1886 - 1888 AD

1886 AD January:  William Gladstone, the Scotsmanand Statesman who was the British Liberal Opposition leader, was by now well aware that Irish Home Rule was certainly on the agenda, but he was also well aware that his Liberal Party members were not ready to accept it, so he made no public statements either way himself.

January - End: The British Conservative Government under Robert Cecil / Lord Salisbury was out of office in England.

February: William Gladstone, was re - elected, once again as the British Liberal Prime Minister for the third time for this year only, with Irish Home Rule in his platform, whether he wanted it or not, but he still had to win over his Conservative Liberal Party members, and Lord Hartington, who lead the Whigs in the Liberal Party, refused to toe the line, while the Radicals in the Liberal Party under Joseph Chamberlain were not too happy either, but despite this Joseph Chamberlain still accepted a seat in the new Liberal Government's Cabinet, but within two months he was to resign and campaign openly against Irish Home Rule.   

     The previous I.R.B. / Irish Republican Brotherhood operations, which had been begun in 1883 AD, under the auspices of the Clann na Gael / the Organization in America now ceased, as the hope of the 1st Irish Home Rule Bill was brought forward by William Gladstone the new British Liberal Prime Minister, as it had already been formally endorsed by the Irish Catholic hierarchy and Charles Stewart - Parnell the leader of the Irish Parliamentary Party, but once again, this particular chance of any Westminster Parliamentary reform for the population in Ireland was to stimulate a "siege mentality" and opposition approach in some of the non - Catholics who had previously enjoyed total Ascendancy in Ireland under the previous overall control of the various British Conservative Governments. This was especially so in the Ulster Province, where they were sure that they were seeing the last vestiges of total Ascendancy control going down, with a Catholic Irish majority parliament in Ireland to follow and the Conservatives, although now the minority in the British House of Commons in the Westminster Parliament, called on all of the racial, religious and economic bias and prejudice they could find, to oppose the Irish Home Rule Bill, especially those Conservatives who were among the Ulster Unionists.  

April: William Gladstone, the British Liberal Prime Minister, brought the 1st Irish Home Rule Bill forward, which provided for an executive to govern the affairs in Ireland, to be situated in Dublin, who were to be responsible to their own Irish Parliament, and who despite this were to be still part of the Immoral Union with the Westminster Parliament, who were to also still have the "final authority over Ireland," and retain total control over all matters, which effected the British Crown and among these were defence and foreign relations, while the fiscal independence of the Irish Parliament was to be narrowly circumscribed, and although he originally included no Irish representation at Westminster, this was now up for reconsideration. To ensure that the 1st Irish Home Rule Bill did not pass, Lord Randolph Churchill, the father of Winston Churchill, who was a Conservative member in the Westminster Parliament at this time, who was also well aware that the Conservative non - Catholics in Ireland, in general, feared Irish Home Rule, had stated that, "It was now time to play the Orange Card." and he went off to Ireland to concentrate on the long ingrained "siege mentality of the Orange Order," and gave a militant speech to the Loyalists in Belfast in Co. Antrim in the Ulster Province, were he stated, "Ulster will fight, Ulster will be right." His actions in this regard were to become a dangerous embarrassment, even to the Conservatives in England, as because of this constant stirring up of personal emotions, further sectarian violence was carried out by the non - Catholics in Belfast against the Irish Catholic community there, and they also began drilling men with arms in trepidation of Ireland actually achieving Irish Home Rule.             

June 8th: William Gladstone the British Liberal Prime Minister, during the second reading of the 1st Irish Home Rule Bill urged all of the members, "To just not think of the moment, but the years that lay ahead," but the reality was that the British House of Commons was divided on the Bill and it was defeated with the added opposition now of Joseph Chamberlain who had since defected from the Liberals. (Although previously he had been just a Radical, he was now publicly known as a Liberal Unionist). He and 92 other Liberals had voted against the Irish Home Rule Bill also, with the votes being recorded as, 343 against to 313 for. The Liberal Party members who had been against the Bill to bring in Irish Home Rule began also to secede from under William Gladstone's leadership, and they now formed themselves into the "Liberal Unionists" under Joseph Chamberlain. (To try and settle the matter, William Gladstone had the Westminster Parliament dissolved and called a new election on the issue).

July: William Gladstone, and the Liberal Government were defeated in the Election when 316 Conservatives and 78 Liberal Unionists were successful compared to 191 Liberals who remained under Gladstone's leadership still, and 85 Irish Home Rulers from the Irish Parliamentary Party under Charles Stewart - Parnell who had received support from 3/5ths of the Scottish members, and 5 / 6ths of the Welsh members, while the Irish Parliamentary Party who had previously had the option of backing either Party was now totally committed to the Liberal Party only. The Irish Home Rule Party was as strong as ever in Ireland, and their previous position was in no way altered with Charles - Stewart Parnell continuing to maintain good relations with the remaining Liberal Party members in anticipation of their return to Government in England, and the re - introduction of Irish Home Rule, but little did he realise, that the Conservative Governments who were now under Robert Cecil / Lord Salisbury, who would remain the Conservative British Prime Minister until 1892 AD, were to also remain basically in Government in England in the future for nigh on 20 years up until to 1905 AD, except for a short period from 1892 - 1899 AD. Although the Conservatives were to once again apply resolute Government to Ireland, they were also to introduce some conciliation measures and William Gladstone had also put forward an Irish Land Purchase Bill to try and buy out all of the Land Lords still holding onto the land in Ireland, but eventually it too had to be abandoned, but despite this the Conservatives when they came under pressure were to eventually introduce a similar scheme of their own.

    This year saw further great hardship in Ireland, brought on by another bad rural season, with the rents still applying that were previously fixed in 1881 AD during better times, and there was a great need for them to be reduced, but the Land Lords once again would not come to the party, and many more evictions of Irish tenant armes and their families were still to be carried out.

    Meanwhile, the Irish National League had by now expanded their membership to 1,262 branches, and their members William O Brien, Timothy Healy and John Dillon, the son of John B. Dillon the previous Young Irelander, supported a "Plan of Campaign" to once agin withhold rents on certain overbearing Land Lord Estates and it was intended that, the tenant farmers should combine as a whole group on each of the Land Lord's Estates were they made a combined offer to the Land Lord at a reduced rent for all concerned, which they were sure that they could afford to pay to keep on going. If their offer was refused by any particular Land Lord, then all of their rent monies were to be paid into a fund for the benefit of any Irish tenant who was evicted while Charles Stewart - Parnell the leader of the Irish Parliamentary Party, was not to be involved in this particular scheme, and this kept him in a good light with all of his followers in the Westminster Parliament and Ireland, with the "Plan of Campaign" also being eventually proclaimed by the British Conservative Government's Dublin Castle authorities as unlawful. William O Brien, the strong Labour supporter from Co. Cork in Southern Munster, who was always working hard for social justice in Ireland, organized a rent strike anyway, at the Kingston's Estate, on the lands that were previously taken off of the Irish O Mahonys, and he was then arrested and imprisoned for taking part, but nevertheless, the British Conservative Government in England were now aware that something still had to be done in Ireland in regard to land reform, if ever things were to eventually settle down there. (At this time John Morley was the British Conservative Chief Secretary in Ireland). 

   This year the Ardagh Chalice, which had been produced in the 8th Century AD, was found on the beach at Ardagh in Co. Limerick in the north - west of the Munster Province.

    Sir Samuel Ferguson, who had been born in Belfast in Co. Antrim in the Ulster Province and lived in Dublin were he had reworked the Irish Myths, died this year, and was interred to the west of Carrickfergus on the road to Antrim.         

1887 AD Arthur "Bloody" Balfour the first English Earl of Balfour, who until recently had been the British  Secretary in Scotland was to be appointed the British Chief Secretary in Ireland until 1890 AD, and he had the Irish Coercion Act strengthened further against the Irish population, and also then tried to break up the very succcessful "Irish National League" and their "Plan of Campaign," and this was to be the cause of further great turmoil in Ireland and even the British Liberals in England were to denounce him as a cruel and tyrannical man, but despite his bad points he also was to try and make land purchase a priority in Ireland. Charles Stewart - Parnell the leader of the Irish Parliamentary Party, now had the full support of the remaining Liberal Party members who all now believed in Irish Home Rule as providing the answer to all the problems in Ireland, and also the Irish National League's Plan of Campaign, so to increase the pressure for reform in the Westminster Parliament, he denounced the British  Conservative Government for their continuing harsh measures carried out by Arthur "Bloody" Balfour in Ireland, and Parnell's standing in Britain, Ireland and America at this time was at it's highest point. In desperation the Conservative controlled anti - Irish newspaper, "The Times" in England, now tried to implicate Charles Stewart - Parnell in the previous Phoenix Park affair, with their reporter, Richard Pigot stating in the newspaper article that Charles - Stewart Parnell had carried out agrarian crimes and condoned the killing of Frederick Cavendish and T.H. Burke and to this end he produced "forged" letters to back up his story, and the end result of all of this was that it was found that Richard Pigott had forged the letters himself, and he was to eventually commit suicide by shooting himself and Charles Stewart Parnell was to sue "The Times" newspaper and called for an enquiry into the whole sorry mess. 

    Robert Cecil / Lord Salisbury the Conservative Prime Minister of Britain now introduced further land reform for Ireland in another Irish Land Act, which was to give the courts power to revise the Land Lord's rents, which had been previously fixed under the 1881 AD Land Act seven years before, which was a measure actually introduced to keep the "Unionists" in the Ulster Province content, and to be therefore less inclined towards Irish Home Rule also, as they were by now well aware that the demand for Irish Home Rule was caused by the continuing social discontent in Ireland and it was now their intention to carry out any measure at all that would remove the main causes for this demand, so as not cause them any further problems in this regard.

   Brian Merriman, the poet and teacher from Feakle in Co. Clare in the north - west of the Munster Province was arrested and convicted at Loughred and imprisoned for 2 months in Co. Galway and Co. Dublin this year, for organizing a protest meeting against the Land Lord, Wilfred Blunt and an Irish language Summer school was to be later held in his honour annually in Co. Clare.

1888 AD Joseph Gillis Biggar, the Irish Parliamentary Party M.P. in the Westminster Parliament was arrested again for "Obstructing" the British Westminster Parliament, while he was still trying to gain attention over Irish Affairs / Irish Home Rule, but he was never tried due to Legislation being introduced into the Parliament to prevent any further attempts at Obstructionism.

    John Redmond the Irish Parliamentary Party M.P. for Co. Wexford in the south - east of Southern Leinster, who would eventually become their future leader, was imprisoned also at this time by Arthur "Bloody" Balfour on behalf of the British Conservative Government.

   Things were now about to proceed rapidly in Ireland towards Irish Independence as the "Old Republican," Tom Clarke, who had been sent to England by the Clann na Gael / The Organization in America to carry out bombings there, was finally released from his prison in England and would soon become a catalyst for further personal revolutionary action in Ireland.

   Due to the previous success of the Ashbourne Act in Ireland, which had allowed those tenant farmers in Ireland who could  financially afford to be able to buy their Irish land from the Land Lords, the British Conservative Government extended it further, with a payment of 5,000,000 pounds.

   The O Connell Memorial Church / "The Church of the Holy Cross" at Caherciveen in Co. Kerry in the south - west of the Munster Province was constructed by Dom O Connell, and Canon Brosnan / Brosnahan / Ua Brosnachain the parish priest from Caher had organised a cornerstone from the Pope that had been a keystone from the Arch of St. Clements House in Rome who had been the nephew of the Roman Emperor Domitian, as a tribute to the continuing high esteem that Daniel O Connell "The Liberator" was continued to be held in.

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