Clare and the Great War

by Joe Power

  However, John Redmond, perhaps bowing to British military and political pressure, unilaterally announced a new policy at Woodenbridge, County Wicklow on 20 September, urging the National Volunteers to join the British forces. Significantly, there was no supporting editorial in the Clare Champion after Redmond’s ‘Woodenbridge speech’; neither did the Clare Champion condemn the new policy. The Clare Champion followed Redmond’s leadership up until 1916 but, thereafter, took a more republican approach to recruitment and the war.

  Both of the Clare MPs, William Redmond, and Col Arthur Lynch, were in favour of recruitment. John Redmond, MP, leader of the Home Rule Party, and Lynch toured the county early in September, urging nationalists to fight for Ireland and the ‘freedom of small nations’ like Catholic Belgium. The Clare Champion of 15 September reported Lynch declaring: ‘I want to get to the front to help France, if I can get troops to come with me’. But there was little response to their ‘call to arms’, even though great emphasis was put on the sufferings of Catholic Belgium in order to win the sympathy of the Irish Catholics.

  Within days of the declaration of war the vigilance of local officials such as policemen and members of the coastguard resulted in the arrest of several ‘spies’ in Clare. One Englishman, who happened to be sketching near Loop Head, was arrested by three members of the local Volunteers, armed with revolvers, who had cycled 14 miles from Kilkee to arrest him as a ‘German spy’ before he revealed his true identity. A week later the Clare Journal of 15 August reported the arrest of three alleged spies in Clare. But, as in the previous week, it turned out that the three men were not spies. Instead they were found to be deserters from a Norwegian ship that had discharged timber in Kilrush. The men, an Englishman, a Welshman and a German, were arrested in Kildysart, and, after being conveyed to Ennis police barracks, were transferred to Limerick. They were jeered at as ‘German spies’ in Ennis en route to Limerick Jail.

  ‘Why Mr. Wm. Redmond, M.P. joined the Army’, article from the Clare Journal, 19 April 1915.

  William Redmond, brother of the Home Rule Party leader, John Redmond, was active in promoting recruitment after his brother made the speech in Woodenbridge, County Wicklow on 20 September urging the National Volunteers to join the British Army. Speaking at a recruitment meeting in Cork in December, he declared that he would not ask men to volunteer unless he was prepared to join them in the British Army: ‘And when it comes to the question – as it may come – of asking young Irishmen to go abroad and fight this battle, when I am personally convinced that the battle of Ireland is to be fought where many Irishmen now are – in Flanders, in France – old as I am and grey as are my hairs, I will say: ‘Don’t go, but come with me’.1

  Willie Redmond also justified his decision to enlist and the overall recruitment campaign in a letter to a friend, Patrick J. Linnane, an Ennis urban councillor:

  If the Germans come here they will be our masters … look at what happened in Belgium, they were invaded and massacred … we must show our gratitude to Britain for restoring our parliament by standing by her in her hour of need … If we stand idly by and not strike a blow for Belgium then indeed, I believe that our name would be disgraced …

  Later, from his training camp at Fermoy, Capt. Willie Redmond wrote to Capt. Jorgenson in Kilkenny, elaborating upon and justifying his decision to enlist:

  My views are well-known, I believe every interest of Ireland is bound up with the Allies, which cause, in my opinion, is the cause of liberty, as against German militarism … I believe the Home Rule Act is a treaty of peace and Ireland is bound to keep her word of defending the empire. That is why I and thousands of others have joined up … In this war the interests of England, Ireland and the empire are identical … Apart from those national and honourable aspects of the war, surely Ireland could not stand by while France and Belgium were being ruined … We are a fighting race and can’t be neutral as though we were cowards. I have left my home and joined the Irish Brigade. That action should be at least as eloquent as any speech I could make in Kilkenny’.2

  Willie Redmond, MP. (Courtesy of the National Library of Ireland)

  Economic and Social Impacts

  Many sporting events in the county were cancelled due to the war. One of the most important was the Clare County Agricultural Show, usually held on 15 August. The reason given was that there was a difficulty in getting judges. A sporting event of national significance, the South of Ireland Golf Championship was also cancelled. Horse racing meetings at Ennis and Miltown Malbay were called off as well as a bazaar at Kilkee. On the other hand, GAA sports were not affected. This was fortunate as Clare hurlers won the first All-Ireland in September 1914.3

  The war brought mixed fortunes to various sectors of the economy of Clare. The agricultural sector entered a long boom period, with rising prices and demand for produce, which continued until about 1919. The earliest manifestation of this was a rising demand for horses for the British Army. Within weeks there were reports of ‘extensive purchases of horses for the army’, with Capt. O’Grady and Mr T. Lloyd, assisted by Mr P.J. Howard, veterinary surgeon, travelling around the county buying horses for transport and for the cavalry. The price of good horses for military use rose from about £25 to £40 each. Also, there was a substantial rise in the price of cattle at the November Fair of Clare. ‘There was a brisk demand for well-conditioned cattle which realised substantial prices. Sheep averaged fifty-five shillings per head. There was also a big supply of horses on sale. There was a brisk demand with remunerative prices’.4

  Horses for the British Army gathered outside the old RIC Barracks, Ennis. (Courtesy of Sean Spellissy Collection)

  On the other hand, tourism in the holiday resorts of Clare, especially the premier resorts of Kilkee, Lahinch and Spanish Point, as well as Killaloe, was badly affected. At a meeting of the County Clare Committee for the Prevention of Distress held in March 1915, a report of the Kilkee sub-committee highlighted the distress in Kilkee caused by the war:

  On the outbreak of war in early August the banks shut down for a few days. There was a great exodus of visitors and the majority did not return. The military men and their families left on the declaration of war. The principal hotel shut down, while other hotels did poorly and suffered losses. This had fallen on the poor, who lived by visitors. There was acute distress due to want of employment’.5

  One businessman, who seems to have had a vested interest in opposition to recruitment, put an advertisement in the Clare Champion of 19 September urging Volunteers to remain at home and not join the British Army. He wrote that Home Rule ‘was only a matter of time’. Mr Griffin, the proprietor of a wholesale and retail draper’s outfit in Ennis, had a large stock of Volunteer outfits and kit, approved by the Volunteer HQ. He stated that he had supplied the Ennis and Doora units of the Volunteers. He did not wish to be left with a large stock of unwanted Volunteer outfits!

  Dr Fogarty, Catholic Bishop of Killaloe. (Courtesy of Peadar McNamara Collection)

  The Catholic Church and the Great War

  Meanwhile, the Catholic bishop of Killaloe, Dr Fogarty, initially justified the war ‘as a sign of God’s anger at sinful humanity’. In perhaps one of his first public utterances about the war, at first Mass at the cathedral in Ennis, Bishop Fogarty spoke ‘with much feeling’ about the war, which he did not condemn. ‘It would’, he said, ‘involve many sacrifices and the poor would necessarily suffer. He deprecated all idea of panic. The banks would be perfectly safe; there was no fear of any financial alarm and no necessity for raising the price of food’.6 Judging by what the bishop said and from the report of the County Clare committee for the prevention of distress, there must have been a run on the banks in the early days of the war as people panicked and tried to withdraw their money.

  Towards the end of the month Dr Fogarty delivered his opinion on the cause of the war. ‘It was’, he said, ‘the anger of God. People throughout Europe had disregarded His power and defied His laws. People worshipped Mammon
instead of God.’ In a pastoral letter to his flock, Bishop Fogarty stated that the Litany of the Saints should be recited after Mass on the first Sunday of each month for the cessation of the war. He also urged his flock to be charitable in their language about the enemy.7

  The Irish Catholic hierarchy met at Maynooth in October and they did not condemn the war either. However, they issued a number of resolutions, which were subtly supportive of Britain’s war aims and justification for war – that is the freedom of small nations and the German invasion of Catholic Belgium.

  They passed four resolutions: 1, that there was a need for Catholic chaplains at the front to cater for the moral and spiritual needs of the many Catholic soldiers in the British Army; 2, that each bishop was to direct his priests to remind their flocks at sermons at Sunday Masses of the sufferings and needs of the ‘brave Belgian people’; 3, that the hierarchy protested at the destruction of Louvain; and 4, that a collection be held for the relief of the Catholic people of Belgium. These resolutions appealed to the sympathies of the Catholic people of Ireland for their suffering co-religionists in Belgium and perhaps encouraged them to enlist.

  According to Jerome Aan De Wiel, ‘in the early months of the war the Church stood by the recruiting sergeant … only a handful of bishops and priests were opposed to the war’. De Wiel states that twenty-one out of twenty-seven Catholic bishops supported the war, three or four were neutral, and only two bishops publicly opposed the war, the Archbishop of Dublin and the Bishop of Limerick.

  One of the bishops who publicly opposed the war was Bishop O’Dywer of Limerick, who urged that Catholics should heed the Pope’s call for peace. Bishop O’Dwyer’s appeal may not have been heeded initially, but his voice became more influential later in the war. The Diocese of Limerick included part of South East Clare, in the parishes of Meelick, Parteen and Cratloe and Bishop O’Dwyer’s call for peace may not have had more influence there initially, but had a much greater impact later.

  The Bishop of Galway, Dr Thomas O’Dea, also had ecclesiastical jurisdiction in part of the county in the deanery of Kilfenora, which covers most of North Clare, including places such as Kilfenora, Ennistymon, Lahinch, Liscannor, Lisdoonvarna, Carron and Ballyvaughan. Dr O’Dea, although he initially condemned the war, it was he said ‘caused by a lack of brotherly love’, preferred ecclesiastical consensus on the issue and did not publicly oppose enlistment. However, in his Lenten pastoral of March 1916 Dr O’Dea seems to have changed his views on the war, suggesting that Ireland should support the allied cause. ‘He hoped that every Irish Catholic would join.’ It was his ‘earnest hope that the contribution of blood made by Irishmen to strike down arrogant militarism would not be a wasted measure’. Such a call from their bishop in a pastoral letter must have carried some weight and had some influence on his parishioners in the North Clare area, encouraging some of them to enlist.8

  A war poster of 1914/1915.

  (Courtesy of Wikimedia Commons)

  The collection for the Catholics of Belgium was held during November and the total sum collected in the diocese of Killaloe amounted to £1,020 14s 0d, what Bishop Fogarty called ‘a magnificent contribution’. He went on to say that it would show the Belgian people, who by all accounts are starving, that the Irish people are not unmindful of their sufferings, which we would alleviate if we could; and that neither do we forget the friendly hand so generously extended by that gallant little country to our forefathers in the tearful centuries, now happily passed and gone, of Ireland’s crucifixion’.9

  It is significant that the Catholic hierarchy did not collectively condemn the war, or indeed condemn the real causes of the war, a potent mix of factors such as: Great Power rivalry; imperialism and imperial rivalry, for example in the Balkans and in Africa; the arms race (especially the naval rivalry between Britain and Germany during the years 1908-1914); the system of great power alliances at the time, Britain, France and Russia in the ‘Triple Entente’ versus the central powers of Germany, Austria-Hungary and Italy in the Triple Axis; the aggressive and boastful militarism of Kaiser Wilhelm of Germany; and ultra-nationalism, especially in ‘powder-keg’ regions such as the Balkans. Instead, Bishop Fogarty and the hierarchy focused on the general bland and politically neutral theme of ‘sinful humanity’ as the cause of the conflict.

  Uniting in a Common Cause

  The war had the effect of temporarily uniting the Catholic nationalists and the Protestant unionists of Clare in a common cause, the defence of the country. Following John Redmond’s appeal for unity of the Ulster Volunteers and the Irish National Volunteers in the common defence of Ireland, several unionists in County Clare responded to the call and offered their military services voluntarily to the Irish National Volunteers. Col George O’Callaghan Westropp sent a letter to the Clare Journal urging unionists in Clare to come forward, ‘fall into line’, and help to train the Volunteers. Following O’Callaghan’s call about a dozen British ex-army officers expressed a willingness to train the Volunteers.

  Several meetings were held between 13 and 27 August at Carmody’s Hotel Ennis, to discuss how they could co-operate in the emergency. The unionist delegation included Sir Michael O’Loghlen of Drumconora, His Majesty’s Lieutenant (HML) for Clare, Col O’Callaghan Westropp of Lismehane, O’Callaghan’s Mills and Dr W. MacDonnell of Eden Vale; while the nationalist delegates were Mr M O’Shea, Solicitor, Kilrush, who was chairman of the county board of the Irish National Volunteers, Mr Kenneally, chairman of Ennis UDC, Mr M. McNamara, commander of the Ennis Volunteers, J. Ryan and T. Lynch, O’Callaghan’s Mills; M. Collins and M. McNamara, Kildysart; J. Kerin, Ennis UDC; M. Murray Newmarket; M. Walsh, Killaloe, D. O’Brien and M. Clair, Ennistymon; P. McNamara, Mr. Dan O’Brien, UC, and Mr J. Kett, Kilkee, chairman of Clare County Council.

  Col George O’Callaghan Westropp stated that he had letters of support from many leading unionists in the county, men such as Mr Stacpoole, Eden Vale, Mr Scott, Mr Ball of Fortfergus, Mr O’Brien of Ballyalla, Mr Crowe jnr, of Dromore, Col Henn of Paradise, Col Massy Westropp, ‘an officer of great experience, who had already taken over the Clonlara Volunteers’, Capt. Molony of Kiltannon, Tulla, Mr Crowe of Moyriesk, and Mr Lefroy of Killaloe. All of these gentlemen were willing to offer their military experience to train the Volunteers.

  However, Mr M. McNamara, chairman of the Ennis National Volunteers, stated that a memorandum from HQ stipulated that all those willing to help would have to enrol and join the ranks, like all other Volunteers. There would be no patronage or favouritism, he said. After their enrolment, allowances would be made for their military expertise. This policy did cause some difficulty for the unionist gentlemen, who would not take orders from their social inferiors. O’Callaghan stated that this policy ‘was an unspeakably silly proposal’. Maj. Hickman of Fenloe wrote to Col Moore of the National Volunteers in 1914:

  I could not take orders from some who appear to be in authority on the County Board. I feel awfully ashamed of us all in the south not enlisting in the Irish Division. How could a soldier work under the class of the County Board and perhaps take orders from ‘Col’ Lynch? You know his record no doubt.

  Col Lynch, to whom Maj. Hickman referred, was Arthur Lynch, MP for West Clare since 1909. Arthur Lynch was born in Australia in 1861 to an Irish father and Scottish mother. His father was a native of Tirmaclane, County Clare. After attending the University of Melbourne he graduated as an engineer. Then he travelled to Europe and studied for a couple of years at the University of Berlin, where he became fluent in German. After that he pursued a career in journalism and became Paris correspondent of the British Daily Mail in 1898. When the Boer War broke out in 1899 he travelled to South Africa as war correspondent for the Parisian newspaper, Le Journal. He met Gen. Botha and decided to join the Boers in the fight against the British. He was appointed ‘colonel’ of the Second Irish Brigade in South Africa. He went to America on a propaganda mission on behalf of the Boers and later returned to Paris.

  While
he was away, he was elected as a nationalist MP for Galway in 1901. He went to London to take his seat in parliament and was arrested in 1902 and charged with treason for his pro-Boer actions. He was found guilty and sentenced to death in January 1903. However, following international protests, the sentence was commuted to life imprisonment. He was released a year later on ‘licence’ by the Tory government. He was finally pardoned by King Edward VII in 1907. He then took up medical studies and qualified as a doctor in 1908. In 1909 he was elected unopposed on 4 September as Nationalist MP for West Clare in a by-election caused by the death of Mr James Halpin, Home Rule MP from Newmarket-on-Fergus. To the unionists Col Arthur Lynch was persona non grata and was greeted with silence when he first entered the House of Commons. He was to remain as MP for West Clare till the next general election of 1918.

  Col Arthur Lynch, MP, in 1915. (Courtesy of the Library of Congress)

  Given Arthur Lynch’s ‘disloyal and traitorous’ actions during the Boer War, it is understandable why members of the unionist community in Clare would not take orders from him or associate with him. However, these two meetings between the unionists and nationalists of Clare, while helping to promote some form of unity in the face of a major crisis, were not fruitful. Col George O’Callaghan Westropp felt that the meetings ‘were overloaded with politicians and other varieties of unpractical windbags’. Unionist interest in the Volunteers cooled, the Volunteers were afraid of being sucked into the regular British Army, the government was unwilling to assign the Volunteers to home defence duties only, and the Protestants and Catholics distrusted each other.10