Hubert de Burgh-Canning, 2nd Marquess of Clanricarde

Who was Hubert de Burgh-Canning, 2nd Marquess of Clanricarde?

Hubert George de Burgh-Canning, 2nd Marquess of Clanricarde, was an Anglo-Irish ascendancy nobleman and politician.

He was the son of Ulick de Burgh, 1st Marquess of Clanricarde and his wife Harriet, daughter of British Prime Minister George Canning. He was unmourned in Ireland, where he had a reputation as one of the worst and most repressive absentee landlords in the country. His estate in Portumna, County Galway, comprising 52,000 acres, yielded 25,000 sterling yearly in rents paid by 1,900 tenants, and was a main target during the 1887 Plan of Campaign fought for fair rents by the Irish Parliamentary Party. Clanricarde's opposition was so obdurate that a minister commented: "... what right has Clanricarde to be treated better than a lunatic or an orphan?" The estate papers contain letters from the Earl which provide ample evidence of his heartless attitude. His land agent John Blake was murdered in 1882 and in 1888 the Earl wrote to Chief Secretary Balfour "the western Irish cannot be kept up to their contracts without the threat of eviction." From 1891 onwards the Congested Districts Board attempted to compulsorily purchase the estate but were not successful until 1915.