Pagan Ireland (3000BC)

Ireland had a complex society even in early times, with people living in small communities farming the land. They were Pagan; worshiping the Sun and Moon and water. For example Newgrange in County Louth, built around 3000BC, pre-dates the pyramids and is an ancient burial site and calendar centred on the energy and importance of the sun in Society of the time. On the Winter Solstice, December 21st, the shortest day of the year, a long narrow passage leading to the centre of the tomb is lit on that one day of the year. The tomb is an amazingly complex design showing the skill of the people of the time. These people saw the days getting shorter and shorter as winter approached. They felt that by pleasing their gods with a series of rituals they would stop the sun disappearing completely. So the days started to lengthen once more and they were saved for another year.

The Celts

From the area that is now Germany, came invaders know as the Celts in around 400BC. They had superior metalwork skills compared to what was in the country at the time. And with their iron weapons they gained control of the country. They changed the social structure, with over one hundred small communities called tuatha . A king or chief was known as a ri tuaithe (meaning king of the tuatha ). Ultimately a number of ri tuaithe emerged to have control over communities in a particular region, which led to the  provinces of Ireland today. And finally there was Tara, a dramatic hill, now in County Meath, though still called the Royal County. This was the seat of the High king of all Ireland. 

Though much of the Celts' metal work skills were devoted to weaponry, some was also set to the task of jewellery. and some extremely fine and detailed work still exists to this day. Probably best known is the Tara brooch, shown below. This can be viewed in Dublin's National Museum.

A New Religion (AD400)

Christianity arrived in Ireland in the form of French and English missionaries in the fifth century. The native population seemed to accept the new religion quite readily. During this time missionaries would set to work building their monastery in their chosen district. For example Clomacnoise still has ruins today that date from the original settlements. For hundreds of years Ireland became a great centre of learning, with people coming to these Monasteries to learn. Great works of art remain from this period such as the Book of Kells; a text illuminated (painted) with gold on vellum (a dried and stretched animal skin). Or the Ardagh Chalice; a magnificent bowl studded in file jewels.

The Vikings

In AD795 a strange ship approached the Irish coast. It was wooden, with a single sail, and had a fierce head carved on its prow. The men in the boat wore fur skin, metal helmets with horns, and were heavily armed. They came from Scandanavia and were part of the first Viking attack on Ireland. They first targeted the monastery on Lambay Island in Dublin Bay. The island had no defences and the Viking attackers could easily make good their escape.

But over time the Vikings became more daring, attacking the coastal sites on the main land, and even travelling up river to attack inland sites. Monasteries were easy targets and provided great rewards in the form of gold crosses and chalices. The monks' reaction was to build tall round towers of stone. They would only have a single entrance that might be twenty or thirty feet off the ground and could be only reached by ladder. A lookout was permanently posted at the top of this tower watching for a Viking boat on the horizon. If spotted, an alarm was sounded and the community would rush to the tower with any precious items and draw up the ladder. Many of these towers are still very much intact today; such as that in Monasterboice in Co. Louth, and Glendalough (see image below) in Co. Wicklow.

Rather than simply attack and escape, the Vikings eventually started to establish communities in Ireland. Dublin, Wexford and Waterford were all originally Viking Settlements.

Ireland's first National Hero

Despite the Viking invasions, Ireland did not present a unified force to try and route the invader. They were still pre-occupied with internal power struggles. But in the late 900's a King from a tuatha in County Clare named Brian Boru, emerged to gain control of a large part of southern Ireland. The forces of Brian clashed with the Viking leader, Sitric, at Clontarf, just north of Dublin, on Good Friday 1014. Though Brian won the battle, he was killed by escaping Vikings.

After Clontarf, Ireland fell back into internal power struggles for control. And ironically, Mael Morda, a king of the Leinster province actually made a pact with Sitric, and fought by his side against Brian Boru, showing how desperate the struggle for control was among Irish kings of the time, if they would side with Viking forces!

The Norman Invasion

The Norman invasion of the 13th Century is a bit of a misnomer, as they originally arrived by invitation of Diarmaid MacMurrough who needed help in regaining his position. He petitioned Henry II, the then King of England, who let him recruit Richard De Clare (Strongbow) who arrived with a force and eventually took Diarmaid's seat of Leinster on his death.

The Normans originated in Northern France, and after the Battle of Hastings in 1066 their leader William the Conqueror assumed the throne of England. It was from the Norman's who settled in England that Strongbow was descended.

Many other Normans followed Strongbow in coming to Ireland and seizing land for themselves. Henry II was anxious to see how swiftly Strongbow and others gathered land under their control,  came to Ireland to assert his feudal rights to the land. So essentially the Normans in Ireland did nominally declare their loyalty to the King of England.

Over time the Irish Chiefs did manage to regain much of Ireland, and the Normans were reduced to control of an area along the East coast taking up the modern day counties of Louth and Dublin known as 'The Pale'.

The Tudors and the Flight of the Earls

In 1541, Henry VIII, King of England asserted his right to the land of Ireland. Desperate to retain their hold on their land, Irish Chiefs surrendered their land to the King and had it granted back to them subject to their loyalty. The strength of this loyalty has to be doubted as they had no other choice if they were to keep the land.

In 1553, Mary Tudor, succeeded her father Henry VIII and  so called "plantations" were attempted with varying degrees of success. Where English people attempted to establish themselves in newly confiscated lands. Elizabeth came to power in 1558. She was concerned about the Spanish (an Enemy of England) invading Ireland, and continued with plantations and crushing any opposition to English rule. The most famous opponents of this oppression were the Chiefs Hugh O'Neill and Hugh O'Donnell (Earls of Tyrone and Tyrconnell). Despite help from the Spanish their rebellion was crushed and they fled to mainland Europe in what was know as the Flight of the Earls. This would be the last action that could be considered a National uprising more than a hundred years. The plantation final brought to an end the tribal social structure that had lasted from the time of the Celts more than a thousand years before! The most successful plantations were in Ulster, where even today the greatest concentration of protestants are to be found.

Rebellion & Cromwell

In 1641 a rebellion broke out in parts of Ulster by Catholics trying to regain their confiscated land. The rebellion soon gained momentum and spread country-wide in a band of men trying to preserve their rights to religion and their property. The people were commonly know as 'The Confederation of Killkenny', with their leader a nephew of Hugh O'Neill who had fled the county almost fifty years before. But the rebellion was put down brutally by Oliver Cromwell. Large numbers of Catholics were killed and much of the land was confiscated, some being given to Cromwell's soldiers.

The Battle of the Boyne

Little changed for the Catholic Irish's circumstances for the next 40 years. But then in 1685, James II became King of Ireland. He was Catholic, and was beginning to introduce change. He appointed a Catholic Viceroy in Ireland, but more importantly passed an Irish Act of Settlement which was to reverse the confiscation of land in Cromwell's time. This incensed the protestant members of the English Parliament to the point that they raised an army under the Protestant William of Orange. James the II's ultimate defeat was at the Battle of the Boyne on 1690.

The Penal Laws

Following James's defeat the Irish Catholics suffered terribly. Catholic ownership of land fell from 25% to less than 10% with the introduction of the Penal laws and further land confiscation. These new laws forbade Catholics to buy land, to hold any position in Government or vote. It was to subject them to the status of a lower class with practically no right for almost the next 200 years.

Grattan's Parliament

For more than one hundred years, little changed in Ireland. But in the latter half of the 1700's a growing body of Protestant middle class gentlemen emerged under the leadership of a lawyer, Henry Grattan to promote reform in the Irish Parliament, and grapple control from it's English counterpart.

These people still considered themselves loyal to the English Crown, and only intended reform by constitutional means. A band of Irish Volunteers consisting mostly of protestants had been formed in the county to guard against a possible French invasion while English troops were fighting in the American war. These volunteers numbered between forty and eighty thousand and supported Grattan in his desire for more power in the Irish Parliament.

Grattan never actually served as a member of the Parliament, and in it's 20 years existence it achieved little of practical value to the common Irish people of the time, being stifled by the system of patronage of it's members.

Catholic Relief Bills in 1778 & 1782 allowed Catholics to start buying land once more for the first time since the penal laws.

The French Revolution & and an Irish Rising

There was increasingly in Ireland a class of middle class Protestants; doctors, lawyers and the like who were frustrated by the lack of Irish parliamentary power, and felt more and more that perhaps pressure by constitutional means would achieve nothing.

The French revolution of 1789  was the spark of inspiration to these people about what was possible to achieve. Secret societies began appearing all over Ireland.

What is it to be Irish?

Celts, Vikings, Normans all had their influence on Ireland. Rather than absolutely conquering, the tended to merge into Society so it became difficult to say what being truly Irish meant. It is said that many of these 'invaders' became more Irish than the Irish themselves' marrying into Irish families and working the land. Many names such as Fitzgerald still popular today can be traced back to those Norman settlers. Becoming ‘more Irish than the Irish themselves’ and indistinguishable from ‘native’ Irish. In the sense of people pre-dating Norman or even Viking invasion.

 From their efforts the so called 'Grattan's parliament' was born in 1783, though Grattan himself never served in it. Because of patronage there was a real lack of power in the Irish Parliament.

The French Revolution of 1789 was a Spark of inspiration for the Irish. It started a Growing number of secret societies all over Ireland whose goal was major reform. A group called 'The Right Boys' was forming with the goal of land reform; trying to reduce rent and abolish the Hearth Tax and Tithes (a fee payable by all to the established Church, which was the protestant Church of Ireland).

More worrying and portentous was the to be the formation of 'The Peep O'Day Boys' in Ulster. With the recent Catholics Relief Acts allowing Catholics to purchase land, many started moving in areas of Ulster prepared to pay the high rents being demanded by Land Lords. The Peep O'Day Boys started targeting Catholics as the biggest threat to their attempts to keep rents down.

Creation of the United Irishmen.

Some advances had been made socially in Ireland in the late 1700's with the repeal of some of  the Penal Laws. But Catholics were still a lesser class, and the Irish Parliament had little  real power. So, in 1791, a group of middle class Protestants, including Theobald Wolfe Tone founded the United Irishmen with the goal of improving civil rights. In time Catholics also joined the  Society.

At this time in Ireland, there were a large number of societies. The comprised of groups of educated people keen to discuss politics and civil rights. But with the French revolution, the Government became concerned and outlawed the formation of such societies. So there activities became secret.

It was accept that help was needed from the French if a revolution was to succeed. The United Irishmen sent emissaries to the French Directory coming into contact with Napoleon Bonaparte himself as well as Carnot, the Minister for War. There were a number of people sent to entreat the directory, but probably the most famous was Wolfe Tone. The French were at the time, at war with England, and to remove Ireland from English control would have had immense significance for them. Tone was enthusiastic about the preparation for rebellion in Ireland. It is accepted that he probably exaggerated the level of organisation, whether intentionally, or through his blind devotion to the cause of freedom. Either way, the French were convinced and in December 1796, with a young but brilliant General Hoche, 43 ships set sail for Ireland.

But the weather was against them, and some ships floundered in the French harbour itself. When they finally reached Bantry Bay of the West Coast of Ireland conditions were atrocious. They waited a time for the weather to improve but it didn't. Hoche was left with no choice to return to France without ever having set foot on Irish soil.

Tone must have been devastated to have literally been within site of land yet been unable to land.

Failure of 1796 attempted landing in Bantry bay. Talk about number in ship versus relatively small number of troops in the country at the time.

Though the 1996 attempt failed, and there wasn't the popular uprising of the peasants which had been expected, it scared the English Government into dramatic and brutal action. They took a two pronged approach; firstly the imprisonment or even killing of any suspected United Irishman or Defender, and secondly the introduction of an amnesty, were people where permitted to re-swear their allegiance the Crown. The Government response was extremely effective in the North of Ireland, and though the French were actively planning a second fleet destined for Ireland in 1798, much of the momentum in Ulster was lost.

The United Irishmen had been infiltrated with spies up to some very high levels within the organisations. And it was with the help of these that much of the Leinster Leadership was captured while attending a meeting. This was a severe blow, and in desperation and confusion the remaining leaders planned to go ahead with a rising. The level of communication between different districts was poor and there were a number of abortive local risings along the east coast that were quickly subdued by Government forces.

But in Wexford more than anywhere else, there was a sustained and organised rebellion.

Earlier the government had established a militia, with the vast majority made up of Catholics. Despite this, they showed absolute brutality in putting down any United Irishman resistance. Tactics included murder by hanging without trial, being beaten with a 'cat o' nine tails', and burning homes.

Off all the abortive risings around Dublin, and neighbouring counties, the most concerted and sustained rising happened in the county of Wexford. 


The spark for Rebellion in Wexford


For a time, a local priest, Father John Murphy had been working with the local people during this time of unrest, and had recently raised a petition covering many of the parishes in the area stating their willingness to give up their arms and swear allegiance to the Government.


But only a month later, on 26 May 1998, Murphy along with some armed men encountered a yeomanry group of government forces. The exact events are unclear, but it seems some shots were fired, and a Lieutenant named Thomas Bookey set fire to a nearby farm. He was killed when stabbed with a pike as he was rejoining his men. This one killing suddenly gave momentum to the rebellion.


The government forces burned and killed the next day in reprisal, and the local reaction to this built Father Murphy's group to over a thousand men or more. The Rebels gathered in numbers and won victory in a number of skirmishes with the government troops. Flush with confidence they took Eniscorthy, then Vinegar Hill just outside Wexford. On top of this hill was set a green flag; symbol of the rebellion. Following this they took Wexford. Bagenal Harvey was freed from prison in the town , made commander of the rebel forces and a civilian government set up in the town.


This was perhaps the peak of the rebellion's activities. The men were enthusiastic, but were undisciplined, and had no training as soldiers. Many would get drunk after taking a town, and co-ordination of so many men proved difficult.

With Beauchamp Bagnel Harvey taking command, the rebel fore split in three. Each was to suffer defeat and the Wexford rebellion was crushed. Other risings took place around the country soon afterwards. Most noticeably in Antrim, with Henry Joy McCracken most prominent of the leaders, and in Down led by a Henry Munro. But these were ill organised and soon crushed by government troops.


The Fate of the United Irish leaders was very different to that of the actual rebel fighters. Those of the Leinster Directory of the United Irishmen who had been arrested in Oliver Bond's house in Dublin including Robert agreed to give information on the United Irishmen and their planning for the rebellion. In return, they received only a minimal sentence on condition that they left for a country outside of the United Kingdom.



On the 22nd August 1798 three ships were seen in the harbour of Kilalla Harbour flying the English flag. Assuming it was an English patrol, a number of people sailed out in a small boat to welcome them. But they were in for a shock, as it was in fact a new French force including Wolfe Tone that promptly took the welcome party captive and landed on Irish soil before anybody released.


The three ships had set sail earlier from France, with about 1000 soldiers, extra uniforms and arms. The force was led by a young but excellent General named Humbert. They quickly took Killala, setting up a provisional government under John Moore, a local catholic gentleman. The French distributed arms and uniforms to the local people, left a small holding force in Killala and moved on. They met and beat General Lake and his government at Castlebar, it what became known as 'the races of Castlebar' owing to the quick retreat of his forces. In their hurry, they left behind weapons and ammunition that
Humbert took. Humbert probably had a few thousand Irish, who had joined his own French soldiers. But he was disappointed that there wasn't the popular mass rising that he had been led to believe. He requested reinforcements from France and made his way towards Dublin. But on 6th September 1798, less than six weeks after setting foot on Irish soil, they were defeated at Ballinamuck. By 22 September government forces were marching on Killala where approximately 1000 Irish rebels along with some French soldiers still held the town.

Humbert's most recent report from Ireland to the French directory had been optimistic based on his recent successes. On the strength of this a ship set sail from France with arms for the Irish rebels it believed had risen en-masse to aid Humbert. On the Ship was Napper Tandy. They landed on the Donegal coast on 16th September. But they was so disappointed by the lack of support from the local people that the returned to ship and sailed for home! 



Wolfe Tone had managed to secure another French fleet, this time consisting of about 3000 men. It set sail just days before Tandy and once again found himself on the western Irish coast. They headed for Lough Swilly in County Donegal but met the English navy and Tone was taken prisoner. Though he was a commissioned French officer, he was tried for treason and found guiltily. The exact event are somewhat unclear, but while waiting to be hanged, slit his throat. He didn't die until a week later on the 12th November 1798. 



Union 

Following the 1798 rebellion, the key topic of the time became the establishment of a Union between Britain and Ireland. There was great debate on the issue from all members of society. It divided many people over whether it would benefit or hinder the country. In the end, through bribery and favours the vote in favour of the Union was passed and came into being on the 1 Jan 1801.


Emmett's Rebellion

Robert Emmet, was the younger brother of Thomas Emmet, one of the United Irishman to be arrested in Bond's house in Dublin back in 1798. He was able to visit he brother and other United Irishmen members in Jail. He spent some time in French trying to get aid from the French Directory without success. He set about organising a rising concentrating it's efforts on taking key points in Dublin. Arms and for the first time in a Irish rebellion, explosives were stored at secret depots around Dublin. He developed
a complex set of plans for a planned rebellion. His efforts were concentrated in Dublin, but he did have contact with rebels in the counties surrounding Dublin. But on 16 July 1803, there was an explosion in one of these secret depots. This drew attention, but to Emmets credit, his preparations had been so secret that the government had little inkling 
as to the size of his plans. The rebellion had been planed for the 23rd, and with the explosion they could delay no longer. Emmet had made contact with rebels in the North, and some of the counties surrounding, but when the rebellion proper started with a crowd of perhaps 100 men armed with Pikes in Dublin, things went drastically wrong. Part of the group attacked and killed the Lord Chief Justice. Emmet was unaware of 
this, but his group dwindled to only about 20 men. He realised the rising was a failure. The rest of the Country failed to rise as hoped, and though Emmet stayed on the run for a time he was eventually captured and tried. He gave possibly the most famous speech in Irish History and upon his death went down in Irish History as a hero.

With the most famous section below:

'I have but one request to ask at my departure from this world; it is the charity of its silence! Let no man write my epitaph: for as no man who knows my motives dare now vindicate them. Let not prejudice or ignorance asperse them. Let them and me repose in obscurity and peace, and my tomb remain un-inscribed, until other times, and other men, can do justice to my character; when my country takes her place among the nations of the earth, then, and not till then, let my epitaph be written.'


Daniel O'Connell

The 1798 and 1803 rebellions had failed for many reasons. But one common factor 
was the lack of support from the masses. In the 1820's there arrived a man who
perhaps for the first time in Irish History would rally the masses. That man 
was Daniel O'Connell, and the cause was Catholic Emancipation.


Born in Kerry, in the south-west corner of Ireland, he studied law. He disagreed 
with the ideals of separation as in the 1798 rebellion. He saw the maintenance 
of the connection with England as vital.

In 1823 he founded the Catholic Association to drive the movement for Catholic
Emancipation through constitutional means. To become a member was only a 
shilling a year, or a penny a month. This was to become known as the "Catholic rent".

Some relaxation of the Penal Laws in the 1790's had allowed certain Catholics to vote. 
But this was limited to 'forty-shilling freeholders'. Essentially people with property
of some sort to the value of 40 shillings. Despite this reform, it had little practical value to change the situation in Ireland. As these freeholders were intimidated and threatened with eviction if they did not follow the voting directions of their landlords. O'Connell changed this situation dramatically in the 1820's as the Catholic rent was generating sufficient funds to support any freeholders evicted for not following their landlord's direction in voting.

There was a dramatic victory in Waterford where the Emancipation candidate won the local election. O'Connell himself stood for election in Clare in 1828 and won in a landslide.

The government had to accept that O'Connell had massive popular support in
Ireland which could not be ignored. Consequently an Emancipation Bill was passed 
through parliament in 1829.


With the success of emancipation, O'Connell now turned his sights on his next goal;
the repeal if the Union. But he would have a struggle. Many in parliament saw
repeal of the Union leading ultimately to total separation of Ireland, and even 
endangering the British Empire itself. So in 1834 when the motion for repeal
came to parliament it was put down by a vast majority. O'Connell managed to 
gain some concessions for Ireland following the defeat of repeal, but these had 
little effect on the day-to-day lives of Ireland's poor.


In 1841, O'Connell formed the Loyal National Repeal Association. This was to 
be his platform form which to drive the repeal of the Union. 

At this time he gained support from a group of young middle-class men; most
importantly Thomas Davis, Charles Gavin Duffy and John Blake Dillon. They founded a newspaper entitled 'The Nation' which soon gained a large circulation. Incidentally
the site of the Nation is now home the a national Irish newspaper; The Irish 
Independent, in Abbey Street, Dublin. But in the Nation and his speeches, Davis
analysed what is meant to be Irish. The importance of the Irish Language, poetry
and the arts in defining 'irishness'. In 1843 there were a series of publicmeeting that commonly became known as 'Monster Meetings'. They were held at emotive 
locations around Ireland such as the Hill of Tara, formerly the seat of the High 
Kings of Ireland. O'Connell commanded huge audiences of up to half a million.
The crowd was always enthusiastic yet disciplined. O'Connell was playing a dangerous
game, with his speeches becoming more and more passionate, and threats becoming less and less subtle as to the limits he and his followers would got to attain their goal.

In his heart, he was committed to maintain the links with England, always maintaining
his loyalty to the Crown. The situation came to a head in September in 1843 when a meeting was arranged for Clonterf. But with significant military overtones in it's use of 
horsemen as cavalry and officers to march the people in formation.

The government had had enough and banned the meeting. They were calling O'Connell's
bluff. Would he go ahead with the meeting and risk a clash with the government 
or cancel? Thus proving his ultimate conviction/commitment to non-violent means.

The split between Young Ireland and O'Connell

Following the cancellation of the Clontarf Monster Meeting, O'Connell tried to rally support for repeal of the Union in England. Duffy wrote an article in 'The Nation' stating that Federalism would never be enough, and only full repeal would do. This contradicted O'Connell's moves to perhaps use Federalism as a stepping stone. Follow up articles in the Nation seemed to further the rift now developing between O'Connell and the Young Irelands. Now, something far worse was also to influence the situation; The Irish Famine . This killed many of the poorest Irish classes and left the rest near  starvation. They were more concerned with mere survival than lofty political issues of repeal.

O'Connell and some other repeal supporters were tired and found guilty of conspiracy in 1844. While in jail, contributions to the repeal rent rose dramatically. But on his release returned to speaking at Monster meetings throughout the Country. In this year, 1845, Thomas Davis died very suddenly aged only 31, and the famine, more and more came to the fore as a major issue. Both of these would have an effect on the repeal movement.



In 1847, Duffy and William Smith O'Brien abandon the Catholic association and set up the Irish Confederation. But by 1848, this split, and what was left of the Young Irelanders attempted a rebellion.




In 1858 Jeremiah O'Donovan Rossa, James Stephens and John O'Mahony for the Irish Republican Brotherhood, or Fenians, whose goal was nothing less than an Irish Republic. 




In the late 1870's a farmer from County Mayo, named Davitt, emerged to lead a movement  to push for land reform. As landlords raised rents many farmers and their families couldn't make the payments and were being evicted from their land

In the same period, Isaac Butt formed the Home Rule party. It's goal was to re-establish an Irish parliament as had existed almost 100 years before in Grattan's time. This would allow it to pass certain laws while still being part of the United Kingdom. The idea appealed to many as being not as radical as full independence for Ireland and by 1874 the party held 59 seats in the English parliament.

In 1879 Charles Stewart Parnell became leader of the Home Rule Party. It was difficult to motivate the masses about a lofty political goal if it had no real affect on 
the day to day quality of ordinary Irish peoples' lives.

But a dramatic change came about when Parnell and Davitt targeted the land issue; high rents and unfair evictions. In 1879 the Land League was formed with the goal of improving peoples' rights to the land. They was a groundswell of support for something so dear to peoples hearts as this.

The league developed an unwritten rule that no one would take over a holding from which another had been evicted. A case of particular note occurred in the West of Ireland on an estate run by a Captain Boycott. (describe in detail) and it is from this that the term 'Boycot' entered the English language!

This period became known as the 'Land War'. It did force Parliament to introduce certain reforms, and fairer rents were introduced. But conditions for many were still very poor.


In 1886, William Gladstone as leader of the liberal party attempted to pass a Home Rule bill in an attempt to solve Ireland's problem. But this was defeated in parliament. The Conservatives came to power in the years around the turn of the Century and followed a 'Plan of Campaign' that would attempt to improve key issues for the poorest Irish in terms of land rights in the hope that they would feel Home Rule was of no practical value. These reforms did have a dramatic effect open the transfer of land in these years from a relatively small group of landlords to small tenant farmers.


When the Liberals returned to power, Gladstone tried to push through a second home Rule Bill in 1893, but this was defeated in the House of Lords.


A unique situation arose in 1909 at the General Election in Britain when a hung parliament resulted with 272 seats for both the liberals and conservatives. It put the Home Rule party and its 84 seats in a very strong position. They agreed to support the liberal party in pushing through the Parliament Act to reduce the power of the House of Lords. In return the Liberals committed to raise a third Home Rule Bill.

The thought of Home Rule enraged many Ulster Unionists and rioting erupted in the North of Ireland. Sir James Craig introduced the 'Ulster Covenant' which many people signed pledging themselves to fight the Home Rule Bill. Emotive statements from Unionists abounded such as 'Ulster will fight, and Ulster will be right', and 'Home Rule is Rome Rule'. A reference to the Pope in Rome and Catholic influence. 



Tensions rose further with the establishment by Unionists of the Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF) which became armed in 1914. In response to this the Nationalist community formed the Irish Volunteer Force (IVF) which also came into the possession of rifles in 1914.


But events on the World Stage changed things as in August the First World War broke out and the government postponed any actions on the Home Rule Bill. Ironically members of the UVF and IVF fought and died side by side in the trenches in France.

At the turn of the century the Irish Republic Brotherhood which had been quiet for many years had gained momentum again, recruiting with the goal of rebellion against the British. This movement now had some famous members like Padraig (Patrick Pearse). They saw that the government was preoccupied with the World War I, and saw the opportunity to attempt a rising. It culminated in the Easter Rising of 1916. 

Lasting only six days and involving about 2000 men and women, it failed. And at the time had little popular support from the Irish people. But this attitude changed when people learned of the leaders being shot (James Connolly had to be sat in a chair before being shot in Kilmainham Jail in Dublin. Support for Sinn Fein, now lead by Eamon DeValera increased dramatically. He had taken part in the Rising but was saved from execution by the fact that he was American, though one of his parents was Irish.

The balance of power had changed now in 1918 with Sinn Fein holding 73 seats to just 6 in the Home Rule Party. Even more dramatically, Sinn Fein MP's refused to sit in Parliament and instead formed their own in Dublin, called Dial Eireann. (this is still the name given to the Irish Parliament to this day!)

The IVF now became the Irish Republican Army (IRA) led by Michael Collins. In the years following the rising, the fight for a republic moved to the tactic of guerrilla warfare. Groups of mean known as Flying Columns took to the country, ambushing Army patrols to kill and take weapons. 

Finally in December of 1921, the Irish were called to Treaty Talks. Perhaps crucially Eamon DeValera didn't attend, instead sending Michael Collins. There was a formidable group of people facing them on the other side of the table. On signing the agreement Collins said " I have signed my death warrant.". This was prophetic as he was to die, ambushed by anti-treaty men at Béal na Bláth, County Cork, on August 22nd, 1922

1922, Civil War

Disagreement over the Treaty drew Ireland into civil war with those taking pro and anti-
treaty sides. In some cases it split families. The Pro-treaty side was the Free State Army, and the anti side the Irregulars. They were still referred to as the IRA and together with Sinn Fein still have a presence in Ireland 80 years on. The free state army eventually won and the fledging Republic developed in quieter times.