Cut from Spiridovich Gentiles Review: on Ireland

[Helphand]

From Cherep-Spiridovich, The Gentiles' Review, issue #1:

Perhaps mainly of marginal interest even for those hailing from the Emerald Isle but I thought the first snippet quite engaging. Again shows Cherep-Spiridovich was on the ball for the time. Any comments on the correctness, completeness or otherwise generally?

"BOLSHEVISM, THE JEW ATTACK ON CIVILIZATION"

"...Who is the head of the Bolshevist movement in Turkey? A Salonika
Jew, who calls himself Mustapha Kemal Pasha. What is Bolshevism in
Ireland? It calls itself Sinn Fein in order to deceive the Irish into thinking
they are fighting for the Irish Republic, instead of a Jew autocracy.
Who is the head of Sinn Fein? A Portuguese, a half Jew, de Valera.
Who is Commissar for Ireland? The Jew, Ludwig Martens, the so-called
Soviet Ambassador to the United States."

Surprisingly, the family-tree style chart which accompanies Mrs Nesta H. Webster's "The Socialist Network" gives some but not as many as expected details on the interconnectedness of Irish Republican bodies with Marxian Socialism and its shadowy antecedents. So,

--1791 United Irishmen;
--1872 Irish Republican Brotherhood (John Devoy);
--1896 Irish Socialist Republican Party (James Connolly)
--1903 Sinn Fein;
--1904 Socialist Party of Ireland;
--1907 Irish Transport and General Workers Union (Jim Larkin);
--IRB [No date] (DeValera, Cathal Brughta, Desmond Fitzgerald, Matthew O'Leary);
--1919 Communist Party of Ireland (Roderick Conolly, Liam O'Flaherty);
--1920 Irish Communist Brotherhood (Supreme Council of 6);
--[No date] Irish Transport Workers (J. Lerkin. Conolly);
--1923 Irish Workers' League (Jim and Peter Larkin);
--1924 Irish Workers' Union (Jim and Peter Larkin);

--  Ireland appears positively virtuous (having exported GBS to England) in the scarce numbers of its recognised "alien-inspired" revolutionary movements and in its selection of native false fronts compared to GB, where one encounters more familiarly recognisable actors such as in:

--1884: Fabian Society (Sidney Webb, G. Bernard Shaw, G.D.H. Cole, Sidney Olivier, Mrs Webb, Annie Besant);
--1918: Labour Research Department (G. Bernard Shaw, G.D.H. Cole, Sidney Webb, G.P. Blizzard, L.S. Woolf);
--May 1920: Hands Off Russia Committee (Tom Mann, Israel Zangwill etc.);
--1925: Plebs League (Mrs W. Horrobin, Mr & Mrs Mark Starr, George Hicks, R.W. Postgate, Cedar Paul, Ellen Wilkinson).

In the English groups one notes the preponderance of the names Allen, Angell, Cole, Davies, Mann, Russell, Starr, Watts, Woolf...

..."I'll Be Seeing You,
In All The Old Familiar Places,"

...tum te tum, tootle, croon croon.....

[Helphand]

More on this from sundry sources, there is more out there and as usual you will find
quite a bit is duplicated. But of possible local interest here

More may follow if I can be bothered.

ROT13 applied near end as an anti-spoiler; have a guess then open the box! And no
follow-ups posting the decoded!


Archibald Maule Ramsay: The Nameless War (1952, last popular edition (?) 1962)

[Chapter 11: REGULATION 18B:]

   "Regulation 18B was originally introduced to deal with certain members of the
I.R.A., who were committing a number of senseless minor outrages in London.
Without this Regulation, no liege of His Majesty in the United Kingdom could be
arrested and held in prison on suspicion.

...
   These I.R.A. outrages were so fatuous in themselves and so apparently
meaningless, at a time when there were no sharp differences between this country and
the Irish Free State, that I commenced making a number of inquiries.

   I was not surprised to discover at length, that special members of the I.R.A.
had been enrolled for the committing of these outrages; and that they were practically
all Communists.

   I had it on excellent authority that the Left Book Club of Dublin had been
actively concerned in the matter; and finally the names of 22 of these men were put
into my hands; and again I was informed on excellent authority that they were all
Communists.

   Immediately on receipt of this information I put down a question to the Home
Secretary, and offered to supply the necessary information if the matter were taken
up.

   Nothing came of my representations. From these Communist-inspired
outrages, however, there resulted Regulation 18B.

   Though the I.R.A. were pleaded as an excuse to the House for a Regulation,
hardly any of their members were ever arrested under it; but in due course it was
employed to arrest and hold for 4 or 5 years, uncharged, very many hundreds of
British subjects, whose one common denominator was that they opposed the Jewish
power over this country in general; and its exertion to thrust her into a war in purely
Jewish interests in particular."



--------------------------------------------------------------

H.A. Gwynne -- The Cause Of World Unrest (1920)


[page 195:]

   The time of sporadic rebellion has passed with the period of Parliamentary
agitation. Sinn Fein, once an intellectual movement, has been swept away and finds
itself united with organized Irish Labour and the Social Revolutionaries pledged to the
cause of Bolshevism and Anarchy throughout the world.

   It is a suggestive study to trace the means by which this vital change was
brought about. The principal agent was James Connolly, who introduced into the
politics of Irish disaffection the philosophy of Social Revolution. From 1903 to 1911,
Connolly was in America, and there, as Mr. Dawson points out in the book quoted
above, he came under the influence of Leon, who counted Lenin among his disciples.
It was Connolly's work that enabled Mr. de Blacam to make the proud boast that
Bolshevism was born in Ireland, and Lenin himself admitted that he owed much to the
Irish rebel who was executed after the rebellion of 1916. Here we have
incontrovertible proof of the unity of control and direction that underlies disorders in
every part of the world. Long before Germany had fallen and could no longer  provide
Ireland with the sinews of war, the Irish movement had come into contact with the
High Priest of Bolshevism and was ready to play its part in the world conspiracy.
Connolly was one of the organizers of the Industrial Workers of the World in
America, and as such had every reason to become acquainted with many of those who
brought about the Russian Revolution. There he must have learnt the doctrines that
the "formidable sect" was spreading through the world for its own purposes.

   A direct link between the great Asiatic conspiracy and the Irish plot is
apparently to be found in the person of Liam Mellowes, who played a leading part in
America in bringing about the open alliance between the Sinn Fein organization and
Russian Bolshevism. In the rebellion of 1916, this Mellowes commanded a rebel force
in County Galway, and after its collapse he escaped from Ireland, probably to
Germany. Later, he is to be found in New York working with a German agent. His
main object on this occasion was to organize another revolution in Ireland in the
spring of 1918, an attempt that failed but another of his enterprises was from our point
of view very significant, since it consisted in forwarding money to the Turks and
establishing a mysterious Turkish organization in America. It would be interesting to
know whether this organization which thus came into existence after the United States
had entered the war has disappeared, or whether it maybe anyway responsible for the
perpetual flow of subversive propaganda that finds its way into Asia from America.

   Of the part played by Sinn Fein during the war there is no need to speak at
length. It is a matter of public knowledge that German money was poured into Ireland
to encourage rebellion, and the sinister figure of Casement serves as a perpetual
reminder of the treachery that was at work. So far as the world conspiracy was
concerned, Ireland had long ago shown that it possessed good material on which the
promoters of disorder could reckon. What better ally could the "formidable sect"
desire than the Ribbonmen of 1850, who wore a ribbon on their sleeves and in their
hearts carried the words of the Ribbon Oath :

   "In the presence of Almighty God, and this my brother, I do swear that I will
suffer my right hand to be cut from my body and laid at the gaol door before I will
waylay or betray a brother, and I will persevere and not spare from the cradle to the
crutch and the crutch to the cradle; that I will not hear the moans or groans of infancy
or old age, but that I will wade knee-deep in Orangeman's blood and do as King
James did.

   Such an oath might well find its place in the Protocols of the "Elders of Zion,"
and Mr. Dawson, when he describes the Ribbon Society as "unrivalled for the purpose
of social revolution, unscrupulous, mysterious, pitiless, 'deaf to the moans of infancy
or age,' " wrote a phrase that could equally well be applied to the world-wide secret
societies with which we have been dealing. When Germany fell and rebellious Ireland
could hope for no more aid from that quarter, it was natural that Sinn Fein should seek
alliance with Bolshevist Russia. The negotiations were carried on in America by
Mellowes, of whose activities we have already spoken, and Dr. McCartan, Sinn Fein
"ambassador" to the United States. The Bolsheviks sent over a Mr. Martens, and an
offensive alliance was concluded. Dr. McCartan proclaimed to the world:

   "The four million people of the Republic of Ireland, in their struggle to free
themselves from military subjugation, want and welcome the aid of the free men of
the Russian Socialist Federated Soviet Republic. Between the Russians and the Irish,
isolated in their struggle against British armies of occupation to found securely the
Republic of Ireland, there can exist only the sense of brotherhood which a common
experience, endured for a common purpose, alone can induce." That the programme
of Sinn Fein as at present constituted is practically identical with that of the Moscow
International, founded to enforce the dictatorship of the proletariat, the abolition of all
existing forms of government, and the expropriation of all property, is shown by the
following parallel passages quoted by the Duke of Northumberland in a speech made
at a meeting of members of the Houses of Lords and Commons on July 7, 1920.

   THE THIRD INTERNATIONAL. SINN FEIN, 1918 AND 1919.
   This adoption of the Bolshevist programme has meant wealth for Sinn Fein.
Seven years ago it was almost bankrupt; today it runs newspapers, keeps up an army,
and even equips its assassins with motor-cars. A Helsingfors despatch of April, 1919,
gives the key to this sudden accession of riches. "The Council of People's
Commissaries . . . have voted the sum of 500,000,000 roubles monthly for the bureau
of foreign propaganda. The first payment of 500,000,000 roubles for the month of
February was sent to the Sinn Feiners in Ireland."

   Naturally enough, the Bolsheviks in England stretched out a helping hand
across the Irish Channel to aid a movement that is admirably organized, well
furnished with the sinews of war, and in all respects congenial to them. Mr. Smillie,
who was so honourably mentioned in Lenin's despatches, sought to tempt Sinn Fein to
the "accursed reactionary chamber" by the bright prospect of finding there an array of
Labour members pledged, like them, to the world conspiracy, and suggested : "Your
fight is our fight ; come over and help us." The cry was promptly taken up by the
Bolshevist Press in this country, and the following quotations show how close is the
alliance sworn between British Bolsheviks and Irish Sinn Feiners:

   "In the fight of the world proletariat for the overthrow of Capitalism, every
conscious section realizes that the British Government typifies reaction in its worst
form. It is Britain which fights the war against Russia, Britain is behind Horthy in
Hungary, Britain is behind the German Junkers. Generally speaking, the overthrowing
of the British Government will be a tremendous impetus to world revolt, and any
people or class which is helping to fight British reaction is deserving of support.
Ireland, the nearest country to Britain, is in revolt, and in spite of every cruelty and
repression, is more than holding her own." (The Socialist, organ of the Socialist
Labour Party, and affiliated to the Moscow International, July 8, 1920.)

   The British Socialist Party (London) published in the Call of April 22, 1920,
the following manifesto:

   "You wish to set up an Irish Republic. So be it. The workers of Britain have
no real quarrel with your demand. Only the British ruling caste, drunk with
imperialism, and sodden with prosperity, denies your claim as it denies the similar
claims of the peoples of Egypt and India. The B.S.P. condemns the brutal methods
employed by the British Government in Ireland . . . and pledges the B.S.P. to assist by
all means in its power the endeavours of the Irish people to national self-
determination."

   The Worker, the organ of the Scottish Workers' Committees, also affiliated to
the Moscow International, printed on July 17, 1920, an appeal from a Sinn Feiner to
Irish people in Britain: "In the future you must view the industrial centres in Britain as
it were from a military point of view and the outposts of our fighting front. Realize
the importance of your position and your power to its full significance as a cog in the
machinery that produces and distributes the means of existence for Britain. You can
help in changing the control of the machinery, or if needs be, destroy it--Thiggin Thu.
Therefore, your place is in the Workers' Committees."

   The Call, June 10, 1920, in a leading article on Mr. J.H. Thomas and the Irish
railwaymen, says:

   "Consider the Irish situation! The vilest and most despicable tyranny of
modern times has driven the Irish people into open rebellion. They hold Ireland
against their English masters. They are desperately reckless, unscrupulous, if you will,
in their fight for the independence which has been their dream for centuries. But they
are right. . . . All that Austria, Russia, Spain, the tyrannies of the past stood for,
England stands for now. By the sword, and by the sword alone, she holds Ireland. The
Irish railwaymen are bound to refuse to carry troops, etc. They would be craven curs
if they did less, and it is the duty of every decent Englishman to support them to the
utmost limit of his power."

   Equally explicit is a leading article in the Worker of April 24, 1920:

   "Come, fellow workers, stir yourselves. We have to go through it yet, for until
we do Ireland cannot be free, nor can we ourselves be free. Not until we have
attempted to cleanse the earth of this foul garbage of Capitalist Militarism can we be
called men. So long as we make no move to prevent these atrocities, we ourselves are
participants in them. Down tools and let Britain rot until Ireland's wrongs are
removed."

   Tom Quelch, of the B.S.P. Executive, in an open letter to a young comrade
printed in the Call of April 29, 1920, bids him:

   "Think of the men of '48; think of the Communards, think of the Chicago
martyrs, think of Marx, of Bebel, of Jaures, of William Liebknecht, of William
Morris, of Jim Connolly, of Debs, of Lenin, of Karl Liebknecht, of Rosa
Luxembourg, of Bela Kun think of all who have given so much for the solidarity and
happiness of the human race and work, and strive, and, if needs be, fight in the service
of the World Socialist Republic."

   Space will not permit more than a brief outline of the activities of the
Bolshevist conspirators in South Africa, Australia, and Canada. In Johannesburg and
Capetown, two Russians preached the world revolution, and as they spoke in Russian
to their own compatriots the meaning of their propaganda was not as first realized by
the authorities. The result of their efforts was displayed in a strike at Johannesburg,
which the leaders proclaimed as the herald of general revolution. M. Miliukov, in his
Bolshevism, An International Danger, tells how when they were sailing from
Mozambique at the request of the authorities, who had discovered their mission, one
of
them, named Lapinsky, told the revolutionaries who had come to see them off that the
Russian Bolsheviks were the advance guard of the world revolution, and that some
day he would return in triumph.

[page 262:]

   The Irish Revolution now in progress is not the result of the Irish national
movement ; Sinn Fein is merely the tool of the International organization for carrying
out the plan laid down by Marx. As long ago as 1870 this secret message was sent by
Marx from London to the Internationale in Geneva:

1. England is the only country in which a real Socialistic revolution can be made.
2. The English people cannot make this revolution.
3. Foreigners must make it for them.
4. The foreign members, therefore, must retain their seats at the London board.
5. The point to strike at first is Ireland, and in Ireland they are ready to begin their
work.

   This is what is happening today. The chaos now reigning in Ireland is simply
the prelude to the same condition of affairs in this country. To cause revolution in
England is the first and most essential point in the programme of the International
revolutionaries. "Every revolution on the Continent," said Marx, "that does not spread
to England is a storm in a teacup." In other words, England is the pivot of the world's
civilization. If England goes the whole world goes with her. Marx was right in his
surmise; he was right, too, in believing that English workingmen will never make this
revolution. "Foreigners must make it for them." They are making it now. Shall we
allow them to accomplish their work?



----------------------
Admiral Sir Barry Domvile:
From Admiral To Cabin Boy (1943; published post-WWII)


...

XI.
Change of surname is another aspect of the same question.

   There is no law to prevent a man from taking any name he
happens to fancy, nor are any unpleasant formalities involved.
   It is not a crime to employ an alias, but if a man
changes his name for good and all, it is customary to regularise
this action by applying for a Royal Licence and publishing the
fact in the Press, after execution of what is termed a Deed Poll.
   People may desire to change their names for many reasons:
they may possess an ugly name, or one subject to vulgar
interpretation: they may be compelled to effect a change, if they
desire to inherit money or property, the transfer of which is
subject to that condition: they may wish to conceal their
connection with some owner of their name, who has rendered
himself notorious.
   The most common reason of all, however, is business
interest. This device is employed by aliens, and especially
by Jews, who find that they can trade better if they are
called Jones or Gordon, rather than Rosenbaum or Mosenstein.
In reality these people are practising a deception on the
public. We have the authority of Shakespeare for saying
"What's in a name? That which we call a rose by any other
name would smell as sweet." I beg leave to doubt that
assertion, in the present connection.
   The following extract from the Fermanagh Herald
of September 1943 illustrates my contention:—
   "A resolution from Longford County Council, received
and approved by Cavan County Council, urged that the
Government's attention should be immediately drawn to
the fact that a large number of foreigners, mainly Jews,
have succeeded in changing their names recently by
deed poll to names of Irish origin. The Chairman
referred to a recent prosecution for fraud of a
Mr. I. O'Hara, formerly Cohen."





------------------
From early 1970's UK nationalists:


If the true facts concerning the Communist infiltration of the Irish Republican
movement were known to the average Irish Catholic then the mass popular support it
presently enjoys would evaporate.  But those facts have been systematically
suppressed.

Long before the Russian Revolution the Communists had been interested in
promoting trouble in Ireland.  Karl Marx himself declared that the Communist
First International should "support the Irish demand for independence from
Britain in order to prepare the way for revolution in Britain itself."

This theme was developed by DR. HERMANN GORTER, a professor at
Moscow University, who wrote in the British Communist publication Workers'
Dreadnought on May 8, 1920:  "The Third International must strive by every
possible means to promote the independence of Ireland.  British workers must
follow the example given by Lenin and the Russian Bolsheviks who, in order
to make revolution in the whole of Russia, demanded the independence of
Finland and Poland".

The process of the Communisation of the IRA proceeded during the Second
World War, during which period many IRA men were interned by the Eire
Government.  Among these internees was one VERSCHOYLE GOULD who, with
some other IRA men, had fought with the Communists in the Spanish Civil war.  
These fanatics set about brainwashing their fellow internees.

After the failure of the IRA's border campaign during the 1950's
disillusionment was rife in the movement and in this atmosphere the Communists,
who had been patiently placing themselves into positions of power, set about
extending their influence.  The first move was the merger of the two
'separate' Irish Communist parties (North and South) into an all-Ireland party,
which took place in 1969.

The second step was the establishment of the Northern Ireland Civil Rights
Movement, under the direction of Communist Party member BETTY SINCLAIR.  
The purpose of the Civil Rights movement was to whip up, by means of marches,
protests and sit-ins, a turbulent atmosphere and a climate of sectarian
strife in order to provide the right conditions for the re-instigation of
IRA 'military' activities.  The Civil Rights movement worked in close
collaboration with the Peoples' Democracy movement of BERNADETTE DEVLIN,
which was then a rabble of Trotskyite students from Queens University, Belfast.

The leader of the "Provisionals", now called SEAN MACSTIOFAIN (English-
born JOHN STEPHENSON) was personally recruited to the IRA cause by none other
than CATHAL GOULDING, a self-proclaimed Marxist of long standing, who is the
leader of the "Official" IRA.  Many experienced students of Communist
subversion feel that the IRA "split" is a clever tactical sham that would have
delighted Lenin.

The Peoples' Democracy Group is, or recently was, one of the most influential
of the side-shows in Northern Ireland, and it provided the machinery whereby the
revolutionist BERNADETTE DEVLIN was elected to the Westminster Parliament.


[un-ROT13 the following for the piece de resistance!:]

Ynggreyl Oreanqrggr unf orpbzr vapernfvatyl vaibyirq jvgu gur Gebgfxlvgr
Oevgvfu onfrq Vagreangvbany Fbpvnyvfgf jubfr yrnqre vf LTNRY TYHPXFGRVA,
na Vfenryv pvgvmra jub bcrengrf haqre gur anzr bs GBAL PYVSS.

...

If enough ordinary Catholics in Northern Ireland could have the facts
clearly presented to them, then they would realise that 'their' rebellion
against Britain has been betrayed from the start, and that even if
it is 'successful' it will open the final and most terrible chapter
of their wretched island's long history of misery. Such a realisation
would draw them back from their present suicidal course.

[Helphand]

And a bit more for those with stamina...

Herbert Vivian: Secret Societies Old and New (1927)

(2) Ireland
White Boys-United Irishmen-Orangemen-
Ribbonmen and St. Patrick's Boys-Fenians-Land
League-Moonlighters and Invincibles-Sinn Fein.

THE Irish are a mysterious people, difficult for
strangers to understand, poetical and shrewd,
whimsical and melancholy, hospitable and
suspicious. They are a mass of contradictions. They
love their land and emigrate. Sport is idealised in
theory, race-meetings are thronged throughout the
most troubled times, fighting is ensued for fighting's
sake. Yet there is always an eye to the main chance,
a zeal for coping and doping horses and making
money out of sport, a shrewdness in saving skins
with great show of bravery.

There is something oriental about Ireland, which,
according to imaginative ethnologists, may have
been originally populated by negroid Portuguese
and lost tribes from Palestine. Women wear shawls
over their heads, as though Donegal markets were
Moorish bazaars, covering their mouths and
displaying little more than eyes and noses like
harem ladies. Oriental also are the disregard of time
and sanitation, the love of noise and tinsel, the cult
of grievances and intrigues that are the seeds of
secret societies.

The oppressions of Cromwell and William of Orange
provoked much furtive opposition, but the first secret
society to leave definite records in Ireland was the White
Boys, founded in 1761 for the plunder and murder of
alien officials and landlords as well as for resisting taxes
and Protestant tithes. The name was derived from the
white smocks which members wore over their clothes as
a disguise.

Hostility to England was stimulated by the French
Revolution, and the United Irishmen, instituted in 1791,
rallied half a million of all classes within a year. They
aimed at an Irish republic in alliance with French
terrorists. Vowed to the strictest secrecy, communicating
with one another in all sorts of mysterious ways, the
members were soon scouring the whole country with
armed bands, killing, robbing, burning everywhere with
ruthless ferocity.

As the Government seemed powerless to protect the
victims, the Protestants determined to strike a blow on
their own behalf and fight the terrorists with their own
weapons. The Society of Orangemen was founded in
1794 by Thomas Wilson, a freemason, on masonic lines,
to commemorate the "pious and immortal memory" of
William of Orange and perpetuate his traditions of
bloodshed; to maintain the Protestant succession, the
Protestant supremacy and the penal laws against
Catholics. Neither side was behindhand in savagery,
treachery or the regular supply of paid informers. Civil
war became universal and, when the Orangemen were
supported by English militia in 1798, they seemed to
prevail. Even if we discount the outcries of imaginative
Irishmen, there must still remain a terrible tale of cruelty
and horror, a Sadic perpetuation of the curse of
Cromwell, sanguinary stains on the fearful banner of
Orange.

But the Irish are no more conquerable by cruelty than
by kindness. Driven out of their mud cabins to
moorlands and wild places, condemned to a living Hell
or a scarcely less hideous Connaught, they perfected
their webs of conspiracy with all the courage of
despair. An army arose from the bogs, rifles were
stored in smugglers' caves and secret cellars, grim drills
were carried on by ragged men at the rising of the
moon. The clergy gave their blessing from the altar.
French revolutionists sent gold, ammunition, promises
of invasion. The day dawned in 1798, the Ninety-eight
of much passionate song. All Ireland gleamed and
bristled with bayonets. But the French army never
came, and the rising was soon suppressed. Lord
Edward Fitzgerald died of wounds in bare time to avoid
the gallows. A fresh massacre was arranged for the
restoration of order.

Order was too much to expect in unruly Ireland, but
organised risings were adjourned for generations. In
their place came guerrilla warfare, shots behind hedges,
arson, pitfalls, kidnapping by Ribbon Men and then St.
Patrick's Boys, so secret in their cunning devices that
not until 1833 were revelations made by that traditional
curse of Ireland, the informer. They were bound by the
most fearful oaths in all the history of secret societies,
and their bitterest vows of vengeance were directed
against the hated Orangemen.

At one time the Orangemen had no less than 2,000
lodges and 300,000 members, including princes and
nobles. They spread to Manchester and London and
the United States of America, taking a prominent
part in politics and returning many members to
Parliament, usually in the Whig interest. They
regarded Catholic emancipation as a severe blow to
their cause, and the Government tried to suppress
them in 1882 and again in 1836 without much
success. Indeed, they have continued their struggle
against all forms of Irish Nationalism to this day. In
the United States, they are now known as The Loyal
Orange Institution of the U.S.A. and numbered 350
lodges with 33,000 members in 1926, opposing
Roman Catholic influence and schools. One
condition of their membership is that their children
shall not be brought up as Catholics or sent to
convents for their education. They often work in
harmony with the Ku Klux Klan.

On the other side, Colonel John O'Mahoney and Michael
Doheny founded the Fenian Brotherhood in 1857 in the
United States to support Irish independence. The name
comes from Fene or Feinn or Fianna, the warriors of
ancient Irish tribes, or perhaps from Finn, the hero of
Ossianic legends almost as romantic as those of King
Arthur. The organisation consisted of local circles,
whose heads or centres were under a body known as a
Senate. These extended rapidly to Canada, other British
colonies and Ireland, the English branch being known as
the Irish Republican Brotherhood. The main objects were
to separate Canada and Ireland from Great Britain and
combine them into an Irish republic. Nearly a quarter of
a million members were represented at a congress at
Chicago in 1863. Immense sums of money and stores of
arms were collected, secret drills went on in all parts of
the English-speaking world, newspapers and pamphlets
were distributed broadcast. Several risings were
attempted in Ireland, but with no success.   Then an
attempt was made to invade Canada after the American
civil war, supported by a sort of fleet in the
neighbourhood of Niagara. The British and Canadians,
however, were warned in good time by informers the
invasion was nipped in the bud and many of its leaders
were hanged. A second attempt on Canada took place in
1871, but was frustrated by the United States
Government.

From 1872 onwards, the Fenians were organised on far
more secret lines, adopting Anarchist methods and
encouraging a long series of murders. One of their
leaders, Patrick Ford, editor of the "Irish News" of New
York, founded a secret "Skirmishing Fund," in 1875 for
plots, as he afterwards admitted, "to lay the big cities of
England in ashes." He organised a band of assassins and
dynamiters whom Lord James of Hereford described as"
enemies of the human race, the lowest and most
degraded of beings, unfit to be regarded as belonging to
the human community." They were responsible for the
Land League in 1880 and the Phoenix Park, Dublin,
murders in 1882. Their agents were known as
Moonlighters and Invincibles. They established a reign
of terror that lasted until 1885, not only in Ireland, but
using dynamite to blow up public buildings in London,
Glasgow, Liverpool and elsewhere. They would
doubtless have accomplished far more than they did, but
for what Sir William Nott-Bower, the City of London
Police Commissioner, calls "a merciful dispensation of
Providence."  "When three Irishmen conspired to commit
crime," he says, "one at least (often all three) turned
traitor and endeavoured to secure safety _and profit_ for
himself at the expense of his confederates, quite
regardless of honour among thieves or the always much
vaunted patriotism."

The next important nationalist society in Ireland was
known as Sinn Fein (Ourselves Alone) and concerned
itself at first with propagating the idea of complete Irish
independence, discouraging enlistment and resisting all
Parliamentary parties. In 1915, when recruits were being
sought for the great war, a counter-body of Irish
Volunteers was formed, adhering to the old tradition that
"England's danger is Ireland's opportunity." They
organised a violent, but brief and abortive rebellion at
Dublin during Easter week 1916, and shot many
blameless people in the back. Being still refused Home
Rule, they proceeded to take it by forming a government
and parliament of their own and securing considerable
power without official recognition. By the year 1920,
they controlled all Irish local authorities outside Ulster,
and administered justice in their own courts, carrying out
their sentences according to the methods of secret
murder associations. Their defiance soon prevailed over
a weak British government and an act of Parliament
constituted an Irish Free State in 1922 under the nominal
sovereignty of the British Monarch. Even that loose rein
was, however, intolerable to the extremists. Sinn Fein
persisted in its agitation and returned a large minority of
members at the general elections of 1927.

Once again, secret societies have triumphed only to reap
a harvest of dead sea fruit. Privy conspiracy, internecine
struggles, mutual hatred continue with even greater
malignancy than under alien rule. Commerce and
industry are dead or dying. Prosperity remains an illusive
dream. The Irish are evidently condemned, as Lord
Salisbury foretold, to stew for ever in their own juice.


AUTHORITIES

J. Frost:   "The Secret Societies of the European
Revolution". London, 1876.

J. Rutherford: "The Secret History of the Fenian
Conspiracy". London, 1877.

Gilbert: "History of the Irish Confederation.  
Dublin, 1882-91". 7 vols.

C. F. Doewsett: "Striking Events in Irish History". 1890.

Sir William Nott-Bower: "Fifty-two years a Policeman".
London, 1926.

[Tomas O'Crohan]

"Once again, secret societies have triumphed only to reap
a harvest of dead sea fruit. Privy conspiracy, internecine
struggles, mutual hatred continue with even greater
malignancy than under alien rule. Commerce and
industry are dead or dying. Prosperity remains an illusive
dream. The Irish are evidently condemned, as Lord
Salisbury foretold, to stew for ever in their own juice.'

Typical limey tripe. They have the insight of squash (our own Travis excepted, of course).

[Helphand]

Yeah I thought this last one was a bit "ripe", still, it gets the thought juices flowing.

Incidentally the dates looked wrong - they're so stated in the book but the context indicates an error.

[CrackSmokeRepublican]

Great stuff H.H.!  I had know idea... seriously...

[mchawe]

More may follow if I can be bothered.

Go for it !
 It is greatly appreciated !

[pas]

Thanks HelpHand, i second CSR and Mchawe.