Ireland an enemy of the allies? (L'Irlande-ennemie?)

Preface

The Irish Question is an international imposture.

Ireland, in order to justify her rebellion and treason, makes out that she is oppressed. Nowadays the oppression of Ireland by England is a myth, and a very feeble one at that. Macaulay said:

"The Irish, on the other hand, were distinguished by qualities which tend to make men interesting rather than prosperous. They were an ardent and impetuous race, easily moved to tears or to laughter, to fury or to love. Alone among the nations of Northern Europe they had the susceptibility, the vivacity, the natural turn for acting, and rhetoric, which are indigenous on the shores of the Mediterranean Sea."

Ireland therefore possesses the power of playing upon our emotions as she chooses, but the accusations which she makes are so startling, and so contrary to all we know of British rule in other dependencies, that we must be careful to verify her statements.

Professor Pearse, one of the ringleaders of the Dublin rebellion, who was shot the followvi PEEFACE

ing week, stated on the eve of the rising: "It will fail in its direct object, but the moral effect before the whole world will be immense, and form a glorious chapter in Irish history." The Professor believed that the world was very simple-minded, easily taken in by resounding phrases and theatrical poses. Possibly he was not mistaken. We need not mock, it was more successful than we realize.

Ireland has always harped upon this note with great effect. How many Frenchmen and Americans have been caught in the snare? Yet what Pearse was asking those rebels to do was nothing less than to stab us in the back when our fate was in the balance at Verdun, and when our soldiers were writing in their blood at Vaux and Douaumont the most heroic page in the history of France. It were well, then, if his scheme should not reap all the success which he anticipated.

The rebellion was followed by punishment; mercy was shown to the rank and file, the ringleaders were executed, and Ireland wailed with grief and decorated their graves with flowers. George Bernard Shaw, an Irishman who owes his reputation as a humorist to the amusing paradoxes of his race, dared to write : "Nothing in heaven or earth can prevent the men shot taking their place beside Emmet and the Manches-

PEEFACE vii

ter martyrs in Ireland, and beside the heroes of Poland and Serbia or Belgium in Europe." This comparison is an insult to noble little countries, and the reason of this these pages will endeavor to show.

There is an amusing side to this, that is, to see the German press waxing indignant at the destruction of a small nation, and Austria — save the mark ! — applauding a national revolt.

We should do well to be very cautious of the word Nationalism; it covers such a multitude of artificial claims. In its name we have Egyptian "patriots" in the pay of the wire-pullers of the Committee of Union and Progress — and such progress! — who want to purge their country of Western corruptions and restore the benefits of Ottoman Kultur. Of late years, too, we have had Hindu nationalists demanding Home Eule for that immense peninsula with its hundred different races. Who are they? Young Bengali lawyers without a mandate, claiming to represent 200,000,000 illiterate and apathetic peasants, without counting 100,000,000 Mohammedans who loathe them, and are quite satisfied with English rule, and would not tolerate a change. When shall we do justice to these ill-timed jests?

It is certain that before the war opinion in Latin countries inclined towards the small comviii PKEFACE

plaining nation, not going very deeply into the matter, as usual, but applauding these tirades, and a priori suspecting England, the silent, who is such a bad defender of her own cause. An Englishman always believes that his cause is perfectly plain and needs no comment.

"Will you defend yourself ?" says Meredith's Princess Ottilia to her friend, after listening to the diatribe of a pretentious Boche.

"Well, no, frankly, I will not. The proper defense for a nation is its history." *

No doubt, but it is not known to everybody. By the time an Englishman makes up his mind to reply to his accusers he has generally ten or twenty years of calumny to contend with, and some of the dirt will stick.

It is no easy matter to destroy a legend, and if the Irish Celts had not given us such stinging blows during the war we should probably have gone on for a long time believing them to be inoffensive and unfortunate victims. They may be humorists, but they overestimate our credulity. They ask for applause. If their recent attitude, by directing all eyes towards them and attracting closer observation, ends by confounding them, and bringing them in more kicks than halfpence, and if they are on the way to lose the last and best of their friends in America, they

PEEFACE ix

have no one to blame but themselves. This frightful war will have had one good result; it will have taught us to recognize our friends and know our enemies.

There is no doubt that the verdict will be a severe one, and unfortunately many good and noble men will suffer from this national crime; among them will be those Irishmen who recognized and fulfilled their duty — and let me say at once that there are many such, several hundred thousand. Mercifully there are still many sound hearts in Ireland, and this indictment is not directed against them.

We shall denounce the clergy who have gone astray, but we shall be most careful to exclude the English Roman Catholics, both priests and faithful, whose conduct during the last four years has been irreproachable in act and word. They do not condone the Irish bishops; on the contrary, they suffer through being compromised by their folly.

We shall have hard words for Irish politicians, but we shall not forget that, in every party, in Ireland as elsewhere, there are men of good faith and perfect loyalty.

But besides them, and in spite of all these reservations, these distressing facts remain — the falling-away of a nation, the hostility of a x PEEFACE

people in whose generosity we believed, the lying pretexts with which we were to be deceived. All this we shall try to describe and explain.

Need I say that the writer is in no man's pay? Some will insinuate that he is, in the bewilderment of seeing their Anglophobe prejudices thus clearly and categorically demolished.

Is this work, then, not impartial? Let us understand one another. Impartial in its point of departure certainly; but frankly partial in its conclusions. After I had examined this question, weighed words and deeds in the balance, I was perforce obliged to take sides. To try to please everybody and never ruffle preconceived ideas is not always the way to find out the truth.

On this subject I shared the illusions — and the ignorances — of almost all my fellow-countrymen, until one day an Irish-American friend, who died an heroic death eight years ago as one of the pioneers of aviation, handed me Sir Horace Plunkett's Ireland in the New Century, and warned me that it contained many surprises for me. These were so great that I was fired with the desire to go into the matter more deeply, and to complete the investigation by the study of men and books — past and present. The first result of this was a contemporary study of the social and political condition of Ireland in 1909*

PEEFACE xi

Having since retained, needless to say, the deepest interest in this question, and followed from day to day, at the very heart of the Anglo- Saxon Empire, the incidents of this endless quarrel, I was often distressed to see the way the French public and press either attributed the blame and responsibility wrongly, or else, amazed at Ireland's misguided folly, gave up trying to understand the business, and relegated it to the mysteries of censored war-news.

Unfortunately even those who were sent to Dublin on missions of inquiry or propaganda were sometimes taken in by the plausible speeches of the local orators. Doubtless Froude's fiction would be denounced to them, Froude, who falsified history by literature and prejudice, and, instead of showing Ireland in her true colors, crowned her with the palms of injured innocence. Then the more accurate and honest work of Lecky would be shown to them. Lecky was the great historian of eighteenth-century Ireland, an epoch during which Ireland played indubitably a creditable part. But were they told that Lecky, in the face of contemporary events, became the opponent of Home Kule just as Froude had been?

Were our friends thoroughly conversant with all the complex facts of the question? I know that some of them, unfortunately, returned havxii PREFACE

ing formed hasty and ill-considered judgments, actuated more by sentiment than reason. This book has been written in the humble hope of enlightening them a little.

R. C, E.

Paris, August 15th, 1918.

Contents

PREFACE . pp. v-xii

Chapter I

Outbreak of war — German atrocities — Concessions and rebellions— Belgian Recruiting Commission — Redmond and Recruiting — Bishop O'Dwyer — The rebellion of 1916 — Growth of Treason — Irish excuses .... 1-22

Chapter II

Monks and bards — Legends and traditions — Earl Strongbow — Normans and Celts — Under Henry VIII — Henry VIII — Elizabeth — Compromise and concession — A new era — Ireland in the sixteenth century — The Ulster plantation — The massacre of 1641 — Oliver Cromwell — The Restoration — James II — William III — The penal laws 23-63

Chapter III

Grattan's Parliament — Hoche's expedition — Wolfe Tone and 1798 — The Union — Daniel O'Connell — Demand for repeal — The Irish at Westminster — The famine of 1847 — America comes in — "Manchester Martyrs" . . - .64-87

xiii xiv CONTENTS

Chapter IV

Chronic pauperism — Land agitation — Boycotting — Difficulties of government — Gladstone — The Ashbourne Acts — The first Home Rule Bill — Plan of campaign — Gladstone's second Bill — Arthur and Gerald Balfour — Wyndham's Act — Mr. BirrelTs failure — Redmond's speech, 1915 88-117

Chapter V

Ireland and Ulster — The position in 1906-7 — Days of hope — Mr. Dillon's opposition — Mr. BirrelPs "policy" — Sir Horace Plunkett— The Budget of 1909— Mr. Asquith's pledges — Mr. Asquith's Bill — Illusory safeguards — Doubtful promises — Separation 118-147

Chapter VI

The Ulster question — Ulster's fears — Lord Ernest Hamilton— Ulster and equality — Ulster's covenant — A futile offer— The crisis of 1914— The eve of war . . . 148-167

Chapter VII

Sir E. Carson's manifesto — Mr. Redmond's view — Enlistment— Redmond's difficulties — Sinn Fein comes in — Sinn Fein Constitution — Sinn Fein predominant — Redmond's ultimatum — "Insults to Ireland" — Sir E. Carson resigns — Recruiting — Growth of rebellion — The sports tax 168-198

CONTENTS xv

Chapter VIII The Insurrection And Its Consequences

Rebellion in Dublin — General Maxwell arrives — "Moral effect" — Mr. Birrell resigns — Rebel recriminations — Mr. Lloyd George called in — Mr. Duke Chief Secretary — Mr. Redmond's difficulties — Deadlock again — Mr. Lloyd George's attitude — The Convention — Sinn Fein and the Convention — Warnings from America — Mr. Redmond's death — Points in dispute — Chimerical factories— Hopes and wishes 199-237

Chapter IX Conclusions And Forecasts

Sir H. Plunkett's hopes — Irish claims — American ignorance — America begins to see — Mr. Stead's opinion — Still far from Home Rule — Germano-Irish Society — The " Wild Men*' — Folly and Vanity — Clerical intimidation — Official optimism — A negative conclusion — Useless concessions—Kuno Meyer 238-268

IRELAND

AN ENEMY OF THE ALLIES?

IRELAND— AN ENEMY OF

THE ALLIES?

Chapter I

Why is Ireland not on our side? Why should this little country, athirst for independence, reserve her sympathy for predatory Germany? Moreover, she wants us to take her part ; can we do so?

Ireland has not the excuse that she did not understand the facts of the case. She could read in the original all the Foreign Office documents, Sir Edward Grey's dispatches — never was diplomacy more frank and outspoken, more loyal or more damaging in its obvious good faith. Ireland had to choose between that and the outrageous depravity, the disgusting cynicism, of the Wilhelmstrasse. She chose ill. She is always accusing her "stepmother" of breaking this promise or that. But in this case it was Germany who dishonored her oaths, and England

l

2 IREIAND— AN ENEMY?

who risked the whole of her Empire to keep her sworn faith. And Ireland stood aloof and was critical — but of England only. "Can England's motives ever be pure?" she mutters.

War broke out.

On August 1st, 1914, Ireland was on the verge of civil war, for there were two Irelands: one, consisting of three-quarters of the island, had just obtained its charter of autonomy, the Home Kule Act, which only needed the royal signature. The other part, that of the Ulster Protestants in the north-east, had sworn a solemn covenant two years before, that it would not submit to this law; in it, Ulster read her death-warrant, and that literally. She was ready for resistance ; for months she had been arming and drilling and having military maneuvers with great seriousness. She was prepared for any sacrifice in order to keep her place in the Empire, in spite of the Imperial Parliament, Her army, consisting of 100,000 picked volunteers, had just been reviewed by its leader, Carson.

Everything was ready and the die was cast. These men expected no quarter from the Irish Nationalists, to whom they had been delivered by the party bargains of the English Radicals; they were determined to sell their liberties dearly.

No less determination was shown by the opposing side. The Nationalists had also raised an army; they had the same number of volunteers, but far less well armed; but, to make up for this, it is true, they had the support of the Imperial Government and Parliament. Ulster had no one to rely upon but herself.

The forces of Redmond and Carson are face to face. A few days later blood will flow. Yes, but in another theater and in vaster floods. The trumpet sounds another blast, another call to arms. A truce to childish games, to the miniature war of Irish factions. The world is bowed under a greater anguish, and on the lurid horizon arise the symbols of Right, Justice, Liberty, Respect for Treaties, Defense of the Weak. Fighting for these on the plains of Belgium, the Irish Volunteers, Catholic and Protestant, would not betray their own cause. Are these not the very principles which they invoke daily against one another?

Their leaders realized this. Carson and Redmond instantly gave orders to their partisans to suspend hostilities, and give their services to the greater cause, the cause which embraced theirs. Carson sent his men "to defend the Empire," that was all ; Redmond made reservations, he offered his brigades ato defend the shores of Ireland." But that was better than nothing. What response was there? Ulstermen could not hesitate. They had armed themselves in order to preserve by force their union with the Empire, and the Empire asked of them a greater sacrifice, and they did not hesitate. They had to choose between three incentives: fear of oppression by a Catholic majority; traditional hatred of those who were to become their masters— selfish incentives if you like ; sincere devotion to the Empire — which meant putting their own grievances on one side, and giving up all safeguards, sending their sons to be massacred in Europe, and finding themselves afterwards disarmed in the hour of their own peril. Their devotion won the day, but we must remember the alternative, for we owe Ulster a debt of honor for her choice.

And what of the rest of Ireland? I wish I could say that she did not hesitate either. But' it would be false. When, in September, 1914, John Eedmond, their leader at that time, greathearted and clear-sighted, pointed out their duty, a certain number of National Volunteers answered the call. But the others, the majority, waited.

Yet the first victim to protect was Belgium, innocent, without a doubt, chivalrous, heroic and Catholic too, which is an important point to an Irishman. Yet Ireland made no move.

A month later we are no longer dealing with

THE IEISH ENIGMA 5

iniquitous diplomacy, but with crimes which disgust the basest minds; the whole world had just heard of the atrocities of Aerschot and Dinant. Louvain was in ashes, its priests taken to Germany in cattle trucks or massacred on the Brussels road. Many Irish priests had been educated at the University of Louvain, hundreds of Belgian priests and nuns had arrived in Ireland, fleeing from violation and murder, telling of their tortures, and crying for vengeance. Will Ireland rise? Yes, but not as you would expect.

All the "National Volunteers" who had sulked during their leader's appeal made up their minds at last ; they denied Kedmond and went to swell a new army, the "Irish Volunteers," opposed alike to Redmond, England, and the Allies. In the first month of the war the German press informed us that these Irish had their ambassador at the court of Potsdam — no less a person than Sir Roger Casement ! *

In December a tragic voice was heard, crying aloud for vengeance; Cardinal Mercier, whom young Irish priests had known and revered at the School of Philosophy in Louvain, solemnly affirmed the barbarism, the revolting cruelty of

basement's "mission" was mentioned in German newspapers I found in Belgium as early as August 25th, 1914.

the invader, the ignominies inflicted upon the priests and nuns of Belgium.

Was that enough to convince the Irish clergy? On the contrary, several of the Bishops attacked England, our ally, with redoubled vituperation. Other things hardly interested them.

In 1915 the German atrocities came nearer home. On a cold spring morning, poor, drenched, miserable, exhausted creatures were landed on the Irish coast, while not far off the bodies of children were thrown up by the tide. A wave of horror swept over the world; the Lusitania had been torpedoed. Was Ireland roused? Hardly at all.

Civilized men howled execration, the brutal Boche from Berlin, New York, and Madrid replied with satanic laughter. This is only the beginning, it seems; the submarine has shown what it can do, we shall see more of its handiwork. Vw victis! the wrath of Germany is terrible. This is by no means displeasing to some of the Irish, since they are now the allies of Germany.

In the outrages which the Bernstorff gang perpetrated in New York, you will often find Irishmen in very sinister company. But it does not seem to worry them.

Little by little, as Germany developed her submarine campaign, a rumor spread; the most

THE IEISH ENIGMA 7

profitable coups always seemed to come off somewhere near Ireland. Would not her lonely, deserted shores, with myriads of inlets, creeks, and reefs, mysterious caves and outlying islands, make admirable bases for supplying the pirates? Was this hateful suspicion far-fetched? Many Irishmen did not appear to resent it. Are we not at war, and is not England the enemy?

Gradually the rumor began to crystallize. Here a chatterbox could not hold his tongue, there a patriot bragged too loud; but still there was not enough evidence for a magistrate to convict. It took two years to find the proof ; it was forthcoming at the rebellion in 1916, much to the confusion of the incredulous, and at the time of Casement's trial. Rebel Ireland had official dealings with Admiral Tirpitz's pirates.

During the following months the contrasts which have been a salient feature of Irish history for the last twenty-five years became still more accentuated; on the one hand the English governors doing their utmost to cajole and satisfy Ireland, on the other every effort being made to discourage them. Elsewhere I have emphasized this attitude; the war in no way altered it.

Locked in a struggle which became ever more deadly, pitted against a foe more dangerous than she had foreseen, Great Britain gave up her comforts, her pleasures, habits, and cherished traditions. The all-powerful Trade Unions imperium in imperio were asked to suspend their privileges. She sacrificed all her liberties by the Defence of the Eealm Act, of which one clause, the suspension of the Habeas Corpus Act, will show the significance. Hundreds of minute regulations and burdensome taxes created havoc in every sphere, in commerce, industry, agriculture, amusements, drink, restaurants, railway journeys, rationing, requisitions, etc. And to almost every regulation, however necessary and far-reaching, would be appended a clause or similar amendment, "this regulation does not apply to Ireland."

The result was what might have been expected (one need only read a few pages of the history of Ireland to guess what would happen) : the more concessions were made, the greater grew the rebel army; the more favors Redmond obtained for Ireland, the less gratitude she showed, and the more she repudiated him. Redmond, poor man, who had once succeeded to ParnelPs prestige, and had led the Nationalist party for a quarter of a century, was now a king without a kingdom. He ruined himself on that day when he dared to say to his fellow-countrymen, "England has a right to your help, give it to her." His convictions as to the origin of and responsibility for the war never varied; his brother,

William Redmond, M.P., died a noble death at the head of an Irish battalion, and his son fought on our side.

But the National Volunteers of 1914 did not follow them ; they went over to the opposite camp and became the "Irish Volunteers" of Sinn Fein who attempted the rebellion of 1916.

This metamorphosis did not take place in a day. The Government was warned twenty times, by the police, by questions in the House, by the press, and by the magistrates, of the plot which was being hatched and of the growth of extremist views in Ireland. But the Government maintained its usual deliberate lofty serenity; its only Irish policy was laissez-faire. At the slightest sign of trouble it turned to the Nationalist politicians, its allies, and the official representatives of Ireland. They were most optimistic. "Never fear, trust Ireland, give her her head, do not irritate her, study her psychology, sympathize with her, you will see all will be well." They forgot that their constituents were becoming less and less disposed to endorse their promises.

Towards the end of 1915 a Belgian Recruiting Commission visited Dublin, in order to enroll several categories of refugees. The Lord Mayor gave them a kindly reception at the Mansion

House, speeches of mutual admiration were exchanged, unimpeachable sentiments, for the benefit of the public and the reporters. But in private our friends received curious impressions of their visit, and were able to see how the land lay. It was quietly suggested to them that they should be broadminded and not worry the refugees too much, nor pull the chestnuts out of the fire for the old ogress over the way. Then followed whispered confidences about the said ogress — Caillaux's methods, in short.

According to the laws of hospitality, no protests nor expressions of surprise could be made ; the puzzled visitors had happened upon a state of mind of which they had had no warning. If this were the attitude of the well-disposed Irish, to whom Mr. Asquith at Westminster gave testimonials for their civic virtue and their loyalty, what must be the attitude of the masses of whom Eedmond was no longer the leader?

One of our friends had an inkling the following day. Some English officers invited him to go for a motor run into the beautiful Irish countryside. Before they had gone far they came upon a strange spectacle — crowds of young fellows, thousands of them wearing caps or soft felts ; words of command ; distant rifle shots ; Indian files going along the hedgerows; patrols

THE IKISH ENIGMA 11

signaling on the crests of the hills ; motor-cyclist scouts.

"What's all this?"

"Oh, nothing — a Sinn Fein field-day."

"In broad daylight? So near Dublin? Is the Government not alarmed?''

Silence on the part of the English officers, who shrugged their shoulders and smiled uneasily.

"You had better ask Mr. Birrell or Lord Wimborne; they will give you reassuring explanations."

The crisis reached its height in 1916. After having enrolled 3,000,000 volunteers, Great Britain asked her sons to make a supreme effort — i conscription. The more desperate the struggle, the more inexorable became the need for it. Every day her resolution was strengthened by some fresh horror; delenda est Carthago. Parliament consented, the nation submitted, and conscription was passed.

But the Government made a fatal mistake, having forgotten everything, yet learnt nothing. As though all the recent concessions to Ireland had not failed in their aim and left her more intractable and more hostile, this final favor was granted her, she was exempted from conscription. A little blackmail was enough to enable John Redmond, alarmed at the disappearance of his popularity, to veto that.

Redmond and his friends added promises to their threats:

"Conscription will exasperate Ireland, you will need more soldiers to enforce it than you will ever raise from Irish conscripts. Try to understand Ireland, O clumsy Saxons! Show trust and sympathy, and you will get far more. Let us manage her, do not annoy her, we will speak to her — she has a generous soul and will understand."

Mr. Redmond did his best in all good faith. The Viceroy asked for a minimum of a thousand recruits a week, so that he might say that Ireland had done her duty as the sister island,

Redmond had reckoned without his host; not only had everybody quite made up their mind to laugh at him behind his back, but Dr. O'Dwyer, the notorious Bishop of Limerick, went farther and forbade his flock to serve under the hereditary enemy, recalling the fact that the Vatican, the mouthpiece of divine wisdom, had remained neutral during this worldly conflict. In his Pastoral the Bishop grew bolder; he not only abused England, but every member of our diabolical alliance; Serbia was a criminal and we were every one of us tricksters. Poor Serbia, writhing in agony, Monsignor O'Dwyer thanks Heaven for having punished you. . . . It will be as well to quote him fully :

THE IKISH ENIGMA 13

"Then see the case of the small nationalities on whose behalf many people have believed that the war is being waged.

"What good has it done for them? What part have they played in it except that of cat's-paws for the larger nations that nsed them? Belgium delayed the German advance for two weeks and gave time to the English and French armies to rally. For her pains she has been conquered and ruined. Servia began the war by an atrocious crime, and as reparation for it might weaken Russia's aims in the Balkans she was encouraged to resist. She, too, has played her temporary role and has followed in the wake of Belgium. Montenegro is the next to go ; and it would seem that the great belligerent nations look to themselves only, and use their weaker neighbors for their own purposes.

"This war is not waged by any of the Great Powers as a quixotic enterprise for lofty ideals. 'Small nationalities' and other such sentimental pretexts are good enough for platform addresses to an imaginative but uninformed people, but they do not reveal the true inwardness of this war.

"All the belligerents have had practical and substantial aims in view. France wants her lost provinces of Alsace and Lorraine; Russia wants Constantinople; England wants the undisputed supremacy of the sea and riddance from German commercial rivalry ; Austria wants domination in the Balkans and an outlet in the iEgean; Italy wants Trieste and what is called Italia Irredenta; Germany wants a colonial em-

U IRELAND— AN ENEMY?

pire and a powerful navy ; and all these Powers have formed alliances and laid their plans many a day, simply for the realization of their respective purposes.

"They planned and schemed solely for the sake of power and material gain. All the talk about righteousness is simply the cloak for ambition, and the worst of it is that some of the belligerents have gone on repeating the profession of their disinterestedness until they have come to believe it themselves.

"Truth, and right, and justice have had very little to say to this war, which is an outbreak of materialism and irreligion. The peoples did not want this war; there is no hatred of one another amongst them ; but the governing cliques in each country have led or driven them like sheep to the slaughter. God has been ignored; His law has been put aside; Christianity is not allowed to govern the relations of nations. And now the retribution is on them all, the fair dreams of victory and expanded empire and increased wealth and prosperity with which they set out have vanished long ago, and there is not a Government amongst them but is trembling for the day when it shall have to answer for its stewardship to its own people."

This is the stuff which was preached from Irish pulpits during the battle of Verdun. Such a document might well be considered seditious, and His Majesty's Government might have recalled the Bishop to his senses. But on this point Ireland has always taken a firm stand. "If you touch our holy prelates we will have civil war instantly." As usual the Government gave in, in order to afford no ground for accusations of tyranny nor occasions for calumny. So successful was this move that on April 7th, 1916, Mr. Sheehy Skeffington, an Irishman, whose evidence is valuable, wrote, "Sinn Fein (the army in the pay of the Wilhelmstrasse ) is at present enrolling more than a thousand volunteers a week — the exact figure which Lord Y/imborne asked for, for the Imperial Army."