PETER COTTRELL is currently a serving Army officer in the British Army. He has recently completed an MA thesis on the Royal Irish Constabulary and is hoping to read a PhD on policing during the Anglo-Irish War. He lives in Wiltshire, UK. PROFESSOR ROBERT O'NEILL, AO D.PHIL. (Oxon), Hon D. Litt.(ANU), FASSA, Fr Hist S, is the Series Editor of the Essential Histories. His wealth of knowledge and expertise shapes the series content and provides up-to-the- minute research and theory. Born in 1936 an Australian citizen, he served in the Australian Army (1955-68) and has held a number of eminent positions in history circles, including the Chichele Professorship of the History of War at All Souls College, University of Oxford, 1987-2001, and the Chairmanship of the Board of the Imperial War Museum and the Council of the International Institute for Strategic Studies, London. He is the author of many books including works on the German Army and the Nazi party, and the Korean and Vietnam wars. Now based in Australia on his retirement from Oxford he is the Chairman of the Council of the Australian Strategic Policy Institute. Essential Histories T he Anglo-Irish W ar The Troubles of 1913-1922 Peter Cottrell Essential Histories The Anglo-Irish War The Troubles of 1913-1922 First published in Great Britain in 2006 by Osprey Publishing, FOR A CATALOGUE OF ALL BOOKS PUBLISHED BY OSPREY Midland House, West Way, Botley. Oxford OX2 0PH, UK MILITARY AND AVIATION PLEASE CONTACT: 443 Park Avenue South, New York. NY 10016, USA NORTH AMERICA E-mail: [email protected] Osprey Direct, c/o Random House Distribution Center. © 2006 Osprey Publishing Ltd. 400 Hahn Road, Westminster MD 21 157 E-mail: [email protected] All rights reserved. Apart from any fair dealing for the purpose of private study, research, criticism or review, as permitted under ALL OTHER REGIONS the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act. 1988, no part of this Osprey Direct UK. PO. Box 140 Wellingborough. Northants. publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or NN8 2FA. UK transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, electrical, E-mail: [email protected] chemical, mechanical, optical, photocopying, recording or www.ospreypublishlng.com otherwise, without the prior written permission of the copyright owner. Enquiries should be addressed to the Publishers. Dedication In memory of my grandfather. 82476 Sgt William Leonard ISBN-10: 1-84603-023-4 Cottrell of the 9th Bn The Cheshire Regt, who was based at the ISBN-13: 978-1-84603-023-9 Curragh. Co. Kildare in the spring of 1918. Typeset in Monotype Gill Sans and ITC Stone Serif Acknowledgements Series Editor: Professor Robert O'Neill I would like to thank Richard Abbott, Jim Herlihy, Kevin Myers, Design: Ken Vail Graphic Design, Cambridge, UK Keith Strange and my wife Heather for all their help and support. Index by Alan Thatcher Maps by The Map Studio Originated by PPS Grasmere. Leeds, UK Scanned & OCRed Printed and bound in China through Bookbuilders 06 07 09 10 11 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 By BlueMeenie A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Introduction It is likely that many people have never Irish cannot help but remember? Arguably heard of the Anglo-Irish War. Many of those the British have no desire to remember a who have probably know very little about it, conflict that in their eyes saw the secession other than that it is one of the many messy of what had been for 121 years an integral conflicts that serve as footnotes to the First part of the United Kingdom, whilst the Irish World War of 1914-18. Some have probably remember British brutality. Just as many US heard of the 'Black and Tans', and doubtless perceptions of the American Revolution are have come across stories of the controversial distorted by their own foundation myth, Michael Collins, subject of many books and Irish Nationalist histories tend to throw up a major feature film. Most will be familiar stereotypical caricatures of the British as with the Irish Republican Army (IRA), Sinn monsters driven by anti-Irish xenophobia. Féin, Orangemen and the Ulster Volunteer This version of events tends to ignore the Force (UVF) because of 35 years of sectarian fact that both sides committed atrocities. violence in Northern Ireland. Less well It also ignores a significant fact about known is the fact that none of these British rule in Ireland: that it would have organizations emerged in the 1960s, but been impossible without the support of instead had their roots in a time when thousands of Irishmen, in the army, the Ireland was part of the United Kingdom. police and the Civil Service; or, indeed, Although the Anglo-Irish War, or the 'War without the acquiescence of the vast of Independence' or 'the Troubles', as it has majority of the population of Ireland. variously been called, receives little attention Although the history of British Ireland is in Britain, it is remembered in Ireland littered with rebellions, nearly all of them through the perpetuation of an 'official' were put down by both British and Irish Nationalist 'Liberation myth'. This myth troops. The rebels may have labelled these made Nationalist icons of Eamon de Valera, Irishmen as 'traitors' but in the words of Michael Collins and others whilst vilifying Sean O'Faolain, who was both in the IRA the British as perfidious colonial oppressors and the son of a policeman during the to such an extent that this version of history conflict, 'Men like my father were dragged has largely been allowed to go unchallenged. out ... and shot down as traitors to their Consequently, it is extremely difficult to country ... they were not traitors. They discern what is myth and what is fact had their loyalties, and stuck to them.' regarding the events that took place in Despite the contentious issues of Unionist Ireland and Britain between 1913 and 1923. and Nationalist politics that dogged pre-First Unfortunately, some versions of Irish history World War Ireland, over 200,000 Irishmen have been so tainted with half-truths and volunteered to fight for 'King and Country' fabrications that at times it is almost in the war. Some, like Tom Barry and impossible to discern fact from fiction. Emmett Dalton, returned to join the IRA and In his book The Black and Tans Richard became violent revolutionaries, whilst others Bennett labelled the Anglo-Irish conflict as drifted into the ranks of the Royal Irish one that 'the English have struggled to forget Constabulary (RIC). In that respect the and the Irish cannot help but remember'. Anglo-Irish War was as much a civil war as Yet what is it exactly that the British have an 'international' conflict, and as such did struggled to forget and why is it that the not end with British withdrawal in 1922 but 8 Essential Histories • The Anglo-Irish War Introduction 9 Although the RIC offered substantial rewards for the British rule. In fact, from the failure of capture of IRA activists, few were captured as a result of the Fenian Rising in 1867 to the period wanted posters like this one. (Courtesy of the RUC immediately before the First World War, George Cross Foundation) Ireland was a relatively peaceful and prosperous part of the UK. However it with the end of the 'official' civil war in was by no means united, and despite the 1923, and arguably not even then. Equally, it high-minded non-sectarian ideals of the is sometimes difficult to establish when the United Irishmen, Ireland was a deeply Anglo-Irish War actually began. Traditionally divided society. Sectarian violence bubbled it is seen as beginning when Dan Breen and beneath the surface and political allegiances members of the Tipperary IRA ambushed were often dictated by sectarian tribal and killed two Irish Catholic policemen - loyalties. In the non-conformist Protestant Constables James McDonnell and Patrick heartland of Ulster most of the residents O'Connell - in a quarry near Soloheadbeg, feared any form of devolved or independent Co. Tipperary on 21 January 1919. This is Dublin-based government, because because this was the first of many incidents they would become a minority in a when the IRA deliberately targeted Catholic-dominated independent Ireland, policemen. Some analysts see the Easter which re-awoke folk memories of the Rising in 1916 as the start of the war, whilst massacres of Protestants during the 1640s others place its roots even earlier in and the 1798 rebellion. Anglo-Irish history. In response to the rising tide of Republican interpretations tend to see constitutional Nationalism, with its goal of every rebellion from the Anglo-Norman a devolved Irish government in Dublin, the invasion of 1169 to the present day as part Protestant North began to mobilize against of a continuous struggle for liberation from the possibility of Irish Home Rule. The year English, or British, rule. However, this is far 1913 saw the creation of pro- and anti-Home too simplistic an interpretation of Anglo-Irish Rule paramilitary groups, firstly in the guise relations, since the Catholic rebels of the of the Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF) and then 1640s recognized Charles I's right to be King in response the National Volunteers; both of Ireland, as did the Irish Army that fought promptly began to smuggle arms into the for James II. Only the predominantly country. The battle lines of some form of Protestant-led United Irishmen fought Irish 'civil war' were being drawn in 1913, for a non-sectarian Republic along and although hostilities were temporarily Franco-American lines. Republicanism was postponed in August 1914 when the UK not the central thread of Nationalist resistance declared war on Germany, it was only a to British domination of Ireland, and even stay of execution that lasted until 1919. Sinn Féin was a constitutional monarchist The compromise treaty that ended the party when it was founded in 1905. conflict and partitioned Ireland turned out Although Ireland's many insurrections to be the catalyst for the civil war that were not part of a continuous struggle for bitterly divided southern Irish society, and liberation, it would equally be wrong to created the political parties that still define say that earlier rebellions did not inspire the Republic's politics. Within living or affect those that came after them. If memory, veterans of these events dominated Republicanism was not a significant feature Irish politics and it is hardly surprising that of Irish rebellions before 1798, it was to they cast a shadow over Anglo-Irish become the dominant feature of 19th- diplomatic relations and bequeathed a bitter century Irish subversion. Despite financial legacy to both the Royal Ulster Constabulary and moral support from Irish emigres in the (RUC) and the Garda Síochána (Garda). US, none of the Republican efforts before Ultimately, it is only since the deaths of 1921 were successful in freeing Ireland from the likes of Eamon de Valera, who took part 10 Essential Histories • The Anglo-Irish War Introduction 11 in the struggle, that Irish historians have an emotional experience. Despite this begun to question traditional Nationalist revisionist renaissance, very little has been interpretations and come to terms with their written about the conflict in the United past as a piece of historical study rather than Kingdom outside of Ulster or the realms of academia, and the British public remain largely ignorant of the conflict that shaped Officers of the North Down 1st Battalion UVF.There were modern Ireland and its relationship strong links between religion and politics amongst the Ulster Paramilitaries. (Courtesy of the Ulster Museum) with Britain.