100 Years Ago
http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/archive/first-world-war/article4721037.ece
The Government and Ireland
April 27, 1916
Everybody who knows Ireland has seen the mischief brewing, and it is simply incredible that Mr Birrell’s official subordinates have not striven to keep him informed of the truth
The Prime Minister announced yesterday that “steps had been taken fully and accurately to inform our friends abroad as to the real significance” of the Irish disturbances. We are very glad to hear it, but why are the peoples of this country still kept in the dark as to these events? Why are we and our friends abroad still restricted to such information as it may suit the convenience of Ministers to give us? The censorship is in force as we write. Why is it maintained, if the whole business is so trivial as the Government suggest? Mr Birrell asserts that they set it up out of their extreme anxiety to avoid the creation of a bad impression in neutral countries, and particularly in America. Could any decision reveal more hopeless incapacity to understand the psychology of newspaper readers in all countries, and especially in the United States? The enemy may be trusted to have already supplied them with ample reports of the most full-blooded character of events that have never occurred and of deeds that have never been done. The fictions they habitually invent and calculate as to the results of their naval and Zeppelin raids show what they can accomplish in this kind. There is an old saying that a lie which has twenty-four hours’ start can never be overtaken. The Government have deliberately given these fictions two or three days’ start, and declare that they have done so in order to prevent the very impression they have given the enemy time to create. They have done worse. They have themselves made statements which were manifestly incomplete, and they have been obliged to supplement them under the pressure of questions. What do they suppose is the impression this process is likely to make on the neutral opinion to which they rightly attach importance? Will not the obvious reluctance with which these meagre details have been disclosed be regarded as confirmation of the enemy fictions, or at least as indications that Ministers have something serious to conceal? When will it dawn upon them that mystery-mongering is the very best and surest means to create distrust at home and abroad?
The statement which Lord Lansdowne made yesterday was much less incomplete than those which the Prime Minister and Mr Birrell gave in the Commons. The Lord Lieutenant describes the situation as “on the whole satisfactory,” but we do not find any distinct assurance that the rebels have been driven out of all their positions in Dublin. Stephen’s Green has been occupied, and “Liberty Hall,” the scene of Mr Larkin’s former triumphs and the headquarters of the “Citizen Army,” was “wholly or partially destroyed ” and taken possession of by midday yesterday. Meanwhile the troops had succeeded in protecting the line from King’s Bridge Station to the Customs House and the North Wall, and a cordon has been drawn round the portion of the city north of the river.
To anybody who knows Dublin these events are not altogether reassuring. Lord Lansdowne further tells us now for the first time that the insurgents made a “half-hearted” attack on Dublin Castle on Monday, and that they seized two railway stations. We also now learn that there have been attempts at risings at a couple of places close to Dublin. The provinces in general are, however, quiet. Martial law has been proclaimed in Dublin City and County, and a proclamation in last night’s Gazette suspends throughout Ireland the right of British subjects charged under the Defence of the Realm Act to be tried by Civil Courts. Drastic measures, we are assured, are being taken to suppress the movement and arrest the offenders, and reinforcements have been dispatched from England as well as from Belfast and other points in Ireland, though no mention is made of the forces actually available in Dublin. We agree with Lord Lansdowne that “this most recent German campaign,” as the Prime Minister termed it, is predestined to ignominious failure, but the whole character of his reply to Lord Midleton’s weighty speech confirms the fact that the Irish Government allowed themselves to be caught napping in the face of the strongest evidence that a seditious rising was being prepared under their eyes.
That they have had ample warnings of coming trouble, and that Mr Birrell has systematically and persistently chosen to disregard them, there is no room for doubt. Lord Midelton’s charge in this respect is unchallengeable. Everybody who knows Ireland has seen the mischief brewing, and it is simply incredible that Mr Birrell’s official subordinates have not striven to keep him informed of the truth. Lord Lansdowne himself admits that the facts were of common knowledge. We have ourselves drawn attention to them regularly at intervals for many months. The rebel preparations were ostentatious. The seditious character of their organization is notorious, and the contempt with which they speak of the many thousands of brave Nationalists who are fighting gallantly beside their fellow-subjects has long been a burning scandal. Yet they have been allowed to arm, to parade, to drill, and even to practise street fighting in the Irish capital, unmolested by Mr Birrell.
He went to Ireland last night. Lord Loreburn expressed the hope that he would stay there. A residence in the country which, he has been supposed to govern for the last nine years would certainly be a novel experience to him. He hardly ever goes near it and appears to treat his office as a sinecure. We recall that his last appearance in public, before the present trouble dragged him into the limelight, was at an entertainment in London given by certain poets and young women, and we were assured by the reporters that he was in his most entertaining vein. Had he not better confine himself to the role in which he excels? His whole administration has been a notorious and ignominious failure, which has brought the law into contempt, and he has treated the failure and its consequences with cynical indifference and levity.
Parliament and the country will require an explanation some day, but in the meanwhile is it expedient, or is it even safe, that in the crisis of a great war such a man should hold the chief executive office in Ireland? Generals who fail are rightly dismissed. Is there any reason why politicians who conspicuously fail should be allowed to remain in office ? The present Irish Executive is a combination quite unfit to deal with the emergency which confronts it. It should be strengthened without a moment’s delay.
http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/archive/first-world-war/article4721051.ece
Suppressing the Revolt
May 1, 1916
Our Dublin Correspondent, who was an eye-witness of the heavy fighting in Sackville Street from his own office, in which he remained practically a prisoner for some days, does not hesitate to lay the blame for a revolt which has cost many precious lives and inflicted immense damage on the city upon the “criminal negligence and cowardice of the Irish Government”.
The communique from Ireland issued yesterday evening will be read with relief, though it leaves some of the good news which comes through other channels unconfirmed. It tells us, indeed, that the situation in Dublin is “much more satisfactory,” but it does not give any details illustrating the improvement. The only statements it makes about the city are that “more incendiary fires took place in Sackville Street” on Saturday night, that the fire brigade was, however, able to resume work, that some 700 prisoners had been taken, and that rebels from the Sackville Street, Post Office, and Four Courts areas were surrendering freely.
We cannot gather from it whether the site of the General Post Office, which was described as having been “destroyed by fire” in the official announcement of Saturday night, has yet been occupied by the troops; it makes no mention of the Four Courts district, which the rebels were then holding; it does not corroborate the report that Connolly, the rebel leader, has been killed; and it is silent about the street-fighting which our Dublin Correspondent tells us was still raging at certain points up to Saturday afternoon.
The words in which it describes the general situation are grave, but not alarming. “Throughout the country,” General Maxwell reports, there was still much to be done, but he hoped “that the back of the rebellion has been broken.” Messages, he states, have been sent out from the rebel leader in Dublin to his accomplices in five counties directing them to surrender. The leader of the band at Enniscorthy - close to the “Vinegar Hill” encampment of 1798 - refused to credit the fact, and, although a mined column had been dispatched to attack him, he has been allowed to come into Dublin under escort “to verify the information”.
“In the meantime,” it is added, “a truce exists.” We must hope this means nothing more than that he has been given a time limit in which to surrender without conditions. Nothing can be more dangerous, or in the long run mere inhumane, than to negotiate with armed rebels upon any other terms. A similar arrangement appears to have been made with a second rebel party from Ashbourne. In Galway the insurgents “are believed to be disbanding,” and on Saturday we had the assurance that the conditions in Belfast and Ulster were “normal”.
Today, for the first time, we are permitted to give our readers connected reports from independent sources of events in the Irish capital during the past week. These accounts are still issued under a censorship, but even so, they do something to lift the veil in which this miserable story has been carefully shrouded. Our Dublin Correspondent, who was an eye-witness of the heavy fighting in Sackville Street from his own office, in which he remained practically a prisoner for some days, does not hesitate to lay the blame for a revolt which has cost many precious lives and inflicted immense damage on the city upon the “criminal negligence and cowardice of the Irish Government”.
We have already expressed our opinion on that subject, and we shall merely add that, in our opinion, the responsibility extends to the Cabinet as a whole. They have been “put upon inquiry” as to the state of Dublin again and again, and if they chose deliberately not to inquire, but to leave matters to the Irish Executive, they must be answerable with it. The authorities in Dublin were taken utterly by surprise, and could only leave the city to the rebels when they rose. They were in command of the chief strategic points in a few hours and held them with determination, while they inflicted heavy losses from houses which they had occupied in the suburbs as. well as in the town. Fire broke out on Wednesday night, and tonight’s official news confirms the suspicion that it was due to arson and not to accident. It appears to have wrought more destruction than any of the fighting; though shells have been used by the troops.
We find it difficult to reconcile even the official reports with the optimistic statements made by Lord Wimborne and Mr Birrell to a party of journalists. They are reported to have said that “the rebels had not attempted anything except “sniping from certain selected spots” since Tuesday morning, with what Mr Birrell - so irrepressible is his humour - called “‘a job lot of rifles and shotguns”.
The Lord Lieutenant was “glad to report that the situation as a whole is very good,” and he attributed the outbreak to the resolve of the rebels to “have a run for their money”.
There is nothing like being light-hearted in creditable circumstances, but these airy references to the most formidable outbreak in Ireland since 1798 are singularly misplaced on the lips of men who are still her responsible rulers.
The Government and Ireland
April 27, 1916
Everybody who knows Ireland has seen the mischief brewing, and it is simply incredible that Mr Birrell’s official subordinates have not striven to keep him informed of the truth
The Prime Minister announced yesterday that “steps had been taken fully and accurately to inform our friends abroad as to the real significance” of the Irish disturbances. We are very glad to hear it, but why are the peoples of this country still kept in the dark as to these events? Why are we and our friends abroad still restricted to such information as it may suit the convenience of Ministers to give us? The censorship is in force as we write. Why is it maintained, if the whole business is so trivial as the Government suggest? Mr Birrell asserts that they set it up out of their extreme anxiety to avoid the creation of a bad impression in neutral countries, and particularly in America. Could any decision reveal more hopeless incapacity to understand the psychology of newspaper readers in all countries, and especially in the United States? The enemy may be trusted to have already supplied them with ample reports of the most full-blooded character of events that have never occurred and of deeds that have never been done. The fictions they habitually invent and calculate as to the results of their naval and Zeppelin raids show what they can accomplish in this kind. There is an old saying that a lie which has twenty-four hours’ start can never be overtaken. The Government have deliberately given these fictions two or three days’ start, and declare that they have done so in order to prevent the very impression they have given the enemy time to create. They have done worse. They have themselves made statements which were manifestly incomplete, and they have been obliged to supplement them under the pressure of questions. What do they suppose is the impression this process is likely to make on the neutral opinion to which they rightly attach importance? Will not the obvious reluctance with which these meagre details have been disclosed be regarded as confirmation of the enemy fictions, or at least as indications that Ministers have something serious to conceal? When will it dawn upon them that mystery-mongering is the very best and surest means to create distrust at home and abroad?
The statement which Lord Lansdowne made yesterday was much less incomplete than those which the Prime Minister and Mr Birrell gave in the Commons. The Lord Lieutenant describes the situation as “on the whole satisfactory,” but we do not find any distinct assurance that the rebels have been driven out of all their positions in Dublin. Stephen’s Green has been occupied, and “Liberty Hall,” the scene of Mr Larkin’s former triumphs and the headquarters of the “Citizen Army,” was “wholly or partially destroyed ” and taken possession of by midday yesterday. Meanwhile the troops had succeeded in protecting the line from King’s Bridge Station to the Customs House and the North Wall, and a cordon has been drawn round the portion of the city north of the river.
To anybody who knows Dublin these events are not altogether reassuring. Lord Lansdowne further tells us now for the first time that the insurgents made a “half-hearted” attack on Dublin Castle on Monday, and that they seized two railway stations. We also now learn that there have been attempts at risings at a couple of places close to Dublin. The provinces in general are, however, quiet. Martial law has been proclaimed in Dublin City and County, and a proclamation in last night’s Gazette suspends throughout Ireland the right of British subjects charged under the Defence of the Realm Act to be tried by Civil Courts. Drastic measures, we are assured, are being taken to suppress the movement and arrest the offenders, and reinforcements have been dispatched from England as well as from Belfast and other points in Ireland, though no mention is made of the forces actually available in Dublin. We agree with Lord Lansdowne that “this most recent German campaign,” as the Prime Minister termed it, is predestined to ignominious failure, but the whole character of his reply to Lord Midleton’s weighty speech confirms the fact that the Irish Government allowed themselves to be caught napping in the face of the strongest evidence that a seditious rising was being prepared under their eyes.
That they have had ample warnings of coming trouble, and that Mr Birrell has systematically and persistently chosen to disregard them, there is no room for doubt. Lord Midelton’s charge in this respect is unchallengeable. Everybody who knows Ireland has seen the mischief brewing, and it is simply incredible that Mr Birrell’s official subordinates have not striven to keep him informed of the truth. Lord Lansdowne himself admits that the facts were of common knowledge. We have ourselves drawn attention to them regularly at intervals for many months. The rebel preparations were ostentatious. The seditious character of their organization is notorious, and the contempt with which they speak of the many thousands of brave Nationalists who are fighting gallantly beside their fellow-subjects has long been a burning scandal. Yet they have been allowed to arm, to parade, to drill, and even to practise street fighting in the Irish capital, unmolested by Mr Birrell.
He went to Ireland last night. Lord Loreburn expressed the hope that he would stay there. A residence in the country which, he has been supposed to govern for the last nine years would certainly be a novel experience to him. He hardly ever goes near it and appears to treat his office as a sinecure. We recall that his last appearance in public, before the present trouble dragged him into the limelight, was at an entertainment in London given by certain poets and young women, and we were assured by the reporters that he was in his most entertaining vein. Had he not better confine himself to the role in which he excels? His whole administration has been a notorious and ignominious failure, which has brought the law into contempt, and he has treated the failure and its consequences with cynical indifference and levity.
Parliament and the country will require an explanation some day, but in the meanwhile is it expedient, or is it even safe, that in the crisis of a great war such a man should hold the chief executive office in Ireland? Generals who fail are rightly dismissed. Is there any reason why politicians who conspicuously fail should be allowed to remain in office ? The present Irish Executive is a combination quite unfit to deal with the emergency which confronts it. It should be strengthened without a moment’s delay.
http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/archive/first-world-war/article4721051.ece
Suppressing the Revolt
May 1, 1916
Our Dublin Correspondent, who was an eye-witness of the heavy fighting in Sackville Street from his own office, in which he remained practically a prisoner for some days, does not hesitate to lay the blame for a revolt which has cost many precious lives and inflicted immense damage on the city upon the “criminal negligence and cowardice of the Irish Government”.
The communique from Ireland issued yesterday evening will be read with relief, though it leaves some of the good news which comes through other channels unconfirmed. It tells us, indeed, that the situation in Dublin is “much more satisfactory,” but it does not give any details illustrating the improvement. The only statements it makes about the city are that “more incendiary fires took place in Sackville Street” on Saturday night, that the fire brigade was, however, able to resume work, that some 700 prisoners had been taken, and that rebels from the Sackville Street, Post Office, and Four Courts areas were surrendering freely.
We cannot gather from it whether the site of the General Post Office, which was described as having been “destroyed by fire” in the official announcement of Saturday night, has yet been occupied by the troops; it makes no mention of the Four Courts district, which the rebels were then holding; it does not corroborate the report that Connolly, the rebel leader, has been killed; and it is silent about the street-fighting which our Dublin Correspondent tells us was still raging at certain points up to Saturday afternoon.
The words in which it describes the general situation are grave, but not alarming. “Throughout the country,” General Maxwell reports, there was still much to be done, but he hoped “that the back of the rebellion has been broken.” Messages, he states, have been sent out from the rebel leader in Dublin to his accomplices in five counties directing them to surrender. The leader of the band at Enniscorthy - close to the “Vinegar Hill” encampment of 1798 - refused to credit the fact, and, although a mined column had been dispatched to attack him, he has been allowed to come into Dublin under escort “to verify the information”.
“In the meantime,” it is added, “a truce exists.” We must hope this means nothing more than that he has been given a time limit in which to surrender without conditions. Nothing can be more dangerous, or in the long run mere inhumane, than to negotiate with armed rebels upon any other terms. A similar arrangement appears to have been made with a second rebel party from Ashbourne. In Galway the insurgents “are believed to be disbanding,” and on Saturday we had the assurance that the conditions in Belfast and Ulster were “normal”.
Today, for the first time, we are permitted to give our readers connected reports from independent sources of events in the Irish capital during the past week. These accounts are still issued under a censorship, but even so, they do something to lift the veil in which this miserable story has been carefully shrouded. Our Dublin Correspondent, who was an eye-witness of the heavy fighting in Sackville Street from his own office, in which he remained practically a prisoner for some days, does not hesitate to lay the blame for a revolt which has cost many precious lives and inflicted immense damage on the city upon the “criminal negligence and cowardice of the Irish Government”.
We have already expressed our opinion on that subject, and we shall merely add that, in our opinion, the responsibility extends to the Cabinet as a whole. They have been “put upon inquiry” as to the state of Dublin again and again, and if they chose deliberately not to inquire, but to leave matters to the Irish Executive, they must be answerable with it. The authorities in Dublin were taken utterly by surprise, and could only leave the city to the rebels when they rose. They were in command of the chief strategic points in a few hours and held them with determination, while they inflicted heavy losses from houses which they had occupied in the suburbs as. well as in the town. Fire broke out on Wednesday night, and tonight’s official news confirms the suspicion that it was due to arson and not to accident. It appears to have wrought more destruction than any of the fighting; though shells have been used by the troops.
We find it difficult to reconcile even the official reports with the optimistic statements made by Lord Wimborne and Mr Birrell to a party of journalists. They are reported to have said that “the rebels had not attempted anything except “sniping from certain selected spots” since Tuesday morning, with what Mr Birrell - so irrepressible is his humour - called “‘a job lot of rifles and shotguns”.
The Lord Lieutenant was “glad to report that the situation as a whole is very good,” and he attributed the outbreak to the resolve of the rebels to “have a run for their money”.
There is nothing like being light-hearted in creditable circumstances, but these airy references to the most formidable outbreak in Ireland since 1798 are singularly misplaced on the lips of men who are still her responsible rulers.