Daingean - some unfriendly reports -- 1724-1846

Daingean was the capital of Offaly from the shiring of the county in 1556 - 1557 until the passing of a local act of parliament in 1832 the effect of which was to transfer the assizes or courts and grand jury meetings from Daingean to Tullamore as and from July 1835. Besides the prestige, the holding of court sessions in Daingean would have resulted in a considerable influx of litigants, witnesses and the lawyers for the several weeks of the sessions each year.

1659 Census

Daingean appears to have thrived if that is not too strong a word in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, but had gone into decline by the 1750s. Its military function would have declined after the 1600s while its role as a market centre was slow to develop. The 1659 'census' or poll tax return would suggest it had an actual population of some 258 by contrast to Birr with 674, Killeigh 156, Geashill 134, and Edenderry 110. One-quarter of the Daingean population were English settlers. The town is said to have been burned by rapparees in the 1690s during the Williamite wars and the fort (the remains of which still survive) was in ruins. Some indication of the ranking of the town vis a vis Tullamore can be seen in a letter from the owner of Daingean, Viscount Molesworth, to his wife in 1724. Molesworth wrote:
'I see by experience that 'tis high time for me to leave off riding long journeys, This last, (though I did no more than walk a foot pace), has brought a fit of strangury and gravel [ a disease of the urinary organs characterised by slow and painful emission of urine ] upon me, and I am in a place where no herb or drug that I might have occasion for (either for clyster, [a medicine injected into the rectum] or oat drink) can be had nearer than Tullamore.'

Idlers and Beggars

The surviving houses in Daingean would suggest an early to mid - eighteenth century date and this is confirmed by an estate map I have seen of Daingean in 1786 which shows clearly the houses and gardens and provides the tenants' names. It must have been an attractive town with nice new houses alongside the cottages of the poor. However the impression given by General Vallencey, then a young engineer, employed to report to the Commissioners of Inland Navigation was not flattering. His findings were published in a little known and scarce pamphlet a Report on the Grand Canal or Southern Line (Dublin 1771).

He wrote of Daingean:
'This and the adjacent Parish of Kilclonfert, is mostly arable. I am informed by Mr. Collgan who fills up the tickets for land carriage, that 2000 Barrels of wheat are annually sent to Dublin from this part. Provisions are extremely dear, and no manufacture of consequence going on, except a few hats and brogues: The town is full of idlers and beggars. The wool is sent from hence to Mullingar, and there bought up from Dublin; this extra carriage will be avoided when the navigation is finished, as the canal is proposed to touch the Town: Provisions also would be more reasonable; they are at present dearer than in the metropolis, being chiefly brought from thence, bread and meal in particular, and the poor would starve, but for the little circulation of money from the troops quartered here.

Daingean in 1801

The Grand Canal was eventually completed as far as Daingean in early 1797 and to Tullamore a year later. The woollen industry was already in decline and when Coote surveyed the county in 1801 for his report to the Royal Dublin Society he wrote of Edenderry 'hither-to [wool] much was manufactured in Edenderry but the trade of that town has quite declined of late, in the woollen line, in which business only it was concerned'. Coote had some interesting comments on Daingean again confirming the view of Vallancey. His views on the state of the roads in winter will strike a chord:
'This country is very thickly inhabited; Philipstown which is the county town, and the only one in the barony, has hitherto sent two members to parliament; it has till lately been in a wretched state, and was rapidly fallen to ruin: now there is but little to recommend it. This town was originally part of the Molesworth estate, and, through family connections, is now divided into three properties; the most considerable part of it is enjoyed by the Right Honourable Mr. Ponsonby. The new leases now given are encouraging, and several new houses are erecting. The Grand canal passes at the northern end of the town, and, before this navigation, was complete to Tullamore, it was of very material service to this town, but now of inconsiderable advantage. A new county gaol is also erecting at the rear of the barracks, which are extensive, and command the town: it is almost entirely surrounded with bog, consequently fuel must be cheap and abundant; and provisions are in plenty, yet no manufacture of any kind is carried on. It had formerly a garrison, and the ruins of lofty castle are situated on the brink of the river. This town is thirty-eight miles distant from Dublin.

The labouring peasants often go from hence to look for work abroad, rather than take reasonable wages; this combination is steadily persisted in though they are paid 9d. and 10d. per day through the year. Cottiers wages, 7d. per day in winter, and 8d. in summer; they have an acre of garden and house for 40s. annually, and pay 30s. for a cow's grass; the keeping of a calf not charged till a year old, and every privilege of pigs and poultry allowed them: turbary is free, consequently they have no want of fuel. Food, mostly potatoes and oatmeal; and, where there is more than one labourer in family,they often afford bacon, and live well: few cottiers but have a cow. Average price of potatoes, 3d. per stone; oatmeal 11s. per cwt. Beer in great demand. The country being very boggy, occasions many bridges, which are very dangerous, seldom better than hurdles thrown across the stream, sodded and gravelled over. They are systematically penurious in repairing these roads, which are in very indifferent order, and must in the winter season be in very wretched state. There are no mines found here, nor is there any river of note, or navigation but the Grand canal.

A study of the building pattern at Daingean through the Registry of Deeds might yield results on town size as would census date and parliamentary reports.

The most colourful and comprehensive account of Daingean published in the travellers' accounts is that of Jonathan Binns in his 'The Miseries and Beauties of Ireland (2 vols, London 1837), based on a survey in 1836. Binns was commissioned to survey the barony of Philipstown and wrote:
From Dublin to Philipstown the road is uninteresting. On our arrival at the latter place, after issuing notices, and adopting the necessary preliminaries, we inspected the district and the farms in the neighbourhood. In the course of our survey we ascended Croghan Hill, a conical elevation, for it scarcely deserves the name of mountain, although it forms an interesting object for thirty miles round, and commands an extensive view of the surrounding country. It is mentioned by Spenser in his Fairy Queen. This hill is remarkable for its verdure, extending even to the top. The soil is a fine rich loam, upon a limestone substratum; ten or twelve acres of summit would let for 15s. per acre. There is a cairn on the top, and near it a cemetery, still used by the Catholics, about which are a number of upright grave-stones, bearing inscriptions of the date of 1714 and thereabouts. These stones were once, as Sergeant Malone informed us, mistaken by a party of police for a company of rebels coming over the hill.

Philipstown obtained its name from Philip (husband of Mary, Queen of England), who once visited it; the county (King's county) owes its name to the same event, [neither Philip or Mary were ever near Daingean or Maryborough.]

All Changed Terribly

The town is well built, and was formerly a place of note. It contains a capital Court-house and Prison, a large Catholic chapel, and a small Protestant church. The Grand Canal, on which two passage-boats ply daily between Dublin and the Shannon harbour, adjoins the town. Previously to the Union, [1800] Philipstown returned two members to parliament, and was a place of considerable trade. Lamentably, however, are things changed now. It is robbed of its representatives - the assizes are removed to Tullamore - its trade has disappeared - many of its houses are in ruins - its shops are falling into decay - and its population, as these signs sufficiently indicate, are poor and wretched. Although surrounded by miles of unreclaimed bog land, its inhabitants wander about the streets in search of employment, and find none. Nor is the desolation confined to the town. In a walk along the bog towards Dublin, we observed the roofless walls of a superb mansion, formerly the residence of Henry Lyons, Esq., one of the representatives of the county. [River Lyons - in ruins in the 1830s and illustrated in the Penny Journal at the time.]

There are several places which bear the name of Inns or Hotels. We took up our abode at the south end of the town, at an hotel kept by Mrs. Ellis, the post-mistress. Here-after sufficient time to procure tea and coffee from Dublin had elapsed - we lived very comfortably; regaling ourselves in the meantime with excellent cream and eggs, and a joint, occasionally, of good beef or mutton. The chickens, like the generality of Irish poultry, were half starved.

Miserable Women

My bed-room was part of the Barristers' dining-room, in the palmy days of Philipstown: the sitting-room which we occupied, looked out upon the street, and the windows were frequently crowded with miserable women, carrying children upon their backs, and soliciting charity with pitiful lamentations. To relieve all was impossible-and to relieve only a few increased the number of those who begged. Under such distressing circumstances, my consolation was, that I was engaged in preparing a full and honest statement of their wretched condition, with a view to the introduction of legislative measures of relief. [Presumably the Poor Law legislation of 1838 which established the workhouses.]

Our examination began in the Court-house on the 16th November. Here, as in the other baronies we found a superabundant population - for the most part, as a matter of course, unemployed, and the wages earned by those who were sometimes fortunate enough to get work, varying from 3d. to 7d. a day, sometimes with, and sometimes without, diet. Between potato time and harvest the distress is general, and very great; and in consequence of it, fevers are prevalent. Many of the witnesses expressed a willingness to work, and declared that it was not the amount of wages they cared so much about, but employment. The children are never employed till fourteen or fifteen years of age, and then victuals is all they get for their labour.

£2 per year

Milk is a luxury. Sergeant Malone informed us, that many a man who sends his milk to the town, eats his potatoes without any; and he knew one man who had only three pints of milk in the year. The distress is considerably greater than it used to be, and was stated by more than one of the witnesses to be the chief cause of crime and mischief. The jail allowance is 9lbs. of potatoes, one pint of milk, and one pint of buttermilk per day. Young men of from sixteen to thirty years of age (called almost invariably "boys") earn from thirty to forty shillings a year as farmers' servants and these, though half naked and half starved, are far better off than the mere labourers, who are often in debt, to the amount of nine or ten pounds. Some of the labourers are, however, naturally idle and averse to work. "If it were advised," said the Rev. Mr. Hamilton, "that a cricket was to walk across the street, crowds would collect to see it."

The poor people are sadly off for bedding; they can scarcely, in fact, be in a worse condition. A family of six or seven have usually nothing but a blanket and a half to cover them; straw, for the most part, composes their bed - sometimes the bare floor. The clothes which they wear in the day serve them for the night also, for they have no change.

The dress of the labourers is what is called a "Handy Down, or outside shade," which costs 5s., or a soldier's old coat turned. To clothe a labourer in frieze, would cost twenty or thirty shillings a year; some of them possess a frieze coat for Sundays, but the generality (to use the words of a witness) "have not a stitch but what they have on their bones".

Conacre £5

Conacre prevails to a considerable extent about Philipstown [Daingean.] Manured land is charged £5 per acre, and, when seeded, £8, and will produce ten or twelve barrels (of 24 stones) per rood. The high price of conacre is accounted for by the great numbers of applicants for it, and the reason that some small farmers let it, is, that they have not capital enough to sow the whole of their farms. They are in fact so poor, that there is not half a year's rent in the hands of any one of them in the barony. Good wheat was selling for 15s. a barrel (of 20 stones) - from five to seven barrels being the produce of an acre; - yet in the event of a farm becoming vacant, great numbers, who had proved themselves unable to make their own succeed, would bid for it, and lives probably be lost in consequence. The successful competitor knows, that though he lives on "lumpers" (potatoes) alone, he is sure of having a home; hence the opposition to a new comer. A witness told us that he knew a person who had got a guinea for shooting one of these unfortunate tenants.

Tithe 1s. 4d per acre

Rents are seldom paid up-a portion generally remaining due. In bad years, no remission of rent is conceded; and when good years come, all is swallowed up, and the accumulation of capital is accordingly prevented. Thesenominal arrears were stated by a witness named Odlum, a gentleman of considerable property and experience, to present a formidable obstacle to industry - to be, in fact, "a chain round the farmer's neck." It seemed to be a general opinion, that if the tenant were relieved from tithe or cess in form, the landlord would add the amount to rent, the tithe 1s. 4d. the acre. The former is laid without reference to the quality of the land, and at an inconvenient season.

Emigration and the Bogs

The farms average from fifteen to thirty acres; some are as small as three. A farm of 100 acres; managed by ten farmers, or, in other words, divided into as many farms, would produce more, it was stated, than if in the hands of one man.

The rent of good arable land is 25s. the acre: the thin land fetches from ten to fifteen shillings; and bog, when improved, from fourteen to fifteen. Previous to the last year, great numbers emigrated, many taking with them their families; yet, in King's county alone, according to Mr. Odlum, who is well acquainted with it, there is as much bog land as would maintain a million of men; and by devoting three or four acres to a labourer, thus supplying him with a home, and providing a stimulus to industry, the surplus population would be diminished, without recourse being had to so summary a measure as emigration. Indeed, it may reasonably be asked what right we have to send multitudes from their native land, when so many thousands and tens of thousands of acres of reclaimable bog exist - not only capable of cultivation, but capable of repaying it, labour being the only capital required. It is absolute folly not to keep them in the country; and the money that would be spent in carrying them out of it, might be well applied in assisting them to prosecute their improvements.

Two or three pounds per acre is the usual price paid for tenant-right in this barony: and it is common to give seven or eight pounds for a small quantity of land, for the convenience of a home. Scarcely a landlord or agent is resident here; and it was the opinion of those who were competent to form a correct judgement on the subject, that tenants of absentee landlords are considerably worse off than those living under landlords who are resident. The lower orders in particular feel the benefit of resident landlords; and the farmers complain, not only that in the absence of both principal and agent, they receive no thanks for any improvements they make, but that they are deprived of the advantages to be derived from example and advice. "The landlord and tenant," said Mr. Odlum, whom I have had occasion to mention before, "should be like father and son; the tenant ought to be hung who would not take his landlord on his back, and carry him through."

Home made clothes

The land is principally in tillage, is greatly impoverished, and is much more frequently ploughed than formerly. On the borders of Croghan Hill, oats are sown for five or six years in succession; Mr. Morgan and Mr. Scully, two landlords in the neighbourhood, have adopted rape and turnips. The small farmers have often from one to six well bred sheep, whose wool supplies them with their frieze clothes. The home-made costs 1s. per yard, but when they buy it manufactured they are imposed upon. The wool is worth £1. per stone; that of hoggets, or sheep first shorn, is worth 23s. per stone; the weight of the fleece is from 5 to 6 lbs. From the wetness of the ground, the sheep are subject to the rot. The breed of cattle has improved of late. A witness of the name of O'Connor [probably from Kilduff] has known from £20 to £30 given for superior cows; farmers cows usually sell at from five to £12. They give ten or twelve quarts of milk a day, after calving; and, if well kept, a hundred pounds of butter in the season.

400 Beggars per day

The beggars in this district are very numerous; they sometimes pass through Philipstown, to the number of three or four hundred a day,are often tipsy, and circulate stories of malicious tendency. They shut up their houses, gamble at cockfights, and occasionally amass, by one means or another, considerable wealth. Mr. Odlum, for instance, knew a beggar who gave his daughter £100. Numbers of the labourers would have no objection to go to a workhouse, but, generally speaking, they would prefer rambling about the country-they get more money by this means than they would in a workhouse, and are of course more at liberty to indulge the propensities which a want of education, idleness, and bad habits, have engendered.

Barney Mangin

In walking over the bog, we came to a cabin occupied by Barney Mangin, the walls of which were cut out of the solid moss. The roof slopes from the front towards the back, which is level with the surface of the moss, as shown in the end-view annexed [ illustrated in Binns' book] Barney was a miserable, half-starved creature, and lived with his wife and two children in this cabin, paying for it, however, no rent. Window or chimney it had none, and the smoke found its way out at the door, and through the imperfect roof, which consisted of sods and turf. Mangin paid, last year, 20s. for one cwt.of meal on trust, when the market price was only twelve shillings. We visited also Patrick Innis, who has a farm of 40 acres, on an island on the bog, at a rent of 15s. per acre. The soil is six or seven inches deep, on a substratum of stiff clay. He digs in the wheat - that is, he sows it on the surface, and afterwards digs out the furrows to cover it, and has a better crop than if it were harrowed in. The produce is from four to five barrels of wheat, and five barrels of oats per acre. His plough was a very clumsy implement, with a patched wooden mould-board. Innis keeps five cows; but knows nothing of green crops. He told us that he should be very glad to learn, but had nobody to put him in the way. How valuable to this man, and to thousands such, might one of Blacker's pamphlets on small farms prove! [Blacker was a model farmer - estate agent. See my earlier article on the Tullamore Agriculture Show.] His mother, his wife, and thirteen children, live under his humble roof, and his boys work the farm, and assist in getting turf, of which he sends seven or eight boat-loads in the season to Dublin, by the Grand Canal, which passes close to his farm. The boat-loads are worth seven or £8 each. Tithe he has not paid for the last three years; indeed he declared that he durst not pay it, even if he wished, as his property would be burnt, in the event of his doing so.

Hopeless situation

About a mile to the south of Philipstown we visited a poor farmer who was employed in winnowing his barley in the wind. Though in rags, he had evidently seen better days. He told us that he had no money, nor indeed had any of the farmers; that the landlords would be obliged to come and manage their farms and hold the plough themselves, as the tenants would soon be destroyed; and that when he had got home at night, after working hard all day, the only food awaited his return was a dry potato, or perhaps a herring. He asked us if the looks of the farmers were not sufficient to prove how they lived; and indeed, the blue colour of his countenance, and the attenuated frame of this poor creature, abundantly attested the accuracy of what he was saying.

Casting a pitiful look at his rags, he exclaimed, "If I had known what I would have come to, I would have thanked anybody to have shot me through the head when I was young." He complained bitterly, among other things, of the unfeeling and arbitrary conduct of the tithe proctors. Far from being an uncommon case of distress, this, I am sorry to say, is but a single instance of general destitution. Some of the wretched sufferers bear their hard destiny with great fortitude;-this man's rankled at his heart. Though disposed to labour, and adapted to enterprise, he has no kind landlord to instruct and encourage him; and, hopeless of any remedy for his acute afflictions, he sees nothing before him but certain destruction, and accordingly gives himself up to bitter despair. Can it be wondered at that men, thus ignorant, degraded, oppressed, and reckless, occasionally disregard the authority of the law, and commit outrages which subject them to its severe inflictions? The wonder would be if they did not. The government of a country is greatly responsible for the crimes of the people.

On crossing the bog, we had an opportunity of experiencing the truth of some of the observations in a preceding page. Our attention was attracted by a beautiful green patch in the midst of the brown heather; and, on inquiring, we found it to be a little piece of the waste land which had been cultivated by the industry of Michael Madden. At first, he manured it for potatoes, and had a good crop; he then sowed oats and grass seeds, and had an excellent crop of oats and of hay the following year. Madden said he derived great advantage from the grass it afterwards produced, in the feeding of his goats. This was done without any outlay of the owner's, and thousands might be made happy in the same way, if the land-owners would permit the poor famishing wretches to cultivate and improve their bogs, with the locked-up capital-labour. The bright green verdure of this little plot of ground, won from the desert by the exertions of one poor man, was a beautiful sight, and gave rise to gratifying reflections. George Rait's farm

We visited the farm of George Rait, which is a large one, a few miles from Philipstown, and belongs to the Hon. William Barrock. Rait and his brother, who also occupies a considerable extent of land, came from Scotland about twenty years ago, and have devoted their time and attention, during the interval, to the prosecution of agriculture, on a system greatly superior to that which generally prevails. The farm contains 1100 acres of good loamy soil, workable in all seasons, with almost a certainty of at least an average crop. The rent is 25s., with a charge for tithe of 1s. 6d., and cess 1s. 6d. per acre. The following rotation is adopted-viz., 1st, oats from grass; 2nd, barley, without manure; 3rd, turnips or potatoes, manured; 4th, wheat, sown with equal quantities of red and white clover, and Pacey's perennial rye-grass. The land is allowed to remain in grass for three years, and the rye-grass to stand for seed; the seed being of more value than the hay. The grass is thrashed, and the seed put up in the middle of a stack well thatched; here it remains till spring. It is then well dressed, and sold to English seedsmen. The hay, or rather stalks, after the seed is thrashed out, serves for horses and bullocks, and is given along with turnips. The clover seed is sown by a machine which distributes it with much greater equality than it can be done by the hand, and is one of the greatest improvements in agriculture; being simple and cheap, it is within the reach of the small farmer. It consists of a long box with divisions, in which turns a cylinder, having small spoons upon it, th size of which can be adapted, on different cylinders, to the kind of seed and the quantity to be sown. The seed is dropped on an inclined board, nearly reaching to the ground; this board scatters the seed evenly, which is protected from the effect of the wind behind, by a sheet. This plan of sowing small seeds (so common in Norfolk and some other English counties) I had frequently recommended in Ireland, but had never found it practised, except upon this farm.

Scotch Plough

George Rait's breeding stock, though not very good, was much superior to Irish stock generally. Many sheep and bullocks were fed on turnips, and were allowed to have as many as they pleased. As soon as the potatoes are forked out, and the land harrowed, the cylinder roller is passed over it; this leaves hollows for the wheat, answering the purpose of a drill, and at the same time giving solidity. The wooden Scotch plough, with iron mould board, was used here, but iron ploughs were about to be substituted. The farm servants are allowed a certain quantity of meal and milk, and a room and fire to cook them by. The cost of their victuals was calculated at £10; they have also their lodging provided, and receive £7 in money; he whole cost of each man is therefore £17 a year. Mr. Rait has generally several agricultural pupils, who pay him handsome premiums.

He informed us that when the Board of Agriculture existed in Ireland, and allowed £4,000 a year for premiums, the gentlemen got them all, and the establishment was abandoned in consequence. Several small farmers in the immediate vicinity of George Rait's residence, have evidently profited by his example; but the fact of his improved plans of agriculture having been practised, for a period of twenty years, with but little effect, except within a circuit of three of four miles, affords a lamentable proof of the difficulty of disseminating information on this very interesting and certainly most important subject. In this instance, however, it may be in some degree accounted for by Mr. Rait's farm being so much superior to the generality, as to induce a supposition that it requires a different management from that adopted on the smaller farms.

Kept Breathing

Before leaving Philipstown let me once more advert to the condition of the people in its neighbourhood. They would work, as I have stated before, for fourpence or sixpence a day, or even less, if they could get it. The food is of the poorest description (the coarse potatoes called lumpers) and obtained in quantities barely sufficient to keep the machine of life in languid motion. To use their own words, uttered with great pathos and feeling,-"We are only just kept breathing,"-"Our eyes are only just kept open." I have witnessed scenes that would awaken commiseration in the coldest and the hardest heart, and some of these I have endeavoured to describe, faithfully, without the slightest shadow of exaggeration. I have seen young and helpless children, almost naked and without food, exposed to the cruel influences of the weather, in huts which should have afforded them protection; and I have seen old people, afflicted severely by asthmas and rheumatic attacks, lying in hovels without either window or chimney, with nothing for their bed but the bare damp floor, or a thin layer of straw. Can it, I again ask, can it surprise us, when people, habituated to such appalling wretchedness, and instigated by mingled feelings of revenge and despair, commit crimes, at the bare relation of which human nature shudders? The Irish are a patient, as well as an oppressed people, or they would not have submitted so long to the hardships they endure.

King's County has been the scene of many cruelties. A man taking a farm, from which another has been rejected, will probably find his horses without ears, or otherwise maimed, and his cattle houghed, that is, the sinews of the hinder legs cut. A grave dug near his house, with a note in it, is considered a friendly mode of warning him of his danger. If these do not produce the desired effect, they set fire to his house, or shoot him; and cruelty has been carried to such excess, that whilst the house was burning, the inhabitants have been kept in by monsters armed with pitchforks. Binns then went on to consider the situation in Tipperary - famous for its agarian troubles and its secret societies. Binns considered that the quarrels among these secret groupings are chiefly confined to catholics and have not a sectarian character. "Taking a district of twenty miles round Philipstown, not more than eight or nine Protestants have been murdered in affrays connected with religion, during the last fourteen years - and no Catholics have been murdered by protestants. The proportion of the former to the latter is about twenty to one. The Protestants, being few in number, are obliging and quiet."

Binns bade a final farewell to Daingean on the 25th of November 1836 travelling by canal boat to Tullamore forgot and staying at the canal hotel that evening. The final description of Daingean Which I want to reproduce here is that from the Parliamentary Gazetteer published in 1846 a useful survey of the whole of Ireland. The correspondent reported:
"[Daingean] consists principally of one street; but, as to both environs and interior character, it is one of the ugliest and most rueful little towns in Europe. An old doggerel couplet does it no injustice in designating it 'an odious heap:'--

"Great Bog of Allen, swallow down
That odious heap called Philipstown"

Even the impingement of the Grand Canal, which might have both enlivened and enriched it, serves just as a sufficient foil to elicit the town's unutterable dreariness. The assizes continued, till a few years ago, to be held among this bog-environed congeries of cabins; but, in consequence of sheer want of accommodation for the strangers necessarily attending them, they were obliged to be removed to Tullamore. The public buildings are a sessions house, a gaol, a barrack, an old but renovated castle two schools, a Roman Catholic chapel, and the parish church of Killaderry. The castle bears the name of Fort or Forth Castle; it was the residence of King Philip, while on a visit to the town to which he gave his name [ Philip never visited Daingean] and it was recently repaired, and is now inhabited. A dispensary in the town is within the Poor-law union of Tullamore; and, in 1839-40, it expended £129 16s.9d., and administered to 1,092 patients. A Roman Catholic parish in the diocese of Kildare and Leighlin takes name from Philipstown, and has chapels here and at Kill. A large and improving weekly market is held on Thursday, and fairs are held in the town on Jan. 3, March 28, May 15, June 24, Aug.17, Oct. 18, and Dec.3. Courts of quarter-sessions and petty-sessions are held in the town, - the latter on the second Thursday of every month. Philipstown was incorporated by charter of 12 Elizabeth; but since 1800, it has not had any corporation. The borough limits extended, on the river Ashmore; on the east, to Mount Lucas; on the south, to Ballingar; and on the west, to the boundary of the parish of Kill. The corporation consisted of 1 burgermaster 2 bailiffs 12 burgesses, and an unlimited number of freeman; but it seems to have been kept up solely for the purpose of sending two members to the Irish parliament; and, at the Legislative Union, the compensation-money for disfranchisement was paid to George, Earl of Belvidere, Robert, Earl of Lanesborough, John King Esq., and Lady Lanesborough his wife, upon the trusts of the will of Robert, then the Earl of Belvidere. Area of the town, 82 acres. Pop., in 1831, 1,454; in 1841, 1,489. Houses 234. Families employed chiefly in agriculture, 16; in manufactures and trade, 103; in other pursuits, 149. Families dependent chiefly on property and professions, 27; on the directing of labour, 118; on their own manual labour, 113; on means not specified, 10."

There is ample documentation on Daingean from the 1850s onwards and I would hope to look at this at a later date. One fascinating document is the 1901 census which provides a detailed survey of the town and the rest of the county and is currently being indexed by the Offaly Historical and Archaeological Society.