In the early 1920's...
..this republican-gamekeeper-turned-Free State-poacher, by then a career politician, stopped just short of describing the men and women of 1916 as criminals, even though he had soldiered alongside the same men and women in the (on-going) struggle for a 32-County Ireland...
That's one of the twenty-or-so pieces we'll be putting pen to paper about on this blog on Wednesday, 30th October 2024.
The man mentioned above left a particularly dirty and bloody thumbprint in Irish history and sullied his family surname to the extent that even so-called 'neutral observers' find it hard to defend his 'official' (ie State) actions.
These are two more 'teaser pieces' that we'll be putting skin on the bone of on the 30th -
..a second IRA attack on Free State paramilitary operatives in their own headquarters didn't go as planned : not only were Volunteers captured, but too much damage was done to the building...
..at one of the weekly meetings held by the IRA leadership to discuss 'the state of play', the fact that family members of enemy combatants were pressuring their loved ones to resign their positions for safety reasons was noted, and it was agreed that the 'sins-of-the-father' rule would still apply to those family members...
So...
..even if ya have other plans on that date, add us in - cancel/postpone whatever it is that ya havta, but get yer butt back here then.
Or else...!!
Thanks for the visit, and for reading - see ya on Wednesday, 30th October 2024!
Sharon and the team.
ON THIS DATE (23RD OCTOBER) 258 YEARS AGO : BIRTH OF AN ANTI-REPUBLICAN 'MANGLER'.
John Claudius Beresford (pictured), was born in Ireland on this date - 23rd October - 258 years ago (1766), into a rich Tory-like family which, due to their favoured position in Irish society, ensured that young John received a top-class education in, among other such institutions, Trinity College, in Dublin.
Between the connections he made in Trinity and his family's 'position in society', young John did well for himself - he was a banker, and was appointed as the 'Inspector-General of Exports and Imports' for the port of Dublin, while also earning a crust as a storekeeper, a renowned 'taster of wines' and he managed to squeeze-in his duties, for a year, as the 'Lord Mayor' of Dublin and as an MP for ten years.
Such was his 'skillset', he also operated as an 'Agent' for the Derry branch of the 'London Society' business grouping and as one of the trustees for the 'Linen Board'!
However, ever selfless as he was (!), when the Irish attempted to overthrow British misrule in their country, in 1798 - when our John was a then 32-years-young MP, Inspector-General, storekeeper and 'taster of (fine) wines' - he decided to fight alongside other like-minded miscreants and he took command of a gang of yeomanry/"military savages" in Dublin and used his 'Riding School' in Marlborough Street - his stables - as his base of operations.
Irish 'dissidents', whether real or imagined, were dragged to the stables by Beresford and his thugs and tortured, including been flogged, for 'information'.
A sign, stating 'MANGLING DONE HERE GRATIS BY BERESFORD AND CO' was fitted to the torture chamber by the British savages and it quickly became known that it was no idle threat -
"Mr Beresford...tortured two respectable Dublin tradesman, one named John Fleming, a ferryman, the other Francis Gough, a coachmaker.
The Nobleman (ie Beresford) superintended the flagellation of Gough and, at every stroke, insulted him with taunts and inquiries how he liked it..." (from here.)
Indeed, one of his own, a 'Lord' Howick, actually complained to other British 'establishment' figures that "John Claudius Beresford (has) a name so terribly distinguished in the history of Irish persecution (but still) receives the open countenance and support of government.." and another Tory-toff, the 'Duke' of Bedford, admitted that Beresford 'had a heavy hand'.
At 46 years of age (in 1812) - having allegedly suffered 'financial difficulties' - he sought yet another pensionable 'job' from his parliament in Westminster but was refused on the grounds that he already had "..a great pension (and) a place in addition would [not] go down with the public..", and so he announced that he was 'withdrawing from public life'.
He died, aged 80, in 1846.
Probably in comfort, and not in a stables.
In September, 1919, a farm in Landenstown, Sallins, County Kildare, owned and worked by the Higgins family, was raided by the British Army.
The man of the house, a Mr Richard Higgins, the Secretary to the Prosperous, County Kildare, Sinn Fein Cumann, took responsibility for a "sword bayonet", quantities of ammunition and two pounds of gunpowder, which were found on the farm, and he was taken into custody.
On the 23rd October (1919), Mr Higgins was "conveyed in a military motor wagon" to a sitting of the military court in Ship Street Barracks, in Dublin, and charged with 'munitions offences'.
He replied that, as a soldier of the Irish Republic, he did not recognise that the 'court' had the legal authority to put him on trial and announced that he was on a hunger-strike in protest ; he was found guilty and was taken to Mountjoy Jail and imprisoned.
He was released from prison in early November, still on hunger-strike, as his health had deteriorated and the British didn't want the death of a hunger-striker on their hands.
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'WHY ARE THE DEAF BEING EXCLUDED FROM THE COMPENSATION SCHEME FOR ABUSED CHILDREN?'
Amid the considerable controversy about the deal struck between the Catholic Church and the State over compensation to victims of institutional child abuse, little attention has been focused on the proposed exclusion from the compensation scheme of a number of institutions run by the church where abuse clearly took place.
By John Cradden.
From 'Magill' magazine, March 2002.
Although no official explanation has yet been given for the exclusion, some speculate that the Minister for Education and Science, Dr Michael Woods, is attempting to draw a line in the sand between industrial schools and other residential institutions.
Unlike industrial schools, victims were not compelled to attend institutions for the deaf, blind or other disabilities, and no court orders were made to place children in these schools.
However, it is not clear how this helps to explain why such schools have been excluded.
Indeed, Kevin Stanley, Chairman of the 'Irish Deaf Society', points out that many parents of deaf children did not have a choice about where to send their children as there was no other place to send them.
The majority of deaf children are today mainstreamed into hearing schools, but this was not the norm even 20 years ago...
(MORE LATER.)
In April, 1920, a 'Sir' Cecil Frederick Nevil Macready (a '1st Baronet', no less, pictured) was sent to Dublin by Westminster to command their forces in Ireland as their new 'General Officer Commanding-in-Chief ('GOC-in-C') British Forces', a title almost as long as his own name!
Apparently disgusted at the nature and amount of so-called 'reprisals' that his troops were carrying-out on civilians, Mr Macready issued orders (on the 18th August [1920]) instructing his soldiers "to cease acts of retaliation and looting against the civil population. Lapses in discipline will be severely punished..."
On the 23rd October 1920, Mr Macready wrote to his colleague, British Field Marshal 'Sir' Henry Hughes Wilson (...himself a '1st Baronet', too. And a 'GCB' and a 'DSO', as well. So there, Cecil..! By the way, Mr Wilson was an Irish man, born in Ballinalee, in County Longford) stating that, in his opinion.. "...no-one with the interests of the Army at heart can for a moment approve of reprisal.."
And here we are, 104 years later, and the British are still looting Ireland...
==========================
...and British Field Marshal 'Sir' Henry Hughes Wilson (see above piece) was a busy man on the 23rd, for it was on that date in October 1920 that he wrote a letter to one of his colleagues, a Mr Winston Churchill (pictured), in which he listed 12 colonels and 21 majors and captains in the British Army who refused service and/or did not want to serve in Ireland!
In his letter, Mr Wilson suggested that "...the obvious course of action to quell the rebellion in Ireland was, when there was a killing of a member of the Crown Forces, to at once arrest the principal members of the IRA in a town or village, and give them twenty-four hours to produce the murderer on pain of being shot themselves.."
Mr Wilson had marked himself out, on more that one occasion, as 'a military hawk' but, as with all such creatures, the more feathers that the hawk uses, the more his flying abilities are impaired.
His feathers were clipped on the 22nd June, 1922...
==========================
A Mr Edward Meade (48), from Number 4 Clarke’s Bridge, in Cork (an ex-British Army soldier) was working as a grocer's assistant and, in his spare time, worked in Victoria British Army Barracks in Cork City (pictured) as a 'civilian subordinate/clerk'.
On the 23rd October, 1920, as he was in the barracks, on his way to do some 'clerking' for the British Army, he passed a lorry full of soldiers just as one of the troopers in the lorry 'accidentally fired his rifle'.
The bullet struck Mr Meade in the head and he died shortly afterwards from the wound.
And to think that he had survived through what the British Army describe as "the Italian campaign during the Great War...".
==========================
William Butler Yeats (pictured) wrote a poem in 1916 entitled 'Easter 1916' but only decided to publish it in 1920 - on the 23rd October.
Mr Yeats choose to publish his poem in 'The New Statesman' magazine, and it appears that his decision to publish it was influenced by the then on-going hunger-strike of Terence MacSwiney -
"Now and in time to be,
Wherever green is worn,
Are changed, changed utterly :
A terrible beauty is born..."
Born in Sandymount, in Dublin, on the 13th June 1865, died in Roquebrune-Cap-Martin, in France, on the 28th January, 1939 (at 73 years of age) and his final resting place is in the village of Drumcliffe, in County Sligo.
Rest In Peace.
==========================
A Mr James McCormack (27) worked in Farrell's fish and chip shop at 100 North Brunswick Street (pictured, top and bottom) in Dublin City Centre, which was owned by his uncle, John Farrell, and his wife, Catherine.
On the 23rd October, 1920, two men in civilian clothing came into the shop at about 9pm and one of them took out a handgun and shot him in the chest.
Mr McCormack died the following morning from his wound.
The British 'authorities' in Dublin Castle investigated (!) but no arrests were made and, in their report into the shooting, the British suggested that Mr McCormack had been shot for "disobeying an order not to serve (British) soldiers", thus indirectly pointing the finger at the IRA.
John and Catherine Farrell "emphatically repudiated" that claim, stating that the gunmen were complete strangers, not known to people in the area, and said that "...nothing was ever said to us by anyone who we served..".
Mr John Farrell was known to have a nationalistic point of view, which would have marked him, his wife and staff out as targets by the Crown Forces.
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ON THIS DATE (23RD OCTOBER) 104 YEARS AGO : MILITARY COURT OF INQUIRY DEMANDED INTO THE IRA'S TOUREEN AMBUSH.
The actual site of the Toureen Ambush, at the house which was then owned by the Roberts family.
Six days later, Westminster held that military court of inquiry into the IRA ambush which stated that...
'...the deceased, Lieutenant Alfred William Dixon (sic- the man's name was William Alfred Dixon) MC, Suffolk Regiment, attached 1st Essex Regiment, died at a spot midway between Innishannon and Ballinhassig, at about 1000hrs on Friday 22nd October 1920, as a result of gunshot wounds inflicted at the aforementioned time and place, and that the said deceased met his death whilst in the execution of his duty, at the hands of some person or persons unknown.
Such person or persons aforesaid are guilty of wilful murder.
...to ask the Chief Secretary for Ireland what steps have been taken, or will be taken, to increase the number of armoured cars for the use of the military in Ireland, and to equip them with quick-firing guns in order to prevent, as far as possible, repetitions of what happened to soldiers of the Essex Regiment..?'
Mr Churchill replied -
"My Right Honourable friend has asked me to reply. The question of the provision of armoured cars for use in Ireland is very seriously engaging the attention of the military authorities. Large numbers, armed with machine guns, are already in Ireland, and steps are being taken to effect a considerable increase in these numbers..."
It wasn't spoke about at their inquiry, obviously (!), that British Army Lieutenant Dixon died as a result of the part he played in assisting with the military occupation of a country he should not have had any dealings with except, perhaps, as a tourist.
He was shot dead whilst attempting to kill or wound those defending their own country from the military (and political) occupation that he, Dixon, enforced ; to state he was 'murdered' is incorrect.
'The Toureen Ambush'-
'The IRA men moved from behind the gate out on to the road. They now faced the Essex, whose shooting appeared to be wayward. Volley after volley was fired by the Volunteers.
Captain Dickson (sic - the man's name was Dixon) ) was shot through the head as he fired his revolver and soon more British soldiers were hit, some fatally.
Before long the remainder of the British surrendered, raising their hands over their heads.
Immediately the whistle to cease fire was blown and an order was given to divest the enemy of their arms and equipment...'
Casualties and losses : IRA none, British 5 dead, 4 wounded, 6 captured, munitions repurposed.
A good day's work...!
In one of the many encounters between the IRA and the Free State Army in 1922, a Sergeant in the Stater army, a Mr James Marum (age 36, 'Service/Reference Number VR2917'), was wounded on the 21st October, 1922, in Charleville, County Cork.
Mr Marum died from his wounds in the Mercy Hospital in Cork City two days later (23rd October 1922), and is buried in Glasnevin Cemetery, in Dublin.
He had been a Sergeant in the Machine Gun Corps of the British Army, after 'serving' in that grouping for eleven-and-a-half years, following which he worked as an agricultural labourer/gardener in Ireland, before joining the then newly-minted Free State Army in May 1922.
After his death, his wife, Isabella, and children, moved to Wicklow and lived in Number 12 Prince of Wales Terrace in Bray, from where she applied for a military pension/allowance, as her late husband was the main bread-winner and, between the 24th December 1922 and the 3rd April 1923, she received £1 18 shillings and 6 pence a week then, from the 4th April 1923 to the 31st March 1924, she received £1 and 8 shillings a week.
Apparently, from that date on - as long as she didn't re-marry - she received 17 shillings and 6 pence a week.
Mr Marum's mother, Ellen, also applied for a financial 'stipend' from the Free Staters and, on the 17th June, 1925, she was awarded "a gratuity of £40".
Cheap at the price, no doubt...
==========================
'The Leinster Leader' newspaper reported that this shooting took place on the 23rd October, 1923, whereas other sources list the date as the 17th December, 1922 -
A young Dublin lad, John Keogh (a future republican-gamekeeper-turned-Free State poacher), joined Na Fianna Éireann in 1913 and was active enough during the 1916 Rising to bring himself to the notice of the British 'authorities'.
He was arrested/captured by the British after the Rising but was released on account of his age.
He joined the IRA and was again active against the Crown Forces until at least 1921 when, records indicate, he threw his political and military lot in with the Free State 'Criminal Investigation Department' (CID) and then with the Free State Army itself, in which he was a Lieutenant, working as a body guard to the State Governor General and the State President, when either of them would visit London (...to report to their benefactor, no doubt).
On the 23rd October, 1922 (...or the 17th December that year..?) more than likely working on a tip-off, Mr Keogh and other Stater militia men raided a dance hall in Johnstown, Kill, County Kildare, apparently looking for IRA Kildare Officer Commanding Jim Dunne and other Volunteers, and a gunfight ensued.
Mr John Keogh was shot dead.
==========================
THE FORGOTTEN PEOPLE...
Emigration from Ireland to the United States continued throughout the 1990's, although the reasons were no longer so bluntly economic.
Now, in the wake of September 11th, the US authorities have been granted increased powers to investigate legal status, and Irish illegal emigrants are more vulnerable than ever before.
By Mairead Carey.
From 'Magill Annual', 2002.
Visa waivers make going to the US far easier than it was in the 1980's, but when the States waived a visa it was in return for emigrants waiving their rights, says Bruce Morrison, the former Congressman responsible for the 'Morrison Visa Scheme' -
"Their status is more legally tenuous than it was in the 1980's.
If you are apprehended you can be put on a plane and sent home there and then. There is no court appearance, no pleadings before a judge, no process that you can go through to attempt to stay.
Now the only relief available is to claim asylum, and that is not going to be accepted for people from Ireland.
You are taken into custody, you won't be released, and the US 'Immigration and Naturalisation Service' can, in a matter of days or in a matter of hours if they were organised enough, send you home..."
(MORE LATER.)
When the 'Boundary Commission' was first mooted, as part of the 'Treaty of Surrender', pro-British elements in the partitioned Six Counties of Ireland were reluctant, to put it mildly, to have anything to do with it, for fear they would 'loose' more territory.
Indeed, it was only on the 23rd October in 1924 that the British finally passed legislation - after being prodded into doing so for years - allowing for themselves to appoint a representative on the Commission to represent the Stormont puppet administration, as the unionist/loyalist politicians in those occupied counties in Ireland didn't want to aid a 'compromising body'.
Westminster duly appointed one of their own, a Mr Joseph Robert Fisher (pictured) to the Commission, having brought him 'up to speed' on the T+C's (ie 'how to indiscreetly favour the Union and screw the Staters'!).
The grouping met for the first time on the 6th November, 1924, and established offices for itself in the Strand, in London, at Number 6 Clement's Inn, and Mr Fisher is known to have regularly briefed pro-British politicians in Ireland on the 'confidential' discussions etc held at the meetings (...he did this with the assistance of an Ulster Unionist MP, a Mr David Reid).
The embarrassing talking shop that it was limped on until December 1925, with 'both sides' (!) claiming a victory of sorts - the Staters were able to claim that they had not conceded even more territory to the British, and the British claiming that they had fought off a territorial grab by the Staters.
And today, 99 years later, Ireland remains as partitioned as she was in 1925.
==========================
ON THIS DATE (23RD OCTOBER) 89 YEARS AGO : DEATH OF DUBLIN-BORN UVF LEADER ANNOUNCED.
'Lord' Carson (pictured) was born in Dublin in 1854 and died at 8am on the 22nd October 1935 on the Isle of Thanet in Kent, England.
His beloved empire had conveyed the title of 'Right Honourable The Lord Carson KC PC' on him , a prefix he was delighted to take with him to his grave.
"We must proclaim today clearly that, come what will and be the consequences what they may, we in Ulster will tolerate no Sinn Féin - no Sinn Féin organisation, no Sinn Féin methods. But we tell you (the British Government) this : that if, having offered you our help, you are yourselves unable to protect us from the machinations of Sinn Féin, and you won't take our help ; well then, we tell you that we will take the matter into our own hands.
We will reorganise, as we feel bound to do in our our defence, throughout the province, the Ulster Volunteers.
And those are not mere words.
I hate words without action..."
- the words of then soon-to-be (anti-republican) paramilitary leader Mr Edward Carson ('Lord Carson of Duncairn') at an 'Orange' rally in Finaghy, Belfast, County Antrim.
He was a staunch supporter of the Irish (pro-British) Unionists who, at 38 years young, was elected as a Unionist MP (to Westminster) for Dublin University and, again at that same age, was appointed (British) 'Solicitor General for Ireland' and served as the 'Solicitor General for England' from 1900 to 1905.
He was also an Irish Barrister, a judge and politician, and the leader Of 'The Irish Unionist Alliance' and 'Ulster Unionist Party'. At 57 years of age (in 1911*) he was elected leader of the 'Ulster Unionist Council' (UUC) and helped to establish the 'Ulster Volunteer Force' (UVF), a pro-British militia (*he wrote to his friend James Craig re his UUC leadership that he intended "....to satisfy himself that the people really mean to resist. I am not for a game of bluff and, unless men are prepared to make great sacrifices which they clearly understand, the talk of resistance is useless...") .
On the 3rd of September 1914, in an address he delivered in Belfast to the 'UUC', he stated -
"England's difficulty is not Ulster's opportunity.
However we are treated, and however others act, let us act rightly. We do not seek to purchase terms by selling our patriotism...."
A lesson there, without doubt, for all the gombeens that inhabit the Leinster House institution!
From 1915 to 1916 he served as the British Attorney General, and was appointed as the 'First Lord of the Admiralty' in 1916 (until 1917) and was a member of Lloyd George's War Cabinet from 1917 to 1918.
Westminster thought so highly of him that they offered him an even bigger 'prize' - that of the 'Premiership' of the new Six County 'State' - but he refused, and retired from public life in 1921, at 67 years of age.
In June 1935, at 81 years of age, Mr Carson contracted bronchial pneumonia but, even though he recovered his health somewhat within weeks, a few months later his strength weakened again and he died on the 22nd of October, 1935.
BEIR BUA...
The Thread of the Irish Republican Movement from The United Irishmen through to today.
Republicanism in history and today.
Published by the James Connolly/Tommy O'Neill Cumann, Republican Sinn Féin, The Liberties, Dublin.
August 1998.
('1169' comment - 'Beir Bua' translates as 'Grasp Victory' in the English language.)
REPUBLICANS AND THE STATE :
One of the predecessor organisations of Sinn Féin, the Dungannon Club, wrote in its manifesto in 1905 -
"They would form the centre and brain of the national life, and with the consent of the whole people behiind them, they could quietly assume and take possession of all the rights and functions of the governor.
With the people banded in support of them, they would form a national entity, self-contained, obeying their own laws and living their own life.
They would simply ignore the existing Government, neither entering its courts of law - for they would have arbitration courts of their own - nor participating in its affairs at all.
Any interference with such a Council, or with the people under its guidance, can be met and resisted by the people.
A passive resistance policy, if properly carried out, would suffice to show the futility of coercive measures on the part of the English Government..."
(MORE LATER.)
ON THIS DATE (23RD OCTOBER) 383 YEARS AGO : 1641 REBELLION BEGAN...
Phelim Roe O'Neil (pictured), one of the leaders of the 1641 Rebellion, was hanged, drawn, and quartered, one quarter being impaled at Lisburn, another at Dundalk, a third at Drogheda and the fourth, with his head, at Dublin, on the 10th March, 1653.
Although the intention of the Irish rebels was to dislodge the English settlers and reclaim their land, O'Neil is on record for stating the following : "...the rising was not against the King, but only for the defence and liberty of ourselves, and the Irish natives of this kingdom..." which, if you read between the lines, would indicate that the action was taken not so much against English rule as against English mistreatment.
The fighting, which began in Ulster on the night of October 22nd/morning of the 23rd and was only quashed 12 years later (September 1653) caused the death of '30,000 English, murdered and massacred...' , according to English politicians but, within weeks, this figure rose to 50,000.
Then 100,000, later 'revised' to between 150,000 and 200,000 and finally a nice round figure of 300,000 was agreed on.
By those English politicians, that is.
But in their haste to make propaganda at the expense of the "..tumultuary Irish rabble...." , they overlooked the fact that there were only 20,000 English people living in the area affected by the rebellion!
The actual casualties are said to be nearer to 12,000 English 'settlers' and 7,000 indigenous.
However : whether the rebellion was fought by some for 'civil rights under the English Crown', so to speak, and by others to remove the political and military might of the English 'settlers', it has to be borne in mind that those who were attacked were being set upon by those whose objective it was to regain that which was once theirs.
In short, the robber was challenged by those he robbed.
More on this rebellion can be viewed here.
Thanks for the visit, and for reading - appreciated!
Sharon and the team.
