seamus dubhghaill

Promoting Irish Culture and History from Little Rock, Arkansas, USA

Tag Archives: Weaving


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Death of James Orr, Weaver, Radical & Poet

James Orr, weaver, radical, and poet, dies on April 24, 1816.

Orr is the son of James Orr, who farms a few acres and is a linen weaver. His mother’s name is unknown. They live in the small village of Ballycarry, in the parish of Broadisland, County Antrim. He is an only child, born when his parents are middle-aged. They are unwilling to risk sending him to school, so they carefully educate him at home, his father having been very well educated. A near-contemporary source George Pepper (1829), claims that the youngster is something of a prodigy, able to read Spectator essays at the age of six. Later in life, partly thanks to membership of a local reading society, he is remarkably well read. Handloom weavers are reputedly one of the most literate and politically radical groups in the period, and he certainly fits the stereotype. Pepper also claims that William Orr is James Orr’s uncle, and that the younger man lives for three years with William Orr and his family, where his literary talents are nurtured and where he develops an interest in radical politics. Other sources do not support this account, but if there is a relationship it might explain an almost morbid interest in assizes, executions, and gallows, evident in several poems. This also might have been prompted by witnessing William Orr’s trial and execution.

Pepper “heard from good authority” that Orr in 1797 is secretary to the Antrim Association, of which William Orr is president; presumably this means the Society of United Irishmen. He sings a patriotic song called “The Irishman,” one of his most celebrated compositions, at a meeting of that body. The earliest publications traced are poems published pseudonymously (1796–97) in the Northern Star newspaper. This paper, edited by Samuel Neilson, is sympathetic to United Irish views, and it is clear that Orr, like many of his neighbours, is actively involved in the 1798 rebellion. Several poems dealing with the events of June 1798, provide a rare participant’s perspective. He takes part in the skirmish at Donegore, and flees after the defeat at the Battle of Antrim. Local sources record his successful efforts to prevent cruelty and looting by his colleagues. He goes into hiding in an Irish-speaking area, perhaps in the Glens of Antrim or in the Sperrin Mountains. After a short time, he escapes to the United States, but unlike many of his former comrades he finds himself unable to settle there, and very soon returns home to Ballycarry, and thenceforth makes his living as a weaver. In 1800, he seeks to join the militia set up to counter a feared Napoleonic invasion, but the local gentry in command rejects his application because of his United Irish associations.

Orr’s first verses are composed at meetings of a local singing school, where rival versifiers produce impromptu verses for the company to sing to the psalm tunes being practised, and he later writes songs for masonic meetings. He publishes poems in the Belfast newspapers. A few carefully written essays on morality and education, signed “Censor, Ballycarry,” are apparently also his work. A collection of poems is published in 1804, with almost 400 subscribers, and another selection is published in 1817 after his death by his friend Archibald McDowell. Orr had requested that the proceeds should go to help the poor of Ballycarry. His poems are an excellent source of information about the life and concerns of a fairly humble stratum of late eighteenth-century Ulster society.

Many of Orr’s best poems deal with subjects of interest to his community – weaving, social life, and farming – and are written in the Scots language still widely spoken in the area. He expertly uses Scots stanza forms, and joyously participates in the almost competitive composition of verse typical of the Scots tradition. Several of his poems rework themes found in Robert Burns or other earlier writers. His An Irish Cottier’s Death and Burial is derived from a Burns poem, The Cottier’s Saturday Night, but later critics acknowledge that the Orr poem is much more successful. He and his friend Samuel Thomson are pioneers in the use of written Scots in Ulster and are regarded as the two most skillful Scots poets in Ulster. Both are celebrated in their day, and their work in Scots has been rediscovered in the twentieth-century revival of interest in the traditional literature and history of the north of Ireland.

Orr’s verse in standard English is equally competent, even more ambitious and almost as interesting. The best of his work, particularly in Scots, is characterised by pleasing cadences and assured control of tone and technique. His novel and generally impressive experiments with soliloquies, verse epistles, and versified direct speech, in English and Scots, parallel his interest in extending the registers in which he could use the vernacular Scots language. He seems not to have known of William Wordsworth‘s poetry, but, apparently independently and arguably more successfully, produces verse written in “the language really used by men” (Wordsworth, preface to Lyrical Ballads (1798)). As well as fascinating foreshadowings of romanticism, his work more often reveals the influence of the enlightenment and of New Light presbyterianism. He is a member of the congregation of the Rev. John Bankhead, whose theological views are decidedly liberal, tending even towards unitarianism. His poems provide a great deal of evidence on his reading, interests, radical aspirations and convictions; and in them and in the prose essays, the reader encounters a humane and generous personality. Like many other United Irishmen, he is an enthusiastic freemason, and believes that freemasonry and education will help to usher in a peaceful millennium. His poetry reveals humanitarian concerns, not yet common in the period. He opposess slavery and cruelty to animals and children and expresses support for a contemporary popular rising in Haiti. In 1812, he signs a petition in favour of Catholic emancipation.

Orr never marries. His friend McDowell believes that the resulting lack of domestic comforts drives the poet to socialise in taverns, and it is said that local fame and popularity encourages his excessive drinking. He suffers from ill health in later life. A neglected cold in 1815 leads to tuberculosis. He dies on April 24, 1816, and is buried in the old Templecorran graveyard at Ballycarry. Some years later, freemasons erect an impressive monument over the grave.

Orr’s poems are republished by a group of local enthusiasts in 1935. Another selection appears in 1992. A plaque put up by the local district council commemorates “the bard of Ballycarry,” probably the most significant eighteenth-century English-language poet in Ulster.

(From: “Orr, James” by Linde Lunney, Dictionary of Irish Biography, http://www.dib.ie, October 2009)


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Birth of Bernard “Barney” Hughes, Master Baker & Entrepreneur

Bernard “Barney” Hughes, master baker, entrepreneur, and liberal reformer, is born on July 8, 1808, second among eight children of Peter Hughes, probably a tradesman or labourer, and Catherine Hughes (née Quinn), of Blackwatertown, near Armagh in what is now Northern Ireland.

Hughes is brought up as a devout Roman Catholic and speaks both Irish and English fluently. He starts working at age 12 as a baker’s boy in Armagh and around 1822 tries unsuccessfully to set up his own bakery. To enhance his career prospects, he moves to Belfast in the mid-1820s and becomes a journeyman baker. He soon proves to be a highly skilled and reliable worker and in 1833 is appointed operations manager at the Public Bakery, Church Street.

Hughes is a great admirer of Daniel O’Connell and is part of the delegation that meets him when he visits Belfast in 1840. However, his employer does not share his views on liberal reform, and strained relations lead to Hughes setting up his own bakery in December 1840. At this point he must have already gained a reputation as a highly respected citizen in Belfast, as he is able to borrow £1,400 for the new factory that is built at 71 Donegall Street. This proves a wise investment, as within two years his factory produces more bread than any other bakery in the town. Demand for his loaves and his famous “Belfast bap” is fueled by the thousands of poor Catholics who migrate to the city in search of employment in the two decades before the famine.

Hughes is probably the first entrepreneur in Ireland to appreciate how machinery can create economies of scale in food production. He keeps enlarging his factory by adding ovens (using his own patent design) and dough‐mixing machines, and in 1847 opens another bakery on Donegall Place, which becomes known as the “railway bakery” on account of the rails that are used to transport raw materials by cart between various parts of the site. By using new technology, he is able to produce large quantities of consistently high‐quality bread at prices that are up to 20% cheaper than his local competitors. By 1851 he employs up to a third of those in the Belfast baking trade. He removes much of the human drudgery in the baking process, and higher productivity means that his employees can sleep at home rather than on the bakery floor. The population growth of Belfast continues to increase steeply after the famine years, and in 1858 he opens a third bakery on Divis Street, in the Falls area of the town. Distribution problems during the 1840s had convinced Hughes that he needs tighter control over all elements of the food production chain. By the 1870s his empire includes flour mills, ships to import grain, a brewery, shops, and a fleet of horse‐drawn vans.

Hughes is an enlightened employer and throughout his life he gives generously to the poor in Belfast. During the famine years of the 1840s he keeps the price of bread as low as possible, and on special days such as Christmas gives away thousands of loaves. In July 1842 he confronts a mob of up to 2,000 hungry and agitated weavers who are intent on causing damage to his bakery. He convinces them that he is a friend of the people. This is borne out by the fact that he is the largest single donor to both the Belfast Relief Committee and the Belfast Relief Fund for Ireland during the great famine. Though he is not politically ambitious, he does feel that he can use his status as one of the largest employers in Belfast and the wealthiest Catholic layman to promote the liberal cause. He is particularly appalled by the way in which the members of the conservative‐dominated council are able to indemnify themselves against the £84,000 debt which they had accrued while in office during the 1840s and 1850s.

Hughes is the first Catholic to be elected to the Belfast town council (1855–58, 1871–72) and the first Catholic alderman (1872–78). There are numerous attempts to smear his reputation, and articles in the Belfast News Letter lampoon his thick Armagh accent. As councillor he imprudently remarks on one public occasion that Belfast is “governed by Protestants, but the bone and sinew of the town is Roman Catholic.” This is seized upon by his conservative adversaries as evidence of an anti‐Protestant stance. In reality, he is always even‐handed and against any form of violent action. In his Smithfield ward there are large groups of poor Catholics and Protestants in close proximity to each other and this leads to regular disturbances. As a JP (1867–78) he urges fellow members of the Belfast Home Rule Association to avoid the tactics of the Fenians. In 1878 he is one of a group of magistrates who upholds the right of the Protestant shipyard workers to hold processions in Belfast.

Hughes’s fair mindedness sometimes brings him into collision with his more zealous Catholic friends. In 1876 he is heavily criticised for supporting the campaign to have a statue of the Rev. Henry Cooke, the Presbyterian preacher with strong anti‐Catholic views, erected in a prominent position in Belfast. He contributes funds to the Catholic Institute in Belfast, donates the site for St. Peter’s Church in 1858, and pays for the Lady Chapel. Despite his generosity, Patrick Dorrian, the coadjutor bishop of Down and Connor, vetoes a plan by the Vatican to award him a papal honour.

Hughes dies on September 23, 1878, and is buried privately at Friar’s Bush Graveyard. His son Edward, later appointed the first chairman of The Irish News at its launch in 1891, takes over the business and builds a large “model bakery” on a two‐acre site on the Springfield Road which is one of the largest and most technically sophisticated factories of its kind in Europe.

(From: “Hughes, Bernard (‘Barney’)” by Daniel Beaumont, Dictionary of Irish Biography, http://www.dib.ie, October 2009)


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Death of Elizabeth Corbet Yeats, Educator & Publisher

Elizabeth Corbet Yeats, known as Lolly, Anglo-Irish educator and publisher, dies on January 16, 1940. She works as an art teacher and publishes several books on art and is a founder of Dun Emer Press which publishes several works by her brother, W. B. Yeats. She is the first commercial printer in Ireland to work exclusively with hand presses.

Yeats is born at 23 Fitzroy Road, London, on March 11, 1868. She is the daughter of the Irish artist John Butler Yeats and Susan Yeats (née Pollexfen). She is sister to W. B., Jack and Susan Mary “Lily” Yeats. From the age of four she lives in Merville, Sligo, at the home of her grandfather William Pollexfen. In November 1874 her family moves to 14 Edith Villas, West Kensington, London. Her governess is Martha Jowitt from 1876 until 1879 before the family moves to Bedford Park, Chiswick, in 1878.

Yeats returns to Howth, County Dublin, in 1881. She enrolls, with her sister Susan, in the Dublin Metropolitan School of Art in 1883 and takes classes at the Royal Dublin Society.

The family moves to Eardley Crescent, South Kensington, London, in 1886. While there Yeats starts to write fiction and publishes a homemade magazine, The Pleiades, with six friends, contributing “Story without a plot” to the Christmas 1888 issue. In addition, she publishes “Scamp and three friends” in The Vegetarian.

Yeats also attends the Chiswick School of Art with her sister Susan and brother Jack Butler Yeats, learning “Freehand drawing in all its branches, practical Geometry and perspective, pottery and tile painting, design for decorative purposes.”

In the 1890s Yeats lives at 3 Blenheim Road, Bedford Park, London, and trains as a kindergarten teacher at the Froebel College in Bedford, Bedfordshire. She undertakes her teaching practice at the Bedford Park High School. In 1892, when her training is completed, she teaches as a visiting art mistress at the Froebel Society, Chiswick High School and the Central Foundation School.

Yeats earns a good income from lecturing and publication of four popular painting manuals: Brushwork (1896), Brushwork Studies of Flowers, Fruits and Animals (1898), Brushwork Copy Book (1899), and Elementary Brushwork Studies (1900).

Yeats trains and works as an art teacher and is a member of William Morris‘s circle in London before her family returns to Dublin in 1900. She writes and creates the artwork for Elementary Brush-Work Studies (1900), an educational book that teaches young children the technique of painting flowers and plants using her simple method. At the suggestion of Emery Walker, who works with Morris on the Kelmscott Press, she studies printing with the Women’s Printing Society in London.

In Dublin, Yeats accepts the invitation to join Evelyn Gleeson to form the Dun Emer Guild along with Lily, who is an embroiderer. She manages the Dun Emer Press from 1902 with a printing press acquired from a provincial newspaper. The Press is located at Runnymede, the house of Evelyn Gleeson. This is set up with the intention of training young women in bookbinding and printing as well as embroidery and weaving. In 1903 she starts printing and Dun Emer’s first book is W. B. Yeats’s In the Seven Woods (1903).

Despite being a gifted printer, the costings exceed the quality of work that Yeats produces with the result that the press is often at risk financially. Eleven books, decorated with pastels by George William Russell, appear under the Dun Emer imprint produced from a first-floor room. She has several disagreements with her brother William over his directions as literary editor. She also dislikes Evelyn Gleeson. In October 1906 she travels to New York to advertise her products but publishes Dun Emer’s last book, William’s Discoveries (1907), in late November when she returns to Dublin.

After many years of strained relations between the Yeats sisters and Evelyn Gleeson, their business relationship is finally ended. Subsequently, in 1908, Lolly and her brother William start the Cuala Press, publishing over 70 books including 48 by the poet. Yeats manages the press while her sister Lily controls the embroidery section. Cuala continues to be a family strain. Their father, John Butler Yeats, has to castigate his son William for sending overtly critical letters to his sisters about the press. However, Cuala produces magnificent books: W. B. Yeats’ The Green Helmet and Other Poems (1910) and a series of Broadsides (published 1908–15, with illustrations from Jack Yeats).

Yeats works with Cuala Press until just before her death in Dublin on January 16, 1940, after a diagnosis of high blood pressure and heart trouble.

(Pictured: “Elizabeth Corbet Yeats” by Jack Butler Yeats, oil on canvas, circa 1899, National Gallery of Ireland)


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Birth of Sarah Makem, Traditional Irish Singer

Sarah Makem, traditional Irish singer, is born in Keady, County Armagh on October 18, 1900. She is the wife of fiddler Peter Makem, mother of musicians Tommy Makem and Jack Makem, and grandmother of musicians Tom Sweeney, Jimmy Sweeney (of Northern Irish Canadian group Barley Bree), Shane Makem, Conor Makem and Rory Makem. Makem and her cousin, Annie Jane Kelly, are members of the Singing Greenes of Keady.

Makem lives in Keady her entire life. Living in the border region of Ulster and in a market town, she is influenced by Irish, Scottish, and English traditions. She learns songs from her mother while she is doing household chores such as cooking, often picking up these songs while sitting with her mother after just one repetition. She also learns some of her repertoire from songs the children sing in school.

Makem leaves school early to work as a factory weaver as many of the girls do in her town. She works from 7:00 AM until 6:30 PM and then comes home to have sessions with many of the other musicians living in the same area. She marries Peter Makem in 1919.

Makem does not consider herself a musician, however, she has a vast musical career. She is a ballad singer who has over five hundred songs in memory. These songs she describes as life stories of murder and love and emigration songs. She records many of her songs, mostly for collection purposes.

In the 1950s, song collectors from the United States tour Ireland recording its musical heritage. Makem is visited and recorded by, among others, Diane Guggenheim Hamilton, Jean Ritchie, Peter Kennedy and Sean O’Boyle. Her rendition of “As I Roved Out” is used to open the BBC Radio folk music programme of the same name in the 1950s. She does not intend to use this recording as such and is very embarrassed to know her voice will be heard every day across Ireland.

Makem dies in Keady, County Armagh on April 20, 1983. She is buried in St. Patrick’s RC Graveyard in Keady.