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Moritz, Verena
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World War One Veterans in Austria and Czechoslovakia.
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Whose Country, Whose Soldiers, Whose Responsibility? First World War Ex-Servicemen and the Development of the Irish Free State, 1923–1939
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 06 January 2014
Abstract
How new states dealt with minority populations and developed (or failed to develop) strong and secure government institutions are significant research areas in the history of states born in the aftermath of the First World War. This article examines how Irish First World War veterans served as transitional figures during the state-building phase of the Irish Free State in the 1920s and 1930s. Though they are often presented as categorically maligned or forgotten victims of a period of rising nationalism, this article argues that the ex-servicemen, despite the imperial legacies they represented, were popularly supported during the 1920s and early 1930s, and even served as vehicles through which the Free State cemented its stability and defined its independence and obligations in the international and domestic arenas.
Quelle patrie les soldats ont-ils servi et qui en est responsable? les vétérans de la première guerre mondiale et le développement de l’état libre d’irlande, 1923–1939
La manière dont les nouveaux états ont traité leurs populations minoritaires et ont mis en place (ou non) des institutions gouvernementales solides et stables constitue un domaine de recherche important pour l’histoire des états nés dans la foulée de la Première Guerre mondiale. Cet article examine la manière dont les vétérans irlandais de la Grande Guerre ont servi de figures de transition lors de la phase de construction de l’État libre d’Irlande, dans les années vingt et trente. On présente souvent ces vétérans comme des victimes extrêmement calomniées ou oubliées d’une période de montée du nationalisme. Mais selon l’auteur, même si les anciens soldats représentaient l’empire britannique, ils ont bénéficié dans les années vingt et au début des années trente du soutien populaire, au point de servir d’intermédiaires dans les efforts de l’État libre pour renforcer sa stabilité et définir son indépendance et ses obligations à l’échelle nationale et internationale.
Wessen land, wessen soldaten, wessen verantwortung? weltkriegsveteranen und die herausbildung des irischen freistaats (1923–1939)
Der Umgang mit Minderheiten und der Aufbau starker, zuverlässiger staatlicher Institutionen (oder dessen Scheitern) zählen zu den wichtigen Forschungsschwerpunkten in der Geschichte der neuen Staaten, die nach dem Ersten Weltkrieg entstanden. Dieser Beitrag untersucht, inwiefern irische Veteranen während der Aufbauphase des Irischen Freistaats in den zwanziger und dreißiger Jahren als Übergangsfiguren dienten. Die Weltkriegsveteranen werden häufig als kategorisch verleumdete oder vergessene Opfer einer von wachsendem Nationalismus geprägten Zeit dargestellt. Dieser Beitrag vertritt jedoch die These, dass sie – auch wenn sie ein Vermächtnis des britischen Empire waren – während der zwanziger und frühen dreißiger Jahre allgemein unterstützt wurden und für den Irischen Freistaat sogar als Vehikel zur Zementierung seiner Stabilität und zur Definition seiner Unabhängigkeit sowie seiner nationalen und internationalen Verpflichtungen dienten.
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References
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19 Jackson, Ireland, 1798–1998, 215–43. While Jackson argues that the decline of the Unionist movement was related to a failure of the cohesion between landed and commercial capital, he notes the role of the First World War in literally killing off part of this population as well.
20 Leonard, ‘Getting Them at Last’, 118–29; Leonard, ‘Facing “The Finger of Scorn”’, 59–72.
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34 Here we need to keep in mind that the 235,000 estimate does include soldiers from both north and south; reliable statistics to separate them do not exist, as the island was not partitioned until 1921. While these numbers unfortunately cannot be split out by north and south, we should remember that such a formal distinction is partially anachronistic and did not exist until several years after the close of the war. The impression of sizeable Irish participation in the imperial conflict was a cultural constant more than six years in the making before the political establishment of the formal geographic split.
35 Fitzpatrick, ‘Home Front and Everyday Life’, 135.
36 William Archer Redmond, Dáil Debates, 21, 16 Nov. 1927.
37 Redmond, Dáil Debates, 21, 16 Nov. 1927.
38 ‘150,000 Ex-Servicemen Resident in Free State’, Irish Independent, 31 Jan. 1929, 11.
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40 As these ex-servicemen served in the British armed forces, it is the British system, and not the Irish one, that is relevant here, despite the change in citizenship.
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56 ‘Touching Tributes to Fallen’, Irish Independent, 12 Nov. 1929, 8.
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58 Leonard, ‘The Twinge of Memory’, 99–114, 104.
59 ‘World-wide Celebrations of Remembrance Day’, 9; Mary Ryan, ‘Letters to the Editor’, The Irish Times, 18 Nov. 1927, 7.
60 Fleury, ‘Earl Haig's Poppy Fund’, 4.
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66 ‘Remembrance Day’, Weekly Irish Times, 14 Nov. 1936, 10; ‘Remembrance Day’, The Irish Times, 10 Nov. 1939, 7. The Irish Emergency was a martial law system declared during the country's official neutrality in the Second World War.
67 ‘Cork Parades’, Irish Independent, 8 Nov. 1937, 6.
68 ‘Letters to the Editor Armistice Day’, The Irish Times, 10 Nov. 1930, 6.
69 ‘Report on the Committee on Claims on British Ex-Servicemen’ (Dublin: The Stationery Office, 1929). See also ‘150,000 Ex-Servicemen Resident in Free State’, Irish Independent, 31 Jan. 1929, 11.
70 Ibid.
71 Dáil Debates 21–3, 16 Nov. 1927.
72 ‘Report on the Committee on Claims on British Ex-Servicemen’, 2.
73 Ibid.
74 ‘Ex-Servicemen in the Free State’, The Irish Times, 31 Jan. 1929, 7.
75 First Report of the Irish Sailors and Soldiers Land Trust, 1st January 1924 to 31st March 1926 (London: HMSO, 1927), 7; Aalen, F. H. A., ‘Homes for Irish Heroes: Housing under the Irish Land (Provision for Soldiers and Sailors) Act 1919, and the Irish Sailors’ and Soldiers’ Land Trust’, The Town Planning Review, 59, 3 (1988), 308–9CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
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77 Aalen, ‘Homes for Irish Heroes: Housing under the Irish Land (Provision for Soldiers and Sailors) Act 1919, and the Irish Sailors’ and Soldiers’ Land Trust’, 309–10.
78 Ibid. 305.
79 Ibid. 311–12.
80 Dáil Debates 5, 1 Nov. 1923.
81 Dáil Debates 35, 12 June 1930.
82 Great Britain, Local Government Board, Annual Report of the Local Government Board for Ireland, for the Year Ended 31st March, 1920, Being the Forty-Eighth Report under ‘the Local Government Board (Ireland) Act, 1872’, 35 and 36, VIC, c.69, 861; ‘Ex-Service Men in the Free State’, The Irish Times, 31 Jan. 1929, 7.
83 First Report of the Irish Sailors and Soldiers Land Trust, Second Report of the Irish Sailors and Soldiers Land Trust, 1st April 1926 to 31st March 1927 (London: HMSO, 1928).
84 ‘Voluntary Recruiting in Ireland’, The Irish Times, 4 June 1918, 3.
85 First Report of the Irish Sailors and Soldiers Land Trust, 1st January 1924 to 31 March 1926, 20–1; ‘No Rent Payable by British Ex-Service Men’, Weekly Irish Times, 5 Aug. 1933, 1; ‘No Rent’, Weekly Irish Times, 5 Aug. 1933, 4.
86 ‘No Rent Payable by British Ex-Service Men’, 1; ‘No Rent’, 4.
87 Ibid.
88 ‘The President May Intervene’, The Sunday Independent, 23 Feb. 1936, 8.
89 ‘No Rent Payable by British Ex-Service Men’, 1.
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