Co. Dublin

County Dublin, the small area of mostly coastal plain enclosing the metropolis, had a population of only about 150,000 (excluding the city) in 1821. Apart from Dublin itself, which naturally dominated local affairs, and its suburb of Kilmainham, where county elections were held, the main towns were the disfranchised boroughs of Newcastle and Swords, the ports of Dunleary and Howth, and the fishing villages of Rush and Skerries, near Balbriggan in the north-east.S. Lewis, Top. Dict. of Ireland (1837), i. 522-5. Although there were a handful of minor Irish peers with small local estates, such as the representative peer and former judge Viscount Carleton of Willow Park, and several more important ones had secondary residences in the vicinity of the borough, such as the 2nd earl of Charlemont at Marino and the 2nd marquess of Ely at Rathfarnham Castle, hardly any active and influential noblemen lived there permanently. Rather, they had their principal estates in neighbouring counties, most notably the Whig 10th earl of Meath of Kilruddery Castle, just across the Wicklow border near Bray, and his liberal Catholic friend the 2nd Baron Cloncurry of Lyons House, near Celbridge in Kildare. The 2nd earl of Carhampton, formerly of Luttrellstown and now Member for Ludgershall, was the only titled governor of the county (he was also its custos rotulorum); and his colleague Colonel George Vesey of Lucan, who had sat for Tuam on the eve of the Union, was more typical of the leading gentlemen who controlled the representation through their territorial interests. The electorate, which numbered up to about 2,000, included many poor tenants whose dependent status was exploited for electoral purposes; 1,261 electors were added in the years 1820-3 inclusive, of whom 890 (or 71 per cent) were 40s. freeholders. Yet the relative affluence of the region accounted for there still being a higher than usual proportion of wealthier freeholders, while their exposure to the radical and nationalist opinions vented in the capital enhanced the growing assertiveness of the many Catholic voters. Hist. Irish Parl. ii. 227; PP (1824), xxi. 682.

Although it was claimed in radical sources that there was ‘no particular influence’ over the return of the Members, there were several powerful interests which, individually, were almost sufficient to secure one seat. Oldfield, Rep. Hist. (1816), vi. 230; Peep at the Commons (1820), 21. The largest Tory interests belonged to the two branches of the Hamilton family. Hans Hamilton of Sheephill Park, who had sat for the county since 1797 and had become a governor in 1813, was an inactive supporter of the Liverpool administration, though from 1810 he had favoured Catholic relief. He was usually supported by his kinsman the Rev. George Hamilton of Hampton Hall, near Balbriggan, whose voters (many of them fishermen), acting in tandem with those of the absentee Mrs. Elizabeth Palmer of Rush, were generally deployed in defence of the Protestant interest. Since 1807, when he had won his seat following a slight realignment of interests and with the assistance of the Catholics, whose cause he supported, the other Member had been the Whig Richard Wogan Talbot of Malahide, who, on occasion at least, busied himself with county matters. Sir Compton Domvile* of Santry House and Templeogue, son of the former Member Charles Pocklington, failed to persist in his candidacy at the general election of 1818, when he was returned for Bossiney, but another respectable opponent forced a contest. This was Thomas White, a governor of the county and colonel of its militia, whose father, the nouveau riche Luke White* of Woodlands, had long been cultivating an interest there for his family, although he now came in for Leitrim as a pro-Catholic independent. Add. 40298, ff. 14, 15; [W. Carpenter], People’s Bk. (1831), 181; HP Commons, 1790-1820, ii. 648, 649. On that occasion, Thomas White, who was taken up by Vesey and others as representing the true independent interest but was opposed by Domvile and George Hamilton, received votes from only 28 per cent of the 985 electors polled. Late Elections (1818), 473-8; PP (1829), xxii. 10 (where the voting figures are given as Hamilton 516, Talbot 459, White 274).

Hamilton, ostentatiously declaring his neutrality prior to the anticipated contest, offered again at the general election of 1820, when Talbot benefited from the mustering of his anxious independent supporters, including General George Cockburn of Shanganagh Castle and Randal McDonnell of Kilmore, who both chaired meetings in his favour, Domvile, who did not himself enter, and the influential Latouche family of Dublin bankers. These developments were alike caused not so much by White’s renewed candidacy, as by the fact that he could now command George Hamilton and Mrs. Palmer’s interests; since he was alleged to have mistreated a Catholic soldier under his command and to be only half-hearted in his advocacy of their cause, this further alienated the Catholics. The Whig press, suspecting a coalition between the Hamiltons and White in order to oust Talbot, despite his having the promises of two-thirds of the £20 and £50 freeholders as well as Meath’s blessing, emphasized his experience over the untried White, while at the same time claiming that the exposure of Hamilton’s trick would itself save Talbot by securing him additional votes. Dublin Evening Post, 19, 24, 26, 29 Feb., 2, 9, 14, 16, 18, 21 Mar.; Dublin Weekly Reg. 4, 11, 18 Mar. 1820. On the hustings, Hamilton (proposed by Thomas Baker of Corduff and Thomas, son of the former Member John Finlay of Corkagh), justified his fitness to continue in Parliament and Talbot (nominated by William Plunket, Member for the University, and McDonnell) and White (by Vesey and George Hamilton) both claimed the mantle of independence. White’s momentum was insufficient to sustain his early lead over Talbot, whose widespread popularity - as attested by an election coin stamped in his honour - narrowly ensured him second place behind Hamilton at the end of the six-day poll, during which the Catholic activist Luke Plunkett of Portmarnock House was particularly vocal. Dublin Evening Post, 25, 28, 30 Mar., 1 Apr.; Dublin Weekly Reg. 25 Mar., 1 Apr. 1820; L. Brown, Cat. of British Hist. Medals, i. 1052. Hamilton, with support from 74 per cent of the 1,557 voters polled, remained unassailable owing to his ‘colony’ of 40s. freeholders, but White (on 49 per cent), who came close to matching Talbot’s share of the vote (52 per cent), had much improved on his previous performance. Dublin Weekly Reg. 1 Apr. 1820; NLI mss 6131 (pollbook); PP (1824), xxi. 682; (1829), xxii. 10 (where the voting figures are given as Hamilton 1,146, Talbot 815, White 757). One paper noted that, in the event of Hamilton finally getting his coveted peerage, White would still face serious opposition. Talbot, whose enthusiastic chairing went so far as to make a special pass by Daniel O’Connell’s* house in Merrion Square, urged his friends to register voters in case of another contest. Dublin Evening Post, 13 Apr.; Dublin Weekly Reg. 22 Apr. 1820; O’Connell Corresp. ii. 827, 830.

The Tory 2nd earl of Howth of Howth Castle moved the loyal address to George IV at the county meeting at Kilmainham, 30 Dec. 1820, when the sheriff, Sir Richard Steele of Hampstead, overruled O’Connell’s procedural complaints, refused to listen to the Dublin barrister James Burne’s amendment critical of ministers’ conduct towards Queen Caroline and, having arbitrarily declared the original address duly agreed, ordered in the military to break up the meeting’s continued attempt, under Cloncurry’s chairmanship, to pass Burne’s hostile address. Undeterred, Cloncurry held another gathering later that day, which not only achieved its main purpose but also, like several subsequent meetings, approved resolutions condemning the sheriff’s actions, which Plunket privately denounced as ‘a most flagrant outrage’, inimical to the peace of the county. Hans Hamilton, who was criticized for having slunk away from the county meeting, kept a low profile, but Talbot, who was likewise attacked for his absence, took up the issue and chaired another which, under pressure from city radicals like the young barrister William Henry Curran, decided to complain to Parliament, 11 Jan. 1821. Dublin Evening Post, 30 Dec. 1820, 2, 4, 6, 9, 11, 13 Jan. 1821; Personal Recollections of Lord Cloncurry, 267-76; D. Plunket, Life of Lord Plunket, i. 405. The critical address was laid before the king that month and the ensuing petitions were presented to the Commons by Lord John Russell, 22 Feb., when his motion for an inquiry (which was supported by Talbot but opposed by ministers and the city Members Thomas Ellis and Robert Shaw) was defeated by 124-90, and to the Lords by the duke of Leinster, 2 Mar. As government declined to intervene, the only recourse available was to the law, but Cloncurry issued an address in March stating that this was deemed impracticable and the affair fizzled out. Dublin Weekly Herald, 3, 27 Feb.; Dublin Evening Post, 27 Feb., 15 Mar.; The Times, 3 Mar. 1821; CJ, lxxvi. 100, 101; LJ, liv. 78, 79. The next time the county officially met, 3 Aug. 1821, Hans Hamilton and Luke White oversaw the uncontentious agreement of a loyal address to George IV on his visit to Ireland that month, in honour of which Dunleary was renamed Kingstown. Dublin Evening Post, 7 Aug. 1821.

Following the death of Hamilton in December 1822, nothing came of the rumoured candidacy of Meath’s eldest son Lord Ardee and the indisposed Thomas White, whose standing with the Catholics was still low, absented himself. Instead it was his younger brother Henry White, lieutenant-colonel of the county militia, who entered as an independent supporter of their claims against the ministerialist anti-Catholic Domvile. He, who had become a governor on the death of Carhampton in 1821 and now replaced Hamilton as custos, temporarily relinquished Bossiney for the purpose and was supposed to have the better chance. Both candidates signed the requisition, headed by Meath and Cloncurry’s names, for the county meeting, which, after O’Connell and his friends had had the best of the running and the Orangemen had failed to make any sort of showing, condemned the recent attack on the lord lieutenant Lord Wellesley in a Dublin theatre, 8 Jan. 1823. Ibid. 24, 28 Dec. 1822, 4, 9 Jan.; Freeman’s Jnl. 1, 4, 6 Jan.; Add. 52011, Stuart Wortley to Fox [16, 30 Jan.] 1823. James Grattan, Member for Wicklow, recorded in his diary on the 13th that White

did not seem to say that he had any of the leading interests, but that the small freeholders whom he had canvassed had promised him support. Mrs. Palmer’s agent was bribed by his father last time. This time Domvile’s people anticipated him. Talbot has not given an answer [he proclaimed himself neutral, but voted for Domvile] ... Meath is indifferent; I think he is wrong. NLI, Grattan mss 5778.

White, whose father was active in his support, was endorsed by the independent interest at two meetings chaired by Sir Capel Molyneux of Castle Dillon, county Armagh, and was puffed in numerous handbills that month, while Domvile, whose apologists did their best to promote him as a resident proprietor and a paragon of Protestant respectability, received the backing of the Dublin merchants’ guild, but was damned as the lackey of the corporation, whose plans for higher local taxes he apparently condoned. Dublin Evening Post, 11, 13, 16, 18, 21, 23, 28, 30 Jan., 1 Feb. 1823; Add. 40613, f. 30; NLI, Domvile mss 9361.

Taking advantage of the prevailing issue of Catholic relief as a weapon to use against the traditional landlord influence, on the eve of the election O’Connell, in his own words, ‘went down to the towns of Rush and Skerries and harangued in the streets of each’. After Domvile had been proposed by Charles Cobbe of Newbridge House and George Alexander Hamilton† (the Rev. George’s eldest son), and White had been nominated by Joshua Spencer of Castleknock, former Member for Sligo, and William Sweetman of Raheny, O’Connell made the only major speech on the hustings, 3 Feb. 1823, and thereafter orchestrated an ultimately successful voting campaign in favour of White, whose uproarious chairing ending in ugly scenes on College Green. Domvile, who had trailed narrowly from the start, resigned 145 votes adrift (being supported by only 46 per cent of the electors polled) on the seventh day, when he complained of ‘the most violent and unconstitutional means’ used against him. O’Connell Corresp. ii. 996, 999; Dublin Evening Post, 4, 6, 8, 11, 13, 15, 18 Feb.; Patriot, 4, 6, 8, 11 Feb. 1823. White (with 54 per cent of the popular vote) denied this, apparently telling Grattan, as he noted on 13 Feb., that the ‘priests did not use their influence in the chapels as was said. They did more in the case of Talbot’s election [in 1807]. The Protestant clergy were more active and all but one voted against him’. Grattan mss 5778. According to his own records, which include printed daily poll sheets, Domvile kept lists of how his freeholders voted and accounts of his almost £17,000 of expenses. Domvile mss 9361. A petition on his behalf was presented, 25 Feb., but was not proceeded with in the Commons, where Luke White vindicated the legality of his son’s return, 17, 22 Apr. 1823. CJ, lxxviii. 65, 66, 176; The Times, 23 Apr. 1823. The result was one of the first occasions on which, to the impotent fury of the Protestant landowners, the electoral influence of the Catholic tenants was effectively harnessed for wider political ambitions. J.A. Reynolds, Catholic Emancipation Crisis in Ireland, 93; D.G. Boyce, 19th-Cent. Ireland, 38.

The Members and O’Connell, who boasted to his wife that ‘as usual I had almost all the business done’, were prominent at the county meeting on 16 Feb. 1824, when a petition was agreed against Dublin corporation’s local taxation bill. O’Connell Corresp. iii. 1097; Dublin Evening Post, 17 Feb. 1824. That autumn it was reported that Domvile, Meath’s second son William Brabazon* and George Alexander Hamilton would all offer in the event of a dissolution, even though the latter two were barely of age, but Henry White and Talbot were promised the full support of the Catholic Association, of which they were both members. Dublin Evening Post, 9 Sept. 1824; Procs. of Catholic Association (1825), 554-6, 568-74. According to a parliamentary return, in 1825 the clerk of the peace Benedict Arthure estimated the number of electors at 3,538, and commented that, of the 2,947 40s. freeholders registered in the previous eight years, perhaps 800 were renewals done ‘within the last two years by the respective chief landlords of the county, for the purpose of keeping up the tenantry duly registered to meet future elections’. PP (1825), xxii. 95. Electoral speculation towards the end of this Parliament had it that Talbot, who twice had to deny that he had joined forces (presumably) with George Alexander Hamilton, and White, who was considered just as good a representative as Brabazon could be, were worthy to continue. Dublin Evening Post, 8 Aug., 10 Sept. 1825, 2 Mar., 8 Apr., 13 May 1826. In January 1826 the 1st earl of Carysfort advised Meath that

as to a seat for the county, persons I am told have got claims upon it which it may not be easy to set aside without a severe struggle. On a fair vacancy, I should think your family could not be passed by, and a little patience on your part may avoid the expense of a contest and prevent your being entangled with obligations for individual support that might be very inconvenient. If you wait to be invited, you will be the master not the obligee, and obtain the highest consideration, both in England and Ireland. Meath mss J/3/24/8 (NRA 4528).

Meath persisted with the candidacy, but in May 1826 the independent interest appealed to him not to disturb the county at present and his son, who as his heir was now known as Lord Brabazon, withdrew by an address in which he acknowledged that his continuing might be ‘attended with feelings of political animosity and public embarrassment’. Dublin Evening Post, 23, 25, 27 May 1826.

Brabazon was thanked by the independent interest, which met under Cockburn’s chairmanship to rally behind Talbot and White at the general election of 1826. They were opposed by George Alexander Hamilton, whose main claim for consideration seems to have been that his paternal grandfather had worked for the improvement of Ireland as a baron of the exchequer, but who was expected to benefit from his family’s extensive territorial interest. Portrayed as an Orange sympathizer in the liberal Dublin Evening Post, which disclosed that he had the support of Domvile, who transferred to Okehampton, and the Protestant archbishop of Dublin, William Magee, its Tory rival the Dublin Evening Mail pointed out that Hamilton had avoided giving his opinion on the Catholic issue, but would have to come down against it to receive the 500 votes that this newspaper supposedly controlled. Ibid. 1, 6, 8, 10, 17, 20 June; Dublin Evening Mail, 12, 16, 19, 21 June 1826. The Irish under-secretary William Gregory, who thought Hamilton would succeed, reported to Peel, the home secretary, that ‘his friends say he will vote for the Protestants; I doubt it, as his father calls himself the intimate friend of Canning’, the pro-Catholic foreign secretary. Add. 40334, f. 174. In fact, although his father had earlier that year claimed that ‘my son is by no means hostile to the claims of the Roman Catholics’, Canning clearly considered him to be so. NLI mss 21291, Hamilton to unknown, 21 Apr; 13981, Canning to Hamilton, 12 July 1826. This was the general impression and resolutions in support of the sitting Members were approved at a county meeting, 12 June, when O’Connell called on the poor voters of Balbriggan and Skerries to oppose Hamilton, and a gathering of Catholics, 21 June 1826, when another appeal was made to the 40s. freeholders to show their independence.Dublin Evening Post, 13, 15, 24 June 1826.

On the hustings, 23 June, Talbot (proposed by Lord Killeen*, son of the 8th earl of Fingall, and the Dublin brewer Arthur Guinness of Beaumont) and White (by Henry Arabin of Corkagh and John David Latouche of Marley) stressed their previous electoral victories and parliamentary service, and received the enthusiastic support of Henry Grattan, the new city Member. Hamilton (nominated by Sir John Sheppey Ribton of Grove and the late Member’s brother Henry Hamilton of Ballymacool, Meath) caused a furore by describing as a lie the rumour that he had approached each of the other two candidates with proposals for a junction, but otherwise declined to explain his principles. As a security, alongside him was introduced James Johnston of Blackbull, a creature of the Hamiltons, who was probably the nephew of Hans Hamilton noted to have been given an inspectorship of fisheries in 1820. Ibid. 24 June; Morning Reg. 26 June 1826; Add. 40296, ff. 28, 29. White and Talbot led from the start of what proved to be a violent and bitter contest, in which there were so many disputed votes that the candidates’ committees differed from each other and the sheriff in their daily bulletins of the state of the poll. Hamilton’s committee’s daily poll lists are in Domvile mss 9361. On the seventh and eighth days Hamilton rallied strongly by polling his father’s tenants, but, although most of the clergy voted for him, some respectable electors viewed him as a callow youth and in any case his family’s territorial forces were just insufficient for him to overhaul the deficit. Boasting of having received 1,052 plumpers (85 per cent of his total vote), compared to only 32 and 49 for Talbot and White respectively, and alleging improper interference by the Catholic priests, he was defeated on the tenth day when (with the support of 46 per cent of the 2,676 voters polled) he was only 73 votes adrift of Talbot (49 per cent) and 117 of White (51 per cent). Dublin Evening Post, 27, 29 June, 1, 4, 6, 8, 11 July, 14, 17 Oct.; Dublin Evening Mail, 28, 30 June, 5 July 1826.

The triumph of the sitting Members was gratifying to the independent interest and the Catholics, who in October 1826 met, in the presence of Talbot and Killeen, to further their claims. Dublin Evening Post, 14, 17 Oct. 1826. A petition on behalf of Hamilton, which in particular alleged bribery by White, was brought up, 4 Dec. 1826. CJ, lxxxii. 65-67. Despite Hamilton’s obstruction, legal proceedings were finally brought against him at the Kilmainham sessions, 24 Feb. 1827, when he (but not his steward) was acquitted of leading the mob which attacked Talbot and White during their electioneering tour of his father’s estate the previous summer. Dublin Evening Post, 16, 25 Jan., 27 Feb., 1 Mar. 1827. The Post thought that some notice should be taken of this in the election committee, which, after White had failed by 63-56 to obtain permission to appear as a separate interest from Talbot on 20 Mar., was appointed on the 21st. It refused to hear evidence about the Catholic priests and ruled against the bribery charge by 12 votes to one (possibly the anti-Catholic Dublin Member George Moore), which O’Connell correctly predicted ‘may be considered conclusive in favour of White’; Hamilton’s counsel gave up the case and the committee reported against him, 1 May 1827. Ibid. 10 Mar., 19 Apr. 1827; CJ, lxxxii. 337, 340, 417; J. Espinasse, Report of Case of Co. of Dublin Election (1827), 1-60; O’Connell Corresp. iii. 1379. Arabin, belatedly finding the initiative too radical in character, unsuccessfully attempted to stifle the formation of an Independent Club for the city and county that summer. Dublin Evening Post, 26 May, 2, 9 June 1827. Making later unsuccessful requests to Peel to employ his son in some government capacity, the Rev. George Hamilton commented that he had ‘always studied and laid himself out for political business with a view to represent the county of Dublin’, 29 Sept. 1828, and was, as ‘it is almost unnecessary to mention, ... against what is called RC emancipation’, 18 Jan. 1829. NLI mss 21291.

The anti-Catholic petitions of the archbishop and clergy of the diocese of Dublin were brought up in the Commons (by Goulburn, a Tory minister), 2 Mar. 1827, 29 Apr. 1828, 12 Feb. 1829, and in the Lords, 26 Feb. 1827, 28 Apr. 1828, 16 Feb. 1829. The Times, 3 Mar. 1827; CJ, lxxxii. 258, 259; lxxxii. 282; lxxxiv. 24; LJ, lix. 106; lx. 249; lxi. 39. Although there were local Catholic gatherings in September 1828 and early the following year, their political opponents stole a march on them when, with surprisingly little resistance, a Brunswick Club was formed in the county, under Vesey’s presidency, 26 Nov. 1828. The ensuing county petition against emancipation, for which White voted and Talbot paired that session, was presented to the Lords by Lord Lorton, 12 Feb., and to the Commons by Moore, 3 Mar. 1829. Dublin Evening Post, 4, 11, 18, 25 Sept., 11 Nov. 1828, 29, 31 Jan. 1829; Dublin Evening Mail, 1 Dec. 1828; Warder, 14 Jan. 1829; CJ, lxxxiv. 98; LJ, lxi. 28. The passage of the related Franchise Act, which removed the vote from about 2,500 40s. freeholders in the county, reduced the registered electorate from 4,016 (including over 1,000 £50 and over 400 £20 voters) to only 1,649 in 1830. PP (1830), xxix. 466. George Hampden Evans† of Portrane and Latouche, as well as the Members and Brabazon, took a leading role in the county meetings which were organized to oppose the increased duties on Irish spirits, 23 Apr., and stamps, 29 Apr.; the subsequent petitions were brought up in the Commons, apparently by Talbot, 25, 28 May, and in the Lords by Lords Lansdowne and Holland, 26 May 1830. Dublin Evening Post, 22, 24, 27, 29 Apr., 1 May 1830; CJ, lxxxv. 474, 495; LJ, lxii. 546, 549.

The sheriff refused Evans’s requisition for a county meeting to put pledges to the candidates at the general election of 1830, when a close contest was anticipated between the sitting Members, who were vulnerable because of their inactivity in the House, Brabazon, who canvassed extensively and was considered secure, and Hamilton, who had Tory and corporation backing. Unexpectedly, the Wellington administration felt obliged to stand by White and Talbot, if they wished to continue, but the liberal press was increasingly urgent in its appeals for one of them to withdraw in order to safeguard the other; the former, in spite of his shorter period of parliamentary service, was generally judged to be the stronger of the two because of his victory in 1823, but the latter, who, like Brabazon, had to deny claims that he had coalesced (with Hamilton), ruled out resigning. Meath mss J/3/35; Add. 40338, f. 223; Warder, 26 June, 10, 17, 24, 31 July; Dublin Evening Post, 3, 5, 10, 13, 15, 17, 20, 24, 27, 29, 31 July, 5, 7 Aug.; Morning Reg. 31 July; NAI, Leveson Gower letter bks. Leveson Gower to Brabazon, 6 July, to Singleton, 6 July 1830. On the hustings, 10 Aug. 1830, neither Talbot (proposed by Charles Stewart Hawthorne of Bellcamp, former Member for Downpatrick, and Cockburn, who briefly offered for Kildare) nor White (by Arabin and Jacob West, the lord mayor), did more than allude to their past conduct, and although Brabazon (introduced by Latouche and John Kennedy, perhaps the son of Hugh Kennedy of Cultra, Down) declared that he would not slavishly support ministers, it was left to Hamilton (nominated by George Woods of Milverton Hall, Hans Hamilton’s son-in-law, and Robert Law of the Cottage, Raheny), to refer to matters of policy by advocating freedom of the press, lower expenditure and taxation, moderate reform and the abolition of slavery; even this did not satisfy the city radical John Lawless, who made a futile attempt to extract pledges. Talbot, claiming to have lost ground among the Catholics and to have suffered from his identification with government, withdrew two days later, when he apparently transferred his interest to Hamilton. The five-day poll ended in victory for Brabazon (who received votes from 60 per cent of the 867 electors polled) and White (on 48 per cent), with Hamilton, who averred that nearly 100 of his supporters had been left unpolled, trailing in third place (on 40 per cent). Dublin Evening Post, 10, 12, 14, 17 Aug.; Dublin Morning Post, 14 Aug.; Warder, 14, 18 Aug. 1830; Wellington mss WP1/1135/23; PP (1830-1), x. 202. According to an analysis of Brabazon’s votes among Domvile’s papers, Brabazon (who had 52 plumpers) shared 223 splits with White (61 plumpers), 203 with Hamilton (65 plumpers) and 45 with Talbot (20 plumpers). Domvile mss 9361.

In the spring of 1831 the nobility and gentry signed an address thanking the lord lieutenant Lord Anglesey for his resistance to the agitation for repeal of the Union. Dublin Evening Post, 5 Apr. 1831. The sitting Members, who had both voted for the Grey ministry’s reform bill, were not challenged at the general election that year, when there were 1,828 registered electors. George Alexander Hamilton declined to enter, James Hans Hamilton† (the son of Hans Hamilton) confined himself to giving notice that he would seek to represent the county on a future occasion, and no other Tory in the end offered. Ibid. 28, 30 Apr., 3 May; Dublin Evening Mail, 29 Apr.; Morning Reg. 29 Apr., 10 May 1831; PP (1831), xvi. 199. White (proposed by Arabin and David Plunket, a younger son of the former College Member who was now lord chancellor of Ireland) and Brabazon (by Latouche and Guinness), who both emphasized that they had tried to forward the electors’ interests, were therefore returned unopposed. Dublin Evening Post, 17 May 1831. They each signed the requisition for a county meeting on reform, 28 May, but apparently missed the largely radical gathering which, after the sheriff had refused to organize it, was held at Cloncurry’s initiative on 17 June, when an address to the king was approved. Ibid. 16, 18 June 1831. The Post, noting the lack of resident noblemen and discounting the Tory gentlemen as unacceptable, suggested Talbot, now heir to the peerage his mother had recently been granted, as a possible lord lieutenant for the county; in fact, the office went to Meath that autumn. Ibid. 25 Aug. 1831. Cloncurry, Brabazon, Henry Grattan, Evans and others moved the reform resolutions at the county meeting on 3 Dec. 1831, when the erratic O’Gorman Mahon* clashed with O’Connell’s son-in-law Christopher Fitzsimon†; the ensuing petitions were presented to the Commons, 8 Feb., and to the Lords, 13 Feb. 1832. Ibid. 6 Dec. 1831; CJ, lxxxvii. 82; LJ, lxiv. 49. Another county meeting, on the subject of road tolls, was held on 7 Feb. On the motion of Fitzsimon, an Independent Club for the county was re-established, 1 July, and, after White had bowed out on the pretext of ill health that month, the O’Connellite Repealers, moderate Liberals and Tory Hamiltons vied for the future representation during the rest of the year. At the general election of 1832, when there were 2,025 registered electors, Brabazon and George Alexander Hamilton were defeated by the Liberals Fitzsimon, who was replaced by Brabazon in 1837, and Evans. Dublin Evening Post, 3, 24 July, 21 Aug., 6 Sept., 27 Nov., 18, 22 Dec.; Derby mss 920 Der (14) 125/4, Barrington to Smith Stanley, 16 Nov. 1832; O’Connell Corresp. iv. 1905, 1917. Yet a long period of Conservative domination began in 1841, when James Hans Hamilton and Thomas Edward Taylor of Ardgillan Castle took the seats from Brabazon and Evans.