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Home , Conscription in Ireland, National Volunteers, Tom Kettle, Ulster Volunteers

Ireland and the Great War

Paul O’Brien

After the flag waving and pageants that the first day of the the Irish state indulged in to celebrate the in almost 60,000 British soldiers centenary of 1913 Lockout, the first in a were killed, wounded or taken prisoner. By decade-long series of centenaries, the hun- the end of the Somme offensive in Septem- dredth anniversary of is upon ber over one million men had perished and us. Each centenary is celebrated in isola- the front line had been pushed forward by tion, in effect to depoliticise these events five miles. The 36th division was and present them as a historical theme one of the hardest hit; it suffered over 5100 park where the great and the good are casualties with approximately 2100 dead. wheeled out to reflect on the past as if it has no consequences for today. If we are to heed the Irish media it seems that having a grandfather or rel- ative who fought, or preferably died, in the Great War of 1914-18 is the latest must-have fashion accessory for the read- ers of and the Irish Inde- pendent. In these features the poems of and are in- Farmers of , Join up & defend your possesions voked to present the heroic sacrifice of the 200,000 who answered the call to arms and the 50,000 who died that Catholic Origins might be saved from the ‘Hun’. If ‘saving Balgium’ did not entice young men to en- The debate over the origins of the war is as list then self interest was tried - one poster old as the war itself. Even before the first enjoined the farmers of Ireland to ‘join up shots were fired Europe’s imperial lead- and defend your possessions’1. The reality ers were constructing narratives depicting for those who enlisted was appalling. This their opponents as barbarians and war- was killing on an industrial scale. Half of mongers. The debate has produced a liter- the men who died have no known grave. ature of unrivalled size with at least 30,000 High explosive shells turned many of the articles in English alone on the subject. dead into dust. Even the term commem- This was the age of imperialism when the oration is an injustice to what happened great empires clashed in the rush to ex- - the First World War was a catastrophe pand and dominate in Africa, the Middle and the losses so horrendous that it over- East, and the Baltic. It was inevitable that shadows in our memory the losses of World these clashes would eventually lead to war. War II. The invention of the machine gun A series of crises had raised tensions be- made a mockery of the concept of tens of tween the major European powers in the thousands of soldiers charging the enemy decades leading up to the war; the Moroc- lines as if in a re-enactment of the Bat- can crisis of 1905, the Bosnian annexation tle of Waterloo a hundred years later. On in 1908, the Baltic wars of 1912 and 1913 1 http://www.rte.ie/archives/exhibitions/1011-ireland-and-the-great-war/

13 - anyone of these could have pushed the listed in 1914, 45,000 followed in 1915, but imperialist powers into war. In addition this dropped to 19,000 in 1916 and 14,000 internal crises resulting from the rise in in 1917. The 1918 figure has been given as working class militancy, nationalist move- between 11,000 and 15,000. The recruit- ments looking for independence, and the ment rate in Ulster matched that of Britain suffragette movement had created tensions itself, while that of Leinster and Munster in the heartlands of the major European were about two thirds of the British rate of powers. recruitment, while Connacht lagged even The Great War killed at least ten mil- further behind them in the number of vol- lion young men, and wounded at least unteers who joined up. Several factors con- twenty million more. It destroyed four tributed to the decline in recruitment after empires; the Russian, the German, the 1916. One was the heavy casualties suf- Austro-Hungarian, and the Ottoman. It fered by Irish units in the war. The 10th paved the way for the Russian Revolu- Irish Division suffered very heavy losses at tion of 1917 and changed the course of Gallipoli in 1915, while the 16th and 36th Irish history. It was, as the historian Fritz Divisions were shattered at the Battle of Stern put it, ‘the first calamity of the 20th the Somme in 1916. The Munster Reg- century from which all other calamities iment and ’ experience was sprang’.2 But this inconvenient truth of typical of the decimation of the British Irish participation in the Great War was Army in the campaigns of 1914 in France not acceptable to the rapidly developing and Belgium. By the end of 1914, those nationalist narrative of the late 1920s. The regiments deployed in the original British historian Roy Forster has suggested that Expeditionary Force had been shattered by the First World War ‘should be seen as one very heavy casualties. On average, in each of the most decisive events in modern Irish battalion of 1,000 men, only one officer and history’3. Here, Foster is only partially 30 men remained unscathed. correct, the political trajectory in Ireland A second important factor was the would have led to clash with Britain with ’s condemnation of the or without the Great War. But Foster is war in July 1915. The Pope Benedict XV right to suggest that the amnesia that has issued an encyclical calling on all powers to affected Ireland on the issue of the war end the war and come to an agreement. As needs to be corrected. a result, the Irish Catholic bishops publicly A total of 206,000 Irishmen served in called on Redmond and the Irish Parlia- the British forces during the war. Of these, mentary Party to withdraw Irish support 58,000 were already enlisted in the British for the war. Also, it appears that Irish Army or Navy before the war broke out. troops in the were treated Another 130,000 men were volunteers re- with particular harshness. They consti- cruited from Ireland for the duration of tuted just two per cent of the army, yet the war. Of these 24,000 originated from they were the recipients of eight per cent the mainly from the (271) of all death sentences imposed by south of Ireland and 26,000 joined from the court martial. . The voluntary recruit- There are many reasons as to why op- ment figures for Ireland were: 44,000 en- position to the war hardened in Ireland. 2Quoted in ‘The First Calamity’, London Review of Books, 29 August 2013, p. 3 3Roy Foster, quoted in Ireland in the 20th Century, Charles Townsend, (Hodder Arnold, London, 1999), p. 68.

14 The Easter 1916 Rising in Ireland and in tion and incipient militancy of Irish work- particular the suppression of the rebellion ers. The British Officer class in Ireland and the execution of the leaders of the had effectively mutinied in on Rising changed the political atmosphere in the issue of whether they would obey or- Ireland leading to the rise of Sinn Fein, the ders to suppress armed resistance to Home virtual destruction of the old Irish Parlia- Rule by the Ulster Unionists. The country mentary Party, and a dramatic fall in sup- was awash with arms; three civilian armies port for the war. The remarks attributed were drilling and armed, and as the sun set to National Volunteer and poet, Francis over the last day of July 1914 it appeared Ledwidge, who was to die in the Third bat- that the rival parties were on a collision tle of Ypres in 1917, perhaps best exem- course. plifies the changing Irish nationalist senti- The Third Act was placed ment towards enlisting, the War, and to on the statute books with Royal Assent on the Germans and British. ‘I joined the 18 September 1914. However, the oper- British Army because she stood between ation of this Bill was, suspended for the Ireland and an enemy of civilisation and I duration of the war. Moreover it was re- would not have her say that she defended sisted fiercely by Unionists, concentrated us while we did nothing but pass resolu- in Ulster. In 1913, they had formed an tions’. In the aftermath of the 1916 Rising armed militia, the Ulster Volunteers, to and the execution of the leaders he said: ‘If resist the implementation of Home Rule someone were to tell me now that the Ger- or to exclude Ulster itself from the settle- mans were coming in over our back wall, I ment. Nationalists in response formed a wouldn’t lift a finger to stop them. They rival militia, the , to de- could come!’4 fend the constitutional rights of the , and to put pressure on Britain to The War in Ireland keep its promise of Home Rule. Conflict between the two armed groups looked pos- In the decade before the war the United sible in the early months of 1914. How- Kingdom experienced a series of crises ever, the outbreak of the war on 4 August that were almost unprecedented in modern engulfed Britain in a crisis that dwarfed times around the struggle for constitution its problems in Ireland. Prime Minister reform in the , the series of Asquith shelved the problem by putting strikes that were part of the ‘great unrest’, the Home Rule bill on the statute books, the fight for the vote for women and the but postponed its implementation until af- issue of Irish Home Rule. In Ireland the ter the war ended. He also provided that crisis was at its most extreme. The rise the bill would not be implemented until of the Irish Transport and General Work- statuary provision has been made for the ers’ Union under the socialist leadership exclusion of the Ulster counties. In this of and James Connelly had way he managed to appease both the con- brought the working class on to the stage stitutional nationalists and the unionists. of history. The terrible defeat during the But as FSL Lyons noted; ‘It was, of course, Lockout of 1913/14had set the movement an illusion. The Irish problem had been back but had not destroyed the organisa- refrigerated, not liquidated. Nothing had 4Francis Ledwidge, Cornhill Magazine, London, No. 288, June 1920, p. 698. 5FSL Lyons, ‘The developing crisis, 1907-14’, A New , 9 Vols., (Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1989), Vol. 6, p. 144.

15 been solved, and all was still to play for’.5 the name of the Irish Volunteers. In the On 3 August 1914 on the outbreak first months of the war Herbert Kitchener of the war in the House was raising a New Service Army in sup- of Commons in London pledged Ireland’s port of the relatively small pre-war reg- support for the British war effort and sug- ular Army. The Unionists were granted gested that the defence of Ireland should their own Division, the 36th (Ulster) Divi- be entrusted to the Irish and Ulster Volun- sion which had its own reserve militia of- teers in order to free up British troops for ficers and its own symbols. It was largely the war, provided the volunteers would not recruited from the be required to take the oath of Allegiance and had a strongly Protestant and union- or serve overseas. The Unionist leader ist identity. Redmond requested the War had promised immediate Office to allow the formation of a separate Unionist support for the war effort. He Irish Brigade as had been done for the Ul- was motivated in this by two main fac- ster Volunteers. The British Government, tors, one being genuine identification with however, was suspicious of Redmond af- the British Empire, the other being a de- ter he declared to the Volunteers that they sire to demonstrate the loyalty of Unionists would return as an armed and trained Irish to the British government, despite having Army by the end of 1915 to resist Ulster’s formed an armed militia in defiance of it opposition to Home Rule. Eventually he over Home Rule. Redmond’s speech on the was granted the gesture of the 16th (Irish) 3rd of August may have been controversial Division. Unlike the 36th (Ulster) Divi- but when Redmond made an impromptu sion, the 16th was led by English officers. speech on 20 September at In one of those historical contingences the in County Wexford offering the Irish Vol- first British engagement in Europe of the unteers for service in France, his actions War was made by the 4th Royal Irish Dra- caused a crisis within the Volunteers: goon Guards on 22 August 1914. They en- countered several German cavalrymen on Go on drilling and make your- patrol near Mons, when Corporal Edward self efficient for the Work, Thomas had the distinction of firing the and then account yourselves as first British shots in the War. men, not only for Ireland itself, Both political camps, the nationalist but wherever the fighting line and unionist, entered the war expecting extends, in defence of right, of the gratitude of the British administration freedom, and religion in this for their willingness to sacrifice themselves war.6 and the rank and file of their parties. Nei- ther foresaw that in the First World War, The organisation split into two fac- all special interests would be expendable. tions, the larger, comprising about 170,000 stayed with Redmond, and was the re- The Road to 1916 named National Volunteers; whose sole function was to supply a stream of re- Shortly after the outbreak of the war the cruits for the war in Europe. The mi- Supreme Council of the Irish Republican nority about 11,000, comprising the most Brotherhood (IRB) had decided to organ- militant and republican section split off to ise a rebellion in Ireland before the war form a new organisation, while retaining ended. In effect the IRB now controlled 6F X Martin, The Irish Volunteers, (James Duffy, , 1963), p. 145.

16 the Volunteers, but the more conservative contrast to Sheehy-Skeffington’s position, elements in the leadership of the Volun- Connolly’s position was political rather teers still commanded considerable sup- than moral, whether the rebellion was a port. Both factions hoped to profit from defensive or offensive war was just a tac- the war on the continent. The IRB fac- tical question. If the British intervened to tion of Clarke, Pearse and McDonagh were disarm the Volunteers or the ICA, or in- determined to organise a rebellion while troduced in Ireland then he Britain was otherwise occupied. The Mac- would fight a defensive war that would Neill/ Hobson group wanted to build up have mass popular support. Connolly was the volunteers into an effective army, who a Marxist and supporter of the Social- would be joined by thousands of demobbed ist International. In 1907 the congress at and disillusioned Irish veterans of the war Stuttgart had passed a resolution that in who could then demand Irish indepen- the event of an imperialist war the duty of dence. Neither side believed the war would socialists was to do all in their power to be protracted; less than a year at most, stop the war, and use the crisis to over- hence the need to implement their plans as throw capitalism. Connolly was deter- quickly as possible. But, in the meantime mined to turn the imperialist war into a they were prepared to fight using guerrilla class war. As he told Cathal O’Shannon: tactics if the British tried to suppress the ‘I have missed the opportunity before, but Volunteers or introduced conscription into I won’t miss it this time’.8 Ireland. The IRB faction in the Irish Vol- unteers made contact with Germany re- questing weapons and also sounded out the possibility of a German force landing in Ireland in the event of a rebellion. Despite The rebellion in April 1916 was domi- the British propaganda of a ‘German plot’ nated by the nationalist politics of the IRB in fact German assistance to the Irish rev- and the more conservative politics of the olutionaries was minimal - a few thousand Irish Volunteers. But, this was leavened ancient rifles and a shipment of arms that by the support of James Connolly and the never arrived in the days before the 1916 Irish Citizen Army who saw the opportu- Rising. nity to light a flame that might inspire so- cialists across Europe to oppose the war The question as to whether the Irish and turn their guns on their own ruling Volunteers or the Citizen Army should class. Despite the failure in military terms fight a defensive or an offensive war was of the 1916 Rising, almost eighteen months a political, tactical and moral question later the Russian working class did pre- that divided both organisations. Fran- cisely that. The war in Europe was one cis Sheehy-Skeffington a pacifist and mem- of the decisive factors that pushed Con- ber of the Citizen Army Council wrote to nolly and the nationalists into an armed Thomas McDonagh of the Volunteers in conflict with the British state. In doing May 1915 warning him of the danger that so Connolly had won a place for the work- the ‘movement could be used for aggres- ing class in the emerging struggle for Irish sive rather than defensive purposes’.7 In independence. 7Quoted in Marnie Hay, Bulmer Hobson and the Nationalist Movement in Twentieth-Century Ireland, (Manchester University Press, Manchester, 2009), p. 176. 8Quoted in DR OConnor Lysaght, ‘The Irish Citizen Army: 1913-1916’, History Ireland, March/April 2006, Vol. 14, No. 2, p. 20.

17 Conscription Crisis ment hoped to appease moderate opinion in Ireland by linking the issue of conscrip- The 1916 Rising and its aftermath had tion to that of Home Rule for Ireland. But hammered the first nails into the coffin of this was too little, too late - positions had the Irish Parliamentary Party, but the con- hardened in Ireland and even the feeble scription crisis of 1917/18 killed it off. But, Irish Parliamentary Party felt constrained Sinn Fein was not the only beneficiary of to withdraw from the House of Commons the militant opposition to the extension of when the Military Service bill was passed conscription to Ireland, and the realign- on 16 April 1917. ment of the political landscape in Ireland. Predictably, Ireland exploded in anger. It also revealed to everyone the potential Two days before the passage of the bill power of the Irish working class. a demonstration against conscription had mobilised nearly 10,000 in . On 18 April 1917 at a conference in Dublin, which was attended by the representatives of the Irish Trade Union Congress (ITUC), it was agreed to launch a nationwide campaign against conscription. The de-facto pres- ident of Sinn Fein Eamon de Valera de- clared that ‘the passage of the Conscrip- tion Bill... must be regarded as a declara- tion of war on the Irish Nation’.10 Later that day the Catholic bishops issued a statement which stated that the ‘Irish peo- ple have a right to resist’ conscription.11 At the special conference of the ITUC Unlike the rest of the United Kingdom, on 20 April attended by 1,500 delegates conscription was never imposed on Ireland. the trade unions put out a call for a However, the German offensive in April general strike against conscription. How- 1917 had strained the manpower and re- ever, as Conor Kostick points out, no dele- sources of the British Army. Sir Henry gate raised any objection to the executive’s Wilson, the chief of staff, insisted that con- identification with the aims of the nation- scription must be extended to Ireland de- alists, employers, and the bishops: spite the complete opposition of all almost all sectors of Irish political opinion. Wil- the general strike was decided son was determined to force conscription upon, but on terms that did on Ireland even at the cost of civil distur- not clearly mark out the dif- bances. He argued that he needed the men ference between the aims of in order to hold the line in France. He labour and the aims of Irish na- was not afraid ‘to take 100,000 to 150,000 tionalism.12 recalcitrant conscripted Irishmen into an army of two and a half million, fighting in It appeared to many in the North of Ire- five theatres of war’.9 The British Govern- land that this was just a broad nationalist 9See Conor Kostick, Revolution in Ireland, (Pluto Press, London, 1996), p. 34. 10Kostick, p. 34. 11Kostick, p. 35. 12Kostick, p. 36.

18 Catholic block, which allowed the Union- could have defeated British imperialism in ists to portray the ant-conscription move- Ireland, but also, could have provided the ment as a nationalist front. As a result the political basis for an Irish Socialist Repub- workers in Belfast played little part in the lic. But the conservative bureaucracy that strike against conscription. Nevertheless, replaced Connolly and Larkin spurned the the strike was a magnificent success across opportunity. This was another moment the rest of the country. On 23 April all fac- when the bureaucracy refused the bold tories closed, transport stopped, even the stroke at the right moment. We should pubs closed. The success of the strike owed resist all attempts to glorify or gloss the much to the activities of the Trades Coun- horrors of the war as some sort of heroic cils around the country. Workers took moment that brought out the best in men. the lead in organising the strike and trade This was a horrific war that changed the union banners led the marches. The de- course of history. That is the lesson we termination of the strikers to resist con- need to learn. In the 1920s people looked scription led the British government to back and suggested that this was ‘the war shelve plans for the immediate introduc- to end all wars’. This was obviously an il- tion of conscription to Ireland. However, lusion and the current imperialist tensions when Lord French was appointed as Lord- in the Middle East and on the Russian Lieutenant of Ireland in May 1918 he ar- borders mean we have to remain vigilant rived with a simple agenda; to enforce con- in our opposition to war. We should not scription in Ireland at any cost. Despite let the war-mongers hijack the centenary the repression and mass arrests this was an of the war. The Irish Nationalist MP and agenda he was unable to implement. The poet Tom Kettle who was killed at the Bat- stalemate was broken only by the signing tle of the Somme in wrote of the armistice that ended thethe war in of how he came to see the war quite differ- November 1918. ently just before he was killed:

Conclusion Know that we fools, now with The Great War was a pivotal moment in the foolish dead, modern Irish history that also provided Died not for flag, nor King, nor a number of important moments in Irish Empire, working class history. In particular dur- But for a dream, born in a ing the 1916 Rising and the conscription herdsman’s shed, crisis in 1917, when the national question And for the secret Scripture of and the socialist question could have been the poor.13 fused into a mass movement that not only

13www.independent.ie/.../lest-we-forget-the-dream-born-in-a-herdsmans

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