Virtual slave labour in the great houses

MUCH has been said about the Government’s financial intentions towards Lissadell House. However, very little has been written about why these ‘great’ houses were built and run as virtual ‘mini Englands’ in pre-independence and, indeed, post-independence Ireland.

My grandmother worked in one such great house near Dublin in the early 1920s. She was paid the princely sum of €3 a year and had the joyous luxury of having every fourth Sunday off. This was slave labour, or indentured servitude, masquerading as servant labour.

The labour camp mood of many great houses was manifested in the high walls to keep ’mini-England’ safe against the restless natives.