Massacre in West Cork (28 page)

57
Roger Casement was hanged for treason in 1916 by the British government after he was captured in County Kerry during a failed attempt to land German weapons in the days before the Easter Rising. He was a renowned human rights activist and exposed genocide in the Congo and South America in the early years of the twentieth century.

58
‘Tom Casement to J. C. Smuts’, 30 May 1921, in Van der Poel, J. (ed.),
Selections from the Smuts Papers
(Cambridge, 1973), vol. 5, pp. 83–5, quoted in Shaw, G., 2012, ‘The Casement brothers, Ireland and South Africa’,
Southern African-Irish Studies
4, series 2, no. 1, pp. 15–24. Van der Poel suggests that the communication was at the request of de Valera.

59
See BMH WS 994, George Berkley, p. 131 footnote, and BMH WS 1769, P. J. Little, pp. 64–5, for Moore’s contacts with Smuts.

60
National Archives, Kew, CAB 23/22/15, ‘Cabinet conclusion’, 30 September 1920.

61
For an example of the anti-war view in Britain it is hard to beat Martin, H., 1921,
Ireland in Insurrection, an Englishman’s Record of Fact
(London, D. O’Connor). Asquith had good cause to ‘dig the knife into’ Lloyd George, whom he believed had manoeuvred him out of the prime ministry in 1915.

62
Chamberlain, A. and Self, R. C., 1995,
The Austen Chamberlain Diary Letters: the correspondence of Sir Austen Chamberlain with his sisters Hilda and Ida, 1916–1937
(London, Cambridge University Press), p. 170.

63
Ibid
., pp. 166, 170.

64
Southern Star
, 18 June 1920, p. 2, col. 2, where Smuts outlines his aims at the dock in Southampton.

65
The 1926 Balfour Declaration states, ‘They are autonomous Communities within the British Empire, equal in status, in no way subordinate one to another in any aspect of their domestic or external affairs, though united by a common allegiance to the Crown, and freely associated as members of the British Commonwealth of Nations.’ It is regarded as one of the founding documents of Australia and it was given force in Great Britain by the Statute of Westminster (1931). Available at:
http://foundingdocs.gov.au/resources/transcripts/cth11_doc_1926.pdf
 (accessed 18 July 2013).

66
See Jeffery (1984), p. 93. For the original cabinet discussions surrounding the Treaty, see National Archives, Kew, ‘The Cabinet Papers 1915–1981’, ‘Irish independence: Truce’:
http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/cabinetpapers/themes/irish-independence.htm
(accessed 19 December 2012).

67
National Archives, Kew, CAB 23/27, ‘Cabinet conclusions’, 6 December 1921. ‘Irish independence: Truce’:
http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/cabinetpapers/themes/irish-independence.htm
(accessed 19 December 2012). This is a little unfair to Lloyd George, whose basically sound reason for fighting on through the winter of 1920 regarded the retention of taxation inside the imperial parliament; National Archives, Kew, CAB 23/38/1, ‘Ministerial conference on Government of Ireland Bill, 1920’, 13 October 1920.

68
Collins and Talbot (1923).

69
Washington Naval Conference, or International Conference on Naval Limitation, November 1921.

70
Collins and Talbot (1923), pp. 139–41 for all three quotations. As Collins was dead by the time Talbot published the book, there is no way of knowing how much of it is true. However, a brief cross-check suggests that he is broadly accurate, even if he is suffering from obvious hero-worship.

71
BMH WS 764, Pat O’Brien, p. 63; BMH WS 1619, Daniel Canty; Lord Chancellor Birkenhead speaking in the House of Lords on 21 June 1921, vol. 45, col. 690 ‘The Government of Ireland’ says: ‘It is a small war that is going on in Ireland. Week by week, month by month, its true character has developed, … I think that the history of the last three months is a history of the failure of our military measures to keep pace with, and to overcome, the military measures which have been taken by our opponents.’
http://hansard.millbanksystems.com/lords/1921/jun/21/the-government-of-ireland
 (accessed 30 July 2013).

72
For a good overview of the entire period, see Michael Laffin’s series of lectures on the Irish revolution: University College Dublin, Historyhub.ie, ‘The Irish Revolution’:
http://www.historyhub.ie/pages/irishrev.html
(accessed 18 December 2012).

73
Terence MacSwiney was elected Sinn Féin Lord Mayor of Cork in May 1921 and explained better than most its aim of a fully independent Ireland. He devised the strategy of indirect war to make the British day-to-day regime redundant rather than confronting its army directly. He was arrested in Cork City Hall on 12 August 1920 and died in Brixton Prison after seventy-six days on hunger strike, having garnered huge international support and attention for the Irish cause.

74
Economic and Social History Society of Ireland, ‘Northern Ireland opts’:
http://www.eshsi.net/Northern_Ireland_opts.htm
(accessed 13 May 2013).

75
Walsh, P. V., 1998, ‘The Irish Civil War, 1922–1923: a military study of the conventional phase, 28 June–11 August, 1922’, paper delivered to The New York Military Affairs Symposium, 11 December. Available at:
http://bobrowen.com/nymas/irishcivilwar.html
(accessed 13 May 2013). This document is useful for the wealth of force dispositions of the British, the Free State and the anti-Treaty IRA it gives.

76
The start of the Civil War in Cork can be precisely dated to an order issued by Óglaigh na hÉireann on 3 April 1922: ‘To OC 5th Batt Cork No. 4 Brigade “It is essential that the proclamation repudiating the Minister of Defence and Chief of Staff be read to all ranks.” ’ On the back of another document, ‘Agenda for the Army Convention’, dated 12 April, five names were ticked. All were believed to be anti-Treaty at this time. Four others, including Florrie O’Donoghue, were not ticked, suggesting that the split occurred at this time. Cork City and County Archives, Siobhán Langford papers, CCCAU169/31.

77
As the British would not agree to the words ‘Irish Republic’ under any circumstances, or to anything less than an oath of allegiance to the king, ‘Free State’ was concocted to give the new, practically independent, entity a name. Those Irish republicans who could countenance nothing but a republic went to war to overthrow it.

78
Gregory, Lady and Murphy, D. J., 1978,
Lady Gregory’s Journals
, vol. 1, books 1–29, 10 October 1916–24 February 1925 (Gerrards Cross, Smythe), pp. 353–5. From an old aristocratic, Protestant and unionist family, playwright Lady Augusta Gregory co-founded Ireland’s national Abbey Theatre in 1904 to revive Gaelic (Irish) culture, which was being lost. She was revered by nationalists, and Sinn Féin in particular. MacEoin captured the Galway city barracks on 8 July 1922.

79
Dáil Éireann, ‘The National Situation – Army Officers’ Deputation’, 3 May 1922:
http://www.oireachtas-debates.gov.ie/D/DT/D.S.192205030007.html
(accessed 12 June 2013).

80
Churchill’s volatility had the potential to cause disaster. At the start of June 1922 he ordered two battalions of British troops with artillery to attack sixty IRA men at Pettigo in Free State territory, which ran the risk of destabilising the situation in Northern Ireland. Then on 26 June he ordered British troops to attack the Four Courts in Dublin, which would have been military and political insanity. General Macready, who was in Dublin, was not impressed, and went to London to change the cabinet’s mind. For the details of the attack on the courts, see Dwyer, T. Ryle, 2012, ‘British Army fire did not spark Civil War’,
Irish Examiner
, 1 November. Available at:
http://www.irishexaminer.com/analysis/british-army-fire-did-not-spark-civil-war-212534.html
  (accessed 8 December 2012).

81
House of Commons debate, ‘Easter recess (adjournment), Ireland’, vol. 153, col. 529, 12 April 1922:
http://hansard.millbanksystems.com/commons/1922/apr/12/ireland-1
(accessed 26 July 2013).

82
This government was formed to cover legally the period between 16 January 1922 and 6 December 1922 when the Free State came into formal existence. See Chambers, I., 2006,
The Chamberlains, the Churchills and Ireland, 1874–1922
(New York, Cambria Press), pp. 227–60 for the pressure that Churchill exerted on the Provisional Government.

83
Quotations from a report of a famous speech in Cork, 21 January 1885, by Charles Stewart Parnell,
Cork Examiner
, 22 January 1885.

84
‘Mr Churchill speaks’,
Southern Star
, 15 April 1922, p. 1, col. 6.

85
‘The History Show’, episode eleven: ‘Dr. John M. Regan of the University of Dundee about revisionism, Peter Hart and the history wars in Ireland’, podcast radio programme, Near FM, Dublin, 14 January 2013:
http://nearfm.ie/podcast/the-history-show-episode-eleven/Dr. Regan
(accessed 21 January 2013) emphasises the explicit nature of the British threat of re-conquest throughout 1922 and its effect during the Civil War.

86
National Museum of Ireland, 2013, ‘Limerick tax roll, Four Courts explosion, 1922’:
http://thecricketbatthatdiedforireland.com/2013/02/15/limerick-tax-roll-four-courts-explosion-1922-4/
(accessed 12 June 2013).

87
‘An Oath of Allegiance was taken by all ranks of the Army to the Irish Republic and the Dáil. When the majority of the Dáil abandoned carrying into effect of ment [sic] the disestablishment of the Republic’, Irish Republican Army Convention, 12 April 1922. The same document rejects the Free State casus belli by dismissing the refusal of Richard Mulcahy, Chief of Staff, to hold an Army Convention, using this logic: ‘There is no analogy between the demand made by the Irish Army for a convention and such a demand if made by the armies of other countries. The Irish Army is a volunteer army with full citizen rights. Their opposition to the Treaty is not a matter of interference with politics.’ Cork City and County Archives, Siobhán Langford papers, CCCAU169/31.

88
‘Letter to Mallow IRA’, Siobhán Langford papers, U169/B/(iv), 27 January 1922. Baker later became vicar of St Paul’s in Cork and passed away in Limerick in 1962.

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1
Ellis, P. B., 2004,
Eyewitness to Irish History
(Hoboken, N.J., John Wiley and Sons), p. 242. The Auxiliary police were former British officers who were initially recruited in July 1920 as an elite police corps to seek out members of the IRA. They were first deployed in September 1920. The force eventually grew to a strength of 1,500. Cadet Guthrie, who managed to escape from the ambush itself, was shot later in the day.