by Liam Timmins, 2024/25 student
My research journey began by firstly finding who wrote the letter, who was it addressed to, and when was it written. The ‘Dunraven’ written on the back page was an obvious clue who wrote it, and by Googling ‘Dunraven cigarette business’ I realized it was likely the 4th Earl with some articles indicating his association with the industry. Anna-Maria with the Special Collections informed me the letter was addressed to a ‘Fitz’, which I guessed could be a FitzGerald. By looking through Dunraven’s Wikipedia, I noticed he had a FitzGerald son-in-law, the 27th Knight of Glin. The letter was clearly dated to April 15 in the text, but the year was not apparent. Admittedly I spent some time in the Dunraven Papers attempting to find my assigned letter, before realising it was contained in the Glin Papers. The archival description of the document confirmed the correspondence was between the 4th Earl and 27th Knight of Glin and estimated the year to be 1905. Additionally the Glin Papers offered some information on their relationship, helping provide some context to this letter.
Over the following weeks, I continued transcribing the letter to understand its context and the people mentioned. Meanwhile I found Michael Spillane’s PhD thesis on the 4th Earl of Dunraven which was a valuable source throughout my project, which also reinforced my existing suspicion on the 1905 year. The ‘1905’ conclusion may still be correct given the evidence, or otherwise it may have been incorrectly recorded or the wrong archival punctuation marks were used.
Another difficulty I faced during this research project was that I could find no reference to this cigarette company anywhere outside of this letter. I could not find any other documents referencing this company in the Dunraven, Glin or Ballingal/Travers archives. The 4th Earl’s autobiography ‘Past Times and Pastimes’ does not mention this particular company, while he does mention his tobacco production and his cigarette factory. My conclusion is that this hypothetical company was never formed as it would be unusual for Dunraven to form the later Adare Cigarette Company in 1912 if he was a major investor in a previous or existing cigarette company.
To determine who were the proposed board mentioned by their surnames, I attempted to find an association between them and Dunraven, if they were alive when the letter was written, and if they were prominent business owners or households in the country or Limerick Dunraven would likely approach. I discovered ‘Ballingal’ to be Robert Rennie Ballingal, Dunraven’s land agent through Liam Hayes’ blog discussing a threat letter sent to Adare Manor. ‘Sir T. Lipton’ was found through Cambridge Dictionary of Irish Biography which directly mentions Thomas Lipton’s political and sporting associations with Dunraven. I also used the dictionary to find Sir. John Arnott, the founder of Arnott Department Stores, although he died by 1898 so instead Dunraven may have approached his eldest son Sir. John Alexander Arnott mentioned in the dictionary’s description.
I discerned that the proposed board members local to Limerick would have to be significant businessowners in the county during the early twentieth century. ‘Beauchamp’ and ‘Cleeve’ were found in the Wikipedia article for the Condensed Milk Factory of Ireland to be William Beauchamp and Thomas Cleeve, some of the most prominent employers in Limerick city during that period and likely candidates Dunraven would approach to establish a company. I initially found Charles Barrington through the Cambridge Dictionary which noted his brother John as my best guess for that person.
Ironically ‘Mr. Bailey’, mentioned five times in the letter, was the most difficult to distinguish. I initially assumed it was William Fredrick Bailey, born at Castletown Conyers who could reasonably be tied to Dunraven through his involved with the Land Commission. Later I discovered the ‘Bailey’ family who purchased Plassey House and later found a Straits Budget article discussing the legacy of ‘Mr.’ William W. Bailey. Admittedly ‘Mr. Bailey’ could be either of these persons, but my conclusion of it being more likely W.W. Bailey was determined as he was potentially settled in Limerick at this time and, having his capital and knowledge in enterprise, would be a more likely candidate for Dunraven to cooperate with forming a cigarette company.
Please note all student submissions have been edited where necessary for accuracy and clarity.
