After almost eighteen months of conflict, the Irish War of Independence showed no sign of abating in July 1920. This would be another month of murder and mayhem, and in terms of engagement with the police and military the IRA inflicted almost a dozen deaths during July alone. The military naturally struck back and a month of raids and destruction followed with the civilian population bearing the brunt of most of ...
The continued industrial unrest in Ireland was carried by the newspaper, The Watchword of Labour, who in June 1920 reported on a host of disputes across the country. Agitating for better pay and working conditions, disputes included workers from a number of professions. In county Kildare stable workers at the Curragh demanded an increase in pay, as did the shop girls in Newbridge town. At the Kynoch factory in A...
The targeting of the Irish language was an obvious tactic adopted by the British military as the War of Independence continued. Seeking to disrupt efforts to promote the Irish language, the military intervened to prevent a host of activities. In June 1920 the Irish Bulletin newspaper compiled a list of just some of the attempts to prevent the teaching and spread of Irish. They included preventing the ho...
Many communities across the country will be actively preparing for the centenary commemorations of events, which happened during the War of Independence. During this commemorative phase, long ago battles, raids and skirmishes will be recalled. Plaques and information signs erected telling the stories from 100 years ago, many of which we have featured on the blog since last October. However, commemoration is sele...
As the month of June wore on the British military resorted to targeting a number of types of premises connected to the Republican movement including newspaper offices and printing shops. These included the offices of the Munster News, a Limerick based nationalist newspaper which was set on fire in the middle of the night. The editorial and commercial departments were entirely destroyed, while Miss Connellan, the...
June 1920 ends with violent reprisals from the British military all across Ireland. Once again the radical newspaper, Irish Bulletin, provides an account of raids and assaults which occurred throughout Ireland in the final week of June. In Limerick city the military fired a number of shots into business and residences after midnight in a night of terror across the country. At Kilcommon, county Tipperary the homes ...
One of the features of Irish radical newspapers was the platform they provided for poets and writers. Harking back to episodes of Irish history or lamenting the present, poetry were used to instil pride, belief and hope for Ireland. Of course many of these poems and prose were nationalist in nature and reflected the interests of the newspaper in which they were published. Many were local scribes, but the newspap...
Cartoons were not a new feature of the Irish newspaper business one hundred years ago but certainly was transformed by the arrival of Ernest Forbes, to the staff of the Freeman’s Journal in 1920. Using the pseudonym ‘Shemus’, he was the first regular cartoonist on an Irish daily newspaper and his cartoons during the during the War of Independence and Civil War were widely published and distributed. Cartoons ...
The daring capture of Brigadier General Lucas in Fermoy county Cork during late June 1920 was captured in the pages of the Irish Bulletin. Described by the newspaper as the ‘Commanding Officer of the British Army of Occupation’ in the Fermoy area, the military carried out a frenzied search for him using armoured cars and even aeroplanes as large parts of Munster were scoured for evidence. It was estimated that...