Horace Plunkett
Irish politician (1854-1932)
Sir Horace Curzon Plunkett (24 October 1854 – 26 March 1932), was an Anglo-Irish agricultural reformer, pioneer of agricultural cooperatives and author. In politics, he had been elected as a Unionist MP, but later became a supporter of a form of Home Rule and served for a year as a senator in the Irish Free State.
Plunkett, a younger brother of John Plunkett, 17th Baron of Dunsany, was a member of the Congested Districts Board for Ireland for over 27 years, founder of the Recess Committee and the Irish Agricultural Organisation Society (IAOS), vice-president (operational head) of the Department of Agriculture and Technical Instruction (DATI) for Ireland (predecessor to the Department of Agriculture) from October 1899 to May 1907, Unionist MP for South Dublin in the House of Commons of the United Kingdom from 1892 to 1900, and Chairman of the Irish Convention of 1917–18. In 1919 he founded the Irish Dominion League, aiming to keep Ireland united. In 1922 he became a member of the first formation of Seanad Éireann, the upper chamber in the Parliament of the new Irish Free State. He has been described as a Christian socialist.
Family and background
Plunkett was born in Sherborne, Gloucestershire, England, the third son of Admiral Edward Plunkett, the 16th Baron of Dunsany, of Dunsany Castle, Dunsany, near Dunshaughlin, County Meath, and the Honourable Anne Constance Dutton (d. 1858; daughter of John Dutton, 2nd Baron Sherborne). Raised in County Meath, Plunkett was Anglo-Irish, being of a Church of Ireland and unionist background, educated at Eton College and University College, Oxford, of which he became an honorary fellow in 1909.
His older brother was John Plunkett, 17th Baron of Dunsany and a distant cousin was George Noble Plunkett, a Catholic, a Papal Count and father of Joseph Plunkett, one of the signatories of the Proclamation of the Irish Republic and a leader of the Easter Rising of 1916.
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Chronology provides the most reliable spine for this subject; interpretation should follow only after identities and dates are secure. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 6, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q3140471. VIAF identifies the subject as 55201998. The Library of Congress control number is n84036463. 3 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1854, 1932, 1899 and 1907.
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