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‘The first of the small nations’: the significance of central European small states in Irish nationalist political rhetoric, 1918–22

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 August 2020

Lili Zách
Lili Zách*
Affiliation:
Maynooth University
*
*Department of History, Maynooth University, [email protected]
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Abstract

Offering new insights into Irish links with the wider world, this article explores and contextualises Irish nationalist perceptions of and links with central European small states in the immediate aftermath of the First World War. The belief that any small nation like Ireland, oppressed by a dominant neighbour, had the right to self-determination was of key importance in nationalist political rhetoric during the revolutionary years. Given the similarity of circumstances among newly independent small states, Irish commentators were aware of the struggles Ireland shared with the successors of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Personal encounters on the continent, as well as news regarding small nations in central Europe, shaped Irish opinions of the region. Certainly, the images presented by Irish commentators reflected their own political agendas and were therefore often deliberately idealistic. Nonetheless, they served a specific purpose as they were meant to further Ireland's interest on the international stage. Looking beyond Ireland for lessons and examples to follow became a frequent part of Irish nationalist political rhetoric. By directing scholarly attention to a hitherto less explored aspect of Irish historiography, this article aims to highlight the complexity of Ireland's connection with the continent within the framework of small nations, from a transnational perspective.

Type
Research Article
Information
Irish Historical Studies , Volume 44 , Issue 165 , May 2020 , pp. 25 - 40
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Copyright
Copyright © Irish Historical Studies Publications Ltd 2020

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References

1 Éamon de Valera's speech at the assembly of the league in Geneva, 2 July 1936 (U.C.D.A., Éamon de Valera papers, P150/2806); Speeches and statements by Eamon de Valera, 1917–73, ed. Maurice Moynihan (Dublin, 1980), pp 282–5.

2 Pašeta, Senia, Before the revolution: nationalism, social change and Ireland's Catholic elite, 1879–1922 (Cork, 1999), p. 153Google Scholar; Hutchinson, John, ‘Cultural nationalism, elite mobility and nation-building: communitarian politics in Modern Ireland’ in Hutchinson, John and Smith, Anthony D. (eds), Nationalism: critical concepts in political science (5 vols, London, 1987), ii, 483Google Scholar; McMahon, Timothy G., Grand opportunity: the Gaelic revival and Irish society, 1893–1910 (Syracuse, 2008), p. 215Google Scholar.

3 While seeking parallels with the ‘oppressed nations’ of the Austro-Hungarian Empire dominated pre-war Irish nationalist accounts, recent historiography has challenged persistent presumptions associated with viewing the empire as ‘the prison of the peoples’. See Pieter Judson, The Habsburg Empire: a new history (Cambridge, MA, 2016), p. 444.

4 For detailed analyses on the link between the empire and the Irish nationalist dailies, compare Patrick Maume, ‘The Irish Independent and empire, 1891–1919' in Simon J. Potter (ed.), Newspapers and empire in Ireland and Britain: reporting the British Empire, c.1857–1921 (Dublin, 2004), pp 182–219; Felix M. Larkin, ‘The dog in the night-time: the Freeman's Journal, the Irish Parliamentary Party and the empire, 1875–1919’ in ibid., pp 109–23.

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7 Irish Independent, 21 Sept. 1914.

8 Mary Harris, ‘Aspects of nationalism and anti-imperialism in Ireland in the late 19th and early 20th centuries’ in Mary Harris, Anna Agnarsdóttir and Csaba Lévai (eds), Global encounters, European identities (Pisa, 2010), p. 179; M. A. Hopkinson, ‘Childers, (Robert) Erskine (1870–1922)’ in D.I.B.; Senia Pašeta, ‘Thomas Kettle: “an Irish soldier in the army of Europe”?’ in Adrian Gregory and Senia Pašeta (eds), Ireland and the Great War: ‘a war to unite us all?’ (Manchester, 2002), p. 13.

9 Michael Laffan, The resurrection of Ireland: the Sinn Féin party, 1916–1923 (Cambridge, 1999), p. 260.

10 Gerard Keown, ‘Creating an Irish foreign policy in the 1930s’ in Michael Kennedy and Joseph Morrison Skelly (eds), Irish foreign policy 1919–1966: from independence to internationalism (Dublin, 2000), p. 27.

11 Brian Maye, Arthur Griffith (Dublin, 1997), p. 97; David G. Haglund and Umut Korkut, ‘Going against the flow: Sinn Féin's unusual Hungarian “roots”’ in International History Review, xxxvii, no. 1 (2015), pp 49, 55.

12 Patrick Murray, ‘Introduction’ in Arthur Griffith, The resurrection of Hungary (1904; repr. Dublin, 2003), p. xii.

13 Donal McCartney, ‘The political use of history in the work of Arthur Griffith’ in Journal of Contemporary History, viii, no. 1 (Jan. 1973), p. 16.

14 Murray, ‘Introduction’, p. xvi.

15 Haglund and Korkut, ‘Going against the flow’, pp 41, 43, 50.

16 McCartney, ‘The political use of history’, p. 8; Maye, Arthur Griffith, p. 99; Michael Laffan, ‘Griffith, Arthur Joseph (1871–1922)’ in D.I.B.; idem, Resurrection of Ireland, p. 223.

17 Laffan, Resurrection of Ireland, p. 223.

18 Maye, Arthur Griffith, p. 4.

19 Laffan, ‘Griffith, Arthur Joseph (1871–1922)’.

20 Thomas Kabdebo, Ireland and Hungary: a study in parallels, with an Arthur Griffith bibliography (Dublin, 2001), p. 45.

21 Haglund and Korkut, ‘Going against the flow’, pp 52–3.

22 Stephen Howe, Ireland and empire: colonial legacies in Irish history and culture (Oxford, 2000), pp 44–5.

23 Ibid., pp 44–5, 56; McCartney, ‘The political use of history’, p. 8; Terence Denman, ‘“The red livery of shame”: the campaign against army recruitment in Ireland, 1899–1914’ in I.H.S., xxix, no. 114 (Nov. 1994), pp 212, 217; Keith Jeffery, ‘The Irish military tradition and the British Empire’ in idem (ed.), ‘An Irish empire’? Aspects of Ireland and the British Empire (Manchester, 1996), p. 96.

24 J. M. O'Sullivan, ‘The problem of Poland’ in Studies, vi, no. 21 (1917), p. 84; M. F. E., rev. of R. W. Seton-Watson, German, Slav, and Magyar: a study in the origins of the Great War in Studies, vi, no. 22 (June 1917), p. 336; Arthur E. Clery, ‘The Gaelic League, 1893–1919’ in Studies, viii, no. 31 (Sept. 1919), p. 399; P. J. C., rev. of Modern Austria: her racial and social problems in Studies, v, no. 18, (June 1916), p. 307; Darley Dale, ‘Roumania’ in Irish Ecclesiastical Record, ser. 5, ix (Jan.– June 1917), p. 46.

25 Freeman's Journal, 16 Aug. 1918.

26 Ibid., 3 July 1918.

27 Ibid., 21 Oct. 1918.

28 John J. Horgan, ‘The world policy of President Wilson’ in Studies, vii, no. 28 (Dec. 1918), p. 562.

29 Freeman's Journal, 25 Jan., 25 July 1918.

30 Alvin Jackson, ‘Carson, Edward Henry (1854–1935), Baron Carson of Duncairn’ in D.I.B.

31 Freeman's Journal, 21 Oct. 1918.

32 Ibid., 12 Nov. 1918.

33 Ibid.

34 Irish Independent, 2 Dec. 1918.

35 Ibid., 8 Sept. 1917.

36 Freeman's Journal, 6 Nov. 1918.

37 Ibid., 12 Nov. 1918.

38 Ibid., 30 July, 16 Aug. 1918.

39 Irish Independent, 20 Oct. 1915, 30 Nov. 1918; Freeman's Journal, 4 Sept. 1918.

40 Irish Independent, 10 Oct. 1918.

41 Patrick J. Gannon, ‘Bohemia and its Ulster question’ in Studies, vii, no. 28 (Dec. 1918), p. 651.

42 Ibid., p. 645.

43 Ibid.

44 Freeman's Journal, 3 June 1919.

45 For a detailed assessment of the importance of central European precedents (with special attention to Silesia, Schleswig-Holstein, Klagenfurt and Burgenland) in the work of the North-Eastern Boundary Bureau and the Boundary Commission, see Lili Zách, ‘Central European border settlements and interwar Ireland: a transnational study of the North-Eastern Boundary Bureau and the Boundary Commission’ in Prispevki za novejšo zgodovino / Contributions to Contemporary History (Nov. 2017), pp 12–25.

46 Ben Novick, Conceiving revolution: Irish nationalist propaganda during the First World War (Dublin, 2001), p. 240; Laffan, Resurrection of Ireland, p. 143; Freeman's Journal, 13 Apr., 7 May, 21 Oct. 1918; Irish Independent, 17 May 1918.

47 Freeman's Journal, 22 Sept. 1917.

48 Ibid., 7 Nov. 1917.

49 Frank Shovlin, The Irish literary periodical (Oxford, 2003), p. 2; Patrick Maume, ‘Moran, David Patrick (‘D. P.’) (1869–1936)’ in D.I.B.; Hugh F. Kearney, Ireland: contested ideas of nationalism and history (New York, 2007), p. 74.

50 The origins of the expression ‘Green Hungarian band’ were discussed in the aftermath of the Easter Rising in May 1916, referring to the musicians known as the ‘Blue Hungarian band’. See ‘Current affairs’ in The Leader, 27 May 1916; McCartney, ‘The political use of history’, p. 12; Murray, ‘Introduction’, p. xiv; McMahon, Grand opportunity, p. 5.

51 Darragh Gannon, ‘The rise of the rainbow chasers: advanced Irish political nationalism in Britain, 1916–22’ in Éire-Ireland, xlix, nos 3 & 4, (fall/winter 2014), p. 116.

52 Freeman's Journal, 18 Sept. 1917.

53 Ibid., 2 Dec. 1918.

54 Ibid., 10 Dec. 1918.

55 Róisín Healy, ‘Inventing eastern Europe in Ireland, 1848–1918’ in Anuarul Institutului de Cercetări Socio-Umane »Gheorghe Şincai« al Academiei Române [The Yearbook of the ‘Gheorghe Sincai’ Institute for Social Sciences and the Humanities of the Romanian Academy], no. 12 (2009), p. 114.

56 Ibid.

57 Freeman's Journal, 22 Sept. 1917.

58 Ibid., 24 Oct. 1917.

59 Irish Independent, 19 Sept. 1921.

60 The Leader, 26 Jan. 1918.

61 Laffan, Resurrection of Ireland, p. 163.

62 ‘The small nations’, 1918 (N.L.I., Sinn Féin pamphlets, ILB 300 P1, no. 16).

63 ‘Can Ireland stand alone?’, 1918 (N.L.I., Sinn Féin pamphlets, ILB 300 P1, no. 1).

64 ‘Irishmen look around you’, 1918 (N.L.I., Sinn Féin pamphlets, ILB 300 P1, no. 104); ‘The Czecho-Slovaks are to-day as free as the English’, 1918 (N.L.I., Sinn Féin pamphlets, ILB 300 P1, no. 87); ‘What will you vote for?’, 1918 (N.L.I., Sinn Féin pamphlets, ILB 300 P1, no. 80).

65 ‘What of Ireland?’, 1918 (N.L.I., Sinn Féin pamphlets, ILB 300 P1, no. 79).

66 Ibid.

67 ‘No home rule’, 1918 (N.L.I., Sinn Féin pamphlets, ILB 300 P1, no. 91).

68 ‘Mr. Dillon wants to see’, 1918 (N.L.I., Sinn Féin pamphlets, ILB 300 P1, no. 134).

69 ‘How Ireland is gagged’, 1918 (N.L.I., Sinn Féin pamphlets, ILB 300 P1, no. 78).

70 Freeman's Journal, 30 July 1918.

71 ‘The Czecho-Slovaks are demanding independence’, 1918 (N.L.I., Sinn Féin pamphlets, ILB 300 P1, no. 75).

72 James MacCaffrey, ‘The Catholic church in 1918’ in Irish Ecclesiastical Record, ser. 5, xiii (Jan.–July 1919), p. 102.

73 Dun Cairin, ‘The argument from Irish history’ in Studies, vii, no. 28 (Dec. 1918), p. 548.

74 Brian Patrick Murphy, The Catholic Bulletin and republican Ireland with special reference to J. J. O'Kelly (‘Sceilg’) (Belfast, 2005), p. 167.

75 M. Quinn, ‘Yugo-Slavs and Czecho-Slovaks (a comparison with Ireland)’ in Catholic Bulletin, ix (Jan. 1919), p. 28. The author's forename was not given.

76 Ibid., p. 32.

77 ‘Czechoslovaks and Ireland’ in The Leader, 2 Nov. 1918.

78 ‘The chaos after the war’ in The Leader, 9 Nov. 1918.

79 Maurice Walsh, The news from Ireland: foreign correspondents and the Irish Revolution (London, 2008), pp 107–8.

80 Ibid., p. 60.

81 Gerard Hogan, ‘Duffy, George Gavan (1882–1951)’ in D.I.B.; Patrick Maume, ‘O'Kelly, Seán Thomas (Ó Ceallaigh, Seán Tomás) (1882–1966)’ in ibid.

82 ‘Papal propositions of peace (August 27, 1917): reply to the pope through Secretary Lansing’ in Selected addresses and public papers of Woodrow Wilson, ed. Albert Bushnell Hart (Honolulu, 2002), p. 221; ‘A statement of Ireland's case before the powers to be assembled in a peace conference: demanding the recognition of her place among the free nations of the world’, 1919 (U.C.D.A., Éamon de Valera papers, P150/1325); ‘Official memorandum in support of Ireland's demand for recognition as a sovereign independent state. Presented to Georges Clemenceau and the members of the Paris peace conference by Sean T. O'Ceallaigh and George Gavan Duffy’ (N.A.I., D.F.A. ES Paris 1919) in Catriona Crowe, Ronan Fanning, Michael Kennedy, Dermot Keogh and Eunan O'Halpin (eds), Documents on Irish foreign policy (henceforth cited as D.I.F.P.) i, no. 13 (http://www.difp.ie/docs/1919/Paris-Peace-Conference/13.htm) (23 Sept. 2015).

83 R. W. Seton-Watson, Masaryk in England (Cambridge, 1943); Harry Hanak, ‘The new Europe’ in Slavonic and East European Review, xxxix, no. 93 (June 1961), pp 369–99.

84 Guido Kisch, ‘Woodrow Wilson and the independence of small nations in central Europe’ in Journal of Modern History, xix, no. 3 (1947), p. 236.

85 Leonard V Smith, Sovereignty at the Paris peace conference (Oxford, 2018), pp 7, 59.

86 Extract from a memo on Dáil Éireann policy attached to a letter by Arthur Griffith, Gloucester Prison, 23 Jan. 1919 (N.A.I., Gavan Duffy papers 1125/15) in D.I.F.P., i, no. 3 (https://www.difp.ie/docs/Volume1/1919/3.htm) (20 June 2019).

87 Sean T. Ó Ceallaigh to Dublin (no. 4) (copy), Paris (N.A.I., D.F.A. ES Paris 1919, 15 June 1919) in D.I.F.P., i, no. 15 (https://www.difp.ie/docs/Volume1/1919/15.htm) (20 June 2019).

88 Childers's political career was marked by a shift from support of home rule through favouring dominion rule for Ireland to eventually being a committed Irish republican. His significance is also illustrated by the fact that he had been sent to Paris in July 1919 in order to publicise the Irish cause internationally. Moreover, in February 1921, he became director of propaganda. See Hopkinson, ‘Childers, (Robert) Erskine’.

89 ‘Memorandum by Erskine Childers on Irish defence as affected by the British proposals of 20 July 1921’, July 1921 (U.C.D.A., Éamon de Valera papers, P150/1913) in D.I.F.P., i. no. 142 (http://www.difp.ie/docs/1921/Anglo-Irish-Treaty/142.htm) (23 Sept. 2015).

90 Éamon de Valera to David Lloyd George, Mansion House, Dublin, 10 Aug. 1921, reprinted from official correspondence relating to the peace negotiations June–Sept. 1921 in D.I.F.P., i, no. 147 (http://www.difp.ie/docs/1921/Anglo-Irish-Treaty/147.htm) (23 Sept. 2015); Éamon de Valera to David Lloyd George, Mansion House, Dublin, 24 Aug. 1921, reprinted from official correspondence relating to the peace negotiations June–Sept. 1921 in D.I.F.P., i, no. 149 (http://www.difp.ie/docs/1921/Anglo-Irish-Treaty/149.htm) (23 Sept. 2015).

91 Robert Brennan to John Chartres (Edward Seaton) (Berlin), Dublin, 25 Aug. 1921 (N.A.I., D.F.A. ES box 33, file 232) in D.I.F.P., i, no. 150 (http://www.difp.ie/docs/1921/Anglo-Irish-Treaty/150.htm) (23 Sept. 2015).

92 Ferriter, Diarmaid, A nation and not a rabble: the Irish Revolution, 1913–1923 (London, 2015), p. 1Google Scholar.

93 Dáil Éireann report on foreign affairs, George Gavan Duffy to the Dáil, Dublin, 26 Apr. 1922 (N.A.I., D.F.A. ES box 1, file 13) in D.I.F.P., i, no. 277 (http://www.difp.ie/docs/1922/Foreign-Policy-General/277.htm) (23 Sept. 2015).

94 Dáil Éireann report on foreign affairs (copy), Dublin, June 1920 (N.A.I., DE 4/1/3) in D.I.F.P., i, no. 37 (http://www.difp.ie/docs/1920/Report-on-Foreign-Affairs/37.htm) (23 Sept. 2015).

95 Keown, ‘Creating an Irish foreign policy in the 1930s’, pp 29, 41.

96 Irish Independent, 19 Sept. 1922.

97 For a comparative study on the violence in post-war Ulster and Upper Silesia, see Wilson, T. K., Frontiers of violence: conflict and identity in Ulster and Upper Silesia, 1918–1922 (Oxford, 2010)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

98 Laffan, ‘Griffith, Arthur Joseph’.