The number of casualties in the War of Independence in Ireland up to the time of the Truce is 2,141. After the Truce, a team was sent to London to negotiate the future of the Irish Republic. The negotiations did not go well for the plenipotentiaries who did not succeed in getting the British to recognise an Irish republic. The Treaty that they signed was hotly debated in Dáil Éireann, and the assembly split over the terms. Dublin Castle was handed over to the Provisional Government but the cost was high, with the IRA, Sinn Féin and the Irish nation left divided.
CASUALTIES
In comparison to the wholesale slaughter of the First World War, the death toll for Ireland’s War of Independence is relatively small at 2,141.1 However, for a nation with a population of a little over four million, the loss of life was significant as it was often highly concentrated. For instance, the violence in Belfast between 1920 and mid-1922 resulted in the deaths of 470 people. In Cork, scene of some of the fiercest fighting, 528 people were killed between January 1919 and July 1921.
The RIC, Black and Tans and Auxiliaries suffered a total loss during the War of Independence of 514, whilst the British Army losses numbered 262. By far the greatest number of RIC and British Army members who died were in the counties of Cork, Tipperary, Limerick, Kerry, Clare and Dublin, which is reflective of the amount of action undertaken by the IRA on a county-by-county basis.
The IRA roll of honour from January 1919 to 11 July 1921 lists nearly 650 names. However, Professor Eunan O’Halpin from Trinity College Dublin suggests that the figure for IRA killed is as low as 467. A figure of 898 civilians is also given by O’Halpin. The historian Pádraig Óg Ó Ruairc says that of those civilian casualties, 198 were spies and alleged spies who were shot by the IRA.
| CASUALTIES, JANUARY 1917 TO DECEMBER 1921 | ||
| RIC/Black & Tans/Auxiliaries/British Army | 776 | |
| IRA | 467 | |
| Civilians | 898 | |
| Total | 2,141 | |
TALKS ABOUT TALKS
After some deliberation, Éamon de Valera accepted an invitation from the British Prime Minister to attend a conference in London. This conference was essentially ‘talks about talks’. There was much correspondence between de Valera and Lloyd George. De Valera wanted a conference that would recognise the Irish as representatives of a sovereign independent state. However, Lloyd George would not entertain that and wrote to his Irish counterpart saying: ‘I told you that we looked to Ireland to own allegiance to the Throne, and to make her future as a member of the British Commonwealth’. Lloyd George again wrote to de Valera with a fresh invitation for Irish delegates to attend a conference, ‘with a view to ascertaining how the association of Ireland with the community of nations known as the British Empire may be reconciled with Irish national aspirations’. De Valera replied, quoting that line, and accepting the invitation.
As regards the team that would negotiate the terms of a treaty, de Valera had a few choices amongst the seven men who made up the Irish Cabinet, besides himself: Cathal Brugha, Austin Stack, Michael Collins, Arthur Griffith, Robert Barton and W.T. Cosgrave. Brugha and Stack simply refused to go. Collins did not want to go, arguing that, ‘It was an unheard-of thing that a soldier who had fought in the field should be elected to carry out negotiations. It was de Valera’s job, not his.’2 But de Valera was far too Machiavellian to allow his name to be appended to a treaty that he well knew would not please everyone in Ireland. He also knew that the British would be unlikely to give in to the demand for a republic. Thus, although he had attended the ‘talks about talks’ (and Collins had not), de Valera insisted that Collins should go to England. To the suggestions that de Valera might go to London without attending the negotiations and be there for the team as an advisor, de Valera argued that it was better if he remained in Ireland, as it would give the negotiating team an excuse to refer back to the President, thus buying some breathing space. De Valera also argued that he was the President, the symbolic head of the Irish Republic, and that it would have been incongruous for him or King George to be at the negotiations.
On 14 September 1921, the Dáil approved three of the Cabinet members, Griffith, Collins and Barton, and two others, Éamonn Duggan and George Gavan Duffy, as plenipotentiaries to go to London to negotiate with the British. Plenipotentiaries, by definition, are given the full power of independent action on behalf of their government, typically in a foreign country.
The tragedy is that de Valera did not go to London. After his time in the US, he was well trained in dealing with politicians. Had Michael Collins, who represented violent republicanism, been left in Ireland as the ‘Ace Card’, someone who needed to be appeased, de Valera could have used the threat of the resumption of hostilities as a bargaining chip. As it transpired, the British themselves used that very threat as their method of pushing the plenipotentiaries to the edge.
IRISH TEAM IN LONDON
The negotiations lasted for under two months, from 11 October to 6 December 1921. Throughout that time, the Irish delegation stayed at 22 Hans Place in Knightsbridge, London. Collins, however, stayed at 15 Cadogan Gardens, with his security team and entourage including Liam Tobin, Emmet Dalton, Tom Cullen, Joe Dolan, Joe Guilfoyle, Ned Broy and Seán MacBride.3 One obvious reason why Collins was against going to London was that if the negotiations broke down, he might be arrested by the British. Emmet Dalton purchased a Martinsyde bi-plane for £2,600.4 This was essentially the first ‘Irish Air Force’ aeroplane. Manned by Charlie Russell and Jack MacSwiney, it was fuelled and ready to fly Collins and the team out of Croydon Airfield in any emergency.5 The Hans Place delegates included Arthur Griffith, Robert Barton, Eamonn Duggan and George Gavan Duffy. Erskine Childers and Fionán Lynch were joint secretaries to the team and Diarmuid O’Hegarty and John Chartres acted as assistant secretaries. They were joined by Cumann na mBan member Lily O’Brennan and two stenographers, Alice and Ellie Lyons, who had been working for Collins at GHQ. Cathleen Napoli McKenna also resided at Hans Place and undertook secretarial duties, mostly for Arthur Griffith. Many other individuals were also part of the entourage with the Irish negotiators, including Desmond FitzGerald, Joseph McGrath, Dan MacCarthy, Michael Knightly, David L. Robinson and Bridget Lynch, who was married to Fionán.
NEGOTIATING A TREATY
The first meeting in Downing Street was very formal and the Irish delegation found itself confronted by trained, devious, professional political giants. Sitting across the table were Prime Minister David Lloyd George whose political prowess had earned him the moniker the ‘Welsh Wizard’; Austen Chamberlain, Lord Privy Seal, Leader of the House of Commons and son of Joe Chamberlain who had campaigned against Home Rule for Ireland; Lord Birkenhead, or F.E. Smith, the Lord Chancellor, well-known Conservative loyalist and also the man who had prosecuted Roger Casement in 1916; Laming Worthington-Evans, the Conservative Secretary for War; Hamar Greenwood, the Chief Secretary for Ireland and the IRA’s nemesis; Gordon Hewart, the Attorney General; the formidable Secretary of State for the Colonies, Winston Churchill; and two of Britain’s finest civil servants – Lionel George Curtis, who wrote The Commonwealth of Nations in 1916, and Tom Jones, the Welsh advisor and secretary to Lloyd George. Supporting this formidable team on the outside was one of the finest civil services in the world.
Arthur Griffith was the official chairman of the Irish delegation. However, he confided in Collins that his health was suffering and asked him to assume unofficial leadership of the delegation. Collins wrote in his notes about the pressure of the discussions: ‘To go for a drink is one thing. To be driven to it is another.’6
Between 11 and 24 October, seven plenary sessions were held. Following the plenary sessions, Griffith and Collins asked to engage in informal discussions with two representatives from each side. In these discussions, Collins and Griffith (as Chairman of the Irish Plenipotentiaries) spoke with Chamberlain and an alternate member of the British team. Gavan Duffy impressed upon de Valera that this policy of dividing the Irish delegation was dangerous. According to Barton, ‘from the moment Griffith and Collins met Lloyd George and Chamberlain alone their power to resist weakened. They became almost pro-British in their arguments with us and Duffy and I often felt we had to fight them first and the English afterwards.’7
Lloyd George was also in regular meetings with the Ulster Unionist leader Sir James Craig. The British Primer Minister was trying to convince the Northern Ireland Prime Minister that the Northern parliament could come under an All-Ireland parliament. Craig was unimpressed. His alternative was that the Northern and Southern parliaments would have equal powers, flatly refusing the All-Ireland parliamentary ideal. Instead, the British came up with the concept of a boundary commission, which Griffith believed ‘would give us most of Tyrone, Fermanagh and part of Armagh, Down etc.’8 Lloyd George, in a private meeting, convinced Griffith to agree to back the British in a proposal to the Unionist leaders concerning an All-Ireland Parliament, which would give ‘Ulster’ the right to remove itself within twelve months. Griffith agreed to back this plan and gave his word to Lloyd George that he would not repudiate it, believing that it was only a ruse on the Prime Minister’s part to appease the Unionists. Robert Barton recalled how Arthur Griffith used to repeat about the Unionists: ‘If they do not come in, they will lose half their territory and they can’t stay out.’ The Irish delegates were convinced that partition of the island was inevitable but that the Boundary Commission would convince the North of the necessity of unity. As it transpired, the Boundary Commission did not meet until 1924, and achieved nothing, as the Northern Ireland Government refused to cooperate..
It should be remembered that there was regular contact between the plenipotentiaries and Dublin. Every weekend, one or more of the delegates returned home to meet with the other cabinet members. Indeed, Collins met with de Valera on several of these visits. Following a cabinet meeting in Dublin on 25 November, attended by Collins and Griffith, the two men presented to the British a memorandum on ‘External Association’, which was an idea being worked on by de Valera (see below). The British rejected it outright although Griffith argued that the Irish delegates had no authority to deal with the British on any other basis than the exclusion of the Crown from Irish affairs. Another cabinet meeting in Dublin was summoned for 3 December.
Meanwhile in the Six Counties, Tyrone County Council pledged its allegiance to Dáil Éireann, declaring that the people of Tyrone and Fermanagh would never accept separation from the rest of Ireland. The offices of the council were raided and its books were seized by the RIC. In four days of violence in Belfast, twenty-six people were killed. In the west of Ireland, de Valera, who was reviewing the IRA, said in an address to the Mid-Clare Brigade, ‘We know the savagery that can be used against us and we defy it.’ The Ennis County Council stated in an address to de Valera that if ‘British statesmen are planning another betrayal … we tell you we are ready … We will follow you if needs be to the death.’9
The British gave the final draft of the Treaty to the Plenipotentiaries on the first day of December. The delegates all sailed for Dublin, and Griffith met de Valera and gave him the document. De Valera told Griffith that he could not accept its terms. A cabinet meeting was convened, which proved to be long, fractious and exhausting. De Valera held firm to what he had said to Griffith. Cathal Brugha, Gavan Duffy, Robert Barton and Erskine Childers were also against signing. Collins believed that further concessions could be obtained on trade and defence and argued that it would be a year before the oath of allegiance would have to be taken. He suggested recommending the Treaty to the electorate but recommending non-acceptance of the oath. At the meeting, de Valera asked the plenipotentiaries to go back to London and make the British understand that the Irish were prepared to face a renewal of the conflict as the alternative to partition of the nation and the oath to the British crown. But on being pressed, de Valera said that if there had to be an oath, it should be in conformity with external association. He made a suggestion to Barton and Childers but it was an informal, hasty discussion and they managed to scribble down only a few of his words. Barton appealed to de Valera to return with the delegation to London, and for a while it appeared as if the President might be considering it. Brugha persuaded Griffith to agree that he would not break on the crown or the oath, that he would not sign the document, and that he would bring it back to the Dáil and, if necessary, the Irish people. The meeting adjourned and it was understood that the delegates were to return to London and tell the British that they would not sign the draft document, that they were ready to face war if necessary.
When the plenipotentiaries returned to London, Gavan Duffy, Robert Barton and Erskine Childers drafted a counterproposal in Hans Place. Collins, Griffith and Duggan, however, refused to present it in that form to Downing Street. Instead, they made certain amendments to the counterproposals, which included substituting the wording of the oath. Griffith then agreed to go with Barton and Gavan Duffy to Downing Street; Collins stayed at Hans Place.
The British reacted badly to the counterproposals. Lloyd George, Chamberlain, Birkenhead and the Chancellor of the Exchequer, Robert Horne, sat with the Irish. As soon as Gavan Duffy said, ‘The difficulty is coming into the Empire…’, the British, as if prearranged, leapt from their seats and declared that the conference was finished. They said that they were sending word to Craig that negotiations had broken down. The Irish returned to Hans Place.
However, Lloyd George had a plan. He sent word to Griffith and Collins that he would like to meet them the following morning. At that meeting, on 5 December, Lloyd George convinced Collins that the Boundary Commission would save Ireland from partition. Collins and Griffith persuaded the rest of the plenipotentiaries to come to Downing Street that afternoon. Collins, Griffith and Barton held firm on their demand for a statement from Craig that he would accept unity. However, when the meeting resumed after a short break, Lloyd George reminded Griffith of the promise of support he had made some weeks back and Griffith agreed to sign the Treaty. Now Lloyd George pressed home his advantage and spoke solemnly to Barton, saying that any delegate who did not sign now was taking full responsibility for war. He issued an ultimatum:
I have to communicate with Sir James Craig tonight: here are the alternative letters I have prepared, one enclosing the Articles of Agreement … the other saying that the Sinn Féin representatives refuse the oath of allegiance and refuse to come within the Empire. If I send this letter it is war — and war in three days! Which letter am I to send?
The Irish returned to Hans Place, where Griffith urged his fellow plenipotentiaries to sign. At 9pm, the final draft of the Treaty arrived by courier. No vital changes had been made. Finally, Collins and Duggan agreed to sign. Barton was reluctant but he too consented. Under duress, Gavan Duffy relented and signed too. After midnight, Collins, Griffith and Barton returned to Downing Street with the signed Treaty.
THE TREATY SIGNATORIES
‘Articles of Agreement for a Treaty Between Great Britain and Ireland’ or simply ‘The Treaty’ was signed in the early hours of 6 December 1921, at 2.20am to be precise. The signatories representing the British were David Lloyd George, Austen Chamberlain, Lord Birkenhead, L. Worthington Evans, Hamar Greenwood and Gordon Hewart. The Irish delegation also signed, all in the Irish language; Art Ó Gríobhtha (Arthur Griffith), Micheál Ó Coileáin (Michael Collins), Riobárd Bartún (Robert Barton), Eudhmonn S. Ó Dúgáin (Eamonn Duggan), Seórsa Ghabháin Uí Dhubhthaigh (George Gavan Duffy).
TERMS OF THE TREATY
Under the terms of the Treaty, Ireland could not be called a republic. Rather, Ireland would be called the Irish Free State, which would come into existence one year from the date of the signing of the Treaty. The Irish Free State would have dominion status, like Canada, New Zealand, Australia and South Africa. The Royal Navy would have access to a number of Irish ports, namely Belfast in the Six Counties, Berehaven and Queenstown in County Cork, and Lough Swilly in County Donegal. The Treaty gave the right for the Six Counties to withdraw from the rest of Ireland. It essentially reinforced the split in Ireland, created by the Government of Ireland Act, 1920, between the six counties of Antrim, Armagh, Down, Fermanagh, Derry and Tyrone, and the remaining twenty-six counties. The British King would be Head of State of the Irish Free State and would be represented by a Governor General.
Article 4 of the Treaty also provided for an oath to be taken by members of the Free State Parliament in the following form:
I …… do solemnly swear true faith and allegiance to the Constitution of the Irish Free State as by law established and that I will be faithful to H.M. King George V, his heirs and successors by law, in virtue of the common citizenship of Ireland with Great Britain and her adherence to and membership of the group of nations forming the British Commonwealth of Nations.
EXTERNAL ASSOCIATION OR DOCUMENT NO. 2
While the Plenipotentiaries were in London negotiating the future of their nation, de Valera was working on a ‘Plan B’ or ‘Document No. 2’, which concerned an alternative to the notion that Ireland should be part of the British Empire. He called this ‘External Association’, that is the idea that Ireland would remain a sovereign nation associated with the Commonwealth but not a member. The British monarch might be the head of the association of nations known as the Commonwealth but would not be the head of state of Ireland. De Valera had explained this to Griffith before the plenipotentiaries went to London and, as referred to above, the idea had been raised with the British who had dismissed it.
Nevertheless, after the delegation had presented the signed Treaty to the Dáil, de Valera offered his suggested alternative as Document No. 2. A maths teacher, de Valera used Venn diagrams to illustrate his concept. The terms of Document no. 2 included the idea that ‘Ireland shall be associated with the States of the British Commonwealth’ and that ‘for purposes of the Association, Ireland shall recognise His Britannic Majesty as head of the Association’.
TDs attending the Treaty debates. Left to right: Kathleen Clarke (widow of Tom Clarke, architect of the Easter Rising); Countess Markievicz; Kate O’Callaghan (widow of Michael O’Callaghan, Mayor of Limerick murdered in 1921 – see Chapter Ten); and Margaret Pearse (whose sons Patrick and Willie were executed in 1916).
THE TREATY DEBATES
The Cabinet voted four to three in support of the Treaty and it was put to Dáil Éireann. Considered to be the most acrimonious of debates the parliament of Ireland ever witnessed, the Treaty debates involved political invective, name-calling and much loss of tempers. The debates ran from 14 December to 7 January 1922. The Anglo–Irish Treaty was ratified by Dáil Éireann on 7 January 1922. It passed by a narrow margin of 64 for and 57 against, with three TDs abstaining.
De Valera formally resigned as President on 10 January. A motion to re-elect him was defeated by only two votes. During the last hours of the debates, he said:
As a protest against the election as President of the Irish Republic of the Chairman of the Delegation, who is bound by the Treaty conditions to set up a State which is to subvert the Republic, and who, in the interim period, instead of using the office as it should be used — to support the Republic — will, of necessity, have to be taking action which will tend to its destruction, I, while this vote is being taken, as one, am going to leave the House.10
De Valera got up to leave and his supporters followed him. The exchange that took place gives some idea of the acrimony between the pro-Treaty Collins and two of the TDs who were anti-Treaty:
Collins: Deserters all! We will now call on the Irish people to rally to us. Deserters all!
David Ceannt: Up the Republic.
Collins: Deserters all to the Irish nation in her hour of trial. We will stand by her.
Countess Markievicz: Oath breakers and cowards.
Collins: Foreigners — Americans — English.
Markievicz: Lloyd Georgites!
The original motion, that Arthur Griffith be appointed President of Dáil Éireann, was then carried unanimously by those remaining in the House. After the vote for Griffith, de Valera and his supporters returned to the Dáil and listened to an appeal by a Labour deputation under Thomas Johnson, concerning the high rate of unemployment. De Valera then spoke and congratulated Griffith on his election as President of Dáil Éireann. But he warned:
Whenever he functions, or will function in his other capacity as head of another government, we cannot recognise that government at all. We will have to insist and continue insisting on our attitude that that government is not the legitimate government of this country until the Irish people have disestablished the Republic, and we shall do everything in our power to see they do not disestablish it.
Erskine Childers, the man who had armed the Volunteers in 1914, then aimed a question at Griffith, concerning his dual role as head of the Dáil and soon-to-be head of the Provisional Government. President Griffith replied with some vitriol:
Before this proceeds any further, I want to say that President de Valera [Griffith still calling him President] made a statement — a generous statement — and I replied. Now (striking the table) I will not reply to any Englishman in this Dáil (applause).
Childers spoke again: ‘If he had banged the table before Lloyd George in the way he banged it here, things might have been different (cries of ‘Order!’ and applause).’ Countess Markievicz interjected, ‘And Griffith is a Welsh name.’ Eventually Griffith, as President, said:
I think President de Valera is acting fairly; some of the other members are not. We want to get a chance. We have not spoken about ourselves, but for three months past we have been working night and day. We were faced with the task of fighting our English opponents first, and then we had to come and fight our Irish friends, and now we have to take on as big a job as ever men took on (hear, hear). We want a chance. We cannot meet every day here and at the same time try and carry out the things. If President de Valera — I will still call him President — agrees, I will fix a month hence as the date for the next meeting, and we will meet again on this day month. Give us a chance to do some thing in the meantime. We cannot work as it is.
De Valera, concerned about a potential split in the IRA, replied:
We ought, I think, to take that as reasonable. Everybody ought to regard it as reasonable (applause). The only thing we are really anxious about is the Army and perhaps the Minister of Defence would give us some idea of what he proposes to do. I am anxious myself as an individual who knows the Army. I am anxious to know what the position of the Army will be. I fear that, unless the Army is kept intact as the Army of the Republic, we will not have that confidence — the members of the Army will not have that confidence — which is necessary if we are to keep them as a solid unit.
Richard Mulcahy as Minister for Defence then spoke:
The Army will remain occupying the same position with regard to this Government of the Republic, and occupying the same position with regard to the Minister of Defence, and under the same management, and in the same spirit as we have had up to the present (hear, hear).
De Valera replied, ‘I do not want to pin you down any further, so I will take it at that.’ He then seconded a motion to thank the hosts of the debates, and it should be noted that the debates did not end on a sour note:
I have great pleasure in seconding that proposal. The University authorities were very kind when, while I was acting as President of the Dáil — President of the Republic — I asked that we might be given accommodation here. Then as Chancellor of the University, I am delighted that this historic meeting — although for many reasons it will be a sad one — was held here (applause).
Richard Mulcahy then spoke again:
On a point of explanation; what I said apparently has not been understood, and it has been suggested I avoided saying what could have been said very simply. It is suggested I avoided saying the Army will continue to be the Army of the Irish Republic. If any assurance is required — the Army will remain the Army of the Irish Republic (applause).
THE PROVISIONAL GOVERNMENT
On 14 January, the ‘Provisional Government of the Irish Free State’ was formed by sixty pro-Treaty Dáil members in the Mansion House, Dublin. Interestingly, the four Unionists elected for the Dublin University did attend this session. The ‘Southern Parliament’ passed a motion approving the Treaty and elected Michael Collins as Chairman of the Executive Committee. Richard Mulcahy was in charge of Defence, and Eoin O’Duffy became Chief of Staff of the National Army.
DUBLIN CASTLE HANDED OVER
The seat of British power and, indeed, the centre of the administration of British rule, Dublin Castle, was symbolically handed over to the Provisional Government of the Irish Free State on 16 January 1922. According to one of the most prolific Irish historians, Tim Pat Coogan, an official at the Castle is reported to have admonished Michael Collins for being tardy: ‘You’re seven minutes late, Mr. Collins.’ Collins is reputed to have replied, ‘We’ve been waiting 700 years, you can have the seven minutes.’11 Collins hoped that the handing over of British Army barracks to the Irish would be seen as a great victory for Ireland.
ANTI-TREATY AND PRO-TREATY
A significant number of IRA leaders were against the Treaty; these included Rory O’Connor, Liam Lynch, Cathal Brugha and Ernie O’Malley, to name but a few. An Army Convention was held on 26 March, which adopted a resolution confirming that the IRA affirmed its allegiance to the Irish Republic. A new executive was elected and Rory O’Connor, at a press conference, repudiated the Dáil and IRA GHQ. Liam Lynch did his best to reunite the divided IRA and continued to hold discussions with Michael Collins. Both men were IRB Supreme Council members and neither wanted to see an Irish civil war.
The Black and Tans and Auxiliaries began to leave the twenty-six counties, some to join the Specials in the Six Counties and some eventually to join a Palestine gendarmerie. However, the pro-Treaty Provisional Government, instead of relying on the Republican Police, began to recruit for a civic guard and also set up a Criminal Investigations Department (CID) at Oriel House, recruiting from amongst the IRA those of a pro-Treaty stance.
Notes
1. O’Halpin, Eunan, ‘Counting Terror’ in David Fitzpatrick (ed.), Terror in Ireland, Dublin: Lilliput, 2012, pg.152.
2. Coogan, Michael Collins, pg.228.
3. Connell, Joseph E.A., Michael Collins, Dublin 1916–22, Dublin: Wordwell, 2017, pg.393.
4. Dalton, Emmet, WS 641, pg.2–5.
5. Connell, Michael Collins, Dublin 1916–22, pg.394.
6. Coogan, Michael Collins, pg.242.
7. Ibid., pg.243.
8. Macardle, The Irish Republic, pg.557.
9. Ibid., pg.575–576.
10. See oireachtas.ie for full debate.
11. Coogan, Michael Collins, pg.310.