50 Years Ago

MILITARY COUNCIL TO DRAFT OVERALL PLAN

FOR seven days from Tuesday, May 28, 1951 a black flag flew from the flagpole on Sinn Féin Head Office, 9 Parnell Square, Dublin.

An English royal visit was taking place in the Six Counties. Arrangements were made by the Seán McCaughey Cumann in Belfast to hold a protest demonstration and public meeting on Thursday, May 30.

Posters advertising these events were put up on the previous Saturday, but these were torn down or defaced by the English colonial police, the RUC.

Then in the early hours of Tuesday, May 28 large-scale raids were made on Republican houses in Belfast and 13 men were arrested and thrown into Crumlin Road jail without charge or trial.

Among them were Jimmy Steele and Liam Burke, recently released after long years in jail. Under the Special Powers Act they all remained in prison for seven days. It was internment without trial again.

In spite of the raids and arrests and British forces interference with Sinn Féin publicity, the protest demonstration went ahead as arranged.

A parade formed up in Hamill Street and, headed by the Tricolour, marched up the Falls Road to Clonard Street where an enthusiastic meeting was held.

Speakers were Pat McCotter, Chairperson; Tom Heenan (Belfast); Seán Ó Cearnaigh, Ard Rúnaí, Sinn Féin; Cathal Ó Murchú; Tomás Ó Dubhghaill, Leas-Uachtarán; agus Seosamh Mac Criostail. The latter four were from Dublin.

One last kick by the RUC was the attempted intimidation of the owner of the lorry and of the loudspeaker hirers. Of course, the so-called nationalist press was too careful or too loyal to carry advertisements for the meeting.

The Sinn Féin Notes in An tÉireannach Aontaithe/The United Irishman of June 1951 reported that there had been increased activity by the Sinn Féin Cumainn in many areas.

The Dublin Comhairle Ceantair held regular weekly public meetings at Elvery’s Corner, O’Connell Street each Saturday night and they had been attracting ever-increasing crowds.

Then there was the Hotel Conference at the Metropole and the flying of the Union Jack over the front entrance. A picket was placed by the Austin Stack Cumann carrying slogans such as: “The Union Jack flies in O’Connell Street, while British troops occupy Irish territory”.

During the second day of the picket some young men entered the Metropole Restaurant, came out on the canopy over the front entrance, seized the two Union Jacks and hurled them into the street.

Following a scuffle between the police and members of the picket who managed to obtain the flags, the Union Jacks were publicly burned at the weekly Saturday night meeting in O’Connell Street, to the great delight of an enthusiastic crowd.

The April edition of the Organ of Irish Republicanism commented on “three cheers, derisive and victorious” which greeted Anthony Mulvey when he (belatedly) took his seat in the British House of Commons.

He had been elected in the Mid-Ulster constituency on an abstentionist ticket. Now he had “adopted a policy which is diametrically opposed to the mandate given to him by his constituents”.

Mulvey, a journalist associated with the Ulster Herald grouping of local newspapers and an independent abstentionist MP for Fermanagh-South Tyrone (along with Patrick Cunningham) 1935-45, was selected by a nationalist constituency convention on an abstentionist basis.

Later, subsequent to his election, he put together another convention, believed to be hand-picked, to reverse that policy. The “News of the Month” column in the Republican organ continued: “Treachery is a word that is often freely bandied about but in this case a man who publicly swears allegiance to a foreign king cannot complain if this terrible epithet ‘Traitor’ is henceforth applied to him.

“It is safe to assume that if this man had been honest enough to announce, before election, his intention to take his seat that a candidate pledged to the old Sinn Féin abstentionist policy would have been nominated and elected.

“But honesty is seldom an attribute of Irish politicians. He has succeeded in retaining his seat but he has lost forever the confidence of the people of Ireland and his good name as a man of honour and honesty.

“Perhaps the fact that the British government’s majority in the House of Commons is dwindling has something to do with Mulvey’s decision.

“It is significant that he took his seat on the government side of the House and it is well within the bounds of possibility that this man’s vote might, in time of crisis, be responsible for saving the government.

“What an achievement for Mulvey and the Anti-Partitionists!”

If 1951 was the “key-year” for the Republican Movement, as has already been mentioned in this series, May was the pivotal month in that decisive year.

In that month a Military Council was established to draft an Overall Plan for the Republican Movement as a whole.

Its members consisted of Tony Magan, IRA Chief-of-Staff; Tomás Mac Curtáin, chair of the Army Council; Pádraig Mac Lógáin, President of Sinn Féin and Chair of the Army Executive; a former British army officer with WWII experience service who was an expert on guerrilla warfare; and one other person who is not identified.

No longer would it suffice to have a political organisation and a military force working in harmony. A policy contesting Westminster elections north of the Border and local elections south of it, together with a military aim of a successful campaign against British forces in the Six Counties and no offensive action in the 26 Counties, would not be adequate any more. The Movement was developing.

The Overall Plan would have to provide for specific military training for Volunteers and lay out objectives to be achieved and step by step.

Similarly, if the mass of the people were to be organised, specific steps needed to be taken by Sinn Féin and within that same organisation. Political education of members’ organisational and publicity skills, preparation for passive resistance – civil disobedience and non-co-operation – all of these skills needed to be developed.

Further, roles needed to be sketched out for Cumann na mBan and Fianna Éireann as well as for a Prisoner Dependants Fund organisation and welfare body. All would need to grow and develop in co-ordination.

The Military Council set to work and did produce an Overall Plan. This was the road map according to which the Movement was to advance in the years ahead.

Essentially, it was followed throughout the 1950s and early 1960s. With a specific policy the Movement would be steered in accordance with the guidelines set down and discipline maintained.

The completion of the Military Council’s work was indeed a significant achievement and a most important milestone in the Movement’s progression.

With all the publicity and a special postal stamp for “75 Years of Irish Radio”, it is necessary to advert to the fact that it is 85 years since the first Irish radio – in 1916.

Similarly, the first President of Ireland – and not just 26 Counties – was Pádraic Pearse. The IRB Military Council, which planned the Rising, met at 9am on Easter Monday 1916 and appointed the seven who signed the Proclamation of the All-Ireland Republic as the Provisional Government of that Republic.

The Provisional Government then elected Pearse as President and James Connelly as Vice-President. Contrary to a recent RTÉ TV programme Pearse did not just assume that title.

The first Irish Radio Station went on the air early on Easter Tuesday 1916. In Reece’s Building, O’Connell Street, Dublin there was a School of Wireless Telegraphy.

At the instance of Joseph Mary Plunkett, this was taken over by Óglaigh na hÓireann on Easter Monday 1916, and after long and arduous labour it was fitted out as a Transmitting Station.

It began functioning next day as Raidió Phoblacht na hÉireann. The messages it sent out were received by a ship at sea and re-transmitted to America.

And so, in spite of rigid censorship the news of the Rising was flashed to the world and newspapers had it on their front page, much to the anger of the British.

The first Irish radio was a great coup for the all-Ireland Republic proclaimed in arms at Easter 1916.

The Irish language weekly, INNIU, in an article on this event in the late 1940s, stated that the Government of the Argentine Republic – Tír an Airgid – where there were many Irish exiles, immediately recognised the Provisional Government of the Irish Republic as the lawful government of Ireland”

While the equipment of this Station was being transferred from Reece’s to the GPO, Captain Thomas Weafer of the Army of the Irish Republic, a native of Enniscorthy, Co Wexford, was mortally wounded.

The building where he was caught fire and his body was consumed in the flames. Two brass plaques on the Hibernian Bank at the corner of O’Connell Street and Lower Abbey Street commemorate his sacrifice.

On Easter Sunday 1937 several thousand people accompanied by six bands marched from St Stephen’s Green to O’Connell Street. A plaque to The O’Rahilly was unveiled in Moore Lane which was re-named O’Rahilly Parade in his honour.

The parade then reformed and marched to the Hibernian Bank where the plaques in honour of Captain Weafer – one in Irish and one in England – were unveiled.

Eoghan Ó Tuairisc, the poet and writer from Ballinasloe has written a beautiful poem in Irish on his thoughts on reading the inscription on the plaques. It was on the course for the Intermediate (now Junior) Certificate examination as recently as the 1980s.

But Raidió Phoblacht na hÉireann did not die in Easter Week 1916. It was heard again throughout 1939 with accounts of the IRA Sabotage Campaign in England and the Comhar na gComharsan (Neighbour’s Co-operation) economic policy of the Movement. It was on the air once more in 1957-59 during the Resistance Campaign.

(More next month. Refs. An tÉireannach Aontaithe/The United Irishman, May 1949, April ,1951 and June 1951; The Last Post published by the National Graves Association, 1938, 1976 and 1985; Northern Ireland: The Orange State by Michael Farrell, published by Pluto Press 1976 and 1980 and INNIU of a date in the late 1940s.)
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