I'm working on a Victoria assassinated in 1840 / Ernest Augustus takes the throne TL, and I'm wondering how feasible an industrialisation of Ireland is in that context.
Land reform could continue in Ireland, with preference given to English manufacturers who would be "creating jobs", but reforms in education would be stopped in their tracks.
Does anyone have any opinions about how plausible this is?
Also, 1851, George V takes the throne, and being completely blind he relies heavily on his courtiers, anyone have any ideas as to how well a king so easily influenced could be used as a tool for the far right in parliament and international affairs?
- Ireland in 1850 was reeling from the famine, population was down about two million, and emigration the only escape for many.
- English parliament had been divided, over the corn laws in particular, between representatives of the aristocratic landowning classes, who championed a dislike for the social effects of indutrialisation, and the new and increasingly powerful manufacturers, whose need for labourers undermined the landowners' authority.
- Irish home rule was an incessant thorn in England's side.
- Ernest Augustus, as Duke of Armagh, was a founding member of the Orange Order, a true supremacist and a die-hard conservative.
Land reform could continue in Ireland, with preference given to English manufacturers who would be "creating jobs", but reforms in education would be stopped in their tracks.
Does anyone have any opinions about how plausible this is?
Also, 1851, George V takes the throne, and being completely blind he relies heavily on his courtiers, anyone have any ideas as to how well a king so easily influenced could be used as a tool for the far right in parliament and international affairs?