Many people know about the Battle of Mount Street and how 15 men fought a force of Sherwood Forresters 1,600 strong and, with the support of some rifle fire from the coastal railway line (and at very long range, from Jacobs Factory), kept them from crossing the Grand Canal for five hours. But what if the British soldiers had been landed at the Dublin docks instead? In fact, why did the British prefer to land them in Dun Laoghaire, seven miles away?
British Soldiers on roof of the Customs House, almost certainly after the 1916 Rising (source Internet)
THE FIGHTING IN THE NORTHSIDE DOCKLANDS
It has been historian Hugo McGuinness’ contention for some time that it was the resistance that British troops encountered around the docks and at Ballybough at the beginning of the Rising, coupled with a history of the workers’ resistance of the 1913 Lockout, that convinced the British that it would be a very bad idea to attempt to land troops in the Dublin docks. Hence the choice of Dún Laoghaire and bringing them from there into Dublin along the coast road. From there, unless they took a considerably roundabout route, they would pass by either the Volunteers in Bolands’ Mill or their comrades at the Mount Street and Northumberland Road outposts. And so, the Battle of Mount Street Bridge.
At the start of the 1916 Rising on the outskirts of the northside Dublin area of Ballybough, the Volunteers and the Irish Citizen Army mobilised to prevent British troops approaching from the Musketry School in Fairview or from any other units approaching from that direction. For a number of recent years, the East Wall History Group and historian Hugo McGuinness have been working to acquaint people with the history of the 1916 resistance in this area. See map of Annesley Bridge area today here: https://www.google.ie/maps/place/Annesley+Bridge,+Dublin/@53.3609037,-6.2409037,17z/data=!3m1!4b1!4m2!3m1!1s0x48670e5ee8f4dad1:0x9d9ebc34b28e0aa4
In 2014, the “1916 Rising: Battle at Annesley Bridge” walking tour organised by the East Wall History Group was a huge success. Led by Hugo McGuinness as guide, it was estimated that almost 200 people took part.
As the East Wall History Group commented in an introduction to eight videos they have put up from the walking tour ( http://eastwallforall.ie/?p=2376 ):
‘The events at Annesley Bridge in 1916 generally receive only a small mention in the history of the Rising. In fact, there was fierce fighting at the time, not only at the bridge but throughout the surrounding areas. There were a great number of casualties, including civilians, though an exact figure has been difficult to compile. Our walking tour, for the first time, attempted to tell the whole story – from the radicalisation of the local residents in the years previous, to the events on Easter Week 1916 and how sporadic sniper battles continued after the Rising had ‘officially’ ended.‘
That there was a military engagement at Annesley Bridge was known but it has been generally thought of as a minor skirmish. Hugo McGuinness’s original research along with compilation and examination of references has uncovered a much more important story, one containing a number of armed engagements – and with far-reaching consequences.
THE RECENT PRESENTATION
On 28th April, a full hall in the Gibson Hotel of mostly North Wall residents received a presentation from historian Hugo McGuinness on “The 1916 Rising: The Fight in the Docklands”, a talk organised by the East Wall History Group. Using an electronic slideshow of photos and maps to illustrate his talk, Hugo took the audience through an amazing story of Irish resistance courage, tragedy, comedy, bungling and initiative, with lots of little vignettes.
Front view of most of the audience at the talk (source D.Breatnach)
Of particular impressiveness was the group of Volunteers who ran down a street to engage a detachment of British soldiers from the Musketry School at Dollymount who were heading down East Wall Road towards the docks. The detachment of British soldiers had slipped out of an engagement with a blocking force facing Annesley Bridge. A small group of Volunteers ran down North Dock Road to cut them off and engaged them, stopping their progress. Then there was the Volunteer who put a British machine gun out of action with one shot when he hit the water-cooling mechanism.
Hugo McGuinness speaking beside screen (Photo: D.Breatnach)
(source Internet)
Hugo’s audience were told of the Irish sniper in the docks whom the British nicknamed the ‘trade unionist’ – he took up position around 8am and always finished at 5pm. There was the floating gun platform in the Liffey, not just the Helga. There were no feeding arrangements made for the soldiers sent into Dublin so they looted homes and warehouses.
Many local people were interned in a large goods shed. Many houses were strafed by machine guns and a number of civilians shot dead – one man later put an empty picture frame on the wall in his hall to surround a pattern of bullet-holes there. A member of the Dublin Metropolitan Police was killed by British troops and his colleague pallbearers were held up for hours at a checkpoint manned by the Dublin Fusiliers – some residual hostility from the Lockout perhaps? Martial law here meant that if you were seen in the area, you were warned and, if seen again, you were shot! If you did not respond to a military challenge you would also be shot. Nevertheless, children hung around the troops and gathered intelligence for the insurgents – but one was killed too.
Just before concluding, Hugo mentioned the research of another historian (whose name I did not catch), showing a rise later in 1916 and in subsequent years of names give to children following some of the better-known participants in the Rising and also a rise in personal names in Irish.
(source D.Breatnach)
As is often the case with those who are passionate about their subject, Hugo’s presentation was a little overlong, in my opinion and he had to rush the end. The projector threw the bottom part of the image frames, which often contained a separate photo or map, too low, so that one had to stand to see them over the heads of those in front. Those are the only two faults I felt in what was an engaging and engaged presentation of well-researched material about a fascinating but understated part of the history of the 1916 Rising, with a working class and lower middle class flavouring sprinkled throughout.
After the talk, a number of the audience joined the organisers in the bar of the Gibson Hotel where history continued to be discussed. In the foyer to the bar/restaurant, a small exhibition of panels entitled “Casualties and Prisoners” had been set up.
Part of the “Casualties and Prisoners” panel exhibition in the Gibson Hotel (source D.Breatnach)(source D.Breatnach)(source D.Breatnach)
Inside the bar, the surroundings were plush and out of synch with the area. Although the bar was only moderately busy, the service was very slow; later we were harassed to leave as the bar was closing, although we had been served pints only ten minutes earlier. There was no arguing from the group but a number remarked that they would not be drinking there again.
The refreshments element apart, for which no responsibility lies with the group, this was another very successful event among a number organised by the East Wall History Group. Rumour has it Hugo may have a book coming out soon – I can hardly wait.
Ray Bateson raises questions about the accuracy of the current 1916 Rising Roll of Honour (of those who died while fighting or as result of fighting for Irish freedom in the 1916 Rising) and builds a case for a revision of the list and the inclusion of an additional number. He also calls for recognition of the medical personnel who were killed in the course of administering to the wounded.
Republished with kind permission of Mícheál Ó Doibhlín from his Kilmainham Tales Internet site.
The gallows being erected at the O’Connell Street approach to North Earl Street (Photo D.Breatnach)
(extract)………. As part of the Dublin State 1916 Commemoration a gallows has been erected at the approach to North Earl Street. It is understood that there will be ceremonial executions here over the weekend. Those listed to ‘take the drop’ over Easter (not at all to be confused with ‘taking A drop’) are believed to be a Water Charge Protester, a Minister Botherer, a Homeless Person and A Nother. Gardaí have refused to confirm the names prior to informing their families, “Out of humane considerations” said Garda Commissioner Battenum.
The gallows, constructed by Pierrepoint Solutions of London, can accommodate eight condemned people at once, according to the manufacturers, “with a little squeeze.” A number of Moore Street Blockaders had been in line to partake of the hanging also but a recent judicial decision has resulted in their surprise acquittal. Asked about the unexpected turn of events, Minister Humphreys said “chucky poor law” which is understood to be a Monghan Orange dialect variation of the Gaelic or Erse for “Our day will come”.
Rumours abound that Hillary Clinton and President Obama and other White House personnel are to have live footage of the executions beamed to them, in recognition of their interest in such events.
Other high points of the 1916 commemoration will be a reading out of the 1916 editorials of the Irish Times and Independent condemning the Rising and calling for stern punishment for the Rebels and, in the case of the Independent, calling not too subtly for the death penalty for Connolly and Mac Diarmada. Sir Bob Geldoff will read the Times editorial and Diarmaid Ferriter the Independent’s.
The full list of all British personnel killed during the Rising will also be read out and in a special addition which is sure to find favour with everyone, also the names of the Lancers’ horses, previously neglected and unrecognised but campaigned for by historian Ann Matthews for many years now, who makes the point that although they were military, they were working horses. Kevin Myers will read out the British Personnel’s names and Frank McDonald will perform the duty for the horses.
After ‘The Last Post’ has been played by an Irish Army bugler, the ceremony will conclude with the solemn “Je vous prie”, with all dignitaries present going down on one knee and, partly in Irish but wholly in English, begging Her Royal Majesty’s pardon for having risen against her predecessor and any and every vexation given since. Going down on both knees had been originally scheduled but was since ruled out as being too servile (and in view also of certain words on the nearby monument to Jim Larkin).
The ceremony will be televised in full and, in an exercise of civic involvement, people throughout the country will be encouraged to kneel at the same time and to repeat the words as they are pronounced.
Substantial security steps have been taken to prevent undesirable elements such as citizens attending the events.
Some of the physical security measures — view north along O’Connell St. from the Spire (Photo D.Breatnach)
In separate but related developments, Dublin City Council Executive Own Keegan and Jim Keoghan of the Planning Department have announced
Some of the physical security measures — view southwards along O’Connell St. from the Spire (Photo D.Breatnach)
plans for the changing of the North King Street name to “South Staffordshire Street” and the erection of a 1916 commemorative plaque with the words “Nothing happened here in 1916”.
Similarly, in Balbriggan the Development Association has unveiled plans to rename the main street “Auxiliary Boulevarde” in memory of the illuminations carried out by members of the Auxiliary Division on the night of 20th/ 21st September 1920. A street party will be held to mark the renaming with children’s face-painting (black or red, white and blue colours only, apparently) and dressing up in Auxilliary or RIC-type costumes for photos, ‘Knock-the-Volunteer Over’ ball-throwing etc. The candy floss and rock stick on sale will be in red, white and blue colours. All the cooked food will be char-grilled to commemorate the historic events in 1920.
I hope this finds you well — although how you could be, with the mob besetting you on all sides, is anyone’s guess. As if you wouldn’t have enough problems already with the economy! Who’d be a politician these days and especially in the year that’s in it? Well, yes, I do know that you get paid for your trouble. But what does the mob expect for their paltry €157,540 per annum? Sure one could never run a decent-sized house with servants and cars and kids going to university on that kind of money (not to mention the holidays you’d need, just to take a break from the mob).
Heather Humphreys, Minister for Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht
The truth is, Heather, that the mob have had it in for you from the beginning – they never gave you a chance. First it was that you are not an Irish-speaker. Well! Who needs to be able to speak that dead language anyway (well, nearly dead, and the sooner the better)! Well, yes, ok, the Irish-speaking areas are part of your special responsibility, it’s called “the Department of Arts, Heritage and Gaeltacht”, it is true, but everyone knows that the “Gaeltacht” just got added on to your Department’s responsibilities because it had to be put somewhere.
However, I do think it was unwise of you, if you don’t me saying this to you as a friend, to put that McHugh in the Gaeltacht job as Minister of State. I know he’s doing his best but darling it’s simply excruciating to listen to him stumbling over his koopla fukal (no, I’m not being rude) in public speeches. Surely there must a Blueshirt somewhere who can speak decent Irish?
Thankfully, with the Arts budget cut so thoroughly by this Government and the previous one, you didn’t have too much to worry about there. But Heritage? Oh dear! You’d think for that, one would just have to stick some cement on crumbling castles and pay some staff to look after some cromlechs or something, wouldn’t you? Or pay for the upkeep of some of those lovely Georgian or Victorian big houses (like the one you sorted out for Enda in his Mayo constituency – no, no, I don’t blame you one bit. Always look out for the boss, I say, if you want him to look after you.)
But a row of dilapidated houses in the city centre next to an untidy and smelly street market! Heritage! God give me strength – and you too, Heather, poor darling. That mob, Heather – fifteen years, going on for sixteen, they’ve been banging away about that. What a pity that Joe O’Reilly (bit of a boor really, but still ….) fell on hard times and couldn’t proceed with the demolition of that whole sorry terrace years ago and save you all this heartache!
Nothing is enough for that mob, nothing! Give them an inch and they’ll be screaming for a mile. First it was a clamour for Joe O’Reilly to put back the State’s 1916 50th anniversary plaque that had fallen off the front of No.16 Moore Street and ended up in his Chartered Land office. Honestly, the hullabaloo! Then it was one house the mob wanted made a monument, then it was four. Then the whole terrace — they’ll want the whole country next!
And just when you were going to have some of the houses demolished, that mob, the worst of them, occupied the buildings and stopped the demolition. What are we coming to? If it were me, Heather, I’ll tell you now, I’d have sent our own SWAT team in right away. You have to be tough with that kind of element, Heather, like your party was back in 1922 and ’23 — and sometimes you’re too soft. Yes, you know you are. Oh, sure, some liberals and Republicans would have kicked up a fuss but those vandals in occupation would have been dead or in jail and the terrace a demolished pile within hours. Let them try and get up a campaign over a pile of rubble!
I wonder whether it was wise to call yourself “a proud Irish republican”, when you were appointed, Heather. You had the job, after all, so why say things like that? It’s not as though your FG colleagues would be expecting it of you and it was, as they say, giving a hostage to fortune. Was it perhaps because you felt a bit insecure, as the only Presbyterian in the Government? Oh, Heather – you should know by now that there’s only one religion in Government, and it’s above even Christianity, never mind its various sects.
I despise the mob as much as you do, Heather but I think you could have thrown them a couple of bones a bit earlier. Buying the four houses from O’Reilly (a million each? Not bad, not bad at all for inner-city run down properties!) at the end of 2015 was obviously going to be too little, too late, with Easter 2016 just around the corner. That might have worked a few years ago but not now. You’d have been better off hanging tough, as our masters across the pond say, and giving them nothing except the back of your hand. Now they’ve got the bit between their teeth, collecting thousands of signatures, marching, picketing, blockading …. and even talking about what kind of a Republic they should have.
Heaven forbid they should ever get the Republic they want for if they do, I’ll be transferring whatever assets I can liquidate and getting out of the country as fast as I can.
But I digress …. What about the elections? Nobody expects the Government to survive, so no point worrying about that. Who will take their place? Well, remember when your party and Labour ousted Fianna Fáil? Election promises aside, it was business as usual afterwards, wasn’t it? It’ll probably be the same this time. Well, let’s hope so, anyway.
And your own Dáil seat? Is it safe? I do worry about that. We must have lunch soon and have a good gossip. The Radisson perhaps? Or better still a trip to Blarney, my treat? Anyway, one wouldn’t want to be around Dublin, of all places, at Easter …. with the year that’s in it.
In the last days of the 1916 Easter Rising, with the GPO in flames, the garrison had to evacuate and did so through Henry Place. When they came to Moore Street, it was being raked by machine-gun fire from a British Army barricade at the junction with Parnell Street. Consequently, the garrison entered the first house in the terrace to the their right, No.10 and tunneled from house to house until they reached the end of the terrace, No.25.
A struggle is taking place currently to have the whole terrace saved and declared a national monument, a battlefield site in the context of the Historic Quarter. In 2007, the State made only four houses a national monument, No.s 14 to 17 and at the very end of 2015, bought the four run-down houses from their speculator owner at a million Euro each. The Government plans to make them into a commemorative centre, in the course of which they wish to demolish buildings 13, 18 and 19. Speculators have planning permission for a giant shopping mall from O’Connell Street to Moore Street and from Parnell Street to Henry street, which envisages the demolition of the entire terrace except for No.s 14-17.
In reply to campaigners, Minister for Arts, Heritage & Gaeltacht, Heather Humphreys, has stated that some of the buildings are of post-1916 construction and therefore are of no historic value. In opinion pieces in the Irish Times, one week after the other, Frank McDonald and Diarmaid Ferriter wrote articles supporting the Government.
JUST FOUR HOUSES — a sketch for three actors
AT HENRY LANE/ MOORE STREET INTERSECTION
(Sounds of shells crashing, flames roaring, combustibles exploding, rifle fire, the chatter of machine-guns)
Irish Volunteer A: “Bloody hell, it was hot in the GPO!”
Irish Citizen Army Volunteer: “Hot as Hell. We were lucky to get out alive, with ammunition about to blow.”
Volunteer A: “We can’t stay here in this laneway in the open, though.”
ICA Volunteer: “No, let’s get under cover quick! Into that terrace there … Moore Street this is, right? Sixteen houses ….
Volunteer B: “No, we have to occupy just four houses in this street.”
Vol. A: “Only four? But there’s nearly 300 of us here!”
Vol. B: “I know. But orders …”
Vol. A: “Damnation! OK, best bash that door down, No. 10.”
Vol. B: “No, not that one.”
Vol. A: “Why not?”
Vol. B: “Only Numbers 14 to 17.”
ICA Vol: “But they’re in the middle of the terrace. We’d get shot to pieces by the British machine gun up at Parnell Street – and we have to carry Connolly’s stretcher so he’d get shot too!”
Vol. B: “Yeah, they’ve already shot up The O’Rahilly’s lads.”
Vol A: “Whose orders are these? Who says we should all pile in just four houses in the middle of the terrace?”
Vol. B: “Somebody called Humphreys …. and a Mac Donald …. and a man called Ferriter. Something about only those four houses being of historic significance.”
ICA man: “What? Bloody rubbish – look, go and ask Connolly what he thinks. He’s the Commandant of this garrison, not that lot, whoever they are.”
(A few minutes later)
Irish Volunteer B: “Well, what did Connolly say?”
Vol A: “His exact words? ‘Don’t be stupid lad – break down the door of No. 10 there and tunnel along the terrace, from house to house, aye, all the way to the end – No. 25, isn’t it?’ ”
ICA man: “That’s more like it – I knew we’d get some sense out of Jim – I mean, the Commandant.”
Vol A: “Thanks be to Jayzus for someone with sense in charge. Who the hell are that other lot and where did they come from, that Humphreys, MacDonald and Ferriter?”
Vol B: “I dunno. Give’s a hand with this door before we get shot out here, gabbing …”
Saturday was the day selected by Pegida for their Irish launch, which they had planned to do at the Dublin GPO at 3pm on Saturday (6th February). Anti-Racist Network Ireland called a demonstration for the same location from 1.30pm but from around noon bands of antifascists were on the street hunting fascists and met them at various locations with painful results for the fascists.
Section of anti-racist rally on central reservation O’Connell Street, looking southward. The GPO building is to the right out of frame. (Photo from ENAR Ireland) FB page).
BACKGROUND
Founded in Dresden, in eastern Germany in October 2014, Pegida (Patriotic Europeans against the Islamisation of the West) is a broad European network of loosely linked groups opposed to what they claim is the “Islamisation of Europe”. Although Dresden remains its stronghold, the organisation has spread to a number of European countries.
In January last year, marches in German cities reportedly attracted up to 25,000 people at their peak, before numbers began to drop severely, rising again however in October as politicians and media stoked fears of a massive influx of migrants and refugees arriving in Europe from war-torn countries (countries, incidentally, where some European powers have played a major role in instigating or directly carrying out those wars).
Pegida claims to be not fascist and ‘solely’ against Muslims as has been the case with so many fascist organisations in the past – they have been ‘only‘ against communism, or against Jews, or against blacks etc. The organisation has been frequently associated with general anti-immigration diatribes and in January last year derogatory descriptions of immigrants by its German leader, Lutz Bachman, in a closed Facebook discussion, were made public. He stepped down from the leadership after those revelations and the circulation of images appearing to show him posing as Adolf Hitler. The following month however he was reinstated with claims that the images were faked.
In Ireland the Blueshirts, popular name for the Army Comrades Association, mobilised and recruited in the 1930s. They were in part a response to the election of the new Fianna Fáil party, a split from Sinn Féin, in a popular national reaction to the hounding of socialists and republicans by the victors of the Civil War, 1922-1923. The Blueshirts presented themselves as Irish nationalists (even Republicans) with their targets being Communists, Jews and the IRA. Meanwhile elsewhere in Europe, fascist groups were organising, variously declaring their targets to be Jews, Communists, Socialists, Anarchists, trade unionists, Roma and Sinti, immigrants, gays and homosexuals and various religious groups.
The Blueshirts were fought on the streets by Republicans, Communists and some social democrats and, when they threatened a coup, their activities were banned by the De Valera government. It seemed that the majority of the Irish capitalist class had decided that Fianna Fáil were a safe pair of hands and would manage the country better and, besides Britain might go to war with some countries where fascists were in power. The Blueshirts lost active members after that and with other right-wing organisations, formed the Fine Gael political party which became the principal mainstream opposition party from then on, occasionally going into Government in coalition with other parties.
Blueshirts marching, 1930s (Photo sourced from Internet)
PRELUDE TO DEMONSTRATIONS AND ANTI-FASCIST ACTION
Saturday was chosen as “a day of action” for the groups that fall under the Pegida banner, with a number of anti-immigration and anti-Islam demonstrations planned to take place across Europe. The Irish far right anti-immigration organisation Identity Ireland supported Pegida on their Facebook discussions and claimed that Saturday would see the launch of the Irish branch of their organisation. According to a report by the Russian news agency RT, Identity Ireland’s leader addressed a Pegida rally in Dresden last month.
The ARN called for a large peaceful demonstration and even encouraged people to bring their children, advertising it as “a family affair”. Some debate between them and antifascists took place on the Internet and in person on what are the effective methods of resistance to fascism to employ. One of the anti-racist event organisers, Bulgarian Mariya Ivancheva, sociologist and anthropologist based at UCD, was reported in The Journal as calling for a “nice rally to celebrate diversity”. “When Pegida are there we are ready to face them but not to confront them,” she went on to say.
Anti-fascists referred to history to verify their case that fascism has always ultimately had to be stopped by physical force and that being the case, application of that approach at an early juncture was most effective and meant less suffering for working people, ethnic minorities and other targeted groups. The response of ARN to these antifascists was that the latter were not welcome on their rally.
Barricade against a Blackshirt march at Cable Street, East London, 1936. The attack was spearheaded by the police but the antifascists were successful. (Photo from Internet)
Many Republicans and Socialists were also angered by reports that the ARN had applied for police permission to hold their rally. Unlike in Britain or in the Six Counties, this is not required by law in the Irish state and the police are required to facilitate with traffic restrictions the right to march or rally on the streets or pavement. The antifascists’ disapproval was based on what was perceived as giving the police more power than they already had and which they often abuse. One veteran of demonstrations in Britain recalled that permission had once not been required in London either but liberals, social democrats and officials of the Communist Party of Great Britain had made it a practice to ask the police in order to cultivate good relations with them. In time, prior police permission became a requirement which at times was withheld or granted with conditions on times and changes of route.
However, subsequent to the publication of this report, I ascertained that ARN had not asked permission of the police, one of them pointing out that such is not required. The misunderstanding may have arisen from one person stating that he had informed the police that the event would be taking place. This of course is quite some distance from asking permission.
The antifascists, composed of Irish Republicans from virtually all organisations and independents, along with a few socialist and anarchist independent activists, organised their own mobile forces.
ON THE DAY
The anti-racist rally at the GPO was attended by a couple of thousand, from the Spire almost to the Jim Larkin monument and covering the road from the GPO to the central pedestrian reservation. O’Connell Street was closed by the authorities to all northbound traffic and stewards were having difficulty in preventing the rally spilling into the southbound lanes. It was addressed by speakers from People Before Profit, the Anti-Austerity Alliance, Sinn Féin and a number of other speakers, including migrants.
Small section of crowd on east pavement, O’Connell St, with Misneach organisation flags visible (Photo D. Breatnach)
Clashes occurred at the pre-arranged Dublin meeting points of fascists on the Luas line with the handful of Irish fascists being attacked and some, including their leader Peter O’Loughlin and member Ian Noel Peeke being reportedly hospitalised. Clashes broke out again in the city centre at a number of points; one of the latter being at Earl Street North. It seems that some Pegida supporters had gathered at the junction with O’Connell Street and were watching the demonstration opposing them across the road and some were filming it. There were reports of some of them abusing women supporters of the antiracist rally who were near the junction with North Earl Street. The Rabble independent media group reported them shouting anti-communist insults at them (see their video link at end of article). In any case, although generally free of visible insignia and carrying no banners, they began to attract an antifascist crowd, scuffles quickly broke out and the fascists ran down North Earl Street and Talbot Street. A couple of the Pegida supporters ducked into a nearby ‘poundshop’ apparently for safety but they were followed and received a pounding.
Police stormed the shop and evicted the antifascists, lashing out at almost anyone close by, as can be seen in the Irish Times video (see link at end of article). RTÉ has lodged a complaint about one of their camera operators being deliberately struck by a police baton. The riot police with batons drawn then set up cordons with barking German Shepherd dogs behind them and cleared North Earl Street of all pedestrians, allowing no others to enter from either direction.
North Earl St. after incident (facing westward). (Photo D. Breatnach)
This cordon was maintained until a few more Pegida supporters were permitted to escape through Malborough and Talbot Streets. All of the fascists in this area at least were identified by a number of sources as being of East European background, both by their accents and appearance. Some posts on fascist sites later on seemed to confirm this (see AFA Ireland statement link at end). Earlier reports gathered by antifascist intelligence had indicated that Pegida supporters from fascist Polish organisations were planning to support the Pegida launch.
North Earl St. facing westward, Police and their vans (Photo D. Breatnach)
Subsequently, word reached antifascist patrols that 5-7 other Pegida supporters had gathered in a pub in Cathedral Street, again off O’Connell Street and scores of anti-fascists raced to arrive outside the pub almost at the same time as police. Another struggle with police took place outside the pub with riot police using their batons to jab and occasionally lash out, though with a degree more restraint than they had earlier at North Earl Street (perhaps due to an initial complaint from RTÉ having reached their senior officers by then). Police continued to violently push protesters and to jab with truncheons and one demonstrator showed a badly swollen and blue hand.
A standoff took place here for some time until the Pegida supporters appeared to be getting bussed out in police vans which sparked a rush of 50 or more antifascists southward down O’Connell Street. Riot police on foot and in vans followed them and at the intersection with Lower Abbey Street, drew up two cordons, one facing eastward down Lower Abbey Street and the other facing the Liffey, while crowds of antifascist gathered on the eastern pavements and Lower Abbey Street and mostly spectators gathered on the central pedestrian reservation. More police arrived and drew plastic shields out of their vans while a number of dogs were in evidence barking, one jumping up and straining on the leash towards antifascists.
Many spectators, natives and others, expressed bemusement and asked people near them what was occurring, evidence of the low level of advance news coverage by the mainstream media. Alternative, liberal, socialist and Republican media and independent sites on the other hand had given extensive coverage and encouraged people to attend the anti-racist demonstration or the antifascist action. Some among the crowd who were ‘in the know’ explained the events to one or two in their immediate vicinity. The overall atmosphere in the crowd seemed opposed to the fascists with mixed attitudes to the police and antifascists. These crowds offered fertile ground for being publicly addressed by word of mouth or leaflets but none seemed available to fulfill that role.
After some time in apparently purposeless deployment, given that nothing was moving, the Gardaí simply returned most of their forces and riot shields to their vans and most drove off. This seemed to indicate that the police maneouvre had been in the manner of a decoy while the fascists were spirited away quietly from the vacated vicinity of the pub. The Rabble video seems to confirm this.
Melee in Cathedral Street as riot police force antifascists away from pub where fascists are in hiding (photo from Internet)Riot Squad police in Cathedral Street facing off antifascists. (Photo D.Breatnach)Standoff Abbey St. junction O’Connell St, facing westward (Photo D.Breatmach).Many spectators — view northwards along O’Connell St. from the William O’Brien monument (Photo D.Breatmach)
SUMMARY ANALYSIS
The State, probably in anticipation of antifascist action, mobilised and deployed considerable forces. Garda vans moved through the city centre, sometimes in convoys, in addition to police on foot, mounted on horse and bicycle (though the horse police were often discreetly out of site in several locations around the demonstration area). Riot police waited in vans while other vans were stacked with plastic riot shields (which in the end were not needed, if a missile was thrown at the police it was a rare one).
In line with the general history of the relationship between capitalist states, their police forces and fascist movements, the police showed their determination to protect the fascists moving around the city centre. The eagerness of officers at times caused them some problems, including one of them striking a cameraman from the national broadcasting network, RTÉ, with a baton. On another occasion, a riot police officer can be heard calling “Hold the line!” at a time when the video shows the line is not under pressure – the only danger to the police line at that point is seen to be from over-eager officers breaking away to pursue and attack demonstrators.
A number of demonstrators and some spectators suffered bruises from police batons as well being violently shoved by police. In one video a police officer is briefly visible striking at a person lying on the ground – a visual echo of that famous photograph of Bloody Sunday during the 1913 Lockout, when the Dublin Metropolitan Police had run riot less than 100 yards away. In other footage police are seen shoving a man, apparently disorientated (perhaps by a blow to the head) to the ground at least three times although he is no threat to them and is not even resisting.
A feature of the antifascist active resistance was the unity in action across the Irish Republican spectrum, a feature that has been growing in solidarity work around Republican prisoners, in resistance to some features of repression and in the defence of the historical heritage represented by the struggle to save the 1916 Terrace in Moore Street. On this occasion however the unity in action included some SF activists. A sprinkling of independent socialists and anarchists were also among them. Some activists of the socialist, anarchist and communist organisations left the rally to join the antifascists blockading the fascists and their police protectors at Cathedral Street. There were a number of reports of football youth ‘casuals’, supporters of four Dublin soccer clubs, also cooperating in hunting for fascists. At least two of these were observed taking ‘selfies’ of themselves against a riot police background!
It is not known how many arrests were made nor what their outcome has been. Fascists were filmed being handcuffed as they were being put in police vans to take them to safety but it is unlikely they were charged. A number of fascists were reportedly hospitalised where no doubt their medical care teams will include a number of migrant background and perhaps even of Muslim religion.
The police and the Government will be considering their response but the ritual condemnations by their mouthpieces of antifascist force can be expected, as well as attempts to isolate the antifascists as some kind of hooligan or sinister element. The capitalist class will not be impressed with Pegida or Identity Ireland’s performance and, if considering building up a fascist movement in the future, will probably look elsewhere.
Both the ARN and the antifascists were pleased with the outcome of their respective efforts but liberal elements can be expected to condemn the antifascists for what the former perceive as marring the message of their demonstration. The ARN statement (see link at end of article) did so in fact albeit in muted tones, “regretting skirmishes”. In a parallel to some Jewish leaders in 1930s Europe during the rise of fascism, a Muslim religious leader was quoted criticising violent actions “by a minority” and called for defeating them by “dialogue”.
The fascists will be licking their wounds and trying to put a brave face on their defeat, also condemning the antifascists for using “undemocratic violence” or words to that effect. All fascist movements in history have been extremely violent while often, while in their growth period, presenting themselves in public as peaceful and condemning the violence of their opponents. This is a fact that liberal elements usually fail to appreciate, while other elements among the middle class are ultimately content to see their order being maintained, whether by the State or by fascists.
Whatever spin the fascists, the State, mass media or liberals may put on it, the fact remains that the fascists have been prevented from staging a publicity coup that would have raised the morale of their few recruits and encouraged more to join them. Fascist movements throughout history have required such morale-boosters and encouragement for potential recruits and, incidentally, intimidation of their opposition. What happened on Saturday in Dublin has been the reverse – the fascists and potential recruits have been intimidated and discouraged. Over 200 indicated intention to attend on the Pegida “Irish launch” Facebook event but reports on the ground in the city centre indicate a total of perhaps 30 fascists being chased around the city in small groups. The 170 or so, whether Irish or from elsewhere interested in supporting islamophobia, racism and fascism won’t be in a hurry to enlist now.
But should a new attempt be made to launch a mass fascist movement in Ireland, on whatever divisive basis, the antifascists are likely to turn out in even greater numbers.
“Supporting organisations (in alphabetical order):
Anti Austerity Alliance, Akidwa Ireland, Africa Centre Dublin Ireland, Anti Racism Network Ireland, Attac Ireland, Autistic Rights Together, Communist Party of Ireland, Conference of Religious in Ireland, Dialogue & Diversity, Dublin Calais Refugee Solidarity, Dublin City Centre Citizens Information Service, Doras Luimni, EDeNn, ENAR Ireland, Fighting for Humanity – Homelessness, Galway Anti Racism Network, Gaza Action Ireland, Gluaiseacht for Global Justice, Green Party of Ireland, Ireland Says Welcome, Ireland Palestine Solidarity Campaign (IPSC), Irish Anti-War Movement, Irish Housing Network, Irish Refugee Council, Irish Missionary Union, Irish Traveller Movement, Migrant Rights Centre Ireland, National Traveller Womens Forum, Shannonwatch, Show Racism the Red Card – Ireland, SARI – Sport Against Racism Ireland, SIPTU, Sinn Féin , The Platform, Pavee Point, People Before Profit, United Against Racism, The Workers Party, Workers Solidarity Movement, You Are Not Alone.” (From their statement published on European Network Against Racism Ireland’s site)
British Embassy Dublin petrol bombed in rage at Bloody Sunday, Derry 1972Some of the wonderful children’s artistic impressions of the Rising on display at the launch of “Our Rising”.
The terrace of houses in Moore Street, No.s 10–25, in the Irish capital of Dublin, much in the news of late, is of great importance to the world and should be recognised as such by Irish people and internationally. The terrace is of great importance in terms of being
an urban WWI battlefield
of opposition to imperialist war
of the struggle of the working class
of women’s struggle for equality
of the struggle of the world’s people against colonialism and
a surviving centuries-old European street market.
In this article I intend to develop this argument and these points.
In the closing days of Easter Week, in the cancelled and hurriedly rescheduled Easter Rising in Dublin, after five days of fighting, siege and a number of days of artillery bombardment, the garrison of the General Post Office, the Headquarters of the Rising, evacuated their burning building and occupied a terrace of sixteen houses in Moore Street. They broke into No.10 and tunneled from house to house up to No.25, until the whole of the terrace and back yards had been occupied.
Meanwhile, a charge of a dozen Volunteers on the British Army barricade at the northern end of that street, at the junction with Parnell Street, had failed to reach its objective; machine-gun fire had injured some and killed others. The leader of that charge, mortally wounded in a side-street, wrote a note to his wife as he lay dying there (the words are reproduced on a plaque in the laneway named after him: O’Rahilly Parade).
That history, and of it as a market in childhood memory, is what engages many people — perhaps most – of those campaigning for the preservation of that terrace of houses and of the thousands who support their efforts. But there are aspects of international importance to that 1916 Rising not usually alluded to and which deserve to be noted, celebrated and commemorated.
A RISING AGAINST WORLD WAR
James Connolly, the revolutionary socialist or communist and trade union leader, had been calling for an uprising for years and his public exhortations intensified with the onset of WWI. A section of the Irish Republican Brotherhood was also anxious to engineer an uprising during that War — “England’s difficulty is Ireland’s opportunity” was a well-known saying among Irish nationalists. But for Connolly, the issue was much more than that – the dispute between some capitalists about which of them would control the Earth’s resources and markets was sending millions to die, workers fighting workers in battlefields in which the instigators of the slaughter would never set foot. While millions died, those big capitalists would continue to make great profits, supplying armies with weapons, transport and equipment, fuel, clothing, food …..
A declaration of war against war — banner on the old Liberty Hall, HQ of the Irish Transport & General Workers’ Union. A parade of a section of the Irish Citizen Army is drawn up in front of it. (Photo from Internet)
A few years earlier, an international socialist conference had threatened revolution on their capitalist masters should they dare to start a world war. Indeed, some revolutionary socialists saw war as anopportunity to instigate socialist revolution. Unfortunately they were outnumbered by social democrats who, despite their earlier militant words, when it came to the crunch, lined up the workers of each country behind their capitalist masters against their own class brothers in other countries.
There were few socialist parties and prominent socialists that took the opposite stand but one of those who did was James Connolly. Among the other things that characterised the 1916 Rising was that it was the first significant uprising of the 20th Century against World War. The next uprisings of that kind would be the 1917 Revolutions of February and October in Russia, with another in Germany in 1918.
“IRISHWOMEN”
The Proclamation of the insurgents in 1916 addressed itself to “Irishmen and Irishwomen”. Although not one of the seven signatories was a woman, there were a number of them prominent in the command structures of the Rising and in the preparations also. And also of course in the lower ranks during the Rising itself.
Constance Markievicz (nee Gore-Booth) of the ICA was, despite her planter family and quasi-aristocratic background, third-in-command of the Stephens Green/ College of Surgeons area. Kathleen Lynne, also of the ICA was Chief Medical Officer for the Dublin insurrectionary forces and third in command in the Dublin Castle/City Hall garrison. It was at the premises of Cumann na mBan founder member Jenny Wyse-Power, No.21 Henry Street, that the 1916 Proclamation was signed in secret a week before the Rising.
Constance Markievicz, Irish Citizen Army, second-in-command of the Stephen’s Green/ College of Surgeons garrison
Kathleen Clarke was de facto a member of the IRB, work and powers delegated to her on the eve of the Rising by her husband, Tom Clarke, one of the architects of the Rising and first of the seven signatories. Elizabeth O’Farrell was one of the Cumann na mBan nurses accompanying the men in the GPO and one of three to proceed to occupy Moore Street; she carried the short truce communications to the British and back to the leaders on the Rising surrender day, accompanied Pearse to the surrender point in Parnell Street and then carried Pearse’s and Connolly’s surrender instructions to a number of garrisons in Dublin. And Winifred Carney, James Connolly’s secretary, was in the GPO and later Moore Street with her typewriter and a Webley revolver.
Winifred Carney was the first woman into the GPO, accompanying Connolly and carrying a typewriter and a Webley revolver
It is difficult for us today perhaps to realise how progressive it was for any general public document 16 years into the 20th Century to address itself specifically to “Irishwomen”. No country in the whole world had given all its women the right to vote by 1916 although the suffragette movement was in full flow throughout most of Europe and in the European colonies. While it is true that New Zealand gave European women the right to vote as far back as 1893, it was for European settlers only and also linked to a reform movement against the sale and consumption of alcohol. Elsewhere in the world outside the colonial Antipodes and the Scandinavian democracies, the extension of the franchise to women did not seem close in 1916. Nevertheless, in Canada, women got the vote in 1917 – but again, women of European descent only. In Britain, women did not receive full rights to vote until 1928. Yet in a large part of the United Kingdom, a cross-section of people making a bid for independent nationhood, were ostensibly recognising women as citizens with equal voting rights as early as 1916.
Given the preponderance of males in all organisations of all shades of Republican and Nationalist outlook, the inclusion of women in the address had to have been agreed by the men in the top leadership. No doubt women, through their agitation for full franchise as well as by their active participation in so many facets of the movement, helped to convince the men. Connolly is often credited with responsibility for this inclusion but there is no reason to believe others among the signatories would not have taken that position themselves (although Kathleen Clarke did allege that one of those would not). Patrick Pearse had previously supported the vote for women and a number of men in the leadership had female partners who were active on that issue, as for example was Grace Gifford, Joseph Plunkett’s fiancee. The 1916 Proclamation was the first insurrectionary proclamation of the 20th Century (and almost first ever) to specifically include women in its address on a basis of gender equality.
The participation of women in the Rising however had a much sharper illustration than their inclusion in the Proclamation – they were present in most of the fighting posts throughout the Rising, whether as members of Cumann na mBan or of the Irish Citizen Army – several were killed or injured, many were arrested and one was sentenced to death (though sentence was commuted later).
The participation of Cumann na mBan made the 1916 Rising the first uprising of the 20th Century (and probably prior to that) in which women participated in their own organisation, in their own uniform.
The participation of women in the Irish Citizen Army, where they shared equal status with men, made the 1916 Rising the first uprising of the 20th Century (and almost first ever) in which women participated in an armed and uniformed organisation, and in equal status with their male comrades.
HOPE AND ENCOURAGEMENT TO THE PEOPLE OF THE COLONIES
The British Empire in 1916 was huge – around 13 million square miles of territory in 1916, nearly a quarter of the world’s area. It was said that the “sun never set” upon the Empire because at any moment during 24 hours, some part of the Empire would be receiving light from the sun. Around 450 million people were under the Empire’s dominion.
Map of the British Empire in 1914 (of course the British ruling class had dominant influence over many other areas, for example over much of Latin America). (Image sourced from Internet)
And of course, there had been resistance. Even after resistance had been beaten, there had been further uprisings – in fact, some areas such as that of the present-day Afghanistan were in almost constant rebellion. But rebellions were mostly localised and even when they took on a more sweeping character, such as the Mahdist War of 1881-’89 in the Sudan or the Boxer Uprising in northern China in 1900, they had been crushed by British military might.
The news of the Easter Rebellion in Dublin ran around all parts of the British colonial world, from the nearer to the most remote. And some of the news was carried by the Irish in the British armed forces. Tom Barry, later to be undefeated guerrilla leader in the War of Independence in West Cork, read about the Rising while serving in the British Army in Mesopotamia (now Iraq). The Connaught Rangers, hundreds of which were to mutiny in India in 1920, were also in Mesopotamia in 1916. These Irish units of the British Army and Irish men in British units serving outside the United Kingdom, served not just next to English, Welsh and Scottish soldiers but also next to soldiers drawn from colonial peoples; they were often serviced too by colonial people in auxiliary roles and mixed to a degree with the colonial populations among which they were stationed, in markets, eating houses, bars and sex-houses. Just four years later, during the mutiny of the Connaught Rangers, it is recorded that Irish rebels in British Army uniforms had communicated their mutiny and their reasons to the Indian traders.
The 1916 Rising took place in what had been considered, the previous century, the second city of the British Empire. Now past those ‘glory days’, Dublin was still a city of the Empire’s “home base”, the United Kingdom. And the Empire’s Army had been obliged to shell one of the UK’s own cities in order to suppress that Rising! To many a colonial subject contemplating resistance or even outright revolt, it must have seemed like a signaling bonfire, one that proclaimed that the end of the Empire was nigh and called the peoples under subjugation to revolt, to finish it off. And, indeed during the War of Independence, the Nehru and Ghandi families were to make contact with Irish Republicans and Ho Chi Minh is reported to have been inspired by the Irish struggle.
Nor was it only those colonial people in the British Empire who were inspired but those in the French, Dutch, Belgian, Portuguese and Spanish colonies too. Ho Chi Minh, as a Vietnamese, was under the French empire and led his people in armed resistance to the Japanese and French occupation in 1941. Over the three decades following the Easter Rising, anti-colonial struggles around the world intensified and pushed the former colonial powers into “de-colonisation” — i.e. imperialism and neo-colonialism.
WORKERS OF THE WORLD
The Irish Citizen Army had been founded in 1913 as a workers’ armed organisation to defend against the attacks of the Dublin Metropolitan Police. The DMP carried no firearms then, though they were well able to kill and maim with their truncheons, a fact they demonstrated during the 1913 Lockout. But it was clear that Connolly at least knew that at some point the workers would come up against the full force of the State which, at that time, meant the British empire and the Colonial regime in Ireland. He called publicly for the ICA to train in and to carry firearms. The Royal Irish Constabulary, policing the rest of the colony outside Dublin, was indeed armed. And British Army units were stationed across the country, many of the garrisons in Dublin alone.
The ICA fell into a kind of disrepair after the workers’ defeat in the Lockout but was soon enough dusted off and reorganised. WWI began the same year the last striking workers of the Lockout, the Jacobs girls and women, marched back to work. It was certain that Connolly would try to stage a rising during the war and suspected that the Republicans, or “advanced nationalists” as they were called then, would do so too. As the war dragged on and the bodies heaped higher, Connolly grew increasingly impatient, contemptuous and even desperate, berating the “nationalists” for not rising and threatened to bring out the couple of hundred ICA on their own.
Irish Citizen Army on the roof of Liberty Hall during a flag-raising activity (Photo sourced from Internet)
But the Irish Republican Brotherhood had been planning to rise and in late January 1916, alarmed by Connolly’s threats, brought him into secret negotiations. When he emerged a few days later after what many thought had been his kidnapping, he had been sworn into the IRB and was part of the Military Council, planning the Rising for the Easter weekend. And that would mean that the ICA would also commit to the Rising.
On Easter Monday morning, around 220 men and women of the Irish Citizen Army marched out of Liberty Hall or mobilised elsewhere in Dublin. Two of the important fighting areas in Dublin were given over to their command, Dublin Castle and Stephens Green. ICA members fought elsewhere too, including the GPO. One account has them as the first to occupy the top of the GPO’s roof and another as hoisting the “Starry Plough” on top of William Martin Murphy’s Imperial Hotel in Clery’s building (the last flag of the Rising to remain flying). At least one was killed in the fighting evacuation of the GPO and a number took part in the occupation of the 1916 Terrace in Moore Street. The 1916 Rising was the first occasion of the 20th Century when a workers’ unit rose in their own units, in their own uniforms and under their own commanders.
SURVIVING STREET OF A CENTURIES-OLD MARKET QUARTER
Authorisation was granted for the development of a market in the Moore Street area by the Dublin and General Markets Act of 1831. But the Act mentioned the location as being around “Coles Lane market”, which means there was already a street market in the area. It is probable that street trading had been going on in that area for centuries before that. Moore Street was something of a modern street of its time in the area, laid down around 1763 (and, it is worth noting, before the Great Hunger and earlier than the city’s main street, O’Connell Street), mainly as a residential street with some businesses. In following decades Moore Street would become the main street of a whole market area which included the aforementioned Coles Lane along with many other streets, laneways, cul-de-sacs (“turnings”) and mews.
The streets and lanes of the old street market quarter now buried under the ILAC (Image cropped by Save Moor Street From Demolition from J Roques Map 1754, sourced on Internet). In 1754 the street across the top was called “Great Britain Street” but by 1916 it had been renamed “Parnell Street”.
All of that was demolished and buried by the 1970s ILAC “development” of Irish Life ltd.(later joined by Chartered Land, which dispossessed the households, shops, stalls and workers for a paltry compensation, to the benefit not only of the ILAC partners but also of Dunne’s Stores and Debenhams. All that remains of that street market quarter is Moore Street, with street traders struggling in difficult circumstances to make a living, harassed by Dublin City Council officials, along with small shops, granted short leases or expensive longer ones by Chartered Land or the ILAC – and under constant threat of demolition or of ILAC expansion.
CONCLUSION
Since the 1916 Rising has all those aspects of international importance listed above, clearly the Moore Street terrace also embodies them all, being the last fighting place of the Rising’s HQ garrison and containing around 300 men of the Irish Citizen Army, the Irish Volunteers and three members of Cumann na mBan.
On the basis of those points alone, the site should be a recognised world heritage site. That the terrace and surrounding streets are, according to the National Museum of Ireland ‘the most important historic site in modern Irish history’and ‘a surviving urban WWI battleground … beyond price’ (as stated by the Imperial War Museum) and they include the last street of a centuries-old European street market adds icing to the cake – a cake that should be made available for the world to share.
End.
Documents consulted include
various accounts of the 1916 Rising,
including biographies and Witness Statements of participants (latter now available on line),
along with Moore Street – the story of Dublin’s market district (2012) by Barry Kennerc and
There are occasions in life when time that can never be retrieved is expended on something that is worthless. So far, three valuable hours of my life has been wasted on what RTE describes as a ‘commemorative drama’ to herald the beginning of the Centenary year of the 1916 revolution. Wasted, other than in terms of understanding the propaganda value to the political class even of badly constructed ‘historical’ costume drama – although describing ‘Rebellion’ as coherent drama is stretching it.
I quibbled after the first episode about the use of the term ‘Rebellion’ instead of the more accurate term ‘Revolution’, but it finally dawned on me with Episode 3 that what the writer, director and producers really mean is that this is about rebelliousness within the featured families, to which the 1916 Revolution is just a backdrop.
It would be a useful exercise after the series comes to an end to put a stopwatch to good use to work out the proportion of the five hours of screen-time that is devoted to an exceedingly poor and skewed telling of the story of the 1916 Revolution, and what proportion was used to tell the confusing, intertwined, and fairly inconsequential stories of domestic disagreement. There is of course a market for the latter, and for its setting in a sort of ‘upstairs-downstairs’ genre, but this series, more soap than serious drama, should not be its vehicle.
The 1916 Revolution – what was it really about, who made up the rank-and-file – essential to the creation of a revolution, what scale of operation was in play, what impediments to success existed? Nobody can be any the wiser by relying on this series.
The leaders – who were they, what were they like, what did they believe in, was there a plan, had they some endgame, some vision? Nobody can be any the wiser by relying on this series.
Where is Tom Clarke, or Seán MacDiarmada, or Joe Plunkett, three iconic signatories of the Proclamation, all present in the GPO – but not so far in this sorry series? No clue as to their characters, and precious little of James Connolly’s – relegated to a bit part, or of Patrick Pearse’s – other than his addiction to prayer, his deference to the clergy, his obsession with blood sacrifice, and a capacity for rhetorical exaggeration – as RTE would have us believe.
Where is the evidence of strong public support particularly in the impoverished inner city tenements, without which the revolution could not have lasted almost a week? We know it was there, we who have bothered to acquaint ourselves with the true narrative. Instead, that hoary old myth of widespread public disaffection with the revolution is hammered home at every opportunity.
Episode 3 begins with some bearded chap being put up against a wall and shot by firing squad. Who was he? We are none the wiser by the end of Episode 3. Why might it be important to know that he was Francis Sheehy-Skeffington, a journalist, an advanced-feminist, a pacifist who had played no part in the revolution itself? Because, perhaps, that it is true, and that he was murdered on the command of a crazed, out-of-control British army officer – an essential detail of the 1916 narrative – but not as the masses are supposed to know it since it would upset the entirely revisionist slant of this television disaster, a revisionism that is deliberately applied. And so it goes on.
Against fleeting scenes of chaos, created as we are led to believe by violent anti-democratic nutcases hell-bent on creating a Catholic state, we are encouraged to note the stabilising influence and the manners and the etiquette of both the Irish ‘Castle Catholics’ and their British masters in Dublin Castle. Fast-forward by 100 years and we see the same spurious choice being presented to the people by the political class – ‘stability’ or ‘chaos’, white or black, good or bad. No need to tease out what each side really stood for back then, or what each side stands for now.
There are those who ask ‘what matter – it is only TV drama?’. Propaganda is at its most effective when it is inserted subtly into the thought-processes of its target audience, and repeated through various forms from news and current affairs, commentary, and yes, entertainment. That works, as Joseph Goebbels knew all too well.
RTE claims an audience of 600,000 for its first episode of ‘Rebellion’. A large proportion of these will vote in the upcoming general election in which the main choice will be between, the political class tells us, stability or chaos. And that audience is also entering into the centenary year of the 1916 revolution with its competing interpretations, one of which champions the Redmondite parliamentarian Home Rule option over the other – the right of a people to self-determination and self-government, to be established through revolution where no other viable option was available. Presenting a partisan and therefore skewed version of the 1916 revolution primes at least a part of that audience to adopt a negative view of the legitimacy of that revolution and of its leaders, and that represents a highly political intervention in the popular history of 1916 on the part of the State broadcaster, RTE. It is not, presented in that way, just TV drama.
‘Rebellion’ looks like a cheap production, but cost as much as Ken Loach spent making The Wind That Shakes The Barley – an excellent production for the big screen, which grossed three times its production costs at the international box-office. Why wasn’t Loach asked to make this series? It is not as if he lacks experience. But then, he could be relied on to create a credible narrative around the main story of revolution and to consign the less consequential sub-plots to their rightful places. That would not suit the political class, including its RTE functionaries.
The 1916 revolution is an intriguing, exciting and rich human story, as rich in dramatic potential – characters, incidents and plot-lines – as was the highly successful and accurate 1913 Lockout TV drama ‘Strumpet City’, produced by RTE in 1980. ‘Rebellion’ on the other hand is dross. Some people, their names figuring prominently on the credits of each episode, opted for dross, and each received a considerable reward tor taking that option.
The foundational narrative of modern Ireland – in which the 1916 Revolution is the inciting incident – deserves to be treated with a modicum of respect. That is entirely absent in this spurious version.
There are times when we remark that ‘you couldn’t make it up’. The series writer did, with input from others.
And there are times when we remark that ‘it couldn’t get any worse’. Oh yes it can, and it will.
Three members of my family fought in the 1916 Rising and eleven “did their bit” in the War of Independence. So it‘s probably not that surprising that as a child, I grew up with stories, real, imagined, and embellished, of those ancestors and their times.
Of those three “1916 men” the one who most aroused my curiosity was my granny’s cousin, Desmond Ryan. “A bit of a consequence”, according to my great-aunt Polly, or “the son of the fellah who wrote the first Irish play that got him a medal from Yeats and Lady Gregory“ according to my uncle.
Desmond actually was “a bit of a consequence”; however his father, W.P. Ryan, while he did write a number of plays “i nGaeilge” didn’t quite write the first to be performed in Dublin and I’m not too sure about the medal either. W.P. was a journalist, editor, novelist, and socialist. His clash with Cardinal Logue, Archbishop of Armagh, while editor of The Irish Peasant, is chronicled in his “The Pope’s Green Island” and his novel “The Plough and the Cross”, both of which bear fruitful reading today. His 1913 book “The Labour Revolt and Larkinsim” together with his work as assistant editor of the London Daily Herald did much to explain and create sympathy among British socialists for the participants of Dublin’s Lockout in 1913.
St. Enda’s boys at work — part of the school curriculum was gardening
W.P.’s inability to toe the line with the bishops saw him return to London, leaving Desmond, “the Consequence”, in the tender care of Patrick Pearse at Saint Enda’s School as a boarder. As most of his Ryan siblings were either in Tipperary or had emigrated, Desmond found himself a temporary orphan save for my great grandparents who promptly “adopted” him and welcomed him into their home.
Willie Moynihan, my great grandfather, was a not very successful publican, and politically, if he had any politics, followed his brother Michael’s line in the Irish Parliamentary Party. Michael was a very successful publican and over a number of decades served as a representative for a number of wards for the IPP on Kingstown (Dún Laoghaire) Borough Council. When the IPP took control of Dún Laoghaire, Michael – being their veteran campaigner in the borough – was given the honour of making the opening speech of that session in which he congratulated the Pope on his recent birthday. It caused a sensation at the time. Now while I realise this was far more politically loaded than it appears today, somehow it strikes me as petty compared with the many other problems Dún Laoghaire faced back then.
Despite his humble roots Michael Moynihan at that stage had a number of pubs, a big house on Haig Terrace, a mansion in Killiney, and was about to be made a Justice of the Peace despite a string of convictions for after-hours drinking and illegal gambling schools in his pubs. His gesture, despite the symbolism, always strikes me as just another example of the “re-branding process” which the IPP really stood for and intended to deliver with Home Rule. They might have cut the cake differently but basically it was to be business as usual – just a new name over the door and on the corporate notepaper.
Nobody ever told me how my great-grandparents reacted to having a socialist with a strong sense of Nationalism in their midst. However Desmond was a boy with a mission and felt it his duty to convert the family or at the very least his young cousins even if their parents were beyond redemption. His stories of St. Enda’s fired the children’s imagination, and I still smile as I remember my great-aunt Polly, throwing back her shoulders, raising herself beyond her full height, and summoning some of the worst traits of amateur dramatics, taking off Desmond, taking off Patrick Pearse, taking off Robert Emmet leading the 1803 Rebellion.
Desmond began leaving his copybooks from school in the house when he visited. These were filled with essays on Fionn MacCumhaill, the Red Branch Knights, Cú Chulainn, and other mythical heroes. The copious marginal notes and comments by Patrick Pearse drew my grandmother and her sister further into this world of Celtic heroics, standing in stark contrast to the stories of the famine during the previous century told by their parents. A generation later both my mother and uncle remember being equally moved by the same essays which were unfortunately lost during a house move in the 1940s.
Patrick Pearse, at the 1st August 1915 interment in Glasnevin Cemetery of Diarmuid Ó Donnobháin Rosa, whose body had been sent from the USA for burial there.
As Desmond’s involvement with the revolution grew his visits to the house became less so there was some delight when he turned up in July 1915 with an invitation to go to the funeral of a Fenian from Cork called Jeremiah O’Donovan Rossa. Pearse, the fellah who wrote all those notes and comments in the margins of Desmond’s copy books was going to give a speech. Willie Moynihan didn’t approve of this fellah called Pearse but his wife relented understanding her children’s curiosity and she was fond of Desmond and didn’t want to let him down.
Desmond, not surprisingly, faded out of family stories after that, as Pearse’s exhortation to revolution was too much for a God-fearing, law abiding woman, like my great grandmother. He would go on to write biographies of Pearse, Connolly, Collins, and De Valera, as well as the first major account of 1916 by a participant. His pioneering journalism during the War of Independence did much to counteract the black propaganda of the State murder gangs who assassinated at will back then. However it was his invitation to a funeral which endured in family lore on a day that changed the family’s political axis forever.
Polly could “do” the speech, and recited it with all the subtlety of a Victorian melodrama well into her eighties. She would recall Pearse as “a bit of a fruitcake” or “sixpence short of a shilling”, but despite his questionable sanity would qualify this with “my God! But that fellah could talk!” Remarkably, with the emergence of the Pathé newsreel footage of the funeral in recent years (footnote to link?), she seemed to have taken all Pearse’s movements and gestures in, and even in old age could deliver it as if she had recently studied the film frame by frame. This delightful entertainment of my childhood had deeply affected her and despite occasionally lamenting how dull Dublin became once the British left, it had been a seminal moment at which she became and remained a republican right down to her bones.
On very rare occasions my granny would “do” the speech. But her version was different. She didn’t have her sister’s dramatic flair, but she too had been affected by Pearse that August day. With her a previously unseen veil of steel and determination seemed to come over her; probably that same steely veil that saw her defy her parents and join Cumann na mBan and which enabled her to carry cases of hand grenades and weapons across the city on numerous occasions. Her rendition suggested she had taken the words in and considered them rather than the exaggerated gestures of which her sister Polly was so fond. Significantly it was through this involvement that she met my grandfather, a member of H Company, 1st Battalion, the Dublin Brigade.
Ó Donnobháin Rosa’s grave, Glasnevin Cemetery, Dublin
As the decade of commemorations gathered momentum, last August saw the centenary of O’Donovan Rossa’s funeral. In many ways it started the countdown to the revolution of 1916-22. Earlier this year I found myself in Glasnevin Cemetery and wandering around came face to face with Rossa’s grave and all those childhood memories came flooding back. It’s difficult, even with all the photographs and the film footage, to really understand just how significant Pearse’s speech was.
Looking at the photographs I wonder just how many lives were changed that day. In its own small way my own family bears testimony to it. As historians and commentators continue to play “what if” in relation to events of that period I found myself doing the same at Rossa’s grave, making similar speculations with what potentially, for me anyway, might have been serious consequences. What if Desmond Ryan hadn’t fired my granny’s imagination so that she went to the funeral? What if she hadn’t been inspired by Pearse that day? Would she have joined Cumann na mBan? More importantly, without being in that circle would she have met my grandfather? The next question doesn’t bear thinking about, because, despite the occasional rocky road, I’ve rather enjoyed being alive, and without that chain of events unleashed by the combination of Rossa, Pearse and that Speech on that August day I might never have been born.
So on the 1st August 2015 I found myself in town at the O’Donovan Rossa Bridge to pay a personal tribute to Rossa, and Pearse, and that speech. In particular I was paying tribute to Desmond Ryan. Because somehow in that crazy way that small events ripple out to have more serious consequences I find myself thinking I owe them for my very existence.
End.
Crowd at erection of plaque to rename the former Richmond Bridge over the Liffey after O’Donnobháin Rosa on 2nd August 2015 (Christchurch is visible in the far background, after Dublin City Council’s offices building to the left).
Hugo McGuinness is a historian specialising in the period of history referred to above.
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