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“You Have Votes and Power”: Women's Political Engagement with the Irish Question in Britain, 1919–23

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  15 February 2013

Mo Moulton
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Abstract

The Anglo-Irish War of 1919–21 spurred organized political activity among women in Britain, including former suffragists who campaigned against coercion in Ireland and members of the Irish minority in Britain who supported more radical republican efforts to achieve Irish independence. Their efforts are particularly significant because they occurred immediately after the granting of partial suffrage to women in 1918. This article argues that the advent of female suffrage changed the landscape of women's political mobilization in distinct ways that were made visible by advocacy on Ireland, including the regendering of the discourse of citizenship and the creation of new opportunities beyond the vote for women to exercise political power. At the same time, the use of women's auxiliary organizations and special meetings and the strategic blurring of the public and private spheres through the political use of domestic spaces all indicate the strength of continuities with nineteenth-century antecedents. The article further situates women's political advocacy on Ireland in an imperial and transnational context, arguing that it was part of the process of reconceptualizing Britain's postwar global role whether through outright anti-imperialism, in the case of Irish republicans, or through humanitarianism and the new internationalism, in the case of most former suffragists. Finally, the article examines the failure of these two groups of women to forge alliances with each other, underscoring the ways in which both class and nationality challenged a notional common interest based on sex.

Keywords

Anglo-Irish WarCitizenshipGenderIrelandIrish Republican ArmyLabour PartyPacifismSelf-determinationSuffrageWomen
Type
Articles
Information
Journal of British Studies , Volume 52 , Issue 1 , January 2013 , pp. 179 - 204
Copyright
Copyright © The North American Conference on British Studies 2013

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145 Notebooks, Paddy Daly, n.d., Ernie O'Malley Papers P17/136, 8, University College Dublin Archives.

146 Bureau of Military History Witness Statement 814 Comd't. Patrick G. Daly, M.D. (March 1953), 22, NAI. Belchem reports that Cathal Brugha also convalesced there after the Easter Rising: Belchem, John, Irish, Catholic and Scouse: The History of the Liverpool-Irish, 1800–1939 (Liverpool, 2007), 265Google Scholar.

147 In September 1920, for example, the local Liverpool “safe” addresses were shifted to Mrs. O'Hanlon and Mrs. Healys, both of Bootle: Memo, 23 September 1920, Richard Mulcahy Papers P7/A3, University College Dublin Archives. In London, Lady Claire Annesley provided her address as well. Bureau of Military History Witness Statement 814 Comd't. Patrick G. Daly, M. D. (March 1953), 16, NAI.

148 Bureau of Military History Witness Statement 924 Mrs. Michael Cremen (“Cis Sheehan”) (February 1954), 7, and Bureau of Military History Witness Statement 945 Sorcha Nic Diarmada (May 1954), 5, NAI.

149 The Irish Exile (April 1921), Joseph Fowler Papers MS 27,097(1), 4, NLI.

150 Bureau of Military History Witness Statement 945 Sorcha Nic Diarmada (May 1954), 5–6, NAI.

151 “Bombs in a Flat,” The Times, 22 July 1922, 7c.

152 Bureau of Military History Witness Statement 945 Sorcha Nic Diarmada (May 1954), 6–7 (quotation, 6), and Bureau of Military History Witness Statement 924 Mrs. Michael Cremen (“Cis Sheehan”) (February 1954), 10, NAI. Markievicz addressed the Dáil in her Cumann na mBan uniform. Pašeta, “Markievicz, Constance Georgine.”

153 Memo, 3 February 1921, Richard Mulcahy Papers P7/A4, University College Dublin Archives: “The £50 I mentioned was given to us by the C. na mBán for no specific purpose per Mrs Lanigan. We used it for the same purpose as the ordinary fund.” See Bureau of Military History Witness Statement 945 Sorcha Nic Diarmada (May 1954), 5, NAI.

154 “Mrs. M. Egan, Ban Oglach, An Cean Brigaide Corcaigh” (1990), H. P. O'Brien Collection, Reminiscence Collection, London Metropolitan University, Archive of the Irish in Britain.

155 Bureau of Military History Witness Statement 924 Mrs. Michael Cremen (“Cis Sheehan”) (February 1954), 5–6, NAI.

156 Bureau of Military History Witness Statement 814 Comd't. Patrick G. Daly, M.D. (March 1953), 19, NAI. See Belchem, Irish, Catholic and Scouse, 263.

157 Bureau of Military History Witness Statement 773 Gilbert F. Barrington (December 1952), 9, NAI.

158 Bureau of Military History Witness Statement 924 Mrs. Michael Cremen (“Cis Sheehan”) (February 1954), 6–7, NAI.

159 Nelly [Mallor?] to Sheehy-Skeffington, 7 May [1920], Sheehy-Skeffington Papers MS 22,691(2), NLI.

160 Bureau of Military History Witness Statement 945 Sorcha Nic Diarmada (May 1954), 7, NAI.

161 Memo, 28 August 1920, Richard Mulcahy Papers P7/A10, University College Dublin Archives.

162 Brady, Edward M., Ireland's Secret Service in England (Dublin, [1928?]), 76Google Scholar.

163 Dorothy Williams to Molly and Erskine Childers, 6 December 1921, Childers Papers MS 7847–51/1305, Trinity College Dublin; Mary Spring Rice to Molly Childers, 8 December 1921, Childers Papers MS 7847–51/1220, Trinity College Dublin; Frances Melland to Molly Childers, 6 December 1921, Childers Papers MS 7847–51/803, Trinity College Dublin; Lady Sarah Anne Byles to Molly Childers, [December 1921], Childers Papers MS 7847–51/152, Trinity College Dublin.

164 Margaret Buckmaster to Molly Childers, 7 December [1921], Childers Papers MS 7847–51/132, Trinity College Dublin.

165 On Childers, see Petitions, [1922], MS 1881 Supp. Box VI, Boston Public Library; note dated 4 May 1927 by George Berkeley on telegrams from November 1922, George Berkeley Papers MS 7,879, NLI; Mary Spring Rice to Molly Childers, 25 November 1922, Childers Papers MS 7848–51/1221, Trinity College Dublin. Molly Childers remained in Dublin, where she raised their two sons—one of whom, Erskine Childers Jr., became a prominent politician, serving as the president of Ireland in the mid-1970s. On Stopford, Edith Stopford, “Autobiographical Account,” MS 11,426, 28, NLI.

166 Pašeta, “Markievicz, Constance Georgine.”

167 Mary Duffy to Joseph Fowler, 26 July 1923, Joseph Fowler Papers MS 27,097(6), NLI.

168 Canning, Paul, British Policy Towards Ireland, 1921–1941 (Oxford, 1985), 80Google Scholar; McMahon, Paul, British Spies and Irish Rebels: British Intelligence and Ireland, 1916–1945 (Woodbridge, Sussex, 2008), 107Google Scholar.

169 See, however, the claim that the police missed the most important people: Notebooks, Dennis Brennan, n.d., Ernie O'Malley Papers P17/100, 89, University College Dublin Archives.

170 Bureau of Military History Witness Statement 924 Mrs. Michael Cremen (“Cis Sheehan”) (February 1954), 10, NAI. See “The Week-end Arrests,” The Times, 14 March 1923, 12e.

171 Bureau of Military History Witness Statement 945 Sorcha Nic Diarmada (May 1954), 10, NAI.

172 Bureau of Military History Witness Statement 945 Sorcha Nic Diarmada (May 1954), 11, NAI.

173 Bureau of Military History Witness Statement 945 Sorcha Nic Diarmada (May 1954), 11–12, NAI.

174 Canning, British Policy Towards Ireland, 1921–1941, 80.

175 McMahon, British Spies and Irish Rebels, 108.

176 Bureau of Military History Witness Statement 945 Sorcha Nic Diarmada (May 1954), 12, NAI.

177 “The Irish Deportees,” The Times, 18 October 1923, 9f, and “Treatment of Women Deportees,” Manchester Guardian, 18 October 1923, 4.

178 See “The Irish Deportees,” The Times, 18 October 1923, 9f, and “Treatment of Women Deportees,” Manchester Guardian, 18 October 1923, 4.

179 See “Irish Deportee's Claim,” Manchester Guardian, 24 October 1923, 4.

180 “Later Dancing in Hotels,” The Times, 6 February 1925, 12d.