In Irish history, an informal secret
agreement in Apr 1882 that secured the
release of the nationalist Charles Parnell
from Kilmainham jail, Dublin, where he had
been imprisoned for six months for supporting
Irish tenant farmers who had joined the Land
League's campaign for agricultural reform.
The British government realized that Parnell
could quell violence more easily out of
prison than in it. In return for his release,
he agreed to accept the Land Act of 1861. The
Kilmainham treaty marked a change in British
policy in Ireland from confrontation to
cooperation, with the government attempting
to conciliate landowners and their tenants,
who were refusing to pay rent. This strategy
was subsequently threatened by the Phoenix
Park murders.