The Irish Volunteers (Irish: Óglaigh na hÉireann) was a military organisation established in 1913 by Irish nationalists. Its declared primary aim was "to secure and maintain the rights and liberties common to the whole people of Ireland",^[1]in other words, the safeguarding of Home Rule.^[2] However, the intention of the Irish Republican Brotherhood in infiltrating the Volunteers was to help establish an Irish Republic.^[3] The Volunteers included members of the Gaelic League, Ancient Order of Hibernians and Sinn Féin,^[4] and, secretly, the IRB. The initiative for a series of meetings leading up to the public inauguration of the Volunteers came from the IRB.^[5]

[edit] Formation

The Irish Volunteers had its public origins in an article penned by Eoin MacNeill, entitled The North Began, which appeared in the Gaelic League newspaper An Claidheamh Soluis on 1 November, 1913. Bulmer Hobson, a prominent member of the IRB, had prompted The O'Rahilly, to encourage MacNeill to write the article.^[6][7] The IRB needed a highly regarded figure as a public front that would conceal the reality of deep penetration and control by the IRB.^[8][9] The IRB found Eoin MacNeill the ideal candidate, Professor of Early and Medieval History at University College Dublin. McNeill’s academic credentials and reputation for integrity and political moderation had widespread appeal. ^[10] The establishment of the Ulster Volunteer Force in January 1913, had prompted Bulmer Hobson (co-founder of the republican boy-scouts, Fianna Eireann), to tell the Dublin IRB that they should use this as a pretext to persuade the public to form an Irish volunteer force. James Stritch, an old IRB advocate who grew up with Jim Boland in Manchester, immediately had a drilling hall built behind the Wolfe Tone Club's headquarters at 41 Parnell Square, (former site of the National Club, and then the Foresters’ Hall). He, together with younger members of Fianna Eireann, began drilling a small number of IRB men associated with the Dublin Gaelic Athletic Association, and led by Jim Boland’s son, Harry. Simultaneously, labour leaders in Dublin began calling for the establishment of a citizens’ defence force in the aftermath of the lock out of 19 August 1913. Three months later, on 1 November, Eoin McNeill then wrote an article suggesting the formation of an Irish volunteer force with the encouragement of Seamus Deakin, Hobson and others. ^[11]

The background to O'Neill's article was the formation, in 1912, of the Ulster Volunteers, formed to oppose the passage and implementation of the Third Home Rule Bill. The O’Rahilly, editor of An Claideamh Soluis (Sword of Light) asked MacNeill to write an editorial for the first issue of a new series. O’Rahilly suggested that it should be on some wider subject than mere Gaelic pursuits. It was this suggestion which gave rise to the article.MacNeill wrote,

There is nothing to prevent the other twenty-eight counties from calling into existence citizen forces to hold Ireland for the Empire. It was precisely with this object that the Volunteers of 1782 were enrolled, and they became the instrument of establishing Irish self-government.

^[12][13]The article "threw down the gauntlet to nationalists to follow the lead given by Ulster unionists in their formation of the UVF".^[14]

The O'Rahilly then encouraged him to follow through with this idea. The first meeting was held on 11 November 1913, at Wynn's Hotel, Dublin, and several others were soon to follow, as prominent nationalists planned the formation of the Volunteers.^[15] Some time later, the organisation was publicly launched at a meeting attended by 7,000 people.^[16]

[edit] First public meeting

On November 25 the Volunteers had their first public meeting and enrolment rally at the Rotunda in Dublin. The IRB organised this meeting to which all parties were invited.^[17] The hall was filled to its 4,000 person capacity, with a further 3,000 spilling onto the grounds outside. Over the course of the following months the movement spread throughout the country, with thousands more joining every week.

From its inception, the leadership of the Volunteers were naturally heavily influenced by the Irish Republican Brotherhood. This was in keeping with the IRB's policy of infiltrating, as with Gaelic League, or creating nationalist movements such as the GAA and the Land League.^[18] MacNeill himself was not a member, and at the time was unaware of the IRB's intentions.^[19] However, the IRB was unable to gain complete control of the organisation after the leader of the Irish Parliamentary Party, John Redmond, demanded that the Volunteers accept his own personal appointments to its Provisional Committee, which effectively placing the organisation under his control. While the moderates did not like the idea, they were prepared to go along with it in order to prevent Redmond from forming a rival organisation, which would draw away most of their support. The IRB was completely opposed to Redmond's demands, as they would end their control of the Volunteers, but were unable to prevent the motion from being carried in Redmond's favour.

[edit] Leadership

The Irish Volunteers were led by a 30-member "Provisional Committee", which in May 1914, shortly before the organisation split, comprised (the names of the organisations with which they identified are provided in brackets):

• Honourable Secretaries: Eoin Mac Néill (Gaelic League (GL)), Laurence J. Kettle (Ancient Order of Hibernians (AOH));
• Honourable Treasurers: The O'Rahilly (GL, Sinn Féin (SF)), John Gore (AOH);
• Members: Piaras Béaslaí, Sir Roger Casement (GL), Eamonn Ceannt (GL, SF), John Fitzgibbon (GL, SF), Liam Gogan, Bulmer Hobson (Fianna Éireann (FÉ)), Michael J. Judge (AOH), Thomas Kettle (AOH), James Lenehan (AOH), Michael Lonergan, Peter (Peadar) Macken (Labour leader, SF, GL), Seán Mac Diarmada (Irish Freedom), Thomas MacDonagh, Liam Mellows, Col. Maurice Moore (GL, Connaught Rangers), Séamus O'Connor, Colm O'Loughlin (St. Enda's School), Peter O'Reilly, Robert Page, Patrick Pearse (GL), Joseph M. Plunkett (Irish Review), John Walsh (AOH), Peter White (Celtic Literary Society);
• Fianna Éireann representatives: Con Colbert, Eamon Martin, Patrick O'Ryan.^[20]

[edit] Arming the Volunteers

Shortly after the formation of the Volunteers, British Parliament banned the importation of weapons into Ireland. Yet, in 1914, the Ulster Volunteers successfully imported weapons in the Larne Gun Running, which brought the Irish Volunteers to the realisation that it too would have to follow suit if they were to be taken as a serious force. Indeed, many contemporary observers commented on the irony of "loyal" Ulstermen arming themselves and threatening to defy the British government by force. Patrick Pearse famously replied that "the Orangeman with a gun is not as laughable as the nationalist without one." Thus O'Rahilly, Sir Roger Casement and Bulmer Hobson worked together to coordinate a daylight gun-running expedition to Howth, just north of Dublin. The plan worked, and Erskine Childers brought nearly 1,000 rifles to the harbour and distributed them to the waiting Volunteers, without interference from the authorities. As the Volunteers returned to Dublin, however, they were met by a large patrol of the Dublin Metropolitan Police and the British Army. The Volunteers escaped largely unscathed, but when the army returned to Dublin they fired on a group of unarmed civilians who had been heckling them at Bachelors Walk. This shooting of four civilians and the wounding of a further 37 caused enlistments in the Volunteers to soar. The remainder of the guns smuggled from Germany for the Irish Volunteers were landed at Kilcoole a week later by Sir Thomas Myles.

[edit] The Split

The outbreak of World War I in August 1914 provoked a serious split in the organisation. Redmond, in the interest of ensuring the enactment of the Home Rule Act 1914 then on the statute books, encouraged the Volunteers to support the British and Allied war commitment and join Irish regiments of the British New Army divisions, an action vigorously opposed by the founding members. Given the wide expectation that the war was going to be a short one, the majority however supported the war effort and the call to restore the "freedom of small nations" on the European continent. They left to form the National Volunteers, which fought in the 10th and 16th (Irish) Division, side-by-side with their volunteer counterparts from the 36th (Ulster) Division. Unlike the latter, however, the 16th Division had no trained military Irish officers of its own, and were commanded by British officers, with the exception of Irish General William Hickie.^[21] The National Volunteers ceased to exist after the Armistice in 1918 when their battalions were disbanded in 1922 under the terms of the Anglo-Irish Treaty.

A minority believed that the principles used to justify the Allied war cause were best applied in restoring the freedom to one small country in particular. They retained the name "Irish Volunteers", were led by MacNeill and called for Irish neutrality. The National Volunteers kept some 175,000 members, leaving the Irish Volunteers with an estimated 13,500. This split proved advantageous to the IRB, which was now back in control of the organisation.

Following the split, the remnants of the Irish Volunteers were often, and erroneously, referred to as the "Sinn Féin Volunteers", or "Shinners", after Arthur Griffith's political organisation Sinn Féin. The term began as a derogatory one, but soon became ubiquitous in Ireland. Although the two organisations had some overlapping membership, there was no official connection between Griffith's then moderate Sinn Féin and the Volunteers. The political stance of the remaining Volunteers was not always popular, and a 1,000-strong march led by Pearse through the garrison city of Limerick on Whit Sunday, 1915, was pelted with rubbish by a hostile crowd.

[edit] The Easter Rising, 1916

Main article: Easter Rising

The official stance of the Irish Volunteers was that action would only be taken were the British authorities at Dublin Castle to attempt to disarm the Volunteers, arrest their leaders, or introduce conscription to Ireland. The IRB, however, was determined to use the Volunteers for offensive action while Britain was tied up in the First World War. Their plan was to circumvent MacNeill's command, instigating a Rising, and to get MacNeill on board once the rising was a fait accompli. Pearse issued orders for three days of parades and manoeuvres, a thinly disguised order for a general insurrection. MacNeill soon discovered the real intent behind the orders and attempted to stop all actions by the Volunteers. He succeeded only in putting the Rising off for a day, and limiting it to about 1,000 active participants within Dublin and a further 2,000-3,000 elsewhere. Almost all of the fighting was confined to Dublin. The Irish Citizen Army supplied slightly more than 200 personnel for the Dublin campaign.

The Rising was a failure in the short term, and large numbers of Irish Volunteers were arrested, even some who did not participate in the Rising. In 1919 the Irish Volunteers became the Irish Republican Army, swearing its obedience to the First Dáil during the course of August 1920.

[edit] References