by Simon Heffer
Dillon also wrote to Redmond on 30 April urging him to intercede with the government to prevent ‘large scale’ executions of rebels, a policy he said would represent ‘extreme unwisdom’ because ‘the effect on public opinion might be disastrous in the extreme.’56 Even he, though, seemed to accept that some ringleaders might be shot. Courts martial began at Richmond Barracks under Major General Charles Blackader on 2 May. They were held in secret and with the prisoners having no defence, which was later deemed illegal. Some of the Army officers conducting them had conflicts of interest as prescribed by the military manual. In the end, ninety were sentenced to death: Maxwell confirmed fifteen of these sentences and the executions happened from 3 to 12 May. He said only ringleaders and cold-blooded murderers would be killed – which Asquith had specified – but this was not inevitably so; de Valera escaped because of his American birth. Patrick Pearse, Clarke and MacDonagh – unquestionably ringleaders – were the first convicted of ‘waging war against His Majesty the King, with the intention and for the purpose of assisting the enemy.’57 They were executed in Kilmainham on the morning of 3 May, in the yard where those sentenced to hard labour broke rocks.
Asquith told French he was surprised at the rapidity of the process and ‘perturbed’ by the executions: rather late in the day, having agreed to the exercise of martial law, he observed that ‘any wholesale punishment by death might easily cause a revulsion of feeling in this country and lay up a store of future trouble in Ireland.’58 French, who like Maxwell thought the rebels should get what was coming to them, nonetheless told Maxwell to confirm that not all the Sinn Féiners would be shot, though added ambiguously that he would not seek to interfere with Maxwell’s freedom of action. Thus supported by a senior officer, Maxwell carried on. All seven who had signed the proclamation were executed. Connolly, unable to stand because of his leg wound, was shot tied to a chair. Maxwell did, however, follow Asquith’s wishes that no woman – the prime minister specifically mentioned Countess Markievicz, who had kissed her revolver in the College of Surgeons before handing it over to a British officer – should be executed before the case was referred to him and to French. When an officer told her of her reprieve, the Countess replied: ‘I wish you had had the decency to kill me.’59 Four more men were shot on 4 May, and another on the 5th, and at that point the lawyer in Asquith took over. He sent a warning to Maxwell to urge the military governor to proceed at a pace that suggested nothing hasty had been done and that there had been adequate ‘deliberation’. Above all, he wanted Maxwell to do nothing that might ‘sow the seeds of lasting trouble in Ireland’.60
However, it was already too late for that. Redmond, who had regarded the rebels as criminals, praised the government’s response to ‘this insane movement’ that had ‘tried to make Ireland the catspaw of Germany’; but on 3 May, pressed by Dillon, he implored Asquith to stop the executions, or risk making his position as leader of the constitutional Nationalists impossible.61 He argued, speciously, that they had committed treason towards the liberty of Ireland, not against Britain. Asquith, maintaining the line he had used to French and Maxwell, promised the executions would be limited, but some were necessary. Redmond warned him that Irish-American opinion was ‘revolted by this sign of reversion to savage repression’, something Asquith had to take seriously if, as he hoped, America were to enter the war. The executions had had a catastrophic effect on public opinion there, and myth-making was already well advanced. When more executions were reported, Redmond warned Asquith that if they continued he would feel forced to denounce them, and quite possibly to retire.
On 8 May, having failed to make Asquith order that no more death sentences be carried out, Redmond asked him in the Commons whether he was aware that the ‘military executions’ were causing ‘rapidly increasing bitterness and exasperation amongst large sections of the population who have not the slightest sympathy with the insurrection’, and whether he would put an immediate stop to them.62 Although in private his reservations about the executions policy were mounting up, Asquith continued in public to defend Maxwell. He said the military governor had consulted the cabinet, and ministers had the ‘greatest confidence’ in his ‘discretion’. He was sure Maxwell would sanction the extreme penalty sparingly, and only for ‘responsible persons who were guilty in the first degree.’63 Arthur Lynch, MP for West Clare, shouted out that Maxwell had ordered ‘these shootings in cold blood’. Asquith refused to promise Ginnell that no more executions would take place until the Commons had discussed them. Ginnell accused him of ‘murder’.64 In Ireland, the industry of martyrdom was already well under way: publications were prepared listing the killed, the executed and the arrested, often with photographs. The continuance of the heavy hand spurred the creation of legends that would dog Anglo-Irish relations for decades.
Eventually, on 10 May, the day after Connolly and Mac Diarmada were shot, Asquith ordered an end to the executions. The press in London generally supported them: The Times, once they had finished, observed that ‘a certain number … were absolutely necessary to teach the traitors who take German money that they cannot cover Dublin with blood and ashes without forfeiting their lives.’65 It conceded that the public relations had been a disaster, in not explaining the reasons for each execution and not holding trials in public. The London newspapers, including The Times – which normally scrupulously avoided the vulgarity of photographs – published pictures of ruined buildings in Sackville/O’Connell Street and other central Dublin locations; the gravity of the rebellion was evident, and British public opinion hardened against the rebels.
It is highly questionable, however, whether even if justice had been seen to be done the feelings of republican sympathisers would have been soothed, or the haemorrhage of Redmond’s support staunched. The British government could never have responded to the use of force by rebels to concede Sinn Féin’s demands to evacuate Ireland and allow complete independence. With a war on it was utterly inconceivable, not least because of proof of German complicity in Sinn Féin’s campaign. But Redmond’s fears about the response were soon justified. By 25 May Dillon was telling Scott that ‘the executions had converted the Sinn Féin leaders from fools and mischief-makers, almost universally condemned, into martyrs for Ireland.’66 He presciently told Scott that unless Asquith gave a measure of Home Rule immediately the Nationalists would break up, and Sinn Féin would control Irish politics.
V
On 3 May, hours after the first executions, Birrell made a resignation speech in the Commons, preceded by an attack by Ginnell on ‘the shooting of innocent men by this Hunnish government’.67 When, after interruptions by Ginnell, Birrell could speak, he admitted: ‘I therefore, speaking for myself alone, say sorrowfully that I made an untrue estimate of this Sinn Féin movement – not indeed of its character or of the probable numbers of persons engaged in it or belonging to the association, nor of the localities where it is most to be found, nor of its frequent and obvious disloyalty, nor indeed of some of the dangers resulting from it.’68 Ginnell would join Sinn Féin in 1917 and be imprisoned in 1918.
Some had told Birrell he should have suppressed the organisation:
I may have committed an error in not doing it; but I ask the House to consider what some of the consequences might have been, would have been, had that step been taken at that time. The unanimity of Ireland has, as I say, even yet been preserved. This is no Irish rebellion. I hope that, although put down, as it is being put down, as it must be put down, it will be so put down, with such success and with such courage, and yet at the same time humanity, displayed towards the dupes, the rank and file, led astray by their leaders, that this insurrection in Ireland will never, even in the minds and memories of that people, be associated with their past rebellions, or become an historical landmark in their history.69
On that, too, Birrell was wrong; and his next remark merely confirmed how badly he had misread the situation. Describing his departure from Dublin, he continued: ‘When I viewed the smoki
ng ruins of a great portion of Sackville Street, when I was surrounded by my own ruins in my own mind and thought, and all the hopes and aspirations and work I have done during the past nine years, one ray of comfort was graciously permitted to reach my heart, and that was that this was no Irish rebellion, that Irish soldiers are still earning for themselves glory in all the fields of war, that evidence is already forthcoming that over these ashes hands may be shaken and much may be done, that new bonds of union may be forged, and that there may be found new sources of strength and of prosperity for that country.’70
Asquith confirmed there would be an inquiry, and a debate: but said it would be ‘most undesirable’ for a debate in what was still the heat of the moment.71 Redmond called what had happened ‘a misery and a heart breaking’, and pleaded: ‘This outbreak, happily, seems to be over. It has been dealt with with firmness, which was not only right, but it was the duty of the Government to so deal with it. As the rebellion, or the outbreak, call it what you like, has been put down with firmness, I do beg the Government, and I speak from the very bottom of my heart and with all my earnestness, not to show undue hardship or severity to the great masses of those who are implicated, on whose shoulders there lies a guilt far different from that which lies upon the instigators and promoters of the outbreak.’72 His calls for leniency were too late, and not entirely appreciated; Carson said that ‘while I think that it is in the best interests of that country that this conspiracy of the Sinn Féiners, which has nothing to do with either of the political parties in Ireland, ought to be put down with courage and determination, and with an example which would prevent a revival, yet it would be a mistake to suppose that any true Irishman calls for vengeance.’73
The government reconsidered the viability of courts martial to try rebels. Irish Unionists, mainly from Ulster, wanted not merely an inquiry into the causes of the Rising, but a thorough examination of the credentials of all Irish public servants, to root out Sinn Féiners. The shock of events caused Carson and Redmond to seek a solution founded on the consent of their two parties. One possibility was for a Dominion prime minister to arbitrate: but they doubted they could bring their followers with them. On 10 May Scott lunched with Carson, who likened the effect of the events to ‘a nail through his heart.’74
The Lords debated the Rising the same day. Lord Loreburn was a rare voice demanding the executions continue, though only for murderers. A far longer debate happened the next day in the Commons, on a resolution of Dillon ‘that, in the interest of peace and good government in Ireland, it is vitally important that the Government should make immediately a full statement of their intentions as to the continuance of executions in that country carried out as a result of secret military trials, and as to the continuance of martial law, military rule, and the searches and wholesale arrests now going on in various districts of the country.’75
Dillon, prepared to attack the government in a way Redmond was not, spoke of the shock that an execution had taken place in Fermoy – the first outside Dublin. It seemed there was a ‘roving commission’ to carry out executions all over Ireland. He felt Asquith was not being kept properly informed: ‘horrible rumours’ were ‘current in Dublin’ and ‘are doing untold and indescribable mischief, maddening the population of Dublin, who were your friends and loyal allies against this insurrection last week and who are rapidly becoming embittered by the stories afloat and these executions – I say the facts of this case disclose a most serious state of things.’76 He continued: ‘At this moment, I say, you are doing everything conceivable to madden the Irish people and to spread insurrection – perhaps not insurrection, because if you disarm the country there cannot be insurrection – but to spread disaffection and bitterness from one end of the country to the other.’77
He cited County Limerick, where there had been no uprising, but where the authorities were now doing house-to-house searches and arresting ‘suspects’. The same was true in Clare and in his own county of Mayo. However, ‘the primary object of my Motion is to put an absolute and a final stop to these executions. You are letting loose a river of blood, and, make no mistake about it, between two races who, after three hundred years of hatred and of strife, we had nearly succeeded in bringing together.’78 Like Midleton, who had spoken in the Lords the previous day, Dillon believed nine-tenths of Ireland had remained loyal: and that was the position of strength the government, by letting martial law take its course, was now squandering.
His conclusion caused some unease, as had the rest of his speech.
I do not come here to raise one word in defence of murder. If there be a case of cold-blooded murder, by all means try the man openly, before a court-martial if you like, but let the public know what the evidence is and prove that he is a murderer, and then do what you like with him. But it is not murderers who are being executed; it is insurgents who have fought a clean fight, a brave fight, however misguided, and it would be a damned good thing for you if your soldiers were able to put up as good a fight as did these men in Dublin – three thousand men against twenty thousand with machine-guns and artillery.79
Asquith was forced to admit ignorance of local circumstances. He reminded the House of the deaths of British soldiers and implored MPs: ‘Do not let our sympathies be entirely monopolised by the unfortunate and misguided victims of this unhappy and criminal rebellion.’80 He felt Dillon had lost a sense of proportion, and claimed the punishments had been ‘necessary’. He promised any further courts martial for murder would not be held in camera, to allay public fears that justice was not being done.
Addressing doubt that some convictions had been unsound, he added: ‘It is one of the most painful duties that can possibly be cast on any human being to be responsible for the death of another. I cannot – I tell the House fairly and frankly – reconcile it with my conscience or my judgment, believing as I do that the five other sentences were properly given and properly carried out, simply because we have reached this stage in point of time and numbers, that a differential or preferential treatment should be accorded to men equally or even more guilty.’81 He agreed with Dillon that most rebels had fought ‘very bravely’ and with ‘humanity’: something he contrasted with the ‘so-called civilised’ enemy in France and Flanders.82 He was also sure many who had taken part had not known what they were doing; and stressed that ‘our desire is not only that they should be treated with clemency, but that every possible opportunity should be given to them – it is a very difficult task, and a task that requires a great deal of thinking out – in the future to redeem what, in their case, and not in that of those who led them, is a merely venial and pardonable error on their part.’
Asquith conceded Sheehy-Skeffington had been shot without cause, in circumstances everyone must ‘deplore’; but did not believe the claims of Sheehy-Skeffington’s widow that British soldiers had attacked and raided her house (they had). Asquith the lawyer demanded evidence; Asquith the Victorian, who found war in all its forms so alien, stated Maxwell would not be ‘shielding officers and soldiers … guilty of ungentlemanly or inhuman conduct … It is the last thing the British Army would dream of.’83 He would leave for Ireland that evening to meet civil and military authorities and to make arrangements for Ireland to be ruled under ‘the general consent of Irishmen of all parties’.84 He had not understood Dillon about the rise of Sinn Féin, the one Irish political movement that now had true momentum. Nationalists welcomed Asquith’s conciliatory tones; but Nationalists were not the future.
Two cases gave Maxwell difficulty. He viewed MacNeill as a ringleader, but an absence of evidence led to his being given life imprisonment for spreading disaffection and impeding recruiting; he was sent to Dartmoor, but released the following year. The women were almost all released within a fortnight, leaving just eighteen in the women’s section of Mountjoy. Soon five of those were released, and some were deported: only Countess Markievicz was court-martialled. Asquith stuck to his decision that she could not be shot, to Maxwell’s chagrin: b
ut this was just seven months after Edith Cavell, and would have reduced the British to German levels of barbarism. Like MacNeill, she had a life sentence from which she was swiftly released.
Asquith now lacked a chief secretary, and struggled to find anyone of stature to take the post. He had wanted Lloyd George to go but the minister of munitions declined, and Asquith was in no position to make him; the dynamic in their relationship was shifting and as self-confidence drained away from Asquith, it drained into Lloyd George. The usually faithful Montagu also declined; and he resisted Unionist pressure to appoint Long, which would have been highly provocative. He considered another Unionist, Lord Robert Cecil, running the crucial (and, as it would turn out, decisive) blockade policy; but Redmond vetoed him, and Asquith was not minded to disoblige Redmond.
Eventually, he chose to fill the vacuum himself and to go to Ireland to assess the situation. Shortly before he left, the Lords passed a vote of censure on the government’s Irish policy. Asquith was away for a week. He went to Richmond Barracks to talk to some of the three or four hundred detainees, and, with his lawyer’s instinct, reached the conclusion that many should not be there: hence the releases of so many of the prisoners rounded up in the immediate aftermath. He also ordered the detainees be given better food, which annoyed the soldiers guarding them who were on military rations. He told Samuel the day after his visit that, having spoken to ‘many’ detainees, ‘in reply to my question whether they had anything to complain of in their treatment, they one and all answered in the negative, except one man who asked for a pillow.’85 He encountered little hostility, which deluded him into thinking that, if treated well, the Irish would become cooperative.
