MR. DRUMMOND, before the Orders of the Day were read, craved permission of the House to make a statement in defence of the character of a constituent of his, who had been attacked, personally, on a former evening by the hon. Member for the city of Limerick. On that occasion he (Mr. Drummond) had deprecated the system of attacking individuals in their absence; 1285 and since then he had received an explanation of the circumstances alluded to from the Rev. Massey Dawson, the gentleman in question. The statement of Mr. Dawson was to the effect that last year he had been obliged to evict 12 tenants, who owed him upwards of 600l. That one of them had had a large farm, from which he (Mr. Dawson) could not only obtain no rent, but upon which he had to pay the poor-rates for two years. That the present ejectments were on lands held by two middlemen, named Carthy and Law. That Carthy had been ejected two years ago for arrears of rent amounting to 400l.; and that Law owed five-and-a-half years' rent. The statement went on to describe the people evicted as lawless people, who received outdoor relief in the day, and plundered the neighbourhood at night; and that the writer considered it a duty he owed to society, as well as to himself, to break up the combination of villany that existed in that part of the county of Tipperary.
§ MR. J. O'CONNELLsaid, though the hon. Member for West Surrey was under a mistake in attributing the attack upon Mr. Dawson to him—the hon. Member for Tipperary having been the Member who made it—he would, nevertheless, take upon himself to reply to the hon. Member's statement. It would be perceived by the House that the facts were not denied by Mr. Dawson; he admitted, on the contrary, that 500 or 600 persons were turned out of their homes, and their houses levelled to the ground. It was an aggravation of the injury and wrong on the part of the rev. gentleman to call those poor people a nest of thieves and murderers. That was charitable in a minister of God. A great number of these poor people had got unstamped receipts for their rents from Mr. Dawson's agent, Mr. Richard Evers Wilson; and those who knew anything of Ireland knew very well that this circumstance enabled the landlord to eject them at a moment's notice. He (Mr. J. O'Connell) had no doubt that a great number of the poor of Ireland were driven to theft and the commission of crime; and he only wondered there were not more of them, such was their frightful misery. He held, however, in his hand the strongest testimony of the good conduct of the people more immediately in question from the clergyman of the district
§ SIR W. SOMERVILLEhad received a communication from the Nenagh board of 1286 guardians in reference to the case, signed by Captain Browne, in which it was stated that the necessary notices had been served on the relieving officers of the union, and that the board had agreed to advance those poor people some small allowance in ready money previous to giving them outdoor relief. The ablebodied among them had been directed to go into the workhouse, but none of them had done so up to the date of that communication. The relieving officer, however, had visited them regularly, and he said their wants were attended to.
§ Subject at an end.