Dear Mum
Dear Mum, I know you’re always there
To help and guide me with all your care,
You nursed and fed me and made me strong
To face the world and all its wrong.
What can I write to you this day
For a line or two would never pay
For care and time you gave to me
Through long hard years unceasingly.
How you found strength I do not know
How you managed I’ll never know,
Struggling and striving without a break
Always there and never late.
You prayed for me and loved me more
How could I ask for anymore
And reared me up to be like you
But I haven’t a heart as kind as you.
A guide to me in times of plight
A princess like a star so bright
For life would never have been the same
If I hadn’t of learned what small things came.
So forgive me Mum just a little more
For not loving you so much before,
For life and love you gave to me
I give my thanks for eternity.
Bobby Sands (RIP).
'MUTUAL GOODWILL...!'
From 'The United Irishman' newspaper, April 1955.
"A portion of the population is attempting to sever the constitutional tie which unites it to Great Britain in the bond which has favoured the power and prosperity of both. It is to be hoped that all men of light and leading will resist this destructive doctrine..."
'Lord' Derby, in October 1881, writing of the Fenian movement, said -
"A few desperate men (sic), applauded by the whole body of the Irish people for their daring, showed England what Irish feeling really was ; made plain to us the depth of a discontent whose existence we had scarcely suspected. It is regrettable that, for the third time in less than a century, agitaetion accompanied by violence should have been shown to be the most effective instrument for redressing whatever Irishmen (sic) may be pleased to consider their wrongs."
Not even the pseudo-freedom we have today was gifted to us by England, or obtained by negotiation and "mutual good will" ; such 'freedom' as we have was wrested from England by force of arms...
(MORE LATER.)
ON THIS DATE (26TH APRIL) 107 YEARS AGO : IRISH PACIFIST EXECUTED BY THE BRITISH.
On Easter Monday, 24th April 1916, the Irish republican Proclamation was circulated in Dublin and, in reply, on Tuesday 25th, the British circulated their own 'Proclamation' in Dublin -
' A PROCLAMATION -
WHEREAS, in the City of Dublin and County of Dublin, certain evil disposed persons and Associations, with the intention of subverting the supremacy of the Crown in Ireland, have committed diverse acts of violence, and have with deadly weapons attacked the forces of the Crown, and have resisted by armed force the lawful authority of His Majesty's Police and Military forces ; and WHEREAS by reason thereof several of His Majesty's liege subjects have been killed and many others severely injured, and much damage to property has been caused ; and WHEREAS such armed resistance to His Majesty's Authority still continues :
NOW WE, Ivor Churchill Baron Wimborne, Lord Lieutenant-General and General Governor of Ireland, by virture of all the powers thereunto enabling us, do hereby proclaim that from and after the date of this Proclamation, and for the period of one month thereafter, unless otherwise ordered, the City of Dublin and County of Dublin are under and subject to Martial Law ; and WE do hereby call on all loyal and well-affected subjects of the Crown to aid in upholding and maintaining the peace of the Realm and the supremacy, and authority of the Crown ; and WE warn all peaceable and law-abiding subjects within such area of the danger of frequenting or being in any place in or in the vicinity of which His Majesty's forces are engaged in the suppression of disorder :
AND WE do hereby enjoin upon such subjects the duty and necessity, so far as practicable, of remaining within their own homes so long as these dangerous conditions prevail ; and WE do hereby proclaim that all persons found carrying arms without lawful authority are liable to be dealt with by virture of this Proclamation.
Given at Dublin,
This 25th day of April, 1916.
WIMBORNE.
GOD SAVE THE KING.'
That British 'Proclamation' was only in circulation for a day when three men were 'arrested' by British forces : Francis Sheehy-Skeffington, Patrick McIntyre and Thomas Dickson.
It was earlier on that same day, Wednesday 26th April 1916, that 1,600 British soldiers from the 'Third Cavalry Brigade', artillery from Athlone and the 176th and 178th Infantry Brigades of the 59th North Midland Division of the British Army were preparing themselves for the march from 'Kingstown' Harbour (Dun Laoighaire) to Dublin city centre.
Tension was high in the city ; Francis Sheehy-Skeffington, a leading writer and well-known pacifist, was in Dublin city centre, on his way home to Rathmines when he tried to help stop looters who were out in force, taking advantage of the disorganised situation in the capital, but he was 'arrested' by British troops from Portobello Barracks, as were two other civilians - Dublin journalists Patrick McIntyre, then editor of the 'Labour' newspaper, 'Searchlight', and Thomas Dickson, then editor of a pro-republican weekly newspaper, 'The Eye-Opener'.
Word circulated on Thursday morning, April 27th, 1916, that the three men had been shot dead in the barrack square by a British Army firing squad, without any 'formal' charges having been brought against any of them. Later , the British Army Captain in charge of the firing squad, a Bowen Colthurst, a member of the 'Royal Irish Rifles', from Dripsey in County Cork, who was a decorated officer who had fought in the Boer War and afterwards served in India, including the 1904 British military incursion into Tibet.
He had been injured while leading a disastrous attack against a German position on the western front in September 1914 and was sent back to Ireland. He was attached to the 3rd Battalion stationed at Portobello Barracks when the 1916 Easter Rising took place. Colthurst was later 'tried' by court-martial regarding the order he issued to the firing squad and was found 'guilty but insane', but a different account re the shooting of the three men was beginning to emerge.
It was during the court-martial of Bowen Colthurst that a different version of the events surrounding the executions of Francis Sheehy Skeffington, Patrick mcIntyre and Thomas Dickson was spoke of - a British Army Officer in Portobello Barracks stated that he heard a number of shots on the Wednesday (April 26th, 1916 - 107 years ago on this date) and went to investigate ; he claimed to have seen three stretchers being carried out of the porch of the guardroom on which were three dead bodies - one of those bodies had a blanket thrown over it and a bowler hat placed across the face and, from either side of the stretcher, an arm hung down, dripping blood.
This (unnamed) British Army Officer claimed that the body with the bowler hat on the face was that of Francis Sheehy Skeffington - the 'witness' stated, apparently in a jovial manner, that the firing party had done its work so badly that a second one had had to be summoned to finish Skeffington off. Were the three men shot dead in the guardroom on the Wednesday night (26th April 1916) by a vengeful British enemy and then, in order to cover-up the deed, were their corpses 'wheeled out' the following day for an 'official' British Army 'execution'..?
The following letter makes for interesting reading in relation to the circumstances surrounding this particular event -
From Henry Lemass
To : Herbert Henry Asquith
13 June 1916
31 PARLIAMENT STREET, DUBLIN,
SIR
As solicitor for Mrs. Sheehy Skeffington - for whose husband's murder, on 26th April, Captain Bowen Colthurst has been adjudged guilty - I have the honour to inquire when the promised Public Inquiry will be held? My client is profoundly dissatisfied with the limited information afforded at the Courtmartial, when the insanity of the accused was suggested. While she abhors the idea that fresh blood should be spilt, my client is equally resolute that the truth should be known, so that the people of the three Kingdoms may determine whether the same measure of justice has been meted out to all parties affected by the rebellion.
That there were circumstances giving rise to anxiety connected with the recent trial will be evident from the following facts : Lieutenant Wylie, K.C. who had prosecuted to conviction other men recently executed, was released from this Courtmartial and an English Counsel, not fully acquainted with the facts or imperfectly instructed, was appointed. Although no plea of inability to plead was entered for the accused, the question of his sanity was raised from the outset.
Yet the manner in which he effected the arrest of the other murdered men (Messrs Dickson and McIntyre) was not proved, nor the process by which he selected them for execution from amongst eight prisoners. Nevertheless, it was within the knowledge of the Military Authorities that Messrs Dickson and McIntyre were taken into custody on the premises of Alderman James Kelly, ex-High Sheriff, by the accused, under the idea that the shop belonged to Alderman Thomas Kelly, a person of wholly different politics.
They also knew that Colthurst threw a bomb into the premises and subsequently "planted" Mr. Dickson's trunk therein to give rise to the suspicion that Mr. Dickson had been harboured by Alderman James Kelly who was also lodged in Portobello Barracks.
Nor was the Court informed that two sisters of Mrs. Skeffington, viz: Mrs Kettle (wife of Lieutenant Kettle), and Mrs, Culhane (widow of a public official lately deceased) called at Portobello Barracks on Friday, 28th April, after the murders, and, on inquiring for their brother, Lieutenant Sheehy, were put under arrest and brought before Captain Colthurst, and that he denied all knowledge of Mr. Skeffington and was perfectly calm and collected in his demeanour and falsehoods.
Similarly, the tribunal was not made aware that on the evening after his examination of these ladies, Captain Colthurst ordered a search of Mrs.Skeffington's house ; that his soldiers first fired into her dwelling, and then, producing a key taken from the body of the murdered man, opened his locked room and removed documents to try to furnish the accused with ex post facto justification for his crime.
The second raid on the widow's house by Colthurst's orders on the following Monday, as well as the fact that one of the soldiers who took part in it was the Sergeant left in charge of Dickson's trunk at Alderman James Kelly's, was also left unmentioned. There was an equally significant silence as to the protests of the murdered men on the morning of their execution, and as to the accused's refusal of spiritual solace to them in their last moments.
The Courtmartial were likewise unaware that Captain Colthurst was allowed to remain at large by his superiors until the 6th May - nearly a fortnight after the murders - while the non-production of Major Sir Francis Vane, his Senior Officer, disabled it from learning that on the 1st may (a week after the murders) the accused was promoted to the charge of the Defence of Portobello Barracks.
His conduct on shooting the lad, Coade, on Rathmines Road previous to the three murders, was not introduced, although Coade's father immediately lodged information at the Barracks.
None of the soldiers who formed the firing party was called to speak as to the nature of the accuseds commands and demeanour, or explain how Mr. Skeffington came to be taken from a locked cell without authority. The added tragedy which led to a second squad of soldiers being called out to fire at the prostrate body of Mr. Skeffington would not have become known (although proved at the private preliminary inquiry) but for the candour of the noble President of the tribunal, Lord Cheylesmore.
As for the attempt to fasten complicity with the rebellion on Mr. Skeffington by the production of a document published previously by Alderman Thomas Kelly (which deceased, as a journalist, kept in his house) - it stands in strange contrast with the silence preserved concerning the innocence of the other slaughtered men and the Court was not even told who or what they were. The admission of this document after Adjutant Morgan, who produced it, had sworn that it was not found on Mr. Skeffington, may have been due to inadvertenance, but the cunning of the untruthful endorsement on it by the accused to the effect that it was found on the body, seemed to call for observation on the issue of sanity, as corroboration of the fact that Captain Colthurst from the date when he knew the murders were discovered, was engaged in the manufacture of evidence to palliate his guilt.
I therefore have to ask that in view of the promised Inquiry you will make arrangements with the Military Authorities to have in attendance thereat, in addition to the witnesses called on behalf of the prosecution at the late Courtmartial, the following persons : 1 — The soldiers under command of Lieutenant Wilson when Mr. Skeffington was marched out of his cell into the street to serve as a hostage. 2 — The soldiers who composed the first and second firing parties. 3 — Lieutenant Colonel McCammond who was in command of the Royal Irish Rifles. 4 — Major Sir Francis Vane, 2nd in Command. 5 — Lieutenant Tooley and Lieutenant Gibbon. 6 — The officers and soldiers who were sent after the murder to search Mrs. Skeffington's residence on two occasions - especially Sergeant Claxton.
Of course, the names, regiment and regimental number of all the proposed witnesses should be supplied to me some days before the Inquiry, unless the Government undertake to call them for examination. I should also be furnished the Notes of the preliminary Inquiry which the Courtmartial were supplied with. In addition I request that all documents, etc., taken from the person of Mr. Skeffington, or seized at his residence, should be returned, and if this is refused that copies should be supplied to me.
I should likewise be afforded an opportunity of examining and taking copies of any reports or entries dealing with the circumstances attending the arrest or execution of Mr. Skeffington, or the searches at his residence. I shall feel obliged by an intimation of an early decision.
I have the honour to be, Sir,
Your obedient Servant
HENRY LEMASS.
To THE RIGHT HON. H. H. ASQUITH, K.C., M.P.,
Prime Minister,
10 Downing Street, London, S.W.'
Francis Sheehy Skeffington : Born 23rd December 1878, Bailieborough, County Cavan ; Died 26th April 1916, 107 years ago on this date, Portobello Barracks, Dublin, aged 37.
ON THIS DATE (26TH APRIL) 278 YEARS AGO : 'LORD' KILLED BY A DRAGO(O)N'S 'STING'.
Changeful still and still adhering,
Spiteful, peevish, rude, untoward,
Fierce in tongue, in heart a coward.
Judgement weak and passion strong,
Always various, always wrong.'
"On this date (26th April 1745 - 278 years ago today), John Allen (3rd Viscount Allen), former MP for Carysfort, kills a dragoon in a street brawl : 'His Lordship was at a house in Eustace Street. At twelve in the night, three dragoons making a noise in the street, he threw up the window and threatening them, adding as is not unusual with him a great deal of bad language.
The dragoons returned it. He went out to them loaded with a pistol. At the first snapping of it, it did not fire. This irritated the dragoon who cut his (ie Allen's) fingers with his sword, upon which Lord Allen shot him.' The wound occasions a fever which causes Lord Allen’s death on 25 May..."
Or maybe, perhaps, the '3rd Viscount' did not invite such misfortune onto himself - '..he seems to have been mugged in the centre of Dublin one night in 1745, and although he fought off his attackers - and killed one of them - he received a wound in his hand which became infected and caused his death a month later...he died on 25 May 1745 from an infected wound in the hand received when he was 'insulted in the public streets by some disorderly dragoons' - one of whom he killed - on 26 April 1745..' (from here.)
And this, sourced from 'Google Books' - 'This nobleman being insulted in the public streets by some disorderly dragoons 26 April 1745, received a wound in the hand which occasioned a fever, and caused his death 25 May...'
But, really, whatever about John Allen (the'nobleman') inviting trouble by being verbally aggressive to three 'loud' soldiers (karma that all four participants were birds of a feather!) or whether the three soldiers momentarily forgot they were on home ground and simply behaved as if they were 'on duty' elsewhere in their 'empire', the parties involved caused trouble only too and for themselves, unlike another 'John Allen', featured here, who would attempt to convince you (having himself obviously being convinced by his 'betters') that the 'empire' he served is some sort of benevolent and charitable organisation, rather than the thieving and toxic entity it is.
That last link will permit you to 'View More Comments', and you should - "And I'm sure that many members of the Red Army were "fully dedicated to the well-being and advancement of the people they served" and had a "sense of mission" too..the problem is that ruling over people without their consent (which is what colonialism is a subset of) is wrong. It doesn't matter if you do it for purely "greater good" or paternalistic reasons, it's still wrong...it would be much better for us as a society to really stop lying to ourselves and face the reality of the British Empire.
It committed genocide across the world, stole the natural resources from the countries we claimed as ours, destroyed and laid waste to the cultures of millions of people, raped, pillaged and then in the dog days of empire we pretend we were their (sic) to protect the people from terrorists.."
At least this'John Allen', the 'Funnyman', admits to being a comedian, unlike the other two, and acknowledges that 'his house is a mess' - the other two John Allen's, by virture of their professions, preferred to 'mess up' everybody else's 'house'...
'THOUGH THE HEAVENS MAY FALL...'
From 'Magill' Annual, 2002.
Dr Moira Woods (pictured).
In March 1992, a complaint alleging professional misconduct against Dr Woods was lodged with the Medical Council, the governing body of the medical profession in Ireland (sic).
The complaint made little progress during the lifetime of the then council, and it was not until a new council took office in 1995 that an inquiry was mooted. In January 1996, the families were informed by the Medical Council that there was sufficient prima facie evidence to warrant an inquiry.
In December 1996, the Medical Council's 'Fitness to Practice Committee' met to consider whether the inquiry should be held in public or in private and a majority of the Committee concluded that, with the exception of matters relating to one family, it would be appropriate to proceed by means of a public inquiry.
The names of children and families were to be removed from all documents, and it was ruled that references to them in the course of the inquiry should not allow them to be identified... (MORE LATER.)
FUNDS AND FINE GAEL'S LEADER...
Michael Lowry has so far been the focus of media attention about Fine Gael fundraising.
But the party's current leader, Enda Kenny (pictured), hosted a £1,000-a-plate dinner two days before the second mobile phone licence was awarded. And other guests say that one of the bidders for that licence was in attendance.
By Mairead Carey.
From 'Magill' magazine, January 2003.
Enda Kenny made it clear from the outset of the latest leadership campaign that he did not support Michael Noonan's view on corporate donations - and overturned the (Fine Gae) ban within months of taking the helm.
Since 1997, the party has had to disclose the identity of donors, which has led to a falling-off in revenue. Fine Gael received no corporate donations last year (2002) as a result of Noonan's ban and received just over €60,000 in 2000 and just over €18,000 in 1999. Because it lost over 20 TD's (sic) in the last election, the party is down some €600,000 in State funding given to the main political parties.
Enda Kenny's own fundraising has never reached the heights it scaled when he was in office...
(MORE LATER.)
Thanks for the visit, and for reading,
Sharon and the team.