When the Islanders of Clew Bay Defied Lord Sligo: The Rent Revolt of 1887 – Croagh Patrick and the Islands of Clew Bay

In January 1887, tenants from several of Clew Bay’s inhabited islands travelled to Westport to confront the agent of the Marquess of Sligo. They wanted the opportunity to purchase their holdings at a reasonable price, or failing that, a reduction in their rents. Their demands were refused. What followed was a little-known chapter in the history of the islands and Ireland’s struggle over land ownership.

The islanders take a stand

On 11 January 1887, a large deputation of tenants from the islands of Inishlyre, Inishraher, Crovinish, Clynish and several smaller islands of Clew Bay assembled at the estate office of the Marquess of Sligo in Westport.

They were accompanied by Reverend Bernard McDermott, Catholic curate of Kilmeena, who acted as their spokesman.

The likely protesters would have included Anthony Moore and Michael Gavin of Clynish (Anthony Moore and his wife Bridget were recorded on Clynish in 1911 with their children. Michael Gavin was recorded as 73 in 1911, suggesting a birth around 1838. Michael would therefore have been approximately 49 in 1887, making him a particularly plausible candidate for an adult island tenant at the time of the deputation.

The Gibbons name was strongly established on Inishlyre in 1887. Twenty of the island’s 21 recorded inhabitants in 1926 were Gibbonses. That makes the family a very likely participant in the protest.

Earlier census information identifies Joyce and Jordan households on Inishraher. Particularly interesting is Pat Joyce, recorded as 70 in 1926, indicating a birth around 1856. He would have been approximately 31 in 1887. He was therefore old enough to have attended the deputation, assuming he already lived on Inishraher.

Martin Fadden, recorded as approximately 60 in 1911, would have been around 36 in 1887. His family occupied a cottage on Crovinish in 1911, making him another person who would have travelled to Westport to confront Lord Sligo’s estate agent.

For generations, island families had lived on small holdings scattered throughout the bay. Their livelihoods depended on modest agricultural plots, fishing and whatever additional employment they could obtain from maritime activities.

Yet the land on which they lived remained under the control of landlords, to whom they were obliged to pay rent.

The deputation represented a determined attempt to change that relationship.

Eighteen years’ purchase versus twelve

The tenants met Mr Powell, the Marquess of Sligo’s estate agent.

Lord Sligo had demanded a purchase price equivalent to eighteen years’ annual rent. The islanders were prepared to pay only twelve.

The difference was substantial.

For a tenant paying £5 annually, eighteen years’ purchase would mean paying £90 to acquire the holding, whereas twelve years’ purchase would amount to £60.

The agent refused to reduce the asking price.

Father McDermott then presented an alternative demand on behalf of the islanders: a reduction of 25 per cent in their existing judicial rents.

That request was also refused.

The islanders left the estate office without an agreement.

A contemporary report, subsequently published in the New Zealand Tablet on 15 April 1887, recorded the confrontation. Remarkably, an account of a dispute involving a handful of small islands off the Mayo coast had reached readers on the other side of the world.

But the deputation was not the end of the matter.

The newspaper reported that the tenants had since adopted the Plan of Campaign.

Joining the Plan of Campaign

The Plan of Campaign emerged in Ireland in 1886 against a background of agricultural depression, falling farm incomes and disputes over rents.

Its principle was collective action.

Tenants on an estate agreed on a level of rent they considered reasonable. If their landlord refused to accept it, they could withhold payment and place the money they were prepared to pay into a common fund.

The fund could then support tenants facing legal proceedings or eviction.

The decision of the Clew Bay islanders to adopt the Plan of Campaign placed them within a much wider struggle over landownership and tenants’ rights.

It also demonstrated a striking degree of organisation among communities that are sometimes remembered today only for their eventual disappearance.

These were not merely isolated families struggling individually to survive. They were capable of acting together, choosing a representative and challenging the terms imposed by one of the region’s principal landed estates.

Whether their campaign eventually secured concessions, resulted in evictions or led to the purchase of individual island holdings remains to be established.

Storms, failed potatoes and an increasingly desperate existence

The dispute must also be understood against the difficult circumstances in which the islanders lived.

A later account, citing the Sligo Champion of 15 July 1887, described the hardship endured by the island communities.

Father McDermott reportedly told the estate agent that he did not know of a single islander who had managed to save more than one-third of his crop.

Storms and high tides had inflicted serious damage, while the failure of the potato crop compounded the difficulties.

More than three decades had passed since the Great Famine, yet these island families remained vulnerable to the same combination of poor harvests, limited resources and dependence on their land.

One particularly revealing detail concerns the additional income earned by the islanders from ballasting boats in Clew Bay.

Ballast was heavy material carried aboard ships to improve their stability. Supplying it provided employment to people living around the bay and formed part of the wider maritime economy associated with Westport and Newport.

According to the account, one islander explained that without this income, the families would have been utterly destitute.

The comment is a reminder that the inhabitants of Clew Bay’s islands were not exclusively farmers or fishermen. Their survival often depended on several different forms of employment.

Communities already in decline

By 1887, many of the islands had experienced decades of depopulation.

The 1841 census, taken shortly before the Great Famine, recorded substantial populations on islands that would later become almost or entirely uninhabited.

Clynish, for example, had 87 inhabitants in 1841. Inishraher recorded 25, while Inishlyre had 113.

The Famine and its aftermath transformed these communities.

Some families left for the mainland. Others emigrated overseas. Houses were abandoned, holdings were consolidated, and the number of inhabited islands gradually declined.

Yet the 1887 deputation demonstrates that the remaining islanders had not resigned themselves to their circumstances.

They were still attempting to secure a future on the land where their families had lived.

The desire to purchase their holdings was especially significant. Ownership could offer security unavailable under the tenancy system and an opportunity to pass property to future generations without the same dependence on an estate landlord.

The people behind the protest

We know the names of the principal figures involved in the negotiations.

The landlord was George John Browne, the third Marquess of Sligo.

His agent was Robert Powell, who conducted the discussions at the estate office in Westport.

Representing the islanders was Reverend Bernard McDermott of Kilmeena.

What we do not yet know are the names of the individual tenants who made the journey to Westport on 11 January 1887.

The surviving newspaper account identifies their islands but not the men and women involved.

Some may have belonged to families whose descendants appear in the 1901 and 1911 census records. On Clynish, for example, the Moores and Gavins were among the families recorded in the early twentieth century.

But it would be premature to identify any particular member of those families as a participant in the deputation without further documentary evidence.

For now, however, the outcome of the islanders’ campaign remains uncertain.

More than a story of disappearing communities

Much of the recent research into the islands of Clew Bay has focused on their dramatic population decline between the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.

The deserted houses, abandoned settlements and surviving family names tell an important story of loss.

But the events of January 1887 reveal another side of island life.

The inhabitants were not simply passive witnesses to the disappearance of their communities.

They organised. They negotiated. They challenged their landlord. And when their demands were refused, they reportedly joined a movement of collective resistance that had become one of the defining features of Ireland’s land struggle.

For a brief moment, the small islands of Clew Bay became part of a much larger national confrontation over land, ownership and the rights of tenant farmers.

The names of the islanders who stood before Robert Powell in Westport that January day have not yet been recovered.

But their collective action deserves to be remembered.

Nearly 140 years later, it provides a remarkable glimpse of the determination of the families who once called these islands home.

Please contact [email protected] if you have a connection or something to share.

References

Croagh Patrick and the Islands of Clew Bay

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