original Catholic Church in Derrigra, Enniskeane, but due to the treasonous nature of his comments, he disappeared to England in 1822, where he later qualified as a barrister.
Returning to Cork he defended many ordinary people in the courts at the time. However his experiences led him to become angry at the lack of civil rights, a critic of tithes (payments to the Protestant church) and more active in politics. He did not support Daniel O’Connell’s Catholic Emancipation campaign contending that it was limited emancipation and O’Connell was “the only Irishman to have benefitted”. In any event he was more interested in the Repeal of the Union movement and his brilliant oratory skills helped him to sway huge crowds at public meetings. He addressed a crowd of some 50,000 people in Dunmanway in 1832, while also holding a large campaign dinner for 500 in Enniskeane village.
Large in stature, fiery and red haired, self-confident, charming, defiant and passionate, he engaged huge crowds and was a natural leader. Occasionally these meetings could be rather robust affairs and O’Connor became involved in many altercations. He was described by his cousin, friend and neighbour, William J O’Neill Daunt as being “indefatigable in agitation”. His increasingly radical views gained many supporters among disenfranchised tenants, labourers and working class people of no property.
William O’Neill Daunt was a supporter of Daniel O’Connell, the Liberator, who had achieved Catholic Emancipation in 1829. Daunt later acted as secretary to O’Connell. He had also won a seat for Mallow in the 1832 election but it was later overturned.
O’Connor challenged openly the aristocratic Tory grip of politics across County Cork and in 1832 surprised all when he was elected MP for County Cork, breaking the political stranglehold of the landlord class in Ireland. His victory sparked mass evictions of hundreds of tenants along the Bandon Valley by Lord Bandon. The influential landlords never forgave Feargus for betraying his class, while those evicted and dumped on the sides of the roads, never forgot either. The entire area became a hotbed for the Irish War of Independence under the West Cork Brigade of the IRA in subsequent generations. Some bloody events during the War of Independence and the Civil War may have had echoes of those evictions in 1832. Kilmichael is just 20 km (12 miles) to the north of Enniskeane, while the infamous Bandon Valley Massacre of April 1922 took place in the general vicinity.
O’Connor was initially a strong supporter of Daniel O’Connell, but he later sundered all relations with O’Connell over his softly softly approach to Repeal of the Act of Union and O’Connell’s collusion with the Whig government after 1835. O’Connell, who later opposed efforts of working class people to organise, blocked all attempts to set up an Irish Chartist movement. In 1834, O’Connor had defended the Tolpuddle Martyrs , six of whom were convicted of administering “unlawful oaths” of union solidarity and were sentenced to transportation for seven years. He blamed the Whig and the Tories for this injustice on working people and by implication O’Connell.
Yet he continued to engineer electoral victories in a corrupt system by somewhat pragmatic methods in many Cork towns against a backdrop of increasing anti tithe violence. (In December 1834, 12 people were killed when troops opened fire in Rathcormac, Co Cork).
In the House of Commons, the new MP for Cork was very isolated and gradually split from Daniel O’Connell accusing him of selling out the Irish people on Repeal, especially after the Liberator’s agreement to the Lichfield House Whig Compact. O’Connor and the working classes became alienated even further from O’Connell due to O’Connell’s regular attacks on the emerging trade union networks.
Re-elected in January 1835 as MP for Cork, he was soon disqualified from the House of Commons in June when a Select Committee found he had not enough property or income to qualify in the first place (.Property qualification was £600) Being unable to contest the Cork election again he then turned most of his attention to English politics.
Later in England in September 1835 O’Connor helped found the Great Radical Association, which united many radicals and agitators and which sought universal suffrage (for men), voting by ballot and the removal of property qualifications for MPs. He possessed ferocious energy and spoke at huge mass meetings in support of working peoples’ rights. He is regarded by many commentators as one of the founders of Chartism. Feargus was becoming the “Lion of Freedom”, adored by countless thousands, yet remaining a very divisive figure to others.
He established the Northern Star newspaper in 1837 in Leeds. This newspaper was hugely popular and sold thousands of copies, which promoted the ideas of Chartism throughout Britain and supported the People’s Charter announced by the London Working Men’s Association in June 1838. He made the north of England his political heartland.
O’Connor was a vigorous campaigner, an accomplished orator, a smart agitator and a shrewd self-publicist. He spoke in a spectacular oratorial style at huge meetings attended by hundreds of thousands of people. Unfortunately he also became involved in the many irrelevant disputes which weakened the Chartist movement. To his credit, he highlighted the many grievances of Ireland to his mainly English audience, whenever he could, thereby making serious enemies in the British establishment.
The authorities ensured he was charged and imprisoned for eighteen months in York Castle for seditious libel in May 1840. While weakening his direct control over the Chartist revolution, O’Connor became a martyr for the now huge movement. In spite of many setbacks, the widespread violence arising from industrial strikes especially in 1842, the rejection of parliament petitions, an over ambitious land plan, O’Connor and others kept Chartism central to the political agenda throughout the 1840s. Feargus was elected as an MP for Nottingham in 1847 and became an even bigger thorn in the side of the political establishment in the Westminster Parliament.
There were serious internal disputes and animosity among the Chartists and Feargus was usually in the centre of the rows. He fell out with many of the Chartists leaders, but due to his popularity among working people where he was seen as a martyr for the cause he remained the colourful public face of Chartism. His publication the Management of Small Farms in 1843 which attracted much attention saw Feargus concentrate Chartist principles on the management, ownership and cultivation of land. Many of his arguments resonate in the modern world when he discusses elements such as ecology, land and wealth distribution, food production for the masses and the mechanisation of agriculture. However these land settlement plans were somewhat of a diversion and distracted Feargus and Chartism from the central aims of the movement.
He founded the Chartist Cooperative Land Company in 1845 and his Land Plan saw over a thousand acres being purchased and hundreds of working class families being settled on small plots of land in model settlements. This was practical Chartism in action and its impact sowed the seeds for the self help organisations and the trade union movement. After initial success, the plan, which was well before its time, fell apart in legal disputes, financial issues and recriminations from those so opposed to O’Connor.
A series of great petitions to Parliament on behalf of the Chartists got nowhere and the failure of the mass meeting at Kennington Common on April 10th, 1848, when it was banned by the police authorities, perhaps following the example of the Irish authorities who banned Daniel O’Connell’s mass meeting in relation repeal of the union at Clontarf, Co Dublin in October 1843. Kennington Common effectively signalled the end of the mass gatherings, the main effective democratic weapon available to Chartists .
Eventually worn out by years of campaigning, wounded by arguments within the movement, lack of finances and the ongoing efforts of the Establishment to be rid of him, O’Connor experienced poor health and mental difficulties, he was eventually sent for treatment to an asylum where he remained for several years. He died at his sister Harriet’s lodgings at 18 Albert Terrace in Notting Hill Gate on 30th August 1855 and is buried at Kensal Green Cemetery. Vast crowds attended his funeral in London and the gates of the cemetery were “unceremoniously broke open” by the throngs. A large monument was erected over his grave. Another monument was erected in Nottingham by his admirers.
Chartism, riven with disputes between reformers and militants receded in the 1850s and much of its vision in education, parliamentary and land reforms and universal suffrage came to nothing in the short term. However the awakening working classes proceeded to organise and consolidate trade unions, co-operatives and friendly societies and absorb new socialist and democratic ideas. Wage negotiations commenced. While political reform took longer…… for many on the ground, O’Connor had led the way across the revolutionary Rubicon!
As early as February 1838, O’Connor as quoted in the Bolton Free Press (Dorothy Thompson The Chartists) had declared that society is divided into two classes…. “The rich oppressors and the poor oppressed. The whole question resolved itself into the battle between labour and capital”. He emphasised the need to create independent working class organisation.
Feargus had introduced powerful ideas to the workers and he would not be silenced as he understood how to promulgate these ideas fearlessly through his newspaper, through vast meetings and through Chartism. Establishment attacks tried to destroy his character portraying him as a colourful and dangerous eccentric of this period yet the West Corkman remains the one innovative, questioning and radical voice in the complex tapestry and history of agitation for full political rights for all in Britain and Ireland.
Feargus was reputed to have had several children and in 1844 he had a son Edward O’Connor Terry with Emblon Terry. On a romantic note, he had a long standing relationship with actress Louisa Nesbitt (1817-1858) , a granddaughter of John McNamara of County Clare.
Today, O’Connor has been consigned to occupy a marginal role in Irish and British history, although he was a central and significant figure in the British Revolution. In his publication “Feargus O’Connor …a Political Life” by Paul A Pickering (published by Merlin Press 2008), Professor Pickering contends that O’Connor has not been “treated kindly by history” and his book is a plea for a place in Irish and British history for Feargus, as “he had earned it”.
Ronan Burtenshaw editor of the Tribune in the UK suggested recently in an article “The Irish Chartist who led Britain towards Revolution” argued that the Fenians in their proclamation was “littered with Chartist rhetoric”.
Issued on 10th February 1867 by the Irish Republican Brotherhood (IRB), this proclamation refers to “founding a Republic based on universal suffrage which shall secure to all the intrinsic value of their labour”. It adds “as for you workmen of England it is not only your hearts we wish, but your arms. Remember the starvation and degradation brought to your firesides by the oppression of labour”
Today, Connorville and the later Carrigmore House shamefully lie in ruins alongside the present day Carbery Milk Products factory at Ballineen. Cattle graze beneath the walls of Feargus’s old home Fort Robert (built in 1787) which is nearby. Very little remains of the old church at Derrigran, Enniskeane where he made his first speech, and today a parochial house stands on the site.
Alongside the “Idle Bridge”, on the main Bandon/Dunmanway road (a bridge built by Roger to carry water from a never completed Blackwater river diversion on the O’Connor lands at Manch), a small plaque unveiled in 1999, commemorates Roger and Arthur O’Connor and their role in the United Irishmen.
For Feargus O’Connor…the “Lion of Freedom”… a truly great West Cork man who has left his mark on the democratic landscape of both the land of his birth which he never forgot and the country where he embraced the democratic principles of Chartism, he remains sadly neglected. West Cork should remedy this neglect and acknowledge the huge contribution of Feargus Edward O’Connor to the struggle for freedom, equality and justice for all people who live in Ireland and Britain today.
Warren Davies, was a Labour Councillor, who represented Baird Ward in Hastings in East Sussex. For many years he taught history, politics, Sociology and anthropology. Warren gave a lecture entitled speak of “Feargus O’Connor – The Corkman behind a British Revolution” on Saturday 5th August 2017 at the 2017 Spirit of Mother Jones Festival. It was attended by Oriana O’Connor of the O’Connor family of Manch and historians, Louis and Bernie Whyte of Enniskeane.
Sources:
Epstein, James, The Lion Of Freedom: Feargus O’Connor And The Chartist Movement, 1832-1842. (Croom Helm, London & Sydney 1982).
Hayter Hames, Jane. Arthur O’Connor, United Irishman. (The Collins Press, Cork 2001)
Howe, Catherine. Feargus O’Connor and Louisa Nisbett (Catherine Howe UK 2016)
Pickering, Paul A, Feargus O’Connor, A Political Life. (Merlin Press Ltd Wales 2008).
Read, Donald, Glasgow, Eric. Feargus O’Connor, Irishman and Chartist. (Edward Arnold (Publishers) Ltd London 1961).
Thompson, Dorothy, The Chartists, Popular Politics in the Industrial Revolution. (Breviary Stuff Publications London 2013).
Thanks to Oriana O’Connor of Manch, widow of the late Con O’Connor. Gratitude also to Bernie & Louis Whyte who know so much about the origins of the Connor/O’Connor clan. Warren Davies is a regular visitor to the annual Spirit of Spirit of Mother Jones Festival.
