Week 2 - Ireland and the Great War
Home Rule and WWI
During the swell that led to WWI Ireland was in the throws of its own political unrest. Irish Nationalists had been working hard towards Irish Home rule from the 1870, and had made progress when the Third Home Rule Bill was introduced in 1912 but their efforts were to be shelved with the outbreak of the first world war. The Irish Home Rule movement was a movement that agitated for self-government for Ireland within the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. It was proposed that purely Irish questions would be dealt with by an Irish parliament in Dublin, but the people of Ireland would still be represented by members of parliament in Westminster.
Watch the following short video to find out more: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VBONYJIh8Nw
The War itself divided opinion with many angered by the delay to Home Rule, while others urged the importance of uniting with the British in the face of foreign enemies.
Research the views of John Redmond and Edward Carson on Home Rule and participation in the war.
Finally read the quotes @ http://brianjohnspencer.blogspot.co.uk/2016/02/home-rule-was-loyalty.html and examine the ppropeganda poster above and write an opinion in the comments below reflecting on the merits and impact of Home Rule for Britain and Ireland.
Home rule is the power of a constituent part of a state to exercise such of the state's powers of governance within its own administrative area that have been decentralized to it by the central government. Nationalists began to fight for Irish Home rule beginning in 1886 by John Redmann.
ReplyDeleteAnti-Home Rule postcard entitled 'Ulster's Prayer - Don't Let Go!' It depicts an Englishman trying to pull Ulster away from the looming 'Home Rule rocks.' Also depicted on the map are the 'Liberal Straits' just off the southern Irish coast and the 'Union Channel' between Ireland and England. The Ulster Prayer is was made to be said every morning and evening by each member of the Ulster Volunteer Force. It talks about the ‘gain of peace’ which suggests some Irish citizens felt Home Rule would bring unrest to Ireland and to remain alongside the English government would be the best solution. Ulster's Solemn League and Covenant, commonly known as the Ulster Covenant, was signed by just under half a million Irishmen and women, mainly from Ulster, on and before 28 September 1912, in protest against the Third Home Rule Bill introduced by the British Government in the same year.
As Unionists were mostly Protestant, they felt that they would become a minority in a Catholic-dominated Home Rule Ireland. Unionists were proud of their association with the British Empire and felt it was their duty to protect its integrity in Ireland.
1912–14: Third Irish Home Rule Bill passed under the Parliament Act after House of Lords defeats, with Royal Assent as the Government of Ireland Act 1914 but never came into force, due to the intervention of World War I (1914–18) and of the Easter Rising in Dublin (1916).
Elliott Wilkie
ReplyDelete12NMN
Impact of Home Rule on Ireland
The Home Rule Bill, passed by the British parliament in 1912, when it would come into effect, was to give Ireland some control over their own affairs for the first time since the Act of Union in 1800. However, this was delayed when the WW1 broke out and by the time the war had ended the political landscape in Ireland had changed irrevocably. The nationalist movement split into the followers of John Redmond who chose to fight for the British in the war in the hope that their loyalty would be rewarded and those on the other side who felt that this was just a delaying tactic and that 'England's difficulty was Ireland's opportunity'. On the other side was the Unionists. The heart of the unionist movement was with Edward Carson; Carson was seen as the ‘granite faced champion of Ulster Unionism at the height of its resistance to Home Rule for Ireland’. The Unionists were violently opposed to any form of Irish self-government, believing that 'Home rule is Rome rule', Rome Rule was a term used by Irish unionists to describe their belief that with the passage of a Home Rule Bill, the Roman Catholic Church would gain political power over their interests in Ireland, as many of the Ulster Unionists were Protestant at the time. and this led to the signing of the Ulster Covenant and the establishment of the Ulster Volunteers. The Ulster Covenant was an oath whereby the Protestant people of Ulster, the northernmost province of Ireland, pledged to defend their way of life from the growing threat of 'Home Rule', a man is said to have been so committed to the cause that he signed the covenant in his own blood. This displays the dedication they had towards Carson himself, The Ulster Unionists and the movement against home rule, even though they were the ones with England. The Ulster Unionist Council (UUC) decided officially to establish a paramilitary body, the Ulster Volunteer Force. It was established partly because the protest demonstrations it had been organising until then against Irish self-government appeared to be having no impact, their activities were just dismissed as ‘bluff and blackmail’ by the British government and by nationalist MPs. In World War I, Carson encouraged the UVF to enlist in the British Army, a process helped with by the War Office’s decision to create the 36th (Ulster) Division specifically for its members. The 36th fought bravely but with heavy losses at the Somme. Meanwhile, the UVF (Ulster Volunteer Force) at home had languished, with around 5,000 members by 1918. But it revived itself subsequently in the wake of the Irish War of Independence (1919-21).
The Propaganda poster that is depicted above is an anti-home rule titled ‘Ulster’s Prayer Don’t let go!’. It pictures an Englishman trying to pull away Ulster from the 3 other provinces Connacht, Leinster and Munster, He is pulling Ulster away into the union channel but not any other province, this Is significant because Ulster were the ones who were resisting the most, Ulster was so devoted to the cause that they signed a covenant to pledge that they would defend the province from invasion and resist any plans to accept home rule. This was because the unionists were mainly protestant, and they felt that home rule would be a threat as they feared the Roman Catholic Church would gain political power over their interests in Ireland. Some Irish citizens felt Home Rule would bring unrest to Ireland and to remain alongside the English government would be the best solution. Unionists were proud of their association with the British Empire and felt it was their duty to protect its integrity in Ireland. This is why they fought so hard for the cause.