Davitt, MICHAEL

Davitt, MICHAEL, founder of the Irish Land League, the son of a Mayo peasant, was born near Straid, County Mayo, in 1846. Evicted from their small holding, the family emigrated to Hastingden in Lancashire (1851); and here six years later the boy lost his right arm through a machinery accident in a cotton-factory. In 1866 he joined the Fenian movement, the result being that he was sentenced in 1870 to fifteen years' penal servitude. He was released in 1877; and, supplied with funds from the United States, began some two years later an anti-landlord crusade in Ireland, which culminated in the foundation of the Irish Land League (October 21, 1879). Davitt was thenceforward in frequent collision with the government, and from February 1881 to May 1882 was imprisoned in Portland for breaking his ticket-of-leave. His Leaves from a Prison Diary were published in 1885. The views of the 'Father of the Land League' on the subject of land therein take a Socialistic form, and accordingly, though a strong Home Ruler, on the question of land nationalisation he found himself in opposition to the Parnellites. After the split in the party, he opposed the continued leadership of Mr Parnell (q.v.), and was returned to parliament in 1892 as anti-Parnellite, but unseated on petition, on the ground of clerical and other intimidation. He was returned unopposed for South Mayo in 1895, but resigned in 1899.