Hold The Harvest

Abstract

When Anna returned to Ireland in the late summer of 1880, the land agitation had entered its second phase and was gathering momentum. The surprisingly successful campaign for rent reductions during the previous autumn and spring, combined with an outpouring of charity from the Irish diaspora, had averted the famine which threatened the small farmers of the West. Now, for the first time in three years, a promising harvest would soon be ready for reaping and the landlords, who had recovered from their disarray when first confronted with determined collective action by tenant farmers, were determined to press for the payment of rent arrears; many desperately needed the money to meet their own obligations on often heavily mortgaged estates. If rents were not paid, the landlords were prepared to evict.²