An Cosantóir

An Cosantóir March / April 2023 www.military.ie/magazine 28 | COMMANDERS OF THE BRITISH FORCES IN IRELAND 1796 – 1922 On the afternoon of Monday 16th January 1922, the Irish Provisional Government took overpower from the British administration at Dublin Castle. It was an event rich in history as Dublin Castle, since the Norman conquest and the consolidation of British power during the Tudor period, had a natural symbolism as the epicentre of British rule in Ireland. The Freeman's Journal noted that "the black old fortress of iniquity has fallen…the Castle as a garrison is gone; the Castle as a centre of Government has fallen." It was also the beginning of the gradual withdrawal of the British army garrison in Ireland. Although its roles have often proved controversial in the whole series of wars and conflict that have characterised the Anglo-Irish relationship, the army had also provided an important social and economic function in Ireland. For many young sons of the Irish Ascendancy class, it provided a career progression within the milieu of English society. Indeed, many of the army's most celebrated commanders, including Field Marshall Wellesley, the Duke of Wellington, victor of Waterloo and Viscount Alanbrooke, Chief of the Imperial General Staff (CIGS) during the Second World War were Irishmen born and bred. Lady Butler's painting, "Listed for the Connaught Rangers," a work of immense power and great artistry, set in Kerry, evocatively captures how for the poor urban and rural Catholic class, the army was a means of employment during times of hardship, particularly in the post-famine period. Even at this remove, many Irish families have a strong lineage with the British army stretching back generations. Tony Gaynor, Director of Governance at Maynooth University (MU), in his meticulously researched book, "Commanders of the British Forces in Ireland: 1796- 1922," focuses with a gimlet analysis on the role of these commanders of the British army in Ireland who were at the nexus of the Anglo-Irish relationship throughout a series of crisis that marked the era. Where Gaynor's work particularly excels, is in describing the often-fractious relationship between the army and the civil authority in Ireland and as to how Government policy was to be implemented. The Abercromby Affair, on the eve of the 1798 rebellion, revealed a British army commander who had genuine empathy for the Catholic populace and bemoaned the indiscipline of the Militia Regiments which he felt contributed to provoking the subsequent orgy of violence. General Arthur Paget was involved in the 1914 Curragh Mutiny 'incident' and inadvertently provoked a constitutional crisis when he advised that officers could 'absent' themselves if told to march on Ulster to enforce Home Rule. From the rebellion of 1798, through to the suppression of the Young Ireland Revolt of the 1840's, followed by the Fenian/IRB revolt of 1867, the army played a central role in maintaining the status and hegemony of the Crown. Much of this was predicated in maintaining a superb intelligence network based on informers that was critical in suppressing many of these nascent revolts. But it was in the Anglo-Irish War of 1919-21 that saw the army attempting to defeat the new generation of Irish republican militancy with the IRA at its spearhead. Here they encountered Michael Collins, who fully understood the importance of intelligence and more importantly counterintelligence, as the events of Bloody Sunday in November 1922 witnessed when the British army intelligence structure was significantly disrupted. General Macready, the British army commander, was the man assigned the task of crushing the IRA insurgency and its urban guerrilla component. It was sobering that Macready advised the then Government, that unless effectively all- out war was persecuted in Ireland, the insurgency could not be defeated. Telling Lloyd George in June 1921 to "go all out or get out" of Ireland was a defining moment and ultimately was a key enabling factor that led to the subsequent Treaty negotiations. The role of King George V is less well known, who in the same month before travelling to Belfast for the opening of the Northern Ireland Parliament at Stormont, voiced his anger at government policy in a tense meeting with Lloyd George. "Are you going to shoot all the people in Ireland?" asked the King. "No, your majesty," replied the Prime Minister. "Well then you must come to some agreement with them. The thing cannot go on. I cannot have my people killed in this manner." Following the signing of the Treaty in December 1921 after a presence that had lasted centuries, the British army 'footprint' which had been inextricably woven into the socio-economic DNA of town and cities across Ireland, was abruptly ending, whereby the military withdrawal from the 26 counties that became the Free State was effectively over in a matter of months, drawing a curtain over echoes of history that still reverberate today. Provide by Dr Rory Finegan (Comdt Retd.), Maynooth University (MU) Author: Tony Gaynor Publisher: Four Courts Press (2022) ISBN: 978-1-80151-037-0 Pages: 400 Price: €54.00

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