I think I'm wrong on that point - this interesting Irish site I just found gives 1915 as the date the tenor banjo was invented. But it also says that "Up to the turn of the 19th century, banjos were plucked and strummed by the fingers," and pictures from that time confirm that to have been the case.

Banjos were extremely popular in England around that time - as evidenced by Kipling's "Song of the Banjo"