The Grand Canal Company strike of 1890

In 1849 the Grand Canal Company decided to begin operating a cargo-carrying service on its own canal, initially from Dublin to Naas and Dublin to Kilbeggan, both destinations on branch lines. According to Ruth Delany, Naas was included because

[…] Daly of Sallins, the only trader to Naas, had announced his intention of withdrawing the service which he was operating at a considerable loss.[1]

It may be the same Daly of Sallins who had leased the Grand Canal Company’s hotel in Sallins after the lease to the Great Southern & Western Railway ended in 1847. Delany says that the Daly family

[…] looked after the maintenance of sections of the banks and trackways for the company under contract and later became the horse contractors for the company’s trade boats.[2]

By 1870, however, the Grand Canal Company had ended that arrangement:

The haulage of the boats by their own horses had been a great success. It had been done at a much less rate, and more efficiently, than was done before by contract.[3]

It is possible that the company used contractors for some of its work some of the time, perhaps to supplement its own resources in busy seasons. A report to the company’s half-yearly meeting in August 1888 included these items:

[…] £103 for a new roof to their stables at Shannon Harbour. […] their horsing account for 52 horses at £669. They had during the last half year replaced several horses worn out in the service by new purchases. Their stud was never in a better condition than at present. […] They had succeeded in obtaining savings in new haulage contracts […].[4]

In February 1890, a new company chairman, Mr William F De V Kane JP, reported a further change. In response to demands for “greater speed in transport and regularity in delivery”, the company had decided to have its boats hauled by two horses instead of by one. The company was finding it difficult to buy enough extra horses but now had 85, valued at £15 11s 0d each, including harness. For those it had bought, it found it necessary to engage additional drivers, which increased its costs, but those drivers could be let go once the new horses had been trained.

If eventually they found the increased acceleration was not commensurate with the expenditure, they would return to the one-horse haulage.[5]

Mr T J Daly, of Sallins, had been appointed inspector and clerk of works to the company engineer, Mr Mulvany, at a salary of £150 a year and travelling expenses;

[…] and the directors were confident that by this appointment an improvement in the management of horses in the country as well as economy would be secured.[6]

Less than two months later, the “towage drivers”, the men who walked with the horses, went on strike.

The company’s operations

At the time of the strike, in April 1890, the Grand Canal Company operated

• 85 horses
• 54 horse-drawn canal boats, each with three boatmen and one driver
• 1 steamer on the River Liffey in Dublin, with a crew of six
• 4 steamers on the River Shannon, each with a crew of six.

However, the company seems to have employed between 60 and 65 drivers altogether: different newspaper reports gave different numbers.[7] The Freeman’s Journal said that about 250 employés [sic] were “thrown idle” by the strike.[8]

The company served these stations:

Athy, Athlone, Ardree, Bagnalstown, Ballinasloe (for Ahascragh, Aughrim, Kilconnell, Kiltormer), Banagher (for Eyrecourt and Parsonstown), Belmont (for Cloghan), Carlow, Dromineer (for Nenagh), Killaloe, Kilbeggan (for Clara, Tyrellspass), Kylemore (for Laurencetown), Leighlinbridge, Limerick, Luska, Monasterevan, Mountmellick, Mageny, Milford, Naas (for Ballymore-eustace), Philipstown, Portarlington, Portumna (for Borrisokane, Killimor, Woodford), Rathangan, Sallins (for Clane, Prosperous), Scariff, Shannon Bridge, Shannon Harbour, Tullamore, Vicarstown (for Stradbally), Williamstown.[9]

Those in bold were on the Grand Canal or one of its branches or on the Barrow Navigation, and could thus be served by horse-drawn boats; the others were on the River Shannon and were served by the company’s Shannon steamers, with cargoes transhipped at Shannon Harbour.

The drivers’ work and conditions

A reporter for the Freeman’s Journal spoke to some of the men on Saturday 5 April 1890 and, on the following Monday, published an account of their pay and conditions and their grievances. Some further information was revealed during the strike.

The men earned 15s, £0.75, per week, about £39 a year; Mr Daly of Sallins, the newly-appointed inspector and clerk of works, was to be paid almost four times what the drivers earned. They sought an increase to £1, 20s, a week.[10]

They said that on private boats [those not owned by the Grand Canal Company, such as Mr Tyrrell’s] drivers rarely worked at night, were often able to be at home for three days at a time and were paid 18s a week.[11]

The men claimed that they could be away from home for five or six weeks, without seeing their families. They worked about 18 hours out of each 24, walking an average of 80–90 miles per week, while managing two horses “and attending to the locks on the route”.[12]

The drivers said that their arduous conditions sometimes

[…] prevented their being able to attend Divine Service on Sunday, a system which the parish priest of the district of Sallins denounced from the altar.[13]

Provision for rest was a particular grievance:

Such rest as they get is obtained at the stations or lodges on the canal bank. At these lodges beds are provided. There are three beds in each lodge, but there may be seven or eight men in one lodge at the same time. A man may be only two or three hours in the lodge when he is compelled to “move out” by the arrival of other men with their boats and horses. These short snatches of repose are trying on the physical strength of the men […].[14]

As far as I can see, these lodges are not identified separately on the 25″ Ordnance Survey map. It is not clear whether the boatmen too slept in the lodges or whether they had accommodation on board.

The men said that they were

[…] allowed 2s worth of coal per week for use in the lodges. That allowance, if continued, would, the men say, be in excess of the 20s.[15]

At a meeting of the men on 15 April 1890, a Mr Whelan

[…] condemned severely the system of fines on the canal, by which men sometimes were fined as heavily as £1, the smallest fine imposed for any offence being 2s 6d. Another thing was the system which threw all the responsibility for damage and breakages on the employés, so that the poor workmen had to bear expense that should be borne by the company.[16]

Some at least of those fines seem to have been for cruelty to horses, as the company secretary, William Digby Cooke, explained in a letter to the Freeman’s Journal:

In reply to the Lord Mayor, who stated that one of the chief grievances of the drivers was that they were fined for working horses with sore shoulders, it was explained that such a neglect was contrary to the printed rules of the company, but that only in very few instances fines of 6s had been imposed, and that the company had paid the fines of excessive amount, as the directors had satisfied themselves that in most cases the prosecutions were unwarrantable. In fact, the directors felt that there was at least excessive zeal on the part of the constabulary at Robertstown, and the company had been put to great expense sending skilled witnesses to defend a test case, which was dismissed on the merits. The chairman further mentioned that he was aware that one driver had left the company’s service rather than be so harassed in his occupation, and that the board had applied to the Inspector-General Royal Irish Constabulary for an investigation into the matter, but so far as the directors are aware without any result.[17]

Writing of practices in the United States of America in the latter part of the nineteenth century, Clay McShane and Joel A Tarr say in The Horse in the City:

Cruelty by teamsters toward their horses was undoubtedly often compelled by owners who insisted that teamsters hold to a tight schedule even though they were pulling excessive loads.[18]

The company view

Like that of the drivers, the company’s case was first stated in an interview with the Freeman’s Journal, but developed over the course of the dispute.

In the interview, the chairman, Mr Kane, said that the Grand Canal Company’s wages compared favourably with those paid by the railway companies and with those paid to rural postmen who, he said, walked considerably further every day than the drivers did. Drivers averaged only 10¼ miles a day, not the 80–90 miles they claimed.[19] However, the company secretary later said, in a letter to the Freeman’s Journal, that the average did not exceed 12 miles in 24 hours, which was within the limits claimed by the men.[20]

Furthermore, the drivers, who wanted 20s a week, had only to lead the horses along the towpaths; the boatmen, who had charge of the cargoes, were paid between 18s and 22s a week. He said of the boatmen

[…] a steadier and more respectable and reliable body of men are not to be found in any employment.[21]

He and the company secretary were less complimentary a week later:

They could not accede to the drivers’ demand, for if they did it would mean giving an advance to all their employés, who, and in this statement they included the drivers, were already greatly overpaid for the work they did.[22]

Mr Kane accepted that the accommodation at the stations was inadequate but said that it was being improved.[23]

Mr Kane made it clear that the company would not concede:

If we are to have a strike we will, of course, have to adopt a different plan to the present system of towage — steam or something of the kind. I may tell you also that for each boat we employ four men — three boatmen and a driver — while on English canal boats only three men, two boatmen and a driver, are employed. We, therefore, employ and pay four men, whereas on all the canals in Great Britain only three men are employed.[24]

A week later, Mr Kane and the company secretary said

At present the men practically worked as they pleased, and if they were to get an advance [increase] of wages, the system of labour would certainly have to be changed.

The directors denied that private firms paid their men 18s a week, unless it was for “entirely different services”.[25] The company was willing to pay the men according to the work done, ie mile covered[26], or to

[…] adopt the English system by which the members of the crews who acted as drivers in turn received much higher wages than in Ireland, while there were none employed for the sole purpose of driving.[27]

Mr Kane said that, when the company’s boat-builders went on strike, the company sacked the lot of them and bought its boats more cheaply from Britain. He blamed the workers’ “society in England” for fomenting the strike, suggesting that it was in the interests of English workmen to have their Irish counterparts go on strike so that the work would be transferred to England — a point singularly irrelevant to the work of the drivers.[28] The company was not prepared to deal with intermediaries — presumably union representatives — or with arbitrators.[29]

Finally, the company secretary said

The net earnings of the company do not permit of any increase in salaries in wages.[30]

The English agitator

The chairman and secretary said that the English agitator, “a delegate from an English labour organisation”, had told the men to accept 18s a week now and to strike again later for 20s.[31] The press reports do nothing to identify him; on the basis of cursory research, I wonder whether it might have been Will Thorne[32] but perhaps it was a more junior official of his Gasworkers’ and General Labourers’ Union.

Adolphus Shields[33], “the District Secretary of the city of Dublin” for the men’s union[34] (and father of the actors Arthur Shields[35] and Barry Fitzgerald[36], was an organiser for Thorne’s union[37], one of the New Unions of the 1880s[38] and now part of GMB[39].

The course of the strike

On 15 April 1890 there was a meeting of Grand Canal Company employees, presided over by Mr M Keogh. He said that they hoped to find a way of settling the dispute; they had already reduced their demand from 20s to 18s a week.

Adolphus Shields, District Secretary of the City of Dublin, condemned the company for having “treated the men shamefully and [having] done their best to bring public odium upon them”. He said that the drivers might not get the full 18s they wanted; their best course was to refer the case to arbitration by a panel of three: one representative each of employers and workers and his Grace the [Roman Catholic? Church of Ireland?] Archbishop as neutral president. He proposed, and a Mr Whelan seconded, a resolution to that effect; after speeches in support, it was passed unanimously.

Mr Whelan proposed, and a boatman, Mr Luke Butler, seconded, a resolution asking whether the 4d that workers had paid weekly, for thirteen years, to the Canal Company Friendly Society would be divided amongst them as they were laid off. That resolution too was passed.[40]

On the day of the meeting, 15 April 1890, the Grand Canal Company had offered its fleet of boats for sale or hire:

GRAND CANAL COMPANY’S BOATS FOR SALE

The Directors of the Grand Canal Company are prepared to receive Tenders for the Purchase or Hire of their Barges, now disemployed in consequence of the strike.

Proposals may be sent in based on the Three Years’ System of Hire.

By order//Wm Digby Cooke, Secretary//Grand Canal House, Dublin//14th April 1890[41]

The employees held another meeting on 18 April 1890, chaired by Adolphus Shields, at which they regretted the refusal of the company to refer the dispute to arbitration; they also expressed their “determination to stand by the drivers in their struggle for their just demand”. Mr Shields said that he would seek assistance from the union’s English branches.[42] On 22 April 1890 the Freeman’s Journal carried a list of donations to the workers: £25 from the Grand Council of the Gas Workers’ and General Labourers’ Union of Great Britain and Ireland, £24 from various Irish branches of the union and just under £12 from various small donations.[43]

On 23 April the company announced that it would “discontinue receiving loading for all stations on and after this day until further notice”.[44] That seemed slightly late as layoffs had begun the previous week.[45] It seems that the company had recruited new drivers but the boatmen refused to work with them and were, in consequence, discharged.[46]

On 28 April 1890 it was reported that, in Carlow, some of the principal traders were considering forming a carrying company of their own if the Grand Canal Company abandoned the trade.[47] However, the Barrow Navigation Company carried some malt and supplies of Guinness got through by road.[48]

On Sunday 27 April 1890 there was a joint demonstration in the Phoenix Park, Dublin, by the Grand Canal Company workers and striking railway men; the total attendance was put at between seven and eight thousand.[49] The Grand Canal Company “men marched in processional order from the Grand Canal Harbour, shortly after three o’clock, accompanied by bands, and carrying flags and banners.” Mr Murphy, a Nationalist MP, presided and said

In his experience as an employer of labour he had never known a dispute to occur which could not be settled by meeting the men fairly face to face with the feeling that they had rights as well as their employers (loud cheers).[50]

The meeting passed a resolution regretting the refusal of the Grand Canal Company to refer the dispute to arbitration.[51]

On the following Monday, 28 April 1890, the MP Mr Murphy — William Martin Murphy, who throughout his life took a keen interest in labour relations — met the company directors, but without success. The Freeman’s Journal said that, although the men’s demand would have added only £8–10 to the weekly wage bill, the directors were absolutely uncompromising, that they would do nothing to enable the men to return to work and that they were intent on “re-organising the system under which the canal is worked”, although the Journal thought that would take time, during which the canal would lose traffic.[52]

The same issue of the newspaper reported that two strikers in Athy were fined for disorderly conduct in shouting and groaning at men unloading a boat carrying coal for the workhouse (under a private contract, which presumably means that the men were not employed by the Grand Canal Company).[53] On the following day, the Journal reported that the crew (master and two “second men”) of one canal boat, who had refused to work with new drivers, had failed in a legal action against the company in which they sought the payment of wages due to them.[54]

On 3 May the Journal reported the end of the railway strike (with, incidentally, the involvement of the Archbishop of Dublin). The canal drivers had resolved to seek the intercession of the Lord Mayor, the Nationalist Edward Joseph Kennedy. And Mr Murphy MP had telegraphed the company chairman asking whether he would be able to lay a reorganisation scheme before the men; the chairman replied that he would. The Journal saw no prospect of an end to the canal strike, yet it was entering its final week.[55]

The Lord Mayor’s intervention

On the same day, Saturday 3 May 1890, the Right Hon the Lord Mayor of Dublin met Mr Kane, the Grand Canal Company chairman, at the request of the drivers. Kane said that the directors had decided to “discontinue the present system of haulage by horses driven by men in the employment of the company”. They had been thinking about this since well before the strike; one of their reasons was “the vexatious prosecutions instituted by the police at various places along the Canal for supposed cruelty in using horses that were unfit to draw the boats”.

As the company had been buying new horses and engaging extra, if temporary, drivers as recently as the half-yearly meeting of February 1890, it seems likely that the chairman was, for reasons that are not clear, lying.

The work, he said, would now be carried out by contractors; they had received tenders from Mr Hannan [recte Hannin] and others. However, if the men returned to work he would recommend that some of the best of them be employed by the contractor.[56]

The same issue of the Journal, for Monday 5 May, carried a letter from the secretary to the Grand Canal Company, in which he pointed to what he thought were errors in the Dublin Evening Mail‘s report of the Lord Mayor’s meeting with the chairman. He seemed to suggest that the company was — as its ad of 15 April 1890 suggested — considering abandoning the carrying trade altogether and reverting to the pre-1849 situation in which the company simply managed the canal and charged others for its use:

[…] the chairman stated that the directors had definitely resolved not to resume the “carrying trade” on the old system, but would eventually try to employ some other method of traction. If, however, the boatmen agreed to return at once to work he believed the board would endeavour to arrange to have the boats hauled by contract at the earliest moment practicable […].[57]

He said that the boatmen [as opposed to the drivers?] were to be offered a scheme — perhaps that mentioned by William Martin Murphy MP — “by which their wages would be in part paid by results, the intention of which was that a larger wage than hitherto could be earned as the trade improved in regularity of service and in amount.”[58]

Finally, he said

The claim of the drivers was for 20s a week (afterwards reduced to 18s a week) or else 6d per mile. They were paid 15s a week, or about 3d per mile for every mile travelled.[59]

Those figures don’t make sense: even if the drivers walked as little as 60 miles a week, Mr Kane’s first figure, 6d a mile would be 30s a week, 50% higher than the drivers had ever asked for. Perhaps the 6d figure was a misprint for 4d.[60]

On the day that letter appeared, Monday 5 May 1890, the Lord Mayor of Dublin paid a second visit to the Grand Canal Company, this time with representatives of the men. They spoke to the chairman, Mr Kane, the traffic manager, Mr Robinson, and some other directors.

The Lord Mayor asked whether the board would compromise on the pay claim; the company said no.

He asked whether the board would agree to arbitration on the men’s grievances if they returned to work at their old wages; the company said no.

He asked whether the board would allow the dispute to be resolved by its shareholders; the company said no.

The company also said that it had resolved to stop employing drivers itself: the work would be contracted out.

The Lord Mayor said that under these circumstances there did not seem to be any need for further discussion.

The Chairman said he did not think there was, and he thanked the Lord Mayor for the trouble he had taken in the matter.[61]

The Lord Mayor and the representatives reported to a meeting of drivers and boatmen at 9 Thomas Street.

The drivers said they were determined not to return until their demand of 18s per week was granted; that the system of contractors had been tried before and failed, and if tried again would fail, as the system of steam haulage had also failed.[62]

The Lord Mayor wrote to the company regretting that there was no chance of a settlement; the company chairman replied with a “curt note to the Lord Mayor in which it was announced that the directors regretted the abortive attempts at a settlement”.[63] The Freeman’s Journal, in an editorial, criticised the board’s unwillingness to accept arbitration.[64]

The end of the strike

On Wednesday 7 May 1890 the Grand Canal Company’s directors decided to accept the tender of Mr [John] Hannin [JP] of Banagher for haulage. He proposed to give the drivers a rise of 1s 6d a week, half of their revised demand, bringing their wages to 16s 6d. He also proposed to take on any drivers who wanted a job. His representative Mr Minnock conveyed the proposal to the drivers, who decided to meet next day. The newspaper commented:

The directors of the Grand Canal Company have cut the Gordian knot which the boatmen and drivers tied so tightly, by disposing of their boats and horses to Mr Hannin, of Banagher, who has contracted for the hauling, and they expect to be soon in a position to announce the resumption of their boat service to Ballinasloe. It can hardly be doubted that they have adopted a prudent course in relieving themselves of the trouble and responsibility of dealing with unreasonable men, who demanded terms which the directors could not afford to give. […][65]

Mr Hannin’s offer was not immediately accepted: the Express reported on Friday that the drivers had not communicated with the directors and that the boatmen had refused to work unless the drivers got the 18s they wanted.[66] However, the strike ended on Saturday 10 May 1890 with a statement from the company secretary that the boatmen had agreed to resume work on Monday 12 May, that the stores would be open and “the business resumed on the line between Dublin and the Shannon and Ballinasloe.”[67]

There was a hitch: one of the returning strikers was refused a job and the rest ceased work. He was then taken back pending a decision of the directors and the men resumed work until that decision was made.[68] There are no further reports of strike action, so the man may have been given a job.

On 12 and 14 May 1890 the company announced that the boats were running as usual between Dublin and Naas, Kilbeggan, Tullamore, Ballinasloe, Athlone, Portumna, Scarriff and Limerick[69]: in other words, between Dublin and the more important stations along the Shannon and the line thereto, but not yet along the Barrow Line.[70] On 24 May 1890 the company announced that

Traffic is now resumed to all Stations.

It thanked its customers for their forbearance and hoped “to carry on the Traffic with regularity and punctuality.”[71]

Afterwards

The drivers had achieved an increase in wages, from 15s to 16s 6d a week, half their revised demand of a 3s increase. However, they were no longer working for the Grand Canal Company: the company had contracted out the towage, abandoning the twenty-year-old practice that had been “a great success”.[72]

However, Ruth Delany describes the contracting-out as a temporary arrangement.[73] It does not seem to have been announced as such at the time, and I have found no reference to the ending of the arrangement, but on the other hand I found no reference to the haulage contractor per se at subsequent half-yearly meetings. Statements by the chairman and points made in discussion read as if the company was back in charge of, and responsible for, men, horses and boats.

At the first half-yearly meeting after the strike, in August 1890, the chairman’s comments showed that the board had been concerned with a broader reorganisation, on the advice of E J Lloyd of the Warwick and Birmingham Canal, involving restructured management, improved engineering practices and retrenchment. He did not want to dwell upon the strike but said “we are still subject to systematic efforts to subvert discipline and hinder progress”. The boatmen admitted that they were well paid but they had withdrawn from the company’s benefit society in order “to secure the membership of the Labour Union”. On the advice of their union, they had rejected the company’s “generous offer” of performance-related pay [“result fees”]. They repudiated existing agreements and broke even their own union rules.

The directors are determined, with your approval, to enforce discipline, and no longer to tolerate the interference of outside parties in the conduct of your affairs. It may be that in our desire to reinstate the traffic we terminated the strike too soon, fearing that your interests would suffer.

There was no discussion of the towing contract.[74] At the following half-yearly meeting, it was clear that the company was itself managing the horses …

The condition of the horses had materially improved, and in a short time they hoped to secure this still further by the general adoption of a better kind of harness.[75]

… and the men:

Something had been done to weed out insubordinate and ill-conditioned employees, and many old established abuses had been checked and others eradicated.[76]

However, within five months — before the next half-yearly meeting — the company sold its horses “on account of the adoption of another system of haulage”. The first twenty of its eighty horses and mares, “most of them young and fresh, and bought within the last 12 months”, were to be auctioned by Messrs Ganly, Sons, and Co in Dublin on 30 July 1891.[77] The company expected favourable results from the return to the old system of haulage but it worried about how to stop further strikes: whether to have strike-breakers ready to step in when needed, to provide police protection, to use men from the naval reserve or to cease operations until the strike ended.[78]

Some points of interest

Here are two minor points, unrelated either to the strike or to each other, that emerge from the newspaper reports.

The distance from James’s Street Harbour in Dublin to Shannon Harbour is roughly 80 miles. Whether the drivers or the directors were right about the average number of miles walked in a day, it seems that the trip to Shannon Harbour must have taken about a week in each direction. Deliveries along the branches would have slowed the journey even more.

It is widely believed that the vessels in use on the Grand Canal were always referred to as boats, not as barges. The company’s ad of 15 April 1890, offering its fleet for sale, referred to the vessels as barges.

Envoi

The Grand Canal Company strike belongs in a wider context of trade union activity; I would be happy to hear from anyone who can add more information about that. The dispute might also have had traces of religious and political differences.

[gc94]

 

Sources

[1] Ruth Delany The Grand Canal of Ireland David & Charles, Newton Abbot 1973

[2] ibid

[3] Report to Grand Canal Company half-yearly meeting 26 February 1870 in Dublin Evening Mail 26 February 1870

[4] Freeman’s Journal 20 August 1888

[5] Report to half-yearly meeting 22 February 1890 in Freeman’s Journal 24 February 1890

[6] ibid

[7] Freeman’s Journal 7 April 1890 said “about 60”; Freeman’s Journal 14 April 1890 said 65

[8] Ibid 14 April 1890

[9] Freeman’s Journal 24 May 1890

[10] Freeman’s Journal 7 April 1890

[11] Freeman’s Journal 6 May 1890

[12] Freeman’s Journal 7 April 1890

[13] Freeman’s Journal 6 May 1890

[14] Freeman’s Journal 7 April 1890

[15] Freeman’s Journal 7 April 1890

[16] Freeman’s Journal 16 April 1890

[17] Freeman’s Journal 5 May 1890

[18] Clay McShane and Joel A Tarr The Horse in the City: living machines in the nineteenth century The Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore 2007

[19] Freeman’s Journal 8 April 1890

[20] Freeman’s Journal 19 April 1890

[21] Freeman’s Journal 8 April 1890

[22] Freeman’s Journal 14 April 1890

[23] Freeman’s Journal 8 April 1890

[24] Freeman’s Journal 8 April 1890

[25] Freeman’s Journal 6 May 1890

[26] Freeman’s Journal 19 April 1890

[27] Freeman’s Journal 14 April 1890

[28] Freeman’s Journal 8 April 1890

[29] Freeman’s Journal 19 April 1890

[30] Freeman’s Journal 19 April 1890

[31] Freeman’s Journal 14 April 1890

[32] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Will_Thorne

[33] http://archives.library.nuigalway.ie:8080/digi/exbos/T13

[34] Freeman’s Journal 16 April 1890

[35] http://www.learnaboutarchives.ie/index.php/news/82-online-exhibition-on-arthur-shields

[36] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barry_Fitzgerald)

[37] http://www.gmb.org.uk/newsroom/president-of-ireland-at-gmb-congress

[38] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Unionism

[39] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GMB_(trade_union)

[40] Freeman’s Journal 16 April 1890

[41] Freeman’s Journal 15 April 1890

[42] Freeman’s Journal 19 April 1890

[43] Freeman’s Journal 22 April 1890

[44] Freeman’s Journal 23 April 1890

[45] Freeman’s Journal 16 April 1890

[46] Freeman’s Journal 1 May 1890

[47] Freeman’s Journal 26 April 1890

[48] Freeman’s Journal 28 April 1890

[49] London Evening Standard 28 April 1890

[50] Freeman’s Journal 28 April 1890

[51] ibid

[52] Freeman’s Journal 30 April 1890

[53] ibid

[54] Freeman’s Journal 1 May 1890

[55] Freeman’s Journal 3 May 1890

[56] Freeman’s Journal 5 May 1890

[57] ibid

[58] ibid

[59] ibid

[60] ibid

[61] Freeman’s Journal 6 May 1890

[62] Freeman’s Journal 6 May 1890

[63] Freeman’s Journal 6 May 1890

[64] ibid

[65] Dublin Daily Express 8 May 1890

[66] Dublin Daily Express 9 May 1890

[67] Freeman’s Journal 12 May 1890

[68] Freeman’s Journal 13 May 1890

[69] Killaloe was mentioned in the first ad but not in the second

[70] Freeman’s Journal 12 and 14 May 1890

[71] Freeman’s Journal 24 May 1890

[72] Dublin Weekly Nation 17 May 1890

[73] Delany op cit

[74] Dublin Daily Express 25 August 1890

[75] Freeman’s Journal 2 March 1981

[76] ibid

[77] Freeman’s Journal 22 July 1891

[78] Freeman’s Journal 24 August 1891