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Michael Davitt was born on March 25, 1846 in Straide, County Mayo. He had four brothers and sisters. His father was a peasant farmer. He was evicted from his small holding for non-payment of rent in 1851 and emigrated with his family to Haslingden, East Lancashire. At the age of eleven Michael lost his right arm in a machinery accident in a cotton mill.
Michael Davitt was sent to a Wesleyan school, which was connected to the Methodist Church, and here he received a good education. Davitt took night classes at the local Mechanics' Institute and used its library.
Two years of unexpected schooling enabled him to obtain employment with the local postmaster. In 1865 Michael Davitt joined the revolutionary Fenian brotherhood, an international secret society that sought to secure political freedom for Ireland. It was formed for the purpose of winning Irish independence by armed force. The name Fenian was derived from the Fianna, the heroic chivalry of ancient Irish legend. Impressed by the militant policy of Charles Stewart Parnell and other Irish proponents of home rule in Parliament, he helped to bring about a new departure in Irish politics. In 1868 he became a secretary of the Irish Republican Brotherhood.
In 1870 he was arrested for treason-felony in arranging for sending fire-arms into Ireland and was sentenced to fifteen years' penal servitude. After seven years he was released on ticket of leave. Returning to Ireland he helped Charles Stewart Parnell to start the National Land League in 1879. His violent speeches resulted in his re-arrest and consignment to Portland by Sir William Harcourt, then a home secretary. He was released in 1882. In the same year he had been elected to Parliament for County Meath as a Nationalist, but as a convict was disqualified. In 1883 he was again prosecuted for seditious speeches and suffered three months' imprisonment.
Influenced by the theories of Henry George, Davitt broke with Parnell over the question of land nationalization. He took the anti-Parnellite side in 1890, and in 1892 was elected to parliament for North Meath, but was unseated on petition. He was then returned for North-East Cork, but had to vacate his seat through bankruptcy, caused by the costs in the North Meath petition. In 1895 he was elected for West Mayo, but retired before the dissolution in 1900.
He wrote constantly in American and colonial journals. He also published some books, always with the strongest bias against English methods, but his force of character earned him at least the respect of those who could make calm allowance for an open enemy of the established order, and a higher meed of admiration from those who sympathized with his objects or were not in a position to be threatened by them.
Michael Davitt's efforts were instrumental to future Irish Land Acts after the Gladstone First Land Act of 1870. The most important of these was the Land Act of 1881, which finally granted "the three Fs" under Davitt's "Irish Democratic Land Federation. " The next stage was the Ashbourn Act of 1885, the most effective land act as it offered tenants the choice to purchase their land from the government with a fixed rate, easy to pay back loan. Vast tracts of land were bought up by the government to be sold to tenants. This Act was passed by the Conservatives as an attempt to appease the Home Rule Party, although it failed to do so.
(This scarce antiquarian book is a facsimile reprint of th...)
Quotations: "I would abolish land monopoly by simply taxing all land, exclusive of improvements, up to its full value. .. In other words, I would recognize private property in the results of labour, and not in land. "
Michael Davitt was self-reliant, self-critical, sensitive, and truthful, and in moral courage he was preeminent among his contemporaries.
Davitt was married to Mary Yore. The Davitt's had five children, three boys and two girls.
