Ladies' Land League

[2] Davitt suggested Anna Parnell, another sister, to head it and on 31 January 1881 at 39, Sackville Street, Dublin the Ladies' Land League was formally established.

[4] At the Central Office a detailed register, referred to by the women as the "Book of Kells" was kept of information sent in weekly by the local branches.

Eventually, Anna Parnell persuaded the League leaders to change to 15s a week allowance to each prisoner to provide for himself.

The Land League had started its own paper United Ireland in August 1881, but towards the end of the year the government tried to close it down.

[7] The final accounts of the Ladies' Land League, presented to Michael Davitt in June 1882, show that they expended just short of £70,000 during their 18 months of existence.

[8] On Saturday 12 March 1881, just more than a month after the formation of the league, a pastoral letter of Archbishop Edward McCabe of Dublin was read out in all the churches of the diocese.

It condemned the league in the strongest terms, deploring that "our Catholic daughters, be they matrons or virgins, are called forth, under the flimsy pretext of charity, to take their stand in the noisy street of life."

McCabe was not representative of all bishops, particularly Archbishop Thomas Croke of Cashel, a strong supporter of the original league.

McCabe complained to the Vatican, backing his complaints with a thick file of Irish newspaper clippings about events around the country.

Bishop Moran was charged with sorting out the quarrel and managed to elicit a grudging apology to McCabe from Croke for being "technically" wrong in his actions.

They contented themselves with expressing their hope that "the women of Ireland will continue to be the glory of their sex and the noble angels of stainless modesty".

[4] Anna Parnell defiantly issued a notice to all Ladies' Land League branches in the country, widely publicised in the press, calling on them all to hold a meeting at 1.30 p.m. on 1 January 1882.

The country was divided into five districts, each presided over by a Special Resident Magistrate, with executive authority over the entire forces of the crown within his area.

That month, Anne Kirke was sent down from Dublin to Tulla, County Clare, to oversee the erection of huts for a large number of evicted tenants.

In December 1881 21-year-old Hannah Reynolds was imprisoned under an ancient statute from the reign of Edward III, the original purpose of which was to keep prostitutes off the streets.

Anna herself was not in attendance at that meeting, having suffered a physical and mental collapse after the sudden death of Fanny the previous month at the age of 33.