The Life and Times of John O’Connor Power by Jane Stanford

The story of John O’Connor Power is the story of Ireland’s struggle for nationhood itself.  Born in 1846, the first year of the Great Famine, O’Connor Power, a smallpox victim, spent several months in the workhouse  infirmary in Ballinasloe.  Early in life he rose through the ranks of the Fenian movement to become a leading member of the Supreme Council of the Irish Republican Brotherhood.  In 1874, he was elected member for Mayo to the British House of Commons where he was widely acknowledged to be one of the outstanding orators of his day. He speeches, both in Parliament and to the US House of Representatives, secured crucial concessions and support for the Irish cause.

O’Connor Power campaigned tirelessly for the rights of tenant farmers and pioneered the policy of Obstruction to this end. Following his address to a tenants’ rights meeting in Mayo, a protest was launched which would quickly become the powerful political force that was the Land League. He was, in short, one of a distinguished company, the indomitable Irishry, who made the dream of an independent Ireland a reality. This is his story.