THE BEREHAVEN EVICTIONS.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume IX, Issue 463, 24 February 1882, Page 7

THE BEREHAVEN EVICTIONS.

The correspondent of the Irish Times, writing from Castletown Berebaven on Thursday Dec. let says :— The eviction expedition was composed of 70 men of the Rifle Brigade from Cork, 50 men of the 30th Regiment from Kinsale, and 30 from Cork, under command of Colonel Lloyd, with 60 or 70 police, nnder Sub-Inspectors Maxwell and Hill. Surgeon-Major M'Keery accompanied the military. The sheriff, Mr. Gale, and his bailiff, were in front. Mr. Warburton, R. M., who had supreme control, was accompanied by Mr. Herbert Gladstone, M. P. for Leeds. They all left Castletown about eight o'clock and marched to Urrhan, nine miles distant. The distance is situate at the foot of Slieve Miskish, and faces the beautiful harbour at the mouth of Kenmare River. The land here is more fertile and richer than in any district yet visited by the expedition. On the shores are washed vast quantities of seaweed, which are carefully collected, and brought over country roads to further enrich the mountain moss.* Several outrages took place in the territory in the late excitemtnt. It was here the police were fired npon, and a Land League residence built for the evicted tenant Dwyer. The sheriff had scarcely left the town when Mißs Reynolds followed him on an outside car, and overhauled him at the house of Timothy Hanley. The sheriff succeeded in getting in first and Mr. Payne, junior, closeted himself with the tenant, so as to make a eettlement. Miss Reynolds, accompanied by a crowd of peasantry, male and female, cheering lustily, attempted to gain an entrance and see the tenant, but Mr. Warburton directed the police to ward off the intruders, When Miss Reynolds found herself foiled at the front door she tried the back door, but Sub-Inspector Maxwell intercepted her there also by a few of his men. The conference between the tenant, his wife, and the sheriff occupied some minutes. Miss Reynolds again intruded herself, and succeeded in gaining admission to the kitchen, where Mr. Gladstone, some bailiffs' policemen, and a dozen relatives of the Hanley family were. Her first act after entering was to inquire for the tenant. A female volunteered the information that he was in the room, and called out that Miss Parnell wanted him. '• Stop, " quoth a bailiff, " and don't be shouting lies. If you say that again I will put you out. " Miss Reynolds reproved the bailiff, and announced, in a decided tone of voice, that she was Miss Parnell's representative, and that was all the same. Silence again prevailed, and in a few minutes she ordered some peasants present to ro forth and preach "no rent." Hanley was protected from such doctrine, and he paid one year's rent out of three and promised to settle the balance within a short time. He was formally ejected by removing the fire and a few chairs, and reinstated as caretaker until he should clear off his arrears. The party then moved along a narrow and badly kept road to the house of Catherine Murphy, who owed three years' rent, the yearly rent being £6 15s. While the •heriff's party were going by road Miss Reynolds and her followers, who were momentarily increasing, ran through the fields, cheering as they went, and heeding little the sloppy passages they took. Miss Reynolds won the race, and waylaid the son of the tenant, a man of forty years of age. She told him not to pay any rent, and that she would undertake to build him a house and supply him with every comfort he has at present. He suggested what about the land, and she replied that he could live as well in the League house, and the land would be all right. This was said in the presence of the expedition, and the people cheered most lustily, and groaned at Mr. Gladstone, who was close by. Murphy was so much carried away by the enthusiasm of his neighbours that he affirmed he would not pay a penny, though he had arranged with Mr. Payne half an hour previously to do so. There was nothing for it but throw the household effects out on the street, and this the bailiffs did, while Mr. Gladstone and Miss Reynolds stood within a short distance. The crowd amused themselves by cheering for P»rnell, the Land League, and Miss Reynolds, and making observations about Mr. Gladstone which were neither polite nor edifying. The rain here began to fall copiously, and the party had to trudge half a mile before gaining the main road. The crowd continued their conduct all the road. When Mr. Gladstone took his car to drive away the people cheered derisively. Ha was accompanied on the car by Mr. Warburton, Mr. Payne, and two armed policemen. Miss Reynolds also drove into town, and on the way met another Lady Land Leaguer from Dublin, a Mrs, Moore, who returned with her, as the evictions were abandoned for the day. After arriving here Mr. Gladstone and Mr. Warburton walked down to the residence of the Catholic priest, Canon Carberry, to see that gentleman. On their way back to the Naval Hotel a lot of youngsters followed them along the street groaning Mr. Gladstone, who immediately drove to Glengariff on an outside car in a regular deluge of rain. He will sleep at Glengariff to-night, and resume his travels to Cork in the morning. Last evening he dined with several gentlemen at Sub-Inspector Maxwell's house. To-night the representatives of the Ladies' Land League received large numbers of tenants and advised them. The correspondent of the same paper, writing on Dec. 2nd. says : — The expedition left town at eight o'clock, and the sheriff was preceded by Mr. Payne, the agent who settled with a number of tenants beforehand. Two tenants on Lord Bantry's property, near the copper mines at Clune, surrendered possession and were readmitted as caretakers, while the others settled their rents the previous day. When Mr. Payne was at Clune, Mr. Gale and his party prosecuted their work about five miles from Castletown, in the same direction and beyond Dunboy Castle, on Mr. Payley's property, Here he effected six evictions, and reinstated the tenants as caretakers, Mrs. Moore and Miss Reynolds, representatives of the League, drove out to the scene of the evictions but were intercepted by the police who spread themselves across the road and prevented their going to the houses with the sheriff. They were informed that Mr. Warburton R. M., had adopted this course to prevent a recurrence of the conduct of the previous day. The rain began to fall heavily, and continued during the entire day but the ladies retained their s«atß on the car

surrounded by the police and a crowd of sightseers. The sheriff having completed his work, Mr. Maxwell, the sub-inspector, went up to the ladies, and informed them that they were now at liberty to go and see the evicted tenants. This they did not feel inclined to do, and turned towards CastletowD. Before going they called for cheers for the Land League, which were responded to by the people. The day's work having ended the police and the troops returned to town. Further evictions in this district have been adjourned for some time. The special correspondent of the Standard, who accompanied the Berehaven evicting expedition during its operations, write 6as follows : — After detailing the preparations made by the police to prevent tb.9 advance of Miss Reynol Is and Mrs. Moore, of the Ladies' Land League, the correspondent says :—: — The constabulary climbed the hill in skirmishing order. The first house the sheriff reached was that of Margaret Walsh, of Crumlong, high up on the mountain. The widow received us weeping. Four young children stood by the hearth, pale as the ashes upon it, and a son lay dying of consumption in the after room. A few words were sufficient. The agent's nephew and the sheriff conferred apart with the poor woman, who made a promise to pay something soon, and then she was directed to remain outside with the children for a moment. It was but a moment while the sheriff extinguished the fire on the hearth ; but the little group stands bsfore me as I wcjte more vividly that any that was ever arranged upon canvas. The children, with their b:iro legs half buried in the filth of the dungheap, held their peace ; but their eyes were brimming with sympathy for their mother, as with her face working strangely before the circl j of armed men she clasps her youngest child more closely in her scanty ahawl to protect it from the driving rain. Four other tenants, owing, like Widow Walsh, about two and a half years' rent, were similarly evict d, and then re-admitted as caretakers, and in each case there was something indescribably mournful in the spectacle of the utter and hopeless poverty of those mountaineers. A thousand feet above the ocean that spread round the shores ot the bay below them, they had driven their hardy cattle daily out to eat the sweet grasses from the crevices in the rocks, and had laboriously dug and planted their tiny plots with potatoes with but one result — a bare yield of food, hardly ■enough to keep life in their lean bodies, unless, indeed, as another resuLt I may be allowed to reckon the growth of that despondency due to the struggle with an unkindly soil, which is here grimly described as " The breaking heart." Their families were very large ; in some cases their husbands were in America sending home what they could spare from their earnings. After completing the evictions on Mr. Puxley's holdings—obtaining, however, nothing in the shape of hard cash — the sheriff made his way back down the road towards the houses of some tenants of Lord Bantry. The bugler occasionally played a lively march, which swelled and eddied away in echoes from the mountain ranges all about us, and the troops, marching r,t ease cheered their solitary musician. Scarcely a human being could be seen in this dreary wilderness. The Bheriff again left the road with some police, and Btopped\at the house of one Widow M'Carthy. It was empty ; the furnitur^ had been carried out, and the door borne away. The party next reached the house of John Cronin, a returned emigrant, who had spent all the money he had braught back with him in building a yery good house and some outhouses. He is a passionate man, and, on seeing the police, seized a hammer and, furiously smashed his furniture into pieces. He then tore the door from its hinges. At this moment Mr. Payne, senior, who had joined the sheriff, accosted him. *' What are you doing that for, Cronin ?" "To get in and out when I wish," he replied. " Now, do be reasonable, and go in as caretaker like the others." " I will not. I must leave the farm, for I can't get a living on it." (> Take a penny now, and shelter your child." " I will not." The penny was put into another man's hand to give him, but he still obstinately refused to touch it, and so did his wife, and the family were accordingly left in the yard outside the house. The same course was pursued with the Widow Conroy, who likewise declined to be put in as caretaker, or to promise to pay the rent. This morning I drove early to Mrs. Conroy's house, and her story in full is as follows :— '• lam the widow of Jerry Conroy, who was killed at Mr. Puxley's Castle when at work, and Mr. Fuxley gave me ten shillings. lam forty-ax years of age, and shall have been widowed fourteen years next May. The old rent was £5 18s, and I had four milch cows. Then the land was stripped six years ago last September, and the rent raised all round. Some of my land was takenaway, and eight and a half acres left. I pay £8 10s rent. I have three-quarters of an acre in potatoes, no oats, and two cows; but one belongs to my mother-in-law. I had one firkin of butter this year, but none last year, when we all had to take the relief. I have one daughter, ninteen years old, in America in service. She has had the fever and could send nothing. I have, three at home ; two children and one boy grown up ;he works at the farm. I have had a little pig this year, but I had to sell it, and I owe a great .deat of money in Castletown. My mother lives with mo, and my mother-in-law next door. The land is poor and wet. I think I could pay three pounds. I owe three years' arrears. John Cronin, already mentioned, is a man of 40, with a hard set face. I noticed that hia hat was worked round with the word " League." He had eight and three-quarters acies, and the rent was five guineas. With two cows he made but one fiikin of butter thig year, and his potato crop was a poor one. He had four boys, three 'of them being still young children. His house is the best in the district for miles around, being substantially built of stone, slated, whitewashed, and fitted with good windows and doors. He had spent sixty pounds upon it, and had drained his land with unceasing industry. He thought he could pay two pounds rent, but he could not, or would not, pay the arrears. The man was walking moodily up and down beiore his house to-day, his wife i watching him anxiously. The broken bed and other furniture were lying in a confused heap, and the young children playing about them.