SNIPPET: In Leitrim, all the landed gentry, such as the SLACKES of Annadale lived in some style. Captain William SLACKE acquired the property that once belonged to the Church in the townland and parish of Kiltubrid in 1699. Here on the monastic site, the main branch of the SLACKE family was to reside for a many years. It encompassed the townlands of Kiltubrid, Drumhubrid, Corglass, Leitrim, Aughrim, and part of Drumcong. At one time it was approximately 500 acres in size, bordered by the Slieve an Iarainn mountain one side and the beautiful Lough Scur on the other; while mostly poor-quality land it was ideal for hunting and fishing. It is believed that Captain SLACKE lived in a section of the old, well-built monastery and that Kiltubrid House was probably built in the early 1760s as a home for William SLACKE, his grandson, and his young bride Angel Anna SLACKE. Captain William SLACKE had married Susanna CROFTON of Mohill and they had five children: Randal, Ebenzer, William, Susanna and Anne. Captain SLACKE died in 1729. It appears that his daughter, Susanna, and her husband, Lancelot LAWDER, lived on the Kiltubrid property until the latter died circa 1754. They had no children. In 1763, Randal willed the property to his nephew Robert, son of his brother, William. But Robert died while still a child and so his sister, Angel Anna, inherited the property. She married her first cousin, William SLACKE, in 1764, when she was just 16 years old and Kiltubrid House was renamed "Annadale" in her honour. Angel Anna SLACKE kept a diary at irregular intervals between 1785 and 1796, and some of her letters have survived. Her father died when she was seven so she spent much of her childhood with her cousin, the Countess of Roscommon, or with her uncle, James WILKINSON, who lived near Swords in Co. Dublin. She used her uncle's extensive library to educate herself and to develop a taste for the more serious authors. When in Dublin, she enjoyed the high life and the theaters. Over the years Annadale welcomed many visitors including William GORE, member of parliament for Leitrim who normally lived in Torkington in Wales but used Annadale as his base whenever he came to the county to canvass before election time. The 1790s were difficult years for all the landed gentry of the county. Ireland was extremely disturbed, with the native Irish living in severe poverty and burdened with having to pay rent to the landlords, dues to priests and tithes to an Established Church to which they did not belong. As well, in 1793 it was widely believed that men would be torn away from their homes and families, forced to join the new militia and be transported to the Continent to fight England's wars. People were desperate and the "Defenders" was formed. The big houses were their first target and were raided regularly for arms. Poverty made them bold, and Mrs. SLACKE wrote in her diary, "They gather in multitudes around us every night, with pipes and fifes they parade from our avenue to Lanty SLACKE's bridge; their place of consultation is the Mass house. What they mean is yet a secret." She wrote, "I have heard the strokes of the hatchet from ten till two at night felling some of my husband's timber, some of which grew near the house, of which they formed handles for spears, pikes and forks. Annadale House was raided several times for weapons. Years later, Angel Anna SLACKE's granddaughter would write in her memoirs of those times, "Although flowers were beautiful and unusually plentiful, food was scarce, few crops had been put down in the spring and the poor misguided, ignorant people were in many places starving." The poverty in Co. Leitrim worsened during the 1800s, mainly because of the alarming increase in the population. It is estimated that there were under 4,000 people in the parish of Kiltubrid in 1800, but by 1846 this had doubled, and in 1828 the parish priest, John MAGUIRE, wrote to the Daniel O'CONNELL-led Catholic Association pleading that the "people of this poor parish" were unable to pay the Catholic Rent. In 1844, John DUKE, a doctor based in Mohill, reported to the Devon Commission on the plight of the people: "They are not able to pay their rents, and they are lying naked and in such a state that it would hardly be believed. They have no bedstead, they are lying on a small quantity of straw, sometimes rushes; they have no covering over them, or one blanket among six. But I generally see one bed for the old couple and the rest of the family generally lie on the ground. It is lamentable to see their state, to which, above all other things, I attribute to the fever that prevails to a frightening extent. With respect to food it is never better than potatoes and milk in the summer, and in winter they have not the milk. Sometimes they get a herring and stirabout but latterly they have not been able to get that." Many families were driven from their homes. Years earlier, in an after-Mass meeting in Annadale in 1795, one of the "Defenders" had told the people gathered there, "We have lived long enough on potatoes and salt, it is our turn now to eat beef and mutton," but 50 years later they were worse off than ever. In 1847, the Famine struck with full force. The potato crop of 1846 had failed due to blight. The people starved, many dying from hunger, typhus, fever and other diseases associated with malnutrition. Some went to the workhouses; others, who could, emigrated. The ambitious program to build a canal linking the Shannon and the Erne began in June, 1846, Lough Scur was to be the high point of the canal with water flowing in both directions from it. During the Famine, this project served as relief work, but many were too weak to work. Indeed, there were those of the landed gentry who were distressed by the poverty around them and tried to help. Randal Thomas SLACKE of Annadale, who had studied law, advised and represented his tenants and neighbors at the court sessions in Carrick-on-Shannon, Mohill, and Ballinamore and was generally sensitive to the plight of his tenants. Despite the fact that he was respected and had a good standing in the community, however, he did receive a letter from the suffering threatening him with the fate of Lord Leitrim (CLEMENTS) if he didn't "dale fair" with them. (Lord Leitrim, one of the most notorious of the landlords, had been assassinated two years earlier and Randal SLACKE gave five pounds at that time towards a reward for the conviction of his killers). Randal SLACKE and his wife Susan did play a full part in the life of the county. Mrs. SLACKE donated produce for the Harvest Thanksgiving in Drumshanbo, attended meetings of the Orphan Society and helped at sales of work in Ballinamore, and her husband contributed to the memorial fund for Reverend A. HYDE, grandfather of Douglas HYDE. In July, 1883, Randal SLACKE died and his wife outlived him by 20 years. By the late 1880s, most of the big houses in the Kiltubrid area were vacant and their lands leased. Landlordism was on the decline but members of the SLACKE family remained with an easy relationship with most of their tenants and neighbors and still enjoyed a good social and recreational life.