Moore Institute Postdoctoral Researcher Receives IRC Award

Dr. Orla Power has been awarded a two year Irish Research Council (formerly IRCHSS) Postdoctoral Fellowship at the Department of History, Trinity College Dublin. Orla completed her PhD here at the Moore Institute under the supervision of Prof. Nicholas Canny. During this time she examined the ways in which a group of Irish Catholic merchant families financed their sugar plantations at the Danish island of St. Croix during the Seven Years’ War. This was made possible through their involvement in the British and Danish sugar and slave trades. Presenting themselves as legitimate traders, they were also highly efficient intra-imperial smugglers and amassed considerable fortunes. During her term at TCD, Orla plans to conduct fresh archival work into these Irish families and to show how their sugar and slaving enterprises also encompassed French and Spanish regions. By approaching the Atlantic sugar and slave trades from the perspective of the trans-imperial Irish merchant, Orla’s research will highlight the dynamism of the eighteenth century Irish kinship network as it organised complex commercial ventures between several European states, North America, Africa and the Caribbean region.