The Local Studies Library acquired copies of a collection of land records from the 19^th and the early decades of the 20^th century. These digitised copies of original records provide fascinating documentary evidence of the change in land ownership in Ireland, as tenants moved from renting land from landlords to gradually purchasing their own farms after the emergence of the various Land Acts. The collection consists of numerous records, such as mortgages, conveyances, indentures and lease agreements relating to the McCarthy, Cronin and O’Connell families who leased land in Ballymacandrick, near Aghada during the 19^th and early 20^th centuries.

1830s-1840s

The oldest document in the collection consists of a lease agreement from 1831 signed by Michael McCarthy who lived at Ballymacandrick, and his landlord William O’Brien, 2^nd Marquess of Thomond of Rostellan Castle. This original lease is a fascinating example of the tenantry agreements that existed in the early 19^th century.

The Marquesses of Thomond also held the title of Earls of Inchiquin. Since the 17^th century, they owned large estates across the country, with 40,000 acres in county Clare, 10,000 acres in county Limerick and over 15,000 acres in county Cork.The Marquess of Thomond William O’Brien held extensive lands in east Cork consisting of nearly 9,000 acres. He is listed as a principal landlord in the Griffith’s Valuation of 1852 in the civil parishes of Kilmacdonogh, Aghada, Ballintemple, Cloyne, Corkbeg, Garranekinnefeake, Inch, Rostellan, and also in the village of Ballymacoda, in the barony of Imokilly. A few years later, the fortunes of the Thomonds changed as the titles of Marquess of Thomond and Earl Inchiquin were discontinued due to the lack of a male heir.  In 1855, after the death of the last Marquess James O’Brien, the vast estates in Clare, Limerick and Cork were sold and the Cork estates were advertised for sale in December of 1857 by the Encumbered Estates Commission. (source: www.landedestates.ie/family/2094-O’Briens of Inchiquin. Accessed 12th December 2025)

1850s-1910s

Subsequently the Thackwell family of Aghada Hall became the landlords for tenants in Ballymacandrick, and there is a lease agreement in the archive dating from 1859 between William Cronin and Joseph Thackwell. Lieutenant General Joseph Thackwell (1781-1859) was a British Army Officer who fought during the Napoleonic Wars, serving with with the 15^th Hussars in the Peninsular War. He lost his left arm at the Battle of Waterloo in 1815.

Joseph Thackwell married Maria Audriah Roche, the eldest daughter of Francis Roche of Rochemount in 1825. During the 1840s he was posted to India during the First and Second Anglo-Sikh Wars. After retirement from the British Army, he bought Aghada Hall in 1853 when the house was put up for sale in the Encumbered Estates Courts. Joseph Thackwell passed away on 8^th April 1859 within a week of signing the tenant lease agreement with Willian Cronin. His great grandson Walter Joseph de Rupe Thackwell appears in later lease agreements in the archive.

During the latter decades of the 19th century and the early 20th century, land ownership in Ireland radically changed as land was redistributed through a series of land acts, culminating in the Land Purchase (Ireland) Act 1903 also known as the Wyndham Act. This resulted in the tenant purchase of land as Irish tenants moved from paying rent to landlords to acquiring their own land facilitated through financial loans. There is an example in the documents of tenants in Ballymacandrick purchasing land via mortgages from their landlord Walter Joseph de Rupe Thackwell. In a conveyance from 1908, Michael Connell and Timothy McCarthy agreed to purchase land under the Land Purchase Act 1903 at a judicial rent of £108:15:0. The bank slips from the Munster and Leinster banks detailing various repayments on the financial loans are also included in the family archive.

In subsequent decades, the annuities on these loans were abolished for famers across the country after the Economic War of 1932-1938.

The Local Studies Library would like to extend our sincere gratitude to the O’Connell family for donating digital copies to our Local Studies Digital Library.