Michael Davitt
Michael Davitt ( Irish Mícheál Dáibhéad ; born March 25, 1846 in Straide , County Mayo , † May 30, 1906 in Dublin ) was an Irish politician and activist and founder of the Irish Land League .
Birth and childhood
Michael Davitt was born in County Mayo in western Ireland, the second of five children. At that time there was a Great Famine in Ireland . When Michael Davitt was six years old, his father, Martin Davitt, was evicted from his land (which was common in Ireland at the time, see also Ballinglass Incident ). So he moved to England to look for work. His wife and children followed him to the industrial town of Haslingden in Lancashire in 1855 .
At the age of ten, the young Michael Davitt began to work in a cotton factory, where he lost his right arm in an accident at work at the age of 12. Because of this injury, he was at least able to attend a Wesleyan school. During this time he became interested in the history and current social situation of Ireland.
politics
This interest led him to join the Irish Republican Brotherhood (Fenians). Because of his political activities in this organization, he was imprisoned from 1870 to 1877.
Even after his release from prison he remained a member of the Irish Republican Brotherhood. In 1879 he returned to Ireland and founded the Irish National Land League , which campaigned for land reforms in Ireland and for the rights of tenants (often oppressed by the English landlords and living in abject poverty). From 1879 to 1882, the Land League, led by Davitt and Charles Stewart Parnell , agitated in the so-called " Land War " for their concerns, and from the beginning they did not shy away from confronting the landlords . Famous in this context was the refusal of the tenants in the Lough Mask area in Mayo County, which was largely operated by the Land League in 1880 , which exposed the local land manager Boycott to the public and imprinted his name as the epitome of collective objection. To support his plans, he founded a journal called Labor World in 1890 , of which he was also the editor.
In the decades to come, Davitt and the Land League achieved their goal. Laws were passed in favor of tenants and the Wyndham Land Purchase Act of 1903 finally returned Irish peasant ownership to Irish land.
Davitt died three years later in Dublin at the age of 60. Today a museum in Straide, his birthplace, commemorates his life and political work. Statues, street and bridge names and postage stamps are dedicated to him, including the Michael Davitt Bridge , which connects the island of Acaill with mainland Ireland.
Child labor
After attending primary school, Davitt began working in a cotton mill at the age of nine . Just a month later he changed jobs to work for Lawrence Whitaker, one of the leading cotton producers in the district, before accepting a job offer at Stellfoxe's Victoria Mill in Baxenden . There he operated a spinning machine . On May 8, 1857, his right arm got caught in a gear. The arm was mutilated so badly that it had to be amputated . Davitt did not receive any compensation.
When he recovered from his surgery, a local benefactor, John Dean, helped him attend a Wesleyan school affiliated with the Methodist Church . There he was well trained. In 1861, when he was 15, he went to work in a post office run by Henry Cockcroft, who also owned a printing company. Despite his injuries, he became a typesetter. He was later promoted to postman and accountant. He worked in the post office for another five years.
Davitt also attended night classes at the local Mechanics' Institute , whose library he also used. He became more and more interested in the history of Ireland and the contemporary Irish social situation under the influence of Ernest Charles Jones , a longtime Chartist leader , whose radical views on nationalization and Irish independence he adopted.
literature
- Cris Clegg: Michael Davitt. Irish patriot and campaigner for social justice , in: North West Labor History Journal 30 (2005), p.
- Carla King: Michael Davitt , Dundalk 1999
- Theodore W. Moody: Davitt and Irish revolution , Oxford 1981
Individual evidence
- ↑ Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press (2004)
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Davitt, Michael |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Dáibhéad, Mícheál (Irish) |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | Irish politician and activist for land reform and social justice |
| DATE OF BIRTH | March 25, 1846 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Straide , County Mayo , Ireland |
| DATE OF DEATH | May 30, 1906 |
| Place of death | Dublin , Ireland |