Glorious Repeal Meeting Held at Tara Hill

DESCRIPTION: Dan and Steele at the Tara meeting say they won't yield without repeal of the Union. "God bless our Queen ... But in spite of all the tory clan We will repeal the Union." "In spite of Wellington and Peel We'll gain our liberation"
AUTHOR: unknown
EARLIEST DATE: 1843 (Zimmerman-SongsOfIrishRebellion)
KEYWORDS: Ireland freedom royalty political
HISTORICAL REFERENCES:
Aug 15, 1843 - Repeal meeting at Tara (source: Zimmerman-SongsOfIrishRebellion)
FOUND IN:
REFERENCES (1 citation):
Zimmerman-SongsOfIrishRebellion 50A, "Glorious Repeal Meeting Held at Tara Hill" (1 text)
Roud #V4968
CROSS-REFERENCES:
cf. "The Meeting of Tara" (subject)
cf. "Daniel O'Connell (I)" (subject: Daniel O'Connell) and references there
NOTES [303 words]: Daniel O'Connell founded National Association of Ireland for full and prompt Justice and Repeal April 1840 (In January the Association was renamed the Loyal National Repeal Association). O'Connell argued that the Union Act of 1801 was invalid. In October Young Ireland established The Nation which supported Repeal. In 1843 O'Connell spoke to "monster" meetings attended by 100,000 or more supporters in favor of Repeal. The June meeting at Mallow was followed in August by the meeting at Tara and, in September, by a meeting at Mullaghmast. Finally, on October 7 [my sources all say October 4 - RBW], the government prohibited the meeting scheduled at Clontarf the following day. O'Connell issued a notice that the meeting was "abandoned." That ended the Repeal meetings. (source: The Princess Grace Irish Library (Monaco) site entry for Daniel O'Connell; O'Connell's notice for the Clontarff meeting can be read at 1169 and Counting site)
Zimmerman-SongsOfIrishRebellion 50: "Thomas Steele, although a protestant landlord, was one of O'Connell's lieutenants."
The commentary for broadside NLScotland L.C.Fol.178.A.2(065) states "The meeting at Tara, Co. Meath in the summer of 1843, is now estimated to have been attended by 750,000 people." - BS
A number which should inspire some skepticism -- 750,000 people was a tenth of the population of Ireland! Robert Kee (p. 208 of The Most Distressful Country, which is volume I of The Green Flag) mentions this estimate, but notes that it was from The Nation, which was pro-Irish. O'Connell's estimate was an even more absurd million and a half. A more realistic estimate is a quarter of a million (from Cecil Woodham-Smith, The Great Hunger, p. 11).
For additional information on the context, and the failure of Repeal, see the notes on "The Meeting of Tara." - RBW
Last updated in version 5.0
File: Zimm050A

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