Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of Tables
- List of Abbreviations
- Acknowledgements
- Preface
- Introduction: ‘A Piece Cut Off from the Old Sod Itself’
- Part One 1800–1914
- Part Two 1914–39
- 10 The First World War: Free Citizens of a Free Empire?
- 11 The Liverpool-Irish and the Irish Revolution
- 12 Depression, Decline and Heritage Recovery
- Bibliography
- Index
10 - The First World War: Free Citizens of a Free Empire?
from Part Two - 1914–39
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of Tables
- List of Abbreviations
- Acknowledgements
- Preface
- Introduction: ‘A Piece Cut Off from the Old Sod Itself’
- Part One 1800–1914
- Part Two 1914–39
- 10 The First World War: Free Citizens of a Free Empire?
- 11 The Liverpool-Irish and the Irish Revolution
- 12 Depression, Decline and Heritage Recovery
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
THE SUSPENSION of the Home Rule Bill in September 1914 notwithstanding, the ‘Nat-Lab’ leaders of the INP were unquestioning in support of the war effort, a stance T.P. O'Connor justified to critical compatriots in America: ‘The Irish Party, when they realised that on this occasion England was in the right, did not allow their historical wrongs to prejudice them.’ As perceived by Harford and the INP councillors, whole-hearted participation in the war would not only underwrite and guarantee the Home Rule settlement for Ireland; it would also enhance the profile (and improve the lot) of the Liverpool-Irish. Hence their support extended beyond military recruitment to special war-time labour schemes in armaments factories and on the docks, hoping thereby to enhance the future employment prospects of constituents previously doomed to ‘blind-alley’ occupations and casualism. Throughout the war, politicians and priests vied with each other in patriotic rhetoric, seeking to secure full citizenship rights for Catholics and Irish within the ‘free’ imperial framework.
A master of the ‘sound-bite’ ahead of his time, T.P. O'Connor led the way in a famous speech on ‘Our Empire’ at a recruiting rally at Tournament Hall in September 1914, recalled with glowing approval by dissident Tories in the 1930s:
Our Empire, founded on freedom, on free institutions, on the respect for nationality. We ask no man to abandon his language. We ask no man to swerve in his faith. We ask no man to swerve in his individuality. Our flag flies over a wide world and a free Empire.
Written in 1916, his contribution to Irish Heroes in the War celebrated the alacrity with which the Irish in Britain had rushed to the ranks:
the principles for which Irishmen had fought all their lives were revealed to them, as in a flash, as the great spiritual and fundamental issues of the War.
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- Information
- Irish, Catholic and ScouseThe History of the Liverpool-Irish, 1800-1940, pp. 249 - 262Publisher: Liverpool University PressPrint publication year: 2007