FIFTY YEARS OF IRISH JOURNALISM FIFTY YEARS OF IRISH JOURNALISM BY ANDREW DUNLOP FELLOW AND PAST VICE-PRESIDENT OF THE INSTITUTE OF JOURNALISTS DUBLIN—HANNA & NEALE LONDON—SIMPKIN, MARSHALL & Co., LTD. 1911 CONTENTS. PAGE CHAPTER I.—My FIRST ENGAGEMENT. I Amateur Journalism—Wicklow to Wexford on a Four-in-Hand—Rosslare then and now. CHAPTER IL—MIGRATION TO DUBLIN. 19 Electioneering in Ireland in 1865—The Irish People trials—A Conservative Candidate's Home Rule Address—Mr. Parnell as Sir Boyle Roche's Bird—Land League Cavalry- Mr. Parnell's Mysterious Movements. CHAPTER III.—THE LAND LEAGUE AND THE NATIONAL LEAGUE. .42 The Daily News—Overwork : A " Light Weight "—Parnell as an Orator, outdoor and indoor—Archbishop Croke and the Pope— " New Tipperary." vi FIFTY YEAES OF IEISH JOUENALISM. PAGE CHAPTER IV.—THE EARLIEST NO-RENT DIS­ TURBANCES. .. .53 The Carraroe Evictions—A Medical Doctor with a wide area. CHAPTER V.—MR. GLADSTONE IN IRELAND AND AT HA WARDEN. .65 Making bricks without straw—The eccentric Mr. Barnes—Journey in a Goods Train. CHAPTER VI.—REPORTERS' DIFFICULTIES. 70 Paper read at Cardiff Conference—Bad Accommodation : Lord Spencer left Un­ reported — Journalists denounced by Speakers—Bad Acoustic Properties of Dublin Law Courts. CHAPTER VII.—FROM LIMERICK TO SKYE— A NON-STOP JOURNEY > . 85 " Elders' Hours" in a Scotch Hotel—A Crofter's Cottage—Interviews with landlords and tenants, CHAPTER VIII.—THE PHCENIX PARK TRAGEPY. 100 How the News was Telegraphed—The Trials of the Invincibles—Tim Kelly's Third Trial. FIFTY YEARS OF IRISH JOURNALISM, vii PAGE CHAPTER IX.—How I BLOCKED THE TELE­ GRAPH WIRES. * . 109 The Parnell Meeting at Kilmallock-—Monopo­ lising two Telegraph Offices—Mr. Biggar dodging the Police—Novel mode of dining. CHAPTER X.—SPEECHES FOLLOWED BY ARRESTS 119 How a Speech ol Mr. Healy was proved in Court—Mr. A. J. Kettle—Mr Michael Davitt's Ticket-of-Leave cancelled. CHAPTER XL—SOME ALL-NIGHT JOURNEYS. 126 The Glenbeigh Evictions, etc.—Girl shot at Bohola. CHAPTER XII.—HOTELS AND RAILWAY TRAVELLING IN IRELAND. 139 CHAPTER XIIL—SOME DISORDERLY MEETINGS 149 Parnell and O'Clery atEnniscorthy—Attempt to pull Parnell ofl the Platform—Parnell dis­ ingenuous—Rowdy Meetings at Claremorris and Sligo—Extraordinary Scenes at Thurles. CHAPTER XIV.—MR. WILLIAM O'BRIEN AT LTJGGACURRAN. 165 Lord Lansdowne's Estate—Scene on the Roadside—Mr. O'Brien's subsequent visit to Canada. viii FIFTY YEARS OF IRISH JOURNALISM. PAGE CHAPTER XV.-^-BY SPECIAL TRAIN TO THE SCENE OF A DOUBLE MURDER. .172 Confreres left out in the Cold—A Timid Car- driver—Midnight Levee in Loughrea. CHAPTER XVI.—THE MAAMTRASNA TRAGEDY. 182 An All-night Journey—Forty Hours without Sleep—Broken-down Bridges—A Telegraph Breakdown. CHAPTER XVII.—WITH LORD SPENCER TO MAAMTRASNA. 192 Writing Despatches on an Outside Car—A Stolen " Interview " with Lord Spencer— Dining under difficulties. CHAPTER XVIIL—A THIRD VISIT TO MAAM­ TRASNA. .207 Interview with the recanting Informers—A Mountain ride on horseback. CHAPTER XIX.—FAMILY EMIGRATION SCHEME. 219 A Peculiar " All-Night Sitting "—Lord Spencer and the Babies. CHAPTER XX.—BELMULLET TO WESTPORT. 227 A Midnight Drive—Sleeping on chairs. FIFTY YEARS OF IRISH JOURNALISM, ix PAGE CHAPTER XXI*—INTERVIEWING. 233 Trades Unionists and Industrial Schools. CHAPTER XXII.—SPECIAL CORRESPONDENCE. 237 The Distress in 1879—The Alleged Miracles at Knock—The First Case under the Land Act-—The Castlefarm Tragedy—Interview witri the Parish Priest—The Parnell Commis­ sion : Pigott's Release. CHAPTER XXIII.—DISTRESS IN CLARE, GAL WAY AND DONEGAL IN DECEMBER, 1882. 253 CHAPTER XXIV.—VISIT TO NORTH-WEST DONEGAL .... 259 CHAPTER XXV.—" UNITED IRELAND " AND THE " DAILY NEWS." . 268 CHAPTER XXVI.—THE OLD NEWSPAPER AND THE NEW : A COMPARISON. 269 The Party System of Government—Tariff Reform—The Referendum—Journalism and University Education. PREFACE. A PORTION of the following. pages was written during the nine months—excepting the brief "vacation" intervals—which I spent at the Parnell Commission in London. The Cpurt sat four days each week, some­ times only three, and this gave me a good deal of spare time which I utilised in writing portions of these reminiscences. People in every part of Ireland have repeatedly said to me " Why don't you write your reminiscences ? " My answer, speaking generally, for the last twenty years, has been that I had not time. Recently, however, I have had occasional short periods of leisure in which I have been enabled to complete my self-imposed task. I am well aware that the narrative is very much of a personal nature, but possibly it may prove of some interest as a picture of journalistic life in Ireland during the troublous times to which it relates. xii FIFTY YEAES OF IEISH JOUENALISM. This work makes no pretension to being a history of the period which it covers. A very fair idea of that history might, I think, be gathered from the newspapers of the time, and possibly, for the period from 1867 to 1889 during which I was correspondent, and, frequently, the special correspondent of The Daily News, that journal may be found to contain as good a summary as exists. I know that I was the most energetic of all the Irish correspondents of the London papers during those years. I have not attempted to adhere to chronological order, which I consider would not have been suitable for the general plan of the work. In every instance, unless otherwise stated, or implied, the incidents are described from personal observation. In a large number of cases, I was the sole journalist present; and the result was that in those cases the information supplied to the newspaper which I repre­ sented was exclusive. This applies in the fullest sense to all the " special correspondence " which represented a very large proportion of the author's labours from 1875 to 1889, and from that time on a considerable, though a smaller, proportion. I have not altogether avoided politics, but I have tried to avoid partisanship, believing as I do that no system of Government could be more pernicious than the present system of Government by Party. CHAPTER I. MY FIRST ENGAGEMENT. THE title FIFTY YEARS OF IRISH JOURNALISM is not a misnomer. For the first two years of the fifty my contributions were those of an amateur. In 1857 I contributed five rather lengthy articles to a newspaper in the North of Ireland— The Coleraine Chronicle—on a subject which was not a popular one then, and which cannot yet be said to be so, but which, for me, had then, and still has a great fascination —Political Economy. It was the time of the Manchester Cotton Famine of 1857, and amongst the special topics then being discussed, especially in The Economist, was the advisability of suspending the Bank Act, that is to say, suspending the provision which limited the issue of notes by the Bank of England to £14,000,000, save in so far as gold was held against them. I strongly opposed the proposed suspension, contending that no good object could be served thereby ; that there was ample money in circulation to carry on all legitimate trading; and that if the practice was A 2 FIFTY YEARS OF IRISH JOURNALISM. adopted of suspending the Bank Act whenever a so-called financial crisis arose, it would encourage a state of things which would multiply financial crises, and render the suspension a matter of frequent occur­ rence. The other topic—the Cotton Famine—I dealt with in another way. I pressed, as strongly as I could, that no man, or woman either, should be altogether dependent on any one particular industry by which to earn a living. Division of labour, I admitted, was on the whole a great boon, but it had its drawbacks, which became obvious the moment any large industry was, from any cause, crippled; and the danger was all the greater if the industry was one which was carried on, as the cotton-weaving industry was, chiefly in one or two districts. I have never ceased, when opportunity has offered, to enforce the views on these points which I then advocated. Before I came to Ireland (in December, 1856) I had contributed to some of the Glasgow newspapers, over my own name, and I had also written and published in Glasgow a couple of pamphlets on the temperance question. My connection with journalism as a profession dates from 1862 when I joined The Wexford Constitution as a reporter. For my appointment on that journal I was largely indebted to the then proprietor and editor of The Coleraine Chronicle—Mr. M'Combie. The salary offered was small, but I would have accepted it had it been but five shillings a week so strong was the MY FIRST ENGAGEMENT. 3 faith I had in my ability to force myself eventually into a fairly good position on the Press. -In 1862 the route to Wexford, from Dublin, was by rail to Wicklow, and thence by a well-appointed four-in-hand to Wexford. A drive of sixty-four miles . on the box-seat of such a conveyance on a fine August day, through the picturesque scenery of the famous Vale of Avoca, was most enjoyable and invigorating. The pace varied from ten to twelve miles an hour, and Wexford was reached shortly after four in the afternoon. The Slaney—at this point a wide and deep river—was crossed, to the southern side of the town, by the " old " bridge, long since disestablished, and which indeed was then about to be superseded by the present structure. When I left Wexford three years later the railway had been completed as far as Enniscorthy.