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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 11 July 2017
James Eadie Todd was appointed to the chair of modern history in Queen’s University, Belfast in 1919, aged thirty-four, having previously held academic posts in Edinburgh, Montreal and Halifax, Nova Scotia. Todd published almost nothing but spent his career as a teacher, and his carefully prepared formal lectures guided generations of Queen’s students to a pass degree. But he also had the ability to inspire a minority of students to the further study of history and several of his pupils went on to occupy chairs of history in Ireland and Great Britain. During the 1930s, with his former pupil T. W. Moody, he created an honours and graduate school with a strong emphasis on Irish history. Todd stressed the importance of the objective study of the sources. Behind the scenes he was instrumental, with others, in founding the Ulster Society for Irish Historical Studies and establishing Irish Historical Studies. His later years were plagued by ill health and personal bereavement. He retired in 1945 and died four years later. The article concludes with an assessment of Todd’s importance to the professionalisation of Irish historical scholarship.
1 The dean was elected by his fellow professors and served for periods of three years (renewable). His main duties were to chair faculty meetings, oversee changes in regulations and advise students on their programme of studies. The post of adviser of studies was established in 1937.
2 When Sir David Keir, a former vice-chancellor of Queen’s University, addressed the Ulster Society for Irish Historical Studies in 1966 to commemorate its thirtieth anniversary, he paid tribute to the roles of R. M. Henry, David Chart and Samuel Simms in founding the society and, ‘less directly’, to James Eadie Todd (David Keir, ‘Old ways and new in history’ in I.H.S., xv, no. 59 (Mar. 1967), p. 214). See also: F. S. L. Lyons, ‘“T.W.M.”’ in idem & R. A. J. Hawkins (eds), Ireland under the union: varieties of tension. Essays in honours of T. W. Moody (Oxford, 1980), pp 4–6; R. D. Edwards, ‘An agenda for Irish history, 1978–2018’ in Ciaran Brady (ed.), Interpreting Irish history: the debate on historical revisionism (Dublin, 1994), pp 56–7 (first published in I.H.S., xxi, no. 81 (Mar. 1978), pp 3–19).
3 H. A. Cronne to T. W. Moody, 7 Aug. 1944 (Q.U.B. Archive, QUB/J/1/20/Professor J.E. Todd). For further detail on this source, see note 14.
4 H. A. Cronne, T. W. Moody & D. B. Quinn, ‘Introduction: James Eadie Todd as historian and teacher’ in idem (eds), Essays in British and Irish history in honour of James Eadie Todd (London, 1949), p. xiv.
5 E.H.R., lxv, no. 257 (Oct. 1950), p. 563. The review was signed ‘R.P.’. It was probably written by Richard Pares, joint-editor of the E.H.R., professor of history at Edinburgh University.
6 In addition, C. M. MacInnes, a pupil of Todd’s at Dalhousie University, Halifax, Nova Scotia, became professor of imperial history at the University of Bristol.
7 Cronne spent two years at Oxford working with V. H. Galbraith and a year at the Institute of Historical Research, studying with Claude Jenkins, librarian at Lambeth Palace (Cronne to Jenkins, 22 Jan. 1931 (Lambeth Palace Library, Claude Jenkins papers, MS 1634, ff 41–5); I owe this reference to Professor David Hayton). Cronne’s publications include The reign of Stephen, 1135–54: anarchy in England (London, 1970); (ed.), Bristol charters 1378–1499 (Bristol Records Society, Bristol, 1946); (ed. with Charles Johnson), Regesta regum: Anglo-Normannorum, 1066–1154 (Oxford, 1956).
8 Moody’s thesis was nominally supervised by Todd but his director of studies was Miss E. Jeffries Davies, reader in the history and records of London. It was published as The Londonderry plantation, 1609–14: the City of London and the plantation in Ulster (Belfast, 1939). The book is dedicated to Todd.
9 Cronne, Moody & Quinn, ‘Introduction: James Eadie Todd’, pp xiv–xv.
10 Nicholas Canny, ‘Quinn, David Beers (1909–2002)’, in Dictionary of Irish Biography.
11 His importance to Irish historical studies is discussed by Alvin Jackson, ‘J. C. Beckett and the making of modern Irish historiography’ in Alvin Jackson and David N. Livingstone (eds), Queen’s thinkers; essays on the intellectual heritage of a university (Belfast, 2008), pp 149–58. See also, idem, ‘J. C. Beckett: politics, faith, scholarship’ in I.H.S., xxxiii, no. 130 (Nov. 2002), pp 129–50.
12 J. Brown, ‘J. L. McCracken – an appreciation’ in Peter Roebuck (ed.), Plantation to partition: essays in honour of J. L. McCracken (Belfast, 1981), pp 1–13; Nicholas Southey, ‘J. L. McCracken, 1914–2008’ in South African Historical Journal, lx, no. 4 (2008), pp 687–9.
13 Todd had two other assistants. D. W. Hunter Marshall (1925–8), a Glasgow graduate, went to Canada as an assistant professor of history at Winnipeg. D. M. Ketelbey was Todd’s assistant in 1931–2. Her appointment was noted in the academic council but not her academic credentials. She published A history of modern times from 1789 to the present day (London, 1929). It was reviewed favourably in History in 1930 (xv, no. 58 (July 1930), p. 138) and was a recommended text for pass students in the early 1930s. The title page describes her as ‘D. M. Ketelbey, M.A., Editor of “European History from the Fall of the Roman Empire to the Eve of the French Revolution”, etc.’ When the editors of Todd’s Festschrift wondered who might contribute Cronne remarked, ‘I don’t think it is either necessary or desirable to ask her.’ (Cronne to Moody, 24 July 1944 (Q.U.B. Archive, QUB/J/1/20/Professor J.E. Todd)). An anonymous referee tells me that Miss Ketelbey became an assistant at St Andrew’s in 1935.
14 The file once belonged to Professor Moody. It contains (a) letters sent by Cronne or Quinn to Moody; (b) letters sent to Cronne or Quinn and forwarded to Moody; (c) letters from third parties (publishers etc.) sent to Moody; (d) a typescript memoir written by Todd and discussed in the text. I can only guess how the file found its way to Queen’s. Moody possibly gave it to Beckett during the 1950s when they were writing their history of Queen’s and it remained in Beckett’s office after he retired. At some point it was handed to Mr Alf McCreary, formerly the university’s information officer, probably when he was writing Degrees of excellence (Belfast, 1994) with Professor Brian Walker. From Mr McCreary’s office the file was sent to me when the Information Office was being relocated. The file is now in the Q.U.B. Archive: QUB/J/1/20/Professor J.E. Todd.
15 J. E. Todd, ‘The apprenticeship of a professor, 1903–1919’ in History, xliv, no. 151 (June 1959), pp 124–33 (with introductory notes by H. A. Cronne).
16 Annual Record of the Queen’s University Association (1945), p. 22; (1950), pp 44–5.
17 A paper of reminiscences about Queen’s by Professor H. A. Cronne, undated, but received by the university in September 1977 (Q.U.B. Archive, QUB/J/2/Cronne, Henry Alfred (Professor)).
18 E. Estyn Evans, ‘Geography at QUB’ (Q.U.B. Archive, QUB/J/2/E Estyn Evans). Professor Evans probably wrote it for a publication edited by J. A. Campbell to mark the department of geography’s jubilee in 1978 (Q.U.B. Archive, QUB/E/4/2/43). The memoir includes pen portraits of colleagues omitted from the jubilee publication.
19 John Boyd, Out of my class (Belfast, 1985); idem, The middle of my journey (Dundonald, 1990); Hugh Shearman, A bomb and a girl (London, 1944).
20 Dalhousie University Archives and Special Collections (hereafter D.U.A.). I am grateful to Ms Dianne Landry, archivist at Dalhousie, for supplying me with copies of the correspondence. The archive also contains correspondence between the president of Dalhousie and Mrs Margaret Todd in Scotland in 1917–18, and newspaper cuttings reporting Todd’s war service.
21 These include four letters in the London School of Economics archives written in 1934 to Professor Sir Charles Webster who acted as external examiner for the D.Litt. thesis on Lord Castlereagh written by one of Todd’s pupils, H. Montgomery Hyde. (I am grateful to Professor Hayton for bringing these to my attention.) Possibly there are Todd letters among the papers of T. W. Moody in Trinity College, but these have not been available to me.
22 Todd to Beckett, May 1941 (P.R.O.N.I., Beckett papers, D41256/B/1/79). The thesis was published as Protestant dissent in Ireland, 1687–1780 (London, 1948). When the university history was published in 1959 it was as a joint authorship (T. W. Moody and J. C. Beckett, Queen’s, Belfast, 1845–1949: the history of a university (2 vols, London, 1959)).
23 A breakaway evangelical church within the Presbyterian tradition, established in 1847 by the merger of two earlier schisms.
24 J. E. Todd, unpublished memoir (Q.U.B. Archive, QUB/J/1/20/Professor J.E. Todd).
25 The letter is quoted in full in Margaret Lodge, Sir Richard Lodge: a biography (Edinburgh, 1946), p. 113, where it is attributed to ‘another of these early students’ (Lodge came to Edinburgh in 1899). The writer was identified as Todd by D. B. Horn, ‘Sir Richard Lodge and historical studies at the University of Edinburgh’ in Scottish Historical Review, xxvii, no 103 (Apr. 1948), p. 77.
26 I am grateful to Mr Grant Buttars, deputy archivist of Edinburgh University, for this information.
27 The incident is recounted also in Lodge, Sir Richard Lodge, p. 114, where Pembroke is not named, but is described as ‘one of the minor Oxford colleges’.
28 Todd, unpublished memoir.
29 R. L. Patterson, ‘Smith, Arthur Lionel (1850–1924)’, in O.D.N.B.
30 [Todd, Unpublished memoir.] Vinogradoff was a Russian-born historian and jurist. His Villainage in England (Oxford, 1892) was described by his biographer as ‘perhaps the most important book written on the peasantry of the feudal age and the village community in England’. See: Peter Stein, ‘Vinogradoff, Sir Paul Gavrilovitch [Pavel Gavriilovich Vinogradov] (1854–1925)’, in O.D.N.B.
31 P. Vinogradoff and E. Morgan, Survey of the honour of Denbigh, 1334 (British Academy Records of the Social and Economic History of England and Wales, i, London, 1914). This was a transcript of the Survey prefaced by nine introductory chapters written by members of the seminar. Todd contributed an eight-page chapter entitled ‘Agriculture’ (pp xlv–liii).
32 ‘English Register’ [minutes of Balliol College governing body], 1908–24 (unfol.), 15 Mar. 1910; ‘Papers of the History Club, 1907–09’, Minute Book (unfol.), 12, 24 Feb., 9 May 1909 (Balliol College Archives). (I owe these references to Professor Hayton.)
33 Todd, unpublished memoir.
34 Smith to Edinburgh University, 1 July 1910 (D.U.A.).
35 On the influence of Oxbridge-trained scholars on historical studies in Britain, see John Kenyon, The history men: the historical profession in England since the Renaissance (2nd ed., London, 1993), pp 206–7.
36 Todd, unpublished memoir.
37 George Unwin (1870–1925) was the son of a Stockport publican and grocer. After leaving school he worked for a firm of hat makers before winning a scholarship to University College, Cardiff at the age of twenty. Three years later he won a second scholarship to Lincoln College, Oxford where he gained a first. Another scholarship from Oriel College took him to Berlin where he met German scholars who were pioneering the study of historical economics. He returned to the London School of Economics and undertook research leading to the publication of: Industrial organization in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries (Oxford, 1904) and The gilds and companies of London (London, 1908). He was appointed to Edinburgh in 1908. See Leslie Clarkson, ‘Unwin, George (1870–1925)’ in Donald Rutherford (ed.), The biographical dictionary of British economists (2 vols, Bristol, 2004), ii, 1238–9. For Ashley, see Barbara M. D. Smith, ‘Ashley, William James (1860–1927)’, in ibid., i, 21–8. For Cunningham, see Clarkson, ‘Cunningham, William (1849–1919)’, in ibid., i, 289–94.
38 Todd, unpublished memoir.
39 Copies of the references, first used by Todd to support his application for the Edinburgh lectureship, are contained in the Dalhousie University Archives.
40 Nicholson held the Edinburgh chair from 1880 to 1925. See Donald Rutherford, ‘Nicholson, Joseph Shield (1850–1927)’ in idem, The biographical dictionary, ii, 854–8. Nicholson’s Principles ran to 1200 pages.
41 Todd, unpublished memoir. There were fourteen applicants. Apart from Todd, the name of only the runner-up is known: Norman B. Deale, M.A. (Oxon.) (Information from Mr Grant Buttars). Deale is not a name that today resonates with economic historians.
42 Todd, unpublished memoir. Frances Hannah Jagger of Leadhills, Lanarkshire, daughter of John Jagger, deceased, a Methodist minister. The marriage took place in Edinburgh on 8 July 1911. She was twenty-nine and Todd was twenty-five. She died on 20 January 1912 of pulmonary phthisis (Extracts from the Register of Marriages and Register of Deaths in Scotland, accessed via www.nrscotland.gov.uk/registration). Copies of the extracts are now among the Todd papers (Q.U.B. Archive, QUB/J/1/20/Professor J.E. Todd). This marriage was seemingly not known beyond a tight circle of Todd’s friends. The Dictionary of Irish Biography lists only Todd’s marriage in 1914 to Margaret Maybin (Timothy Bowman, ‘Todd, James Eadie (1885–1949)’, in D.I.B.).
43 Todd, unpublished memoir.
44 The inquiries were through James Seth, professor of philosophy at Edinburgh and one time professor of philosophy at Dalhousie. Seth had had Todd in his sights as early as 1912 when Todd had no intention of leaving Edinburgh. Seth, Edinburgh, to President Mackenzie, Dalhousie, 30 Jan. 1913 (D.U.A.).
45 Todd, unpublished memoir.
46 She was the daughter of William Maybin, a schoolmaster, and his wife Catherine. Both parents were dead. Margaret Maybin was twenty-nine (Extract from the Register of Marriages in Scotland, accessed via www.nrscotland.gov.uk/registration)
47 Todd, unpublished memoir.
48 Todd to President Mackenzie, Dalhousie, 13 Mar. 1916 (D.U.A).
49 On 12 April a Halifax newspaper carried the headline, ‘Dalhousie Professor makes the supreme sacrifice’, relying on a report from an army chaplain, ‘somewhere in France’. A letter from Mrs Todd eventually told the president of Dalhousie of her husband’s whereabouts (Evening Mail, 12 Apr. 1917; Mrs Margaret Todd, Elderslie, Scotland, to President Mackenzie, Dalhousie, 10 May 1917 (D.U.A.)).
50 Cronne, ‘Reminiscences’; Estyn Evans, ‘Geography at QUB’.
51 Todd, Edinburgh, to President Mackenzie, Dalhousie, 29 June 1919 (D.U.A.).
52 Todd sets these out in a letter of 4 August explaining his decision to apply for the Queen’s chair (Todd, Elderslie, Scotland to President Mackenzie, Dalhousie, 4 Aug. 1919 (D.U.A.)).
53 Minutes of Senate of Queen’s University, Belfast (Q.U.B. Archive, QUB/3/2/1/1/6, 1919), pp 185–6
54 Todd, Edinburgh, to President Mackenzie, Dalhousie, 9 Sept. 1919 (D.U.A.).
55 Todd, unpublished memoir.
56 Todd, Belfast, to President Mackenzie, Dalhousie, 14 Oct. 1919 (D.U.A.).
57 For an account of Powicke’s time at Queen’s see, Maurice Keen, ‘Maurice Powicke: medieval historical scholarship at Queen’s’ in Jackson and Livingstone (eds), Queen’s thinkers, pp 83–92.
58 In December 1918 Powicke told the university that he hoped to be back in March 1919. In February he reported that his return had been delayed ‘until the end of the session’ (Academic council minutes, vol. iii (Q.U.B. Archive, QUB/E/1/5/A/1/1918–1921)).
59 University Calendars, 1917–20 (Q.U.B. Archive, QUB/E/2/1/9/1917–18; QUB/E/2/1/10/1918–19; QUB/E/2/1/11/1919–20). Powicke’s teaching was influenced by his time in Manchester where he had studied and taught under Tait and Tout. His courses in Belfast included a special subject, ‘The History of Great Britain and Ireland 1625–1660’. See Jennifer FitzGerald, Helen Waddell and Maude Clarke. Irish women, friends and scholars (Berne, 2012), pp 31–3.
60 University Calendar, 1920–1 (Q.U.B. Archive, QUB/E/2/1/12/1920–21); William Stubbs, Select charters and other illustrations of English constitutional history: from the earliest times to the reign of Edward the First (9th ed., rev. by H. W. C. Davis, Oxford, 1913); G. W. Prothero (ed.), Select statutes and other constitutional documents illustrative of the reigns of Elizabeth and James I (Oxford, 1913).
61 Cronne, Moody & Quinn, ‘Introduction: James Eadie Todd’, p. xii.
62 For an introduction, see J. G. Edwards, William Stubbs (London, 1952).
63 Kenyon, The history men, pp 207–8. Lodge and Prothero built on the Stubbsian tradition already present in the teaching of constitutional history in the law faculties. See Robert Anderson, ‘University teaching, national identity and unionism in Scotland, 1862–1914’ in Scottish Historical Review, xci, no. 1 (Apr. 2012), pp 1–41; idem, ‘The development of history teaching in the Scottish universities, 1894–1939’ in Journal of Scottish Historical Studies, xxxii, no. 1 (May 2012), pp 50–73.
64 And what R. F. Treharne imposed on Welsh students in University College, Aberystwyth according to my former colleague Dr Alun Davies, who was an undergraduate there.
65 University Calendar, 1928–9 (Q.U.B. Archive, QUB/E/2/1/20/1928–29).
66 J. W. B[lake], ‘J. E. Todd. An appreciation’ in Annual Record of the Queen’s University Association (Belfast, 1950), pp 44–5.
67 In 1921–2 Todd delivered 225 lectures to thirty-one students (Vice-Chancellor’s annual report, 1921–22 (Q.U.B. Archive, QUB/3/2/1/1/9)). Two years later there were sixty-four students and Todd gave 239 lectures, with his assistant conducting tutorials (Annual report, 1923–24 (Q.U.B. Archive, QUB/3/2/1/1/10)). In 1928–9 there were sixty-five students in modern history and thirty-seven education students reading history. Todd gave 298 lectures and tutorials and Cronne, his assistant, fifty-four. G. R. Potter had twenty-nine students in medieval history and gave 317 lectures (Annual report, 1928–29 (Q.U.B. Archive, QUB/3/2/1/1/12)).
68 Todd’s chair was in modern history, following the then usual practice of dividing history into ancient and modern periods, the division being the collapse of the Roman empire.
69 L. A. Clarkson, ‘Introduction: K. H. Connell and economic and social history at Queen’s University, Belfast’ in J. M. Goldstrom and L. A. Clarkson (eds), Irish population, economy, and society: essays in honour of the late K. H. Connell (Oxford, 1981), p. 3.
70 Lyons, ‘“T.W.M.”’, pp 8–9. Her best-known book is probably Dublin under the Georges, 1714–1830 (London, 1936).
71 R. W. Dudley Edwards, ‘T. W. Moody and the origins of Irish Historical Studies: a biographical memoir’ in I.H.S., xxvi, no. 101 (May 1988), pp 1–2; R. B. McDowell and D. A. Webb, Trinity College Dublin 1592-–1952: an academic history (Dublin, 1982), pp 412, 458.
72 The assistantship had been vacated by Cronne in 1931. Ketelbey’s appointment (1931–2) was almost certainly intended as a stopgap until Moody was ready to return.
73 The details are taken from Q.U.B., Minutes of the faculty of arts, vol. iv (Q.U.B. Archive, QUB/E/4/1/B/1933–37).
74 These included Edward Hyde, earl of Clarendon, History of the rebellion and civil wars in Ireland (London, 1720); ‘Project for the plantation of the escheated lands in Ulster’ in Cal. Carew MSS, 1515–74, vi, 13–22; T. W. Moody (ed.), ‘The revised articles of the Ulster plantation, 1610’ in Bulletin of the Institute of Historical Research, xii, no. 36 (Feb. 1935), pp 178–83; excerpts from The earl of Strafforde’s letters and dispatches, with an essay towards his life, by Sir George Radcliffe (2 vols, London, 1739).
75 These included Richard Bagwell, Ireland under the Tudors: with a succinct account of the earlier history (3 vols, London, 1885–90); Agnes Conway, Henry VII’s relations with Scotland and Ireland, 1485–1498 (Cambridge, 1932); Philip Wilson, The beginnings of modern Ireland (Dublin, 1914); W. F. T. Butler, Confiscation in Irish history (London, 1918), chapter one; idem, ‘The policy of surrender and regrant’ in idem, Gleanings from Irish history (London, 1925); Edmund Spenser, ‘A view of Irish history in 1596’ in Constantia Maxwell (ed.), Irish history from contemporary sources (London, 1923).
76 See Michelle O’Riordan, ‘Ireland, 1600–1780: new approaches’ in Mary McAuliffe, Katherine O’Donnell & Leeann Lane (eds), Palgrave advances in Irish history (Basingstoke, 2009), pp 49–94.
77 This comment was prompted by a letter from a schoolteacher, Daniel Liddy, in Waterford in February 1946. When Liddy heard of the Festschrift he contacted Moody claiming to be a ‘personal friend of Mr Todd’s’ and noting that the name of Dr Patrick Rogers of St Malachy’s College (‘one of Professor Todd’s most brilliant students’) was not on the list of contributors and there was no plan to include an article written in Irish. Liddy offered to write a paper himself. When Cronne saw the letter he told Moody: ‘I quite see the type he [Liddy] represents – and I feel that any reflection of the opinions of such people in the Todd volume would be most undesirable.’ He continued, ‘any sort of party statement, whether in English or in Irish, would be not only out of place, but positively harmful’. (Liddy to Moody, 22 Feb. 1946; Cronne to Moody, 28 Feb. 1946). Rogers, in fact, became a contributor. These and subsequent quotations are from the letters contained in Q.U.B. Archive, QUB/J/1/20/Professor J.E. Todd.
78 Lyons, ‘“T.W.M.”’, p. 4.
79 See the discussion in Ciaran Brady, ‘“Constructive and instrumental”: the dilemma of Ireland’s first “new historians”’ in idem (ed.), Interpreting Irish history, pp 3–31, and especially Brendan Bradshaw, ‘Nationalism and historical scholarship in modern Ireland’ in ibid., pp 191–216 (first published in I.H.S., xxvi, no. 97 (Nov. 1989), pp 329–51). On mythology see T. W. Moody, ‘Irish history and Irish mythology’ in ibid., pp 71–86 (first published in Hermathena, cxxiv (1978), pp 7–24). Patrick Maume has pointed out that whatever Moody and Edwards were aiming for was not ‘value-free’ history. ‘On the contrary it could be argued that it reflects an ethical commitment to civic peace through mutual recognition of the Other based on a common ground of scholarly technique’ (Patrick Maume, ‘Irish political history’ in McAuliffe, O’Donnell & Lane (eds), Palgrave advances in Irish history, p. 3).
80 Brady, ‘“Constructive and instrumental”’, pp 3–6.
81 Maume, ‘Irish political history’, p. 2. For the extensive debate on revisionism see Brady (ed.), Interpreting Irish history, passim.
82 See Bradshaw, ‘Nationalism and historical scholarship in modern Ireland’, p. 191.
83 Quoted in Lyons, ‘“T.W.M.”’, p. 2.
84 Cronne, ‘Reminiscences’.
85 Quinn to Moody, 11 July 1944 (Q.U.B. Archive, QUB/J/1/20/Professor J.E. Todd).
86 Isabel Megaw went to the Institute of Historical Research to work on medieval ecclesiastical history with Cronne.
87 Three former colleagues, Betts, Blake and Hughes, contributed essays. G. R. Potter was unable to prepare something in time. The final essay was by C. M. McInnes, a former pupil from Dalhousie.
88 Keir, ‘Old ways and new in history’, p. 214.
89 Estyn Evans, ‘Geography at QUB’.
90 Cronne, ‘Reminiscences’.
91 Cronne, Moody & Quinn, ‘Introduction: James Eadie Todd’, pp xi–xii. The Mazzini reference is to an incident said to have occurred in Milan when Giuseppe Mazzini was leading the revolt against Austrian rule in 1848.
92 Teresa M. O’Connor, Dungiven, Co. Londonderry, to Moody, T.C.D., 18 Sept. 1944 (Q.U.B. Archive, QUB/J/1/20/Professor J.E. Todd).
93 Boyd, Out of my class, p. 110. Boyd also recalled a conversation with E. R. R. (Rodney) Green, later director of the Institute of Irish Studies at Queen’s. Green spent a year at Q.U.B. in the early 1940s before transferring to Trinity College. Boyd asked Green what he studied. ‘History, mostly. At least that’s what they called the garbage.’ (Boyd, The middle of my journey, p. 10).
94 Shearman, A bomb and a girl, quotation at p. 54. Shearman’s claim that no character in his novel resembled staff or students is unconvincing. Shearman later became a ‘moderate apologist’ for Ulster unionism. See Gillian McIntosh, The forces of culture: unionist identity in contemporary Ireland (Cork 1999), pp 190–4.
95 Cronne to Moody, 7 Aug. 1944; Blake to Moody, 10 Dec. 1944; Cronne to Moody, 10 Jan. 1945; Blake to Moody, 26 Jan. 1945; Blake to Moody, 18 Feb. 1945; Cronne to Moody, 17 May 1945; Blake to Moody, 22 May 1945; Quinn to Moody, 29 May 1945; Cronne to Moody, 19 Dec. 1945 (Q.U.B., Archive, QUB/J/1/20/Professor J.E. Todd).
96 Cronne, ‘Reminiscences’.
97 Todd, unpublished memoir.
98 A. L. Smith, Balliol, to Edinburgh University, 1 July 1910; Todd, McGill, to President Mackenzie, Dalhousie, 17 Jan. 1913 (D.U.A.). There is no record of the Todd volume in the archives of Geo. Bell and Sons which are deposited at the University of Reading (I am grateful to the archivist for this information), but Bell and Sons were advertising it as forthcoming during the 1920s.
99 Ronald Buchanan, Noel Mitchell, et al. Mourne country revisited: a tribute to Estyn Evans (Belfast, 2000), quotation from the title page. See also Henry Glassie, ‘E. Estyn Evans and the interpretation of the Irish landscape’ in Jackson & Livingstone (eds), Queen’s thinkers, pp 131–40.
100 For Meredith, see Wesley McCann, ‘“Apostles” in Belfast: H. O. Meredith & E. M. Forster’ in Linen Hall Review, i, no. 4 (Winter 1984), pp 11–13; idem, ‘H. O. Meredith (1878–1964), professor of economics, 1911–1945’ in The Queen’s University Association Annual Review (1984 & 1985), pp 130–4; S. Gourley Putt, ‘A packet of Bloomsbury letters: the forgotten H. O. Meredith’ in Encounter, lxix (Nov. 1982), pp 77–84.
101 Cronne to Moody, 7 Aug. 1944 (Q.U.B. Archive, QUB/J/1/20/Professor J.E. Todd). In June 1945 Professor Macbeath (professor of philosophy) was worried that Moody might not be able to preside at Todd’s retirement dinner. It would then become the responsibility for the senior professor to take the chair ‘and the senior professor is Meredith & I needn’t say more’ (Macbeath to Moody, 16 June 1945 (ibid.)).
102 B[lake], ‘J. E. Todd. An appreciation’, pp 44–5. Blake was Todd’s colleague for ten years. Blake kept in touch with him after he retired and visited him in Edinburgh.
103 The phrase quoted in Lyons, ‘“T.W.M.”’, p. 2. I am grateful to Professor David Hayton, Dr Alun Davies and the late Dr Margaret Ó hÓgartaigh for comments on an earlier draft; and to Dr Margaret Crawford and Ms Ursula Mitchel, the Q.U.B. archivist, for assistance with the references.
