Daniel O'Connell

Donnie O’Brien
Semester One Research Paper
How did Daniel O’Connell influence Ireland? O’Connell carried out the traits of getting what was right for Ireland for reasons of rallying the Irish people, agitating for degrees of civil rights in Ireland, and was widely revered by the common people in Ireland.
Daniel O’Connell was born on August 6, 1775, in County Kerry, in the west of Ireland. O’Connell’s family were unusual Catholics, they were considered members of the gentry. O’Connell’s family was fairly wealthy and owned their own land. The O’Connell family practiced an ancient tradition of “Fosterage”, Daniel O’Connell was a child of wealthy parents but raised in a household of peasants. Daniel O’Connell’s parents did this so the child would deal with hardships and that their children would learn the Irish language as well as local traditions and folklore practices. During O’Connell’s childhood an uncle nick named him “Hinting Cap” and would often go hunting in the rough hills of Kerry using hounds. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daniel_O'Connell
Daniel O’Connell faced many hardships but rallying the Irish people increased his reputation toward Ireland and greatly grew attention toward his career. In 1843, O’Connell mounted a great campaign for Repeal of the Act of Union. O’Connell held a series of Monster Meetings throughout many locations of Ireland outside the Protestant and Unionist-dominated province of Ulster. These meetings were called Monster Meetings because each was always attended by 100,000 people or even more at times.
At times when O’Connell would cancel meetings violence would quickly break out because of anger that these people had not only because of O’Connell ending the meetings but because he was told to and believed that it was not right that British authorities would make O’Connell dosuch kinds of things. This happened when O’Connell had one of his
Daniel O’Connell argued that the Irish people "were not sufficiently enlightened...