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extracted from the Appletree Press title Hiring Fairs and Market Places by May Blair.
COUNTY TYRONEAnd the first money ever he got, he got thirty-one shillings for four pigs in Fintona fair and he told me he was shaking hands with himself. And he got a pound a month out of the creamery. If he got 22s 6d you’d think he’d got a tall hat.County Tyrone, like most of Ulster, was linen country in the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. Weaving occupied at least half of the male population, some full-time and the rest during slack times in the farming year, for most farmhouses had a loom which was constantly in use during the winter months. The farm (which seldom exceeded twenty acres) provided the food, and the loom provided the money for the landlord’s rent and hopefully a few small luxuries for the family. Markets and fairs were held in almost every town and village in the county. Some, like Fintona, started off with four in the early days and other places like Gortin, Fivemiletown and Sixmilecross had just one. By 1800 one of Fintona’s old fairs had ceased to exist but twelve more were granted by George III at that time making fifteen in all. According to Pynnar’s 1619 survey, 2000 acres called Fentonagh were allotted to John Leigh Esq. who lived in ‘a good large stone house within a bawn of lyme and stone.’ Near the bawn there was a village of eight houses which grew into the town of Fintona. The markets were noted for the quantity of oatmeal sold at them and the fortnightly brown linen markets which attracted buyers from the bleach greens of Counties Londonderry and Antrim. Other goods were on offer too. Customs ranging from one penny to fourpence were due to the lord of the manor on every item sold. Fairs held on Saints’ Days were said to bring out the idle and dissipated and to offer temptation to the idler. The number of fair days in Fintona, it was said ‘could advantageously be curtailed as tending only to riot and disturbance and being profitable only to the spirit dealer and distiller.’ In nearby Dromore it was a similar story. According to records the quantity of whiskey drunk in Dromore in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries was quite disproportionate to the number of inhabitants. The town had no hotel, nor was it patronised by any post conveyance but out of forty-four tradesmen’s houses nineteen were spirit shops. However farmers in the area were said to live comfortably having plenty of beef and bacon and an abundance of tame and wild fowl besides a great variety of vegetables. The labouring class on the other hand could barely afford potatoes, and ate mainly oaten bread, flummery and stirabout. Cooking was done over an open fire. Fuel was plentiful in Tyrone. The mountains and bogs provided plenty of hard black turf which in some cases was supplied free of charge. Others paid half a crown to five shillings for a day’s cutting. In Tyrone the settlers were brought over by families such as the Abercorns and the Hamiltons who proceeded to build towns like Strabane, Newtownstewart and Omagh. The settlers formed the nucleus of each new town. Fairs and markets were established soon after. In those days these towns had just two, four and six small fairs respectively in the year. By the nineteenth century all three towns had twelve fairs. The weekly markets were well supplied not only with linen but with many other articles of provision. Everything had its allotted space in each town. In Omagh, for example, corn and potatoes were sold in Brooke Street, sheep at the front of the Infirmary and at the corner of Church Street, cattle between the church and the Presbyterian meeting house and pigs in the open space near the courthouse. You could have bought a good horse at the Dublin end of the town at that time for under £20. The goods manufactured in Omagh included hats and shoes and there were two tanneries. There was a gaol as well as the courthouse mentioned above. In the four years after 1829 no executions took place but thirty-four people were transported for life, five for fourteen years and ninety-four for seven years. There is no record of how many returned. Hiring took place in all these towns. Labourers’ wages in the nineteenth century were small at tenpence a day in winter – a shilling in summer. Extracted from the Appletree Press title Hiring Fairs and Market Places by May Blair. Forthcoming extracts regarding County Tyrone: Part 2 Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 |
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