Historic Commemorations in New Zealand and Northern Ireland, 1940–1990
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Remembering the Past, Thinking of the Present: Historic Commemorations in New Zealand and Northern Ireland, 1940–1990 Helen Alexandra Robinson A thesis submitted in fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctorate of Philosophy, the University of Auckland, 2009. ii iii Abstract This thesis analyses and compares two historic commemorations in Northern Ireland with two in New Zealand, in the period from 1940 to 1990. These commemorations are the Twelfth of July and Remembrance Sunday in Northern Ireland, and Waitangi Day and Anzac Day in New Zealand. Examination of these commemorations has revealed several patterns. In the commemorations studied in this thesis, levels of public adherence generally depended on the extent to which the values that the commemoration symbolised were seen as threatened or highly needed. The commemorations which reaffirmed compelling values tended to enjoy higher levels of public support than those expressing values which were seen as either unnecessary or unthreatened. In both countries, historic commemorations were capable of uniting communities behind core values. However, in cases where there was no general agreement on what those values were or what they meant, commemorations frequently became sites of division and conflict. All four commemorations were regularly used by organisers and participants to express views on contemporary political and social issues and, on several occasions in both countries, different groups battled for the control of particular commemorations. In both countries, increased levels of social conflict often led to the increased use of the past as a rhetorical device. The main conclusion to be drawn from this study is that these historic commemora- tions derived more of their meaning from their contemporary context than from the historical events which they commemorated. In particular, how the public viewed and understood the values symbolised and reaffirmed by the commemorations strongly affected their levels of support. People were most likely to observe the commem- orations when they were seen as symbolising values which were widely adhered to and seen as threatened or urgently needed. The historic commemorations examined in this thesis were often strongly affected by contemporary events which were seen as relating, positively or negatively, to the values which the commemorations embodied. iv v Acknowledgements This thesis could not have been started, let alone completed, without the help of many people. My supervisors Malcolm Campbell, James Belich and Aroha Harris provided invaluable guidance, especially Malcolm who was, in practice, my sole supervisor for the first half of 2008. The University of Auckland granted me a PhD. scholarship and other funding which enabled me to dedicate myself full-time to the thesis, and spend six months living in Belfast. The university’s Department of History provided me with an office, computer, photocopying and printing, and internet connection. Various people within the department helped me in a range of ways, especially Barbara Batt, Caroline Daley and Tiopira McDowell. I was able to undertake productive research in four different cities thanks to the helpful staff at various libraries and archives in Auckland, Wellington, Belfast and London. In particular, various librarians at Queen’s University Belfast kindly bent rules concerning what materials Associate Members were allowed to access, and a Eugene O’Sullivan Theological Library librarian went above and beyond the call of duty to track down copies of the New Zealand Tablet in Auckland. The Ulster Society was also enormously helpful. My stay in Belfast was made instructive and enjoyable by a huge range of friendly locals, Protestant and Catholic, who answered my questions and generally gave me insight into their communities. In particular I would like to thank Mary Clarke, Elaine Doyle and Stephen McCormick, all of whom made me welcome and helped me understand their country. Mary also rescued me when I realised that I had got the date of Remembrance Sunday 1971 wrong and consequently left Belfast with no coverage of that particularly significant event. My husband Douglas Jones provided me with support, distraction and insight, and was enthusiastic about temporarily moving to one of the colder, stranger parts of the United Kingdom. vi vii Table of contents List of abbreviations ix Introduction 1 Chapter One: Commemorating the Boyne, 1690-1968 17 Chapter Two: Commemorating the Treaty, 1840-1967 52 Chapter Three: War Commemorations in Northern Ireland, to 1966 84 Chapter Four: War Commemorations in New Zealand, to 1966 118 Chapter Five: The Twelfth, 1969-1990 151 Chapter Six: Waitangi Day, 1968-1990 184 Chapter Seven: War commemorations in Northern Ireland, 1967-1990 220 Chapter Eight: Anzac Day, 1967-1990 250 Conclusion 278 Bibliography 283 Glossary of Maori words and Irish and British terms 313 viii ix List of abbreviations Organisations, titles etc AIA Anglo-Irish Agreement CESA Catholic Ex-Servicemen’s Association CGM County Grand Master CND Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament DUP Democratic Unionist Party EEC European Economic Community IOO Independent Orange Order IRA Irish Republican Army LOL Loyal Orange Lodge MWWL Maori Women’s Welfare League NIO Northern Ireland Office NZUSA New Zealand University Students’ Association PD People’s Democracy PRONI Public Record Office of Northern Ireland PYM Progressive Youth Movement RSA Returned Services Association, originally Returned Soldiers’ Association, later Returned and Services’ Association SDLP Social Democratic and Labour Party TD Teachta Dala (Member of Parliament) TVNZ Television New Zealand UDA Ulster Defence Association UDR Ulster Defence Regiment UFF Ulster Freedom Fighters UUP Ulster Unionist Party UUUC United Ulster Unionist Committee UVF Ulster Volunteer Force WAC Waitangi Action Committee Publications AH Te Ao Hou BT Belfast Telegraph BN Belfast News Letter DST Dominion Sunday Times EG Education Gazette EP Evening Post IN Irish News KM Te Kaunihera Maori LN Loyalist News MOOHR Maori Organisation on Human Rights NA Northern Advocate [New Zealand] NBR National Business Review NIPD Northern Ireland Parliamentary Debates NISPD Northern Ireland Senate Parliamentary Debates NZCN New Zealand Centennial News NZH New Zealand Herald x NZJH New Zealand Journal of History NZL New Zealand Listener NZMR New Zealand Monthly Review NZPD New Zealand Parliamentary Debates NZWW New Zealand Woman’s Weekly ODT Otago Daily Times OS Orange Standard PT Protestant Telegraph TC Tyrone Constitution TT Treaty Times UKNIWM United Kingdom National Inventory of War Memorials WACN Waitangi Action Committee Newsletter Introduction In 1986 Wellington’s Evening Post newspaper ran an editorial on the subject of Anzac Day: For many – probably the majority – it is now a late summer holiday, a day for relaxation, sweeping up the leaves or attending sporting events. When attention is focused on the reason for the day being commemorated, however, the country seems… divided on the issue... The differences are so sharp that the day itself cannot be left to those with memories but must be challenged by protesters who want the past judged by the standards of today… Like Waitangi Day, Anzac Day attracts the anger of those who do not want New Zealanders to acknowledge the past simply as history but want judgments to be made on our forebears as well… This questioning is going on everywhere, but unlike other Western nations with whose citizens New Zealanders can individually identify, we do not have a long history of shared experience which can be taken for granted as something we hold in common. Neither, it seems, do we have any clear focus for loyalty which tran- scends divisions over the course of our future directions. Now public occasions do little more than offer a platform for those opposed to some aspect of past history or present policy. Public holidays of a commemorative nature have become uncomfortable times to be a New Zealander and there seems little chance of our coming to peace with ourselves in the immediate future.1 The editorial sums up the complexities of historic commemorations not only in New Zealand but in much of the world, including Northern Ireland. Like New Zealanders, the Northern Irish in the second half of the twentieth century found that their commemorations could become forums for the expression of anger at past history and present policy. Nor did they have a ‘clear focus for loyalty which transcends div- isions’ or much apparent chance of coming to peace with themselves. Like Anzac Day and Waitangi Day, Northern Ireland’s commemorations were regularly turned into platforms for passing judgement. This thesis will argue that this questioning and judging is a common part of historic commemorations. It will be shown that the commemorations it examines were, in essence, much less about the past than contemporary issues and the need of national and sub-national groups to work out and express their identities and core values. Four commemorations will be examined: two from New Zealand and two from Northern Ireland. One remembers a seventeenth-century battle, one a nineteenth- century treaty, and two focus primarily on World War I. The commemoration of the 1 Evening Post (EP), 24 April 1986, p.6. 2 Introduction seventeenth-century Battle of the Boyne, known in Northern Ireland simply as the Twelfth of July, or ‘the Twelfth’, is different in nearly every way from Waitangi Day, the anniversary of the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi. The two First World War commemorations, Anzac Day in New Zealand and Remembrance Sunday in Northern Ireland, are very similar in form and content. Many of the Twelfth’s features date back to the late eighteenth century and, as we will see, its general form has been fairly consistent since the late nineteenth century. It commemorates the victory of William III, Prince of Orange, over James II at the Boyne Valley in Ireland in 1690. William was Protestant and James Catholic, and William’s victory cemented Protestant supremacy in Britain and Ireland, as well as ushering in constitutional reform.