LETTERS TO THE EDITOR.
(Letters of the length of one of our leading paragraphs are often more read, and therefore more effective, than Those which Oil treble the space.] THE IRISH CRISIS.
[To THE EDITOR OF THE "SPECTATOR,"] 8,a,—The cynical Irishman (and what educated Irishman is not a cynic nowadays ?) has observed with some amusement the manoeuvres of the "Labour Delegation" now visiting Ireland "in order to see things for themselves." As was expected, though they have seen representatives of various interests and parties, they have not interviewed a single official—they have probably accepted the Nationalist doctrine that all officials in Ireland are Englishmen or Protestants, whereas, of course, nearly all are Roman Catholics, and practically all are Irish- men. Further, though invited by the Lord-Lieutenant to an interview and a lunch, they refused to go, whereas they dined with the Irish Dominion League. That is, they listened to the views of Sir Horace Plunkett's tiny party, which shrieks every week in the columns of the Irish Statesman its denunciations of the Lord-Lieutenant personally and his Government. They refused to hear the Lord-Lieutenant himself, though he gave them every opportunity. Yet already they pose as complete experts on the Irish question.
Last week a policeman was brutally murdered in cold blood at Thurles in Co. Tipperary, and the local police, getting momentarily out of hand, fired into the houses of twelve prominent Sinn Feiners of the town. No one was hurt, and the police returned quietly to barracks. It is of course impossible to say 'whether this emeute was the result of the work of a Sinn Fein agent provocateur, but the Labour Delegation, arriving opportunely next day in Thurles, were shown round the broken glass with obvious satisfaction by their Nationalist conductors, and they were able at once to pronounce their verdict that "this was the result of Castle misrule." They did not say that this was the first time that any such thing had occurred, that there had been numerous brutal murders of police, some in this very district, without a word of protest from the local Sinn Feiners : in fact, some of them had stood laughing when Mr. Hunt, the District Inspector, lay murdered In Thurles some months ago; and two police barracks within a radius of five miles had been, the night before, subject to all- night attacks with rifles and bombs—i.e., with intent to kill.
Needless to say, there has been no " misrule " in Ireland : the Irish during the war have been subjected to certain restric- tions (though not nearly so many or so severe as the inhabit- ants of Great Britain), but such as existed were in process of removal, and the removal has only been checked by reason of the series of unprovoked and brutal murders against which even the Roman Catholic Church has now begun to protest.
When the American Government deported 4,000 Bolsheviks the Labour leaders did not pronounce pontifically against " coercion." And when a fierce mob sacked a large district in Liverpool and did 2100,000 worth of damage they did not say that it was caused by "Whitehall misrule "—they, being decent, law-abiding men, were probably on the side of the authority, as they would realize, as they live in England, that in the face of determined law-breaking, even to the point of murder, civilized government must assert itself or perish. They seem incapable of realizing, as they would if they lived in Ireland, that life and property must be protected, even if rules and regulations annoy the innocent.
The following account of an attack on a police barrack shows what the Government is up against in Ireland, and why it is not unnatural for the police, who know exactly who does these things but cannot get evidence because of universal terrorism, to retaliate. "The first we heard of it," says my informant, "was when the butler appeared at the door, saying : You can get ready, Sir, they're firing in the yard.'" It should be explained that the police barrack is about 300 yards from the house on the public road; and the butler's house, where his family was, is next door. Both are smallish houses built of galvanized sheeting lined with wood, and the Sinn Feiners bravely took cover behind the butler's house, knowing that the police would not fire in that direction for fear of hitting the children through the thin walls. The account con- tinues: "We found, however, that the enemy were no nearer than the barrack. The noise was pretty bad—bullets whizzed by close to the house, and the bad explosions shook everything in the room. It lasted from 9 till 10.15 p.m., and then all was still, and we did not know how things had gone, but conjectured all was well as they did not come up to the house. So we retired to bed at 12.30. It was evidently a big attack—the roads were barricaded and the barrack 'was surrounded on all sides—it was held well by a sergeant and four men." Apparently the trees were cut and sentries posted shortly after dark, and no one was allowed to pass—a lady in the neighbourhood had been giving a tea party and her guests were not allowed to go to their respective homes. In this way no alarm could be given —one of the police who was out off duty was bound and blind- folded.
"No one knows why the assailants got the wind up, but they bolted, leaving cross-bars, hammers, two long ladders, three live bombs, some tins of petrol, and a bag of turf behind them : they evidently meant to burn the barrack. There are several theories—one, that the police got a group of them with a Mills bomb; two, that they were frightened by the Vgry pistols fired by the police, which lit up the wood where they were; three, that, being on both sides of the wood, they were firing at each other and got demoralized. However, whatever it was, the result was good from our point of view. None of the police were hit, but a hole was blown in the top of the barrack, windows were broken, and there were many bullet-holes in the barrack and in the butler's house. It was a pitch-dark night, and we "don't know if any of the enemy were hit. The house- hold behaved very well on the whole. . . . It should be noted that the Sinn Fein army in these parts consists mostly of shop- boys and well-to-do farmers' son, not labourers."
The above reads like an account of doings in the Wild West, or in Sicily under the Camorra. No Mr. Asquith foams at the mouth and appeals to the goddess of Liberty and the spirit of Nationalism when the Sheriff in Texas strings up a "gunman," or the Carabinieri of Syracuse round up or pistol the members of the Secret Society : why should that respectable bureaucrat talk nonsense when the Government tries to stop this sort of thing in Ireland ? and why should he be listened to in England ?
The difficulty is to cope, by legal methods, with the forms of
illegal warfare described above. And, if the murders continue, the long-suffering inhabitants of the South and West of Ireland will be compelled to take the law into their own hands. Possibly some young gentlemen who have been fighting Huns in Flanders, and who did not altogether dislike it, may feel impelled to offer their services to fight Huns in Clare or Tip- perary or Kerry (where the local Huns have recently cut off a man's ears with a pair of wool-clippers). If so, they will be warmly welcome : they will be assured of excitement, and they may have the chance of getting some of the brutes who put a ramshackle cottage containing, as they knew, women and children, between their fire and the fire of the men whom they were attempting to muider for doing their duty.—I am, Sir,
Q.
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