The photograph above was one of several that feature on this website that was in my grandfather's house in Killeen. No-one knew who they were, so I labelled it 'Unknown' and left it aside for many years.  Recently I had another look at it and something struck me.

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The photo shows a prosperous-looking family,  a gentleman and his three children. But where was his wife? If such a formal family photograph was being taken, surely it  would include the wife and mother, unless.....

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Could it be that his wife had died? This helped to narrow the search and sure enough, I found that Terence Brady, Bridget Brady Boyle's brother, was widowed. His 1911 Census form includes his wife Josephine, to whom he has been married for only 2 years, and his children Anne Kathleen aged 20, Mary Frances aged 16, and Terence Edward aged 15. Clearly Josephine was his second wife, and if the photo was taken before this marriage, then the ages of the children matched.

 

I was confident that I had identified the photo, but I was intrigued that an ordinary 'farmer' (as he described himself on the census form)  would look so prosperous. The details of his dwelling house were also a surprise: 13 or more rooms, 16 windows to the front of the house - a much larger house than any others occupied by family members I had researched.  Clearly Terence was not just a run-of-the-mill small farmer.

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The picture that emerges is that of a very successful businessman who is keen to make his mark and establish himself as a man of substance, both in his home community and in his adopted city. He plays a prominent part as a civic leader and benefactor, yet there are signs that he was overtaken by the momentous changes that occurred in Ireland . There's still a lot to research about his activities and achievements, so this is still work in progress...

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Business success

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Terence was the youngest of the six children of  Terence2 Brady and Mary O'Reilly (born 3 March 1866). He emigrated to Liverpool in his early twenties, and appears in records of the time as a 'wine and spirit merchant', 'commercial traveller' or 'brewer's agent'.

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Liverpool was a busy city, a major port for the cotton and wool trade of the north of England, and had a large Irish population stretching back for a number of generations.  A massive influx of destitute and starving Irish due to the famine of the 1840s created an impoverished ghetto and a sectarian divide that existed well into the 20th century. But for a young man with energy and ambition, it offered endless opportunities and it seems that Terence seized these with relish.

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In the 1891 census, he is at 73 Old Hall St, in the centre of Liverpool, with the occupation of Licensed Victualler. Although in Ireland, 'victualler' usually refers to a butcher, elsewhere a licensed victualler, is a formal name for the landlord of a public house or similar licensed establishment, and this address is that of a pub called the Eagle Vaults. At the same address are his wife, Ann, daughter Ann K (aged 1 month) and a visitor, Philip Brady, aged 29 - almost certainly his brother.

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Three years later, Terence is listed as the landlord of the Wheatsheaf Inn, at 180-184 Scotland Rd.  By 1900 this pub is occupied by a Patrick Finnegan, and Philip Brady has taken over the Eagle Vaults at Old Hall St. Meanwhile Terence seems to have moved to the Globe Hotel at 309 Scotland Rd, though he is no longer living 'over the shop'. - he has moved out to the suburbs, a sign that he was doing well. 

 

In a street directory of the time he is listed as an agent of  Edinburgh brewers John Jeffrey & Co,  which had a large export trade and tied trade in Scotland and northern England, But the next entry is also for Terence Edward Brady, victualler, 309 Scotland Rd, Liverpool. It appears that he is in business on his own account, running a pub in a densely packed, almost entirely Irish, part of the city, while also engaged in what appears to be the wholesale drinks trade.

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309 Scotland Road was the location of the Globe Hotel [https://www.closedpubs.co.uk/lancashire/liverpool_l5_globe.html ] (probably not an hotel in the modern sense; the term was used for grandiose Victorian gin palaces which may also have offered some accommodation. It was directly across the street from St. Anthony's Catholic Church, now one of only two catholic churches in the area, but at one time there were 17. The church would have been good for after-Mass business, but the competition was fierce- the area was known for having a pub on every street corner. At the beginning of the 20th century there were reputed to be 246 pubs on Scotland Road and its immediate vicinity, or one pub for every 156 people.. The last one closed in 2022.

 

The area is now desolate and lifeless, but in Terence's time, it was the centre of a bustling Irish immigrant community. "Scotland Road was distinct not just culturally, but also politically... from 1875 Liverpool’s Irish Nationalist Party had developed a stable foundation on continuous electoral victories in two “Irish” wards, Scotland and Vauxhall. In addition... in 1887, core ‘Catholic’ streets in the Scotland Road area such as Lace Street, Crosbie Street and Marybone were described as ‘as Irish as any part of Dublin’. The first generation of ‘Liverpool Irish’, though born in England, still identified with their parents’ native land"[Roberts, 2018].

 

There is scope for more research on Terence's business interests, as it is unlikely that he would have made his fortune from just a single pub. It's [possible that he owned or managed several hostelries, or became involved in other lines of business. And he was not the first or last Irishman to use the drinks trade as a stepping stone to a career in politics. On his arrival in Liverpool he would have known of 'Dandy Pat' Byrne, who owned over twenty pubs and hotels, including many on Scotland Road, and who made a name for himself in the rough-and-tumble of Liverpool local politics. As we shall see, Terence achieved a high level of social standing both in the Liverpool Irish community and back home in Ireland.

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Family

Just a few years after arriving in Liverpool, in 1890 he married Anne Kilcoyne from Scotland Road, a daughter of Irish immigrants. By 1901, when he was 35, Terence and Anne have three children, Anne Kathleen (born 1891), Mary Frances (1894) and Terence Edward Jnr (1896). They are living in a respectable middle-class area of the city at 70 Yewtree Road, Walton-on-the-Hill. The house no longer exists (possibly due to bomb damage in WW2) but the nearby houses that survive are large detached Victorian villas He is still described as a brewer's agent, but as an employer - whether this meant that he had staff working for him, or that he was self-employed is not made clear. 

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Civic duties

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In addition to his business activities, he quickly became involved in civic affairs. Newspaper accounts from 1895 refer to his election to the Select Vestry, though he was not yet 30. Although the term harks back to ancient church governance, in Liverpool and a few other places it survived into the days of modern local government. The Select Vestry was responsible for the administration of the Poor Law in the city, what today would be the Social Services Department.

 

In the middle and later 19th century it still had a quasi-religious tone, the dominant view being that too generous publicly-funded support for the poor and destitute would only encourage idleness and dependence. The influx of impoverished Irish immigrants, especially after the Famine of the 1840s, (nearly 300,000 'paupers' arrived in Liverpool in 1847 alone) heightened tensions and sharpened the existing anti-Irish and anti-Catholic sentiments of the ratepaying classes.

 

Local government at the time was viewed by the Irish Catholic community as inimical to their interests, so it made concerted efforts to organise itself in alliance with the Liberals to overturn the Conservative majority and secure representation on public bodies such as the Select Vestry. Terence Brady was elected to this body in 1895, and continued to serve on it for many years, including a term as chairman. 

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In this period, the main responsibility of the Select Vestry was the administration of the workhouse system. Nowadays regarded as a cruel and inhumane system of poor relief, it was then the main means of public support for the destitute, apart from private charities. The Select Vestry also had  responsibilities for public health, including vaccinations and data gathering. Terence would undoubtedly think of his work as beneficial, especially to the Irish community of Liverpool who were the main recipients of the support offered.

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From the time of Terence's arrival in Liverpool until his retirement, the most prominent politician there was T.P. O'Connor. He was a Member of the Westminster parliament for almost 50 years, all but five of those representing the Liverpool Scotland constituency. He had the distinction of being the only Irish nationalist MP ever to be elected to a constituency outside of the island of Ireland. Even after the demise of the Home Rule movement and the parties that supported it to which he belonged, and the establishment of the Irish Free State in 1922, he continued to be elected unopposed by the Irish community in Liverpool. 

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As another prominent Irishman in the city, Terence must have had considerable dealings with O'Connor, and this relationship would merit further research. His support for O'Connor is apparent in a newspaper report from 1900 where he is on the platform with O'Connor at a meeting of his supporters, and Terence proposed the motion endorsing him. The Irish political machine was very powerful in Liverpool, and there is scope for much more research on Terence Brady's role in it. 

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Another activity that engaged him was the campaign to build a Catholic cathedral in Liverpool, the most Catholic city in England due to the massive Irish post-famine immigration. More pressing concerns - building parish churches and schools meant that the early plans from the 1850s had come to nothing, but by the 1920s the idea of a Cathedral was mooted again. 

 

A suitable site was found on Brownlow Hill. The Poor Law Institution or Work House there had been a shelter for Liverpool's destitute from 1771 until 1928 when the revision of the Poor Laws brought the property on to the market. This was the very institution that would have been the focus of Terence Brady's attention as a member of the Select Vestry. One wonders to what extent his experience and influence contributed to the decision of the church to purchase the site for the new cathedral.  However, the purchase was not without opposition in the sectarian atmosphere of Liverpool. The voice of militant Protestantism, Rev Harry Longbottom declared "I would sooner have a poison germ factory than a Roman Catholic cathedral on the site. After all, a poison germ factory can at worst only poison the body...such a cathedral would poison the mind as well" [1]. Nevertheless, the site was acquired for the new cathedral.

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Terence is described in newspaper reports at his death as "one of the founders of the new cathedral", and he seems to have contributed generously in time and money towards its completion.

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Sir Edward Lutyens, a leading architect of the day was chosen to design it, and substantial funs were collected. Lutyens' design was intended to create a massive structure that would have become the second-largest church in the world, with the world's largest dome. Terence lived to see construction work started on the cathedral in 1933, but it was never finished. World War II and spiralling costs put an end to the project. In the 1960s, a much-scaled back building was erected on the site. Though not as grandiose as the original plans, the actual cathedral has attracted much praise, as well as derision, disparagingly called 'Paddy's Wigwam'.

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At some point in the early 1900s, Terence and family move to an even larger home, in Oakhill Park, Old Swan, and this remains his Liverpool base for the rest of his life. Although the area has since been redeveloped, when the Bradys moved there it consisted of large Victorian villas set in extensive gardens, as can be seen from the map. His address was initially  'Hawthorn House, Oakhill Park'.  Later it is 'Leinster House' Oakhill Park, and in newspaper reports at the time of his death in 1934, the address of his son, also Terence Edward, is Hawthorne House. If these are indeed two different houses, it seems that he has given the original Hawthorne to his son and purchased or rented another house in the same estate; presumably he has renamed the house to 'Leinster'  reflecting his Irish background,. 

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But in 1904, Annie, aged 38, dies.  This may have been the catalyst that led to a change of direction in Terence's life.

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