[1] His father John Kickham was the proprietor of the principal drapery in the locality and was held in high esteem for his patriotic spirit.

[4] Kickham began to write for a number of papers, including The Nation, but also the Celt, the Irishman, the Shamrock, and would become one of the leader writers of the Irish People, the Fenian organ, in which many of his poems appeared.

[4] On hearing of the progress of O’Brien through the country, Kickham had set to work manufacturing pikes, and was in the forge when news reached him that the leaders were looking for him.

[8] After the failed 1848 uprising at Ballingarry he had to hide for some time, as a result of the part he had played in rousing the people of his native village to action.

[2][5] When the excitement had subsided, he returned to his father's house and resumed his interests in the sports of fishing and fowling, and spent much of his time in literary pursuits, for which he had great natural capacity and all the more inclined as a result of the accident.

[9] In the autumn of 1857, a messenger, Owen Considine arrived from New York with a message for James Stephens from members[10] of the Emmet Monument Association, calling on him to get up an organization in Ireland.

[18] In mid-1863, Stephens informed his colleagues he wished to start a newspaper, with financial aid from O’Mahony and the Fenian Brotherhood in America.

Trusting to the patriotism and ability of the Executive, I fully endorse their action beforehand, and call on every man in our ranks to support and be guided by them in all that concerns our military brotherhood.

[24] It would fall to Kickham, as a good Catholic, to tackle the priests,[25] though not exclusively with articles such as "Two Sets of Principles", a rebuff to the doctrines laid down by Lord Carlisle, and "A Retrospect", dealing with the tenant-right movement chiefly but also the events of the recent past and their bearing on the present.

With this information, Ryan raided the offices of The Irish People on Thursday 15 September, followed by the arrests of O’Leary, Luby, and O’Donovan Rossa.

[28] Stephens would also be caught but with the support of Fenian prison warders, John J. Breslin[29] and Daniel Byrne was less than a fortnight in Richmond Bridewell when he vanished and escaped to France.

[4][32] The prisoners' refusal to disown their opposition to British rule in any way, even when facing charges of life-imprisonment, earned them the nickname of 'the bold Fenian men'.

This is my vindication, my justification for the attitude I have taken...Quoting then from Thomas Davis Kickham continued: The tribune’s tongue and poet’s pen May sow the seed in slavish men, But 'tis the soldier’s sword alone

Can reap the harvest when 'tis grown.The judge William Keogh, before passing sentence, asked him if he had any further remarks to make in reference to his case.

Then the judge with many expressions of sympathy for the prisoner, and many compliments in reference to his intellectual attainments, sentenced him to be kept in penal servitude for fourteen years.

[36] Kickham was given a free pardon from Queen Victoria on 24th February 1869[37] because of ill-health, and upon his release he was made Chairman of the Supreme Council of the I.R.B.

The novel portrays landlords as apathetic to the needs of their tenants and their land agents as greedy and unscrupulous, leading to rural depopulation, emigration and poverty.

The lives of the characters illustrate the iniquities of the land system but Kickham also provides a positive portrait of the virtues of Irish life.

[40] Vincent Comerford accounts for the novel's success with the lower middle class by claiming that they saw "an explanation of [their] own origins in a struggle against vicissitudes of insecurity of tenure".

[46] Charles Kickham was the author of three well-known stories, dealing sympathetically with Irish life and manners and the simple faith, the joys and sorrows, the quaint customs and the insuppressible humour of the peasantry.

“Sally Cavanagh,” or “The Untenanted Graves,” a touching story illustrating the evils of landlordism and emigration; and “For the Old Land,” dealing with the fortunes of a small farmer's family, with its lights and shades.