1 Cork City & County Archives: Through War and Rebellion: Cork 1912-1918

SP1912-18, 1914 de Roiste ©Cork City and County Archives 2015

2 Cork City & County Archives: Through War and Rebellion: Cork 1912-1918

Year: 1914 U271/A/16 pp. 101-102 (31 December 1914) De Roiste Diaries

Background

War in Europe broke out on 4 August 1914 after the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand of

Austria by Serbian nationalist Gavrilo Princip. Austria declared war on Serbia and Russia went to

support Austria. Germany, France, and Britain all joined the conflict. The British Expeditionary Force

(BEF) had been moved to southern Belgium to help stop the Germans, the first troops arriving with

Sir John French on 12 August 1914. In a speech on 20 September 1914, Irish Parliamentary Party

leader John Redmond committed the 200,000 Irish Volunteers to fight for Britain. The Volunteers

were a paramilitary group set up to defend Home Rule, which passed into law on 18 September but

was suspended for the course of the war. Redmond’s speech led to a split in the Irish Volunteers

when Eoin MacNeill rejected Redmond’s call to war on 24 September, but the vast majority

(175,000) supported Redmond, becoming known as the National Volunteers. Many expected to be

‘home by Christmas’, and to see Home Rule in place in 1915. However, at the First Battle of Ypres on

19 October, the BEF took casualties of 2,368 officers and 55,787 men killed or injured, practically

wiping it out as a force, and other troops from around the British Empire were dispatched to dig

trenches across Belgium and France and defend the ground they held. At home, a rump of 13,500 in

the Irish Volunteers remained. It was this group that was involved in the Easter Rising of 1916.

The document

Liam De Roiste was a Gaelic scholar and republican. He kept a diary throughout the period of the

revolution and is an extremely important source for any historians who write about the period.

These documents are two pages from his diary, and discuss the Pro German comments of his fellow

Gaelic scholar Kuno Meyer (a German) in New York. He then compares the current period with the

previous great rebellion in 1798.

Liam De Roiste was born in 1882 in Tracton, County Cork. An Irish language speaker and enthusiast,

he was founder member, in 1899, of the Cork branch of Conradh na Gaeilge (Gaelic League). He was

a founder member of Coláiste na Mumhan in Ballingeary. He founded the Cork Industrial

Development Association alongside George Crosbie of the Cork Examiner. He chaired Sinn Fein’s first

meeting in Cork in 1906, which was attended by Eoin MacNeill and Douglas Hyde. He was a

prominent member of Irish Volunteers movement, taking part in the march to Macroom on Easter

Sunday 1916 and later smuggling arms for the I.R.A.

He was elected a TD (MP) for Cork in both 1918 and 1921. In 1921, a force of 'Black and Tans' raided

his home in Sunday's Well and murdered Rev. Seamus O'Callaghan, probably intending to

assassinate De Roiste. He was Leas Ceann Comhairle (Deputy Chairman) of Dáil Éireann, and

presided over many of the debates on the Anglo-Irish Treaty in December-January 1921-22. He took

the pro-Treaty side, and was elected as a pro-Treaty candidate in June 1922. In the lead up to Civil

War, he was part of a group that tried unsuccessfully to reconcile the pro- and anti- Treaty sides, but

in doing so, he alienated many of his supporters, and his future career in national politics was

effectively ended.

He stood unsuccessfully as a Cumann na nGael candidate at the June 1927 general election and

served as an alderman on Cork Corporation (now Cork City Council) from 1920-1922 until its

suspension. He was elected one of three Cumann na Gael members of the reformed Cork

Corporation in March 1929. He lost his Cork Corporation seat in 1930. In 1936-1937 he formed the

3 Cork City & County Archives: Through War and Rebellion: Cork 1912-1918

Irish Christian Front to support Franco in the Spanish Civil War with Alfred O'Rahilly (1884-1969). He

was a councillor for the Cork Civic Party for two periods from 1945-1950. He was secretary and

Director of the Irish International Trading Corporation, Cork. He was a lifelong member of the St.

Vincent De Paul Society. He died on 15 May 1959 and buried at St.Joseph's Cemetery, Cork. (A

biography of De Roiste, by Diarmuid O'Murchadha, was published in 1976)

Project Work

This document lends itself to project work using De Roiste’s comparison between 1914 and 1798

and working out references mentioned such as Grattan’s Parliament.

Some of de Roiste’s diaries are being published online on our website, allowing his activities and

opinions on Ireland and Europe in 1914-15 to be studied in greater detail.

Instructions

1. Read through the document.

2. Highlight the names of people, sentences, or words you do not understand.

3. Highlight any words you cannot read.

4. Fill in the recording sheet supplied and attach it to the document.

5. Optional: 5.a Pick any two of the people that De Roiste mentions and research them (or De Roiste

himself) on the internet. Write a report on them and include references to at least two different

sources explaining why you chose these. And/or 5.b This is a link to Kuno Meyer’s speech which

resulted in his name being removed from the list of the Freedom of Cork. Jim Larkin also spoke at

the meeting. Write and deliver a speech either attacking or defending both men.

6. Store the completed work as directed by your teacher.

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Further research and sources

CORK CITY AND COUNTY ARCHIVES CATALOGUE

This diary entry comes from collection U271 Liam de Roiste Papers:

http://catalogue.corkarchives.ie/Details/archive/110000722

Register of Honorary Burgesses (freemen) of Cork:

http://catalogue.corkarchives.ie/Details/archive/110004336

Minute book of the short-lived Cork Civic Party, 1946-48:

http://catalogue.corkarchives.ie/Details/archive/110000370

Records of St Joseph’s Cemetery, Cork: http://catalogue.corkarchives.ie/Details/archive/110004282

CORK CITY AND COUNTY ARCHIVES WEBSITE

Diaries of Liam De Roiste T.D. Nov. 1914 - Dec. 1915

http://www.corkarchives.ie/collections/onlinedigitalarchive/liamderoistetddiaries/

U271 De Roiste Papers collection-level descriptive list:

http://www.corkarchives.ie/media/U271web.pdf

Search St Joseph’s registers online:

http://www.corkarchives.ie/collections/onlinedigitalarchive/stjosephscemeteryregisters/

Original records may be consulted at the Archives by appointment

ELSEWHERE AND ONLINE

National Archives of Ireland Bureau of Military History Liam De Roiste 1698

http://www.bureauofmilitaryhistory.ie/reels/bmh/BMH.WS1698%20PART%201.pdf

http://www.bureauofmilitaryhistory.ie/reels/bmh/BMH.WS1698%20PART%202.pdf

Parts one and two of Liam De Roiste’s 385 page statement to the Bureau of Military History which

covers the period from 1901 to 1918.

National Library of Ireland Photographic Archive

http://www.nli.ie/

Excellent archive of many of the events surrounding the 1916 rebellion

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Archives.org Grattan’s Parliament: before and after.

http://www.archive.org/stream/grattansparliame00bodkuoft#page/n359/mode/2up

This is a very long and detailed book about the history of Grattan’s Parliament and the Act of Union.

Particularly useful for portraits of the main individuals, and for explaining the causes of the 1798

rebellion.

UCC Multitext Project in Irish History: The 1798 Rebellion in Wexford

http://multitext.ucc.ie/d/The_1798_Rebellion_in_Wexford

Very detailed history of the 1798 Rebellion on Wexford with good detail on the origin of the United

Irishmen

Houses of the Oireachtas: Parliament in Ireland

http://www.oireachtas.ie/parliament/about/history/parliamentinireland/

The official Irish parliament’s history of parliamentary government in Ireland

History Ireland New Light on Lord Edward Fitzgerald

http://www.historyireland.com/18th-19th-century-history/new-light-on-lord-edward-fitzgerald/

Lord Edward Fitzgerald was one of the leaders of the 1798 rebellion and this article is about a new

cache of documents which shows him in a different light. See also

Library Ireland Wolfe Tone

http://www.libraryireland.com/biography/TheobaldWolfeTone.php

National 1798 Rebellion Centre

http://1798centre.ie/

Peach Productions 1798 Battle of Vinegar Hill

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hYtEic7UE8U

Youtube video of the final battle of the Wexford Rebellion at Vinegar Hill

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RTE.IE Century Ireland Lord Aberdeen and the office of Lord Lieutenant in the Home Rule era

http://www.rte.ie/centuryireland/articles/irelands-lord-lieutenant-a-fount-of-all-that-slimy-in-our-

national-life

New York Times

IRISH JOIN GERMANS TO SWAY SENTIMENT http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-

free/pdf?res=950CE1DA1438E633A2575BC1A9649D946596D6CF

New York Times article about Kuno Meyer’s speech in New York which led directly to De Roiste’s

comments. The article includes comments by Jim Larkin the founder of the ITGWU (and workers’

leader during the 1913 Dublin Lockout’.

Book Quinlivan, Aodh, The Freedom of Cork, a chronicle of honour, Collins Press, Cork, 2013

Includes entries on Kuno Meyer and Fr Peadar O Laoghaire

This Project is made possible through the support of the Heritage Council Grants Programme 2015

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Ref: U271/A/16, Diary. Collection: U271 Liam de Roiste Papers

8 Cork City & County Archives: Through War and Rebellion: Cork 1912-1918