The Loyal National Repeal Association was founded in 1841 by Irish politician Daniel O'Connell (1775-1847), the leader of the movement for the repeal of the Act of Union (1800) between Great Britain and Ireland. Through a central administration in Dublin, the organization sought to demonstrate overwhelming popular support for Repeal to the British Government. O'Connell fostered mass participation in the organization at local and national levels through meetings, speeches, establishment of Repeal reading rooms throughout Ireland, and in fundraising and mobilization of the electorate. He declared 1843 "Repeal Year" and began a series of large-scale public demonstrations, popularly referred to as "monster meetings". The British Government banned a critical meeting at Clontarf, near Dublin, in October 1843 and arrested and imprisoned O'Connell and several colleagues for sedition. Upon his release the following year O'Connell tried to revive the Repeal campaign, claiming he would achieve repeal in only six months. When this promise was not kept, O'Connell's power began to diminish. By 1846 the organization had lost its political influence as O'Connell's health declined and the Irish public turned its attention from Repeal to the economic and social catastrophe of the Great Famine.

Thomas Mathew Ray (1801-1881) was Secretary of Daniel O'Connell's Precursor Society, 1838-1840, and held the same post for the Loyal National Repeal Association throughout its existence, writing nearly all the association's correspondence. He was arrested and charged with sedition, along with O'Connell and several others, in 1843. He was convicted, but the decision was reversed on appeal the following year.

Sources:

Boase, Frederic. Modern English Biography, Vol. 3. London: Frank Cass, 1965.

Connolly, S.J., ed. Oxford Companion to Irish History, 2nd edition. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002.

Crone, John S., ed. Concise Dictionary of Irish Biography. Dublin: The Talbot Press.

Fitzpatrick, William J. History of the Dublin Catholic Cemeteries. Dublin: 1900.

Hickey, D.J. and J.E. Doherty, eds. New Dictionary of Irish History from 1800, 2 nd edition. Dublin: Gill and Macmillan, 2003

O'Connell, Maurice R., ed. Correspondence of Daniel O'Connell. Vol. 5, 1833-1836. Dublin: Irish University Press for the Irish Manuscripts Commission, 1972.