“Roger Casement – the Real and the Fabricated”
Jack Lane:
Text of a talk at the
Mother Jones Festival Cork,
26 July 2025
You will find more work by Jack Lane on his website https://aubanehistoricalsociety.com
This talk is a very brief outline of the case for the real Roger Casement and why we are now presented with a fabricated or concocted version of him.
Like some people here, and anyone of my vintage in particular, I was introduced to Casement at the time of his re-interment in 1965.
Two events stand out for me at the time. A meeting in University College Cork addressed by Dr. Herbert Mackeyon the ‘Black Diaries’. At the time he the leading proponent of the forgery thesis of the diaries.
That meeting was chaired by the then very radical and ostentatious Republican, friend and admirer of Tom Barry – Eoghan Harris. In his FCA trench coat he would perform at the Philosophical Society and seemed a reincarnation of Barry! And delighted to be regarded as such!
How times have changed! Oh, how people have changed.
The other event was de Valera’s Address at the re-interment event, at which he said:
“It required great courage to do what Casement did, and his name would be honoured, not merely here, but by oppressed peoples everywhere, even if he had done nothing for the freedom of our own country.”
This was true of course and de Valera was no doubt referring to Casement’s humanitarian reputation. But it left me with a bit of a puzzle. Why exactly was he hanged and his name blackened ever since—and why is it still ongoing? Surely he was not hanged for his humanitarianism—which was carried out by him on behalf of the Empire. (He went to Putumayo at the specific request of his close friend, Sir Edward Grey, the Foreign Secretary; and Casement did an excellent job as usual—but that did prevent Grey sanctioning his execution as a leading member of the cabinet that did so in 1916.)
Casement did his job and Grey did his job.
Opposition To The Rising
Was Roger Casement hanged for his part in the 1916 Rising? Not likely as he played no part in it, being in custody at the time. He came back from Germany to oppose the Rising—and the British knew this very well and prevented him from getting this message to the Irish Republican Brotherhood [IRB]leaders after he landed at Banna Strand.
So they hardly hanged him for that—for opposing the Rising?
They should have applauded him rather than hang him, surely?
So the puzzle remained.
Casement’s contribution to the Rising was echoed with just a few words in the Proclamation, where it refers to support for “our gallant allies in Europe” i.e., the Germans, a sentiment which Connolly also endorsed—though they never met—and Connolly ensured it was in the Proclamation.
But those few words were the key to get an understanding of Casement’s political position then, and his fate. That phrase unlocks what Casement really was at that point, and what he meant to the British then and since.
His was clearly not the simple Irish Republican Brotherhood position of England’s difficulty being Ireland’s opportunity. And I am not of course criticising that IRB approach – just that it was not Casement’s.
Now, Casement’s opposition to the Rising was quite understandable from his point of view: he knew that this would be a declaration of war on the Empire, and what matters in war is military success and any other approach is reckless. He knew enough about how the British Empire was built to appreciate that. The sword was mightier than the pen in building that Empire!
The likelihood of military success is also a condition for a ‘just war’, as any Catholic theologian will tell you. It is immoral to start a war you cannot hope to win.
Of course, despite a military failure, 1916 turned out to be a political success as events developed and confirmed the validity of its purpose. The 1916 leaders could claim to be successful in beginning the end of the British Empire: there seems to be a sense that all is forgiven them by the Empire! But for British historians and commentators it is clear that this not the case with Casement. Why?
Casement’s Imperial CV
A regular series of books have been appearing since the 1950s that keep painting a very negative picture, shall we say, of him. Vilifying him, in fact. Though he had served the Empire and opposed the Rising? What is going on?
To get an understanding of this, we should begin by reminding ourselves that, for about 49 of his 52 years, Casement was a committed and active British Imperialist ‘at the top of the tree’ in the British Establishment with a worldwide reputation.
He was a British Consul in ten different locations across two continents, was given the Queen’s South Africa medal for his “special services, 1899-1900” in the Boer War, was made a CMG in 1905, Knighted and given the Coronation Medal in 1911. Not many got such honours. Erskine Childers, another prominent Imperialist did not get them.
Casement was the ‘go to man’ for dealing with some problematic issues for the Empire. He was in fact a poster boy for the Empire, exposing evils in the world such as the Belgian atrocities in the Congo, and the atrocities of the rubber/robber barons in Peru.
In supporting the War on the Boers, he was at odds with Irish Republican Brotherhood and with Irish public opinion which vehemently opposed that war.
Casement As A Cultural Nationalist
Casement was an Irish cultural nationalist after the turn of the 20th century and, as with everything he did, he put his heart into it. Purely cultural nationalism is quite compatible with British Imperialism—and with any Imperialism worthy of the name! The Empire can thrive by encouraging such nationalism—as it can be quite containable politically because, in itself, it is non-political and can remain “inside the box” of the Imperial ambit.
This did not put him at odds with the Empire. So he was not hanged for that.
Home Rule And Irish Volunteers
Casement supported Home Rule and he helped organise the Irish Volunteers to bring it about, in the face of Ulster military resistance. The IRB played a part in this but only a bit part at this stage. The proof of this is that Volunteers were taken over by Redmond and Casement supported that takeover.
The Howth Gun Running was an Anglo-Irish achievement: with Casement and others to help the Government militarily ensure Home Rule. The Volunteer forerunners of the IRA came into existence to help the British Government achieve its aims.
All this was quite compatible with Imperialism as the ‘progressive’ Imperialists such as Cecil Rhodes, the greatest of them, saw Home Rule as helping to consolidate the Empire and he supported it financially and otherwise.
Of course the IRB had other ideas but they did not then determine things, as Redmond’s take-over with Casement’s support proved and events did to yet fall their way. They infiltrated the Volunteers—as they infiltrated everything that moved in Irish national and cultural spheres at home and abroad—but they were not then the driving force they later became.
What Casement was doing at that stage was fully consistent with what he then was, an Imperialist, and there is no need for any convoluted explanations for his behaviour.
He was helping to update Ireland’s role as a member of the Empire, as Redmond was also doing with Home Rule. Like millions of others for generations he saw the British Empire as a laudable and worthwhile project and served it with great, if sometimes critical, loyalty—and he was not hanged for that.
Again this activity with the Volunteers did not put him at odds with the Empire.
So Why Break With The Empire?
Why then did Roger Casement begin to break with the Empire, shortly after being knighted? And why was he hanged a few years later for High Treason to the King and Empire that had knighted him an honour which he had accepted with fulsome thanks?
His disenchantment seems to have begun with his research into the atrocities in the Putumayo which were even worse than those of the Belgian Congo in terms of torture, floggings mutilation and killing of the native population. But this time the rubber industry was sustained and dominated by British capital investment companies—with the main one, the Peruvian Amazon Company, listed as the largest member on the London Stock Exchange. Rubber was like oil, another “black gold” of the era.
So it was not nasty little Belgium and King Leopold this time! Others knew of all this but Casement saw it as it as an intrinsic part of the Imperial system he represented and he began to question the raison d’être of the Empire itself.
The Planned War On Germany
But, crucially, crucially Casement also began to realise that there was a much bigger and a more consequential horror in the offing than anything he had witnessed in the Congo and Peru. This was when he began to realise that plans were afoot to launch a war on Germany. And that was his final disenchantment!
Casement began to articulate this alienation in writings from about 1913 onwards and they were put out in his only published book, “The Crime Against Europe”, which appeared just as the war against Germany began. This is a book that is not easily available these days and rarely even mentioned by his ‘biographers’. It is available from Athol Books. It is a clear and incisive analysis of the international situation at the time, and it has stood the test of time. It is essential reading for understanding Casement and the world at the time.
He suspected the existence of this war plan for some time, while still accepting that the Empire was a constructive force for good in the world. But ,when he saw his suspicions taking shape, he saw the plan as a wanton attack on a central part of European culture and on civilisation itself. This was a crime against Europe as he succinctly put it.
What Was The Problem With Germany?
Since its creation in 1871, the German Federation had become a powerful innovative force in all areas of life, trade, and industry. (For instance, it created the pharma industry). It also brought advances in science, music, culture, philosophy, scholarship, and political progress.
Politically, Germany had the largest Social Democratic party in the world. It developed the genesis of what is now the welfare state, partly copied decades later by Lloyd George when he introduced Old Age Pensions.
It was a constitutional monarchy, like Britain: with a parliament that was directly elected by universal male suffrage on the basis of one man, one vote, and was the most progressive electoral system in Europe at that time.
As regards scholarship, the Gaelic Revival here would not have happened as it did without German linguistic scholarship, as represented by Kuno Meyer and others.
Germany had been a multitude, of at least 30 little states, kingdoms, principalities, municipalities, cities etc.—which were united by language: so the relationship between linguistics and nationhood was of great interest to them.
In the first instance, it was an Empire of Germans only and the State was not interested in acquiring other nationalities in Europe, having no designs on any other country and certainly not on England! It was Anglophile and took great pride in the fact that their royal families were first cousins. Prussia was the staunch Protestant ally of England in the 19th century and it had won The Battle Of Waterloo for England.
It was a qualitatively very different Empire to that of Britain and other contemporary European Empires. It would be better named as a German Union. So different was it, that the word Empire as generally understood is not appropriate. Bismarck did not even include Austria in the Union and said of the nearby Balkans that “they were not worth the blood of a single Pomeranian Grenadier.”
Being Anglophile, and after Bismarck had left the scene, some elements tried to copy England’s methods in “the scramble for Africa”, but the project was a bit late in the day and turned out to be a pathetic venture. Exceptional for Germany, but all the fashion for others.
Despite its spectacular success in less than 50 years, Germany did not cause, or get involved in any war, from 1871 to 1914. The British wouldn’t have counted the German attempt to catch up on colonialism in Africa as a ‘war’. Compare that with the many wars of the British Empire in those years—it was almost permanently at war!
As Germany was developing growing trade, it needed to develop an appropriate Navy. This was potentially a point of conflict with Britain—which relied on its Navy as a guarantee of its world trading supremacy, and prevented freedom of the seas, i.e. prevented other nations from having the trading freedom to grow to their full potential economically.
But Germany thought such problems could be solved amicably between friends—how naive they were!
The British Empire was based on compulsory free trade for others—and would try its best to counter efforts of states which wished to use Protection to develop fully national economies, as Germany was doing by following the trading principles of Friedrich List, one of the founders of the German Union.
Connolly On Germany
Connolly, from a completely independent standpoint to that of Casement, wrote a lot about Germany and this is a typical example written just before the Rising:
…
“That country had the best educated working class in the world, the greatest number of labour papers, daily, weekly, and monthly, the greatest number of parliamentary and local representatives elected on a working class platform, the greatest number of Socialist votes in proportion to the entire population. All this was an index to the high level of intelligence of the German working class, as well as to their strong political and industrial position. This again was an infallible index to the high civilisation of the whole German nation. Germany had built well upon the sure foundation of an educated self-respecting people. Upon such a foundation Germany laid her progress in peace, and her success in war. Let Ireland learn this lesson” (“Forces of Civilisation’’, James Connolly Workers’ Republic, 8 April, 1916)
And it is interesting to note that, like Casement, he regards the war on Germany as involving civilisation.
On 29th August 1916 he published “The War Upon The German Nation” in which he said that for England:
“It was determined that since Germany could not be beaten in fair competition industrially, she must be beaten unfairly by organising a military and naval conspiracy against her……remember that the war found England thoroughly prepared, Germany totally unprepared…. The British capitalist class has planned this colossal crime in order to ensure it uninterrupted domination of the commerce of the world.”
I think we can guess which side he was on in the war and it was not neutrality as is sometimes suggested because of the slogan over Liberty Hall.
SO WHY DECLARE WAR ON SUCH A COUNTRY?
The war against Germany was on the cards since 1871 when Germany was first united and had defeated and repulsed France’s invasion to prevent its unification. However, under the English balance of power rules, Germany being the new power in Europe, was in the frame for being attacked by England in alliance with other less powerful states.
This was Britain’s Balance of Power strategy since the so-called Glorious Revolution, and should really be called the balance of perpetual war and conflict within Europe: thus ensuring an ongoing conflict between European states which gave England a relatively free hand to increase its power in the rest of the world to build its Empire.
Casement summed it up :
“The balance of power strategy had nothing to do with maintaining peace in Europe. Quite the contrary. It was a strategy to keep Europe in a condition of unresolved conflict—of negating Europe as a force in the world by keeping it in conflict with itself” (The Crime Against Europe).
It worked a treat. Some Imperial apologists even used to suggest it was all built by default and in a fit of absentmindedness—and that it was ‘lost’ in the same way.
The strongest Power in continental Europe at any stage, whether Spain, France, and now Germany, was to be opposed by inciting, and allying with, the lesser Powers against it.
Part of the plan to destroy Germany was to ensure it was surrounded by alliances of hostile Powers, as pointed out in detail by Casement in The Crime Against Europe—which is essential reading for anyone interested the history of the period. It has stood the test of time.
An expansionist Czarist Russia was expanding eastward, in what was Britain called the “great game”—the contest between the two Imperial Powers over control of Afghanistan and other places—as well as looking westward towards the Balkans and the carving up of the Ottoman Empire. Here the intention was to have Constantinople becoming a Russian city and centre of Orthodox world.
On the other hand, Germany wanted the Ottoman Empire modernised, not destroyed, and saw it as a necessary part of the world order for Muslims.
Within Europe Russia encouraged conflict with Germany’s ally, Austria (the Hapsburg Empire), by supporting Serbia’s expansion at Austria’s expense in the Balkans. Hence the basis for a conflict with an aggressive Russia.
Separately, France wanted revenge for the 1871 defeat in a war it had started with Germany, and the recovery of Alsace Lorraine which it had lost as a result—and this laid the basis for an irredentist conflict from the west. And France had an intense desire to recover its position as the main Power in continental Europe by dismembering Germany back into its constituent parts.
Special Planning For The Great War
Britain’s special planning for the war began in earnest with the setting up of the Committee of Imperial defence in 1902 by Arthur Balfour—whose plans were kept secret from Parliament and most of the Cabinet, and therefore from Casement. Balfour was the main orchestrator of the war plans and was the ever-present power whether in or out of government. He was the personification of what today would be called the deep state. An eminence grise who exercised power without being officially in power.
“Bloody Balfour”, as he was nicknamed by William O’Brien after the “Mitchelstown massacre” when he was Irish Secretary.
As the author of the “Balfour Declaration” he gave the green light to Jewish nationalists with the unique award of a “national home” to people who did not actually live in their “home”. And that bit of ‘statesmanship’ has worked itself out to have dire consequences ever since—including the continuing Genocide in Gaza and expansionist war against all its Muslim neighbours with no end in sight. O’Brien could hardly have given the British leader a better, if very understated, nickname.
The Balfour Declaration was a tactic to win the war against Germany and the Ottoman Empire by getting Jewish support. It ensured a conflict with, and within, the Moslem world—weakening it so that Britain could increase its power in the Middle East.
Balfour On The Need For A War On Germany
Of course, we don’t need to rely on Casement or Connolly for the causes of WWI. We can go to the horse’s mouth, to the man himself, the doyen and philosopher of British politics in that era, which is what Balfour was. It is not often we hear such a person give his real views clearly on fundamental issues except in very private settings.
But Balfour did so with the American Ambassador, Henry White, in 1910. In his memoirs White recounts a conversation he had with Balfour:
BALFOUR: We are probably fools not to find a reason for declaring war on Germany before she builds too many ships and takes away our trade,
WHITE: You are a very high-minded man in private life. How can you possibly contemplate anything so politically immoral as provoking a war against a harmless nation which has as good a right to have a navy as you have? If you wish to compete against German trade, work harder.
BALFOUR: That would mean lowering our standard of living. Perhaps it would be far simpler for us to have a war.
WHITE: I am shocked that you of all people should enunciate such principles.
BALFOUR: Is it a question of right or wrong? Maybe it is just a question of keeping our supremacy.
(Alan Nevins, Henry White,
Thirty Years of American Diplomacy,
Harper, New York, 1930.)
You will see that this admission corresponds exactly to what Connolly said about the War and Germany. But Connolly’s conclusion as an Irish Socialist was the exact opposite of that expressed by Robert Blatchford, a leading English socialist—who coined the famous catchphrase “My country right or wrong”, a view which complements Balfour’s view perfectly.
I think Balfour’s view might remind you of what has become known recently as a transactional view of international affairs: The action of going to war against another state because it is more successful than yours, so that you can be better off. Sounds familiar?
This is of course a most realistic view of what is euphemistically called ‘international relations’—which in reality is dog eat dog, however sophisticated the rhetoric! We should be grateful to Mr. Trump for making that absolutely clear.
White’s exchange with Balfour also shows that the US had no problem with Germany and regarded it as a harmless nation.
War: Right And Wrong
Balfour’s concluding remark about right and wrong not mattering sums up in a nutshell the morality of the planned war against Germany. Right or Wrong did not come into it.
This was the exact opposite of Casement’s view—that war is always a question of right or wrong and this 1914 War was wrong. And should be opposed in word and deed.
Casement, as always, had the courage to act on what he believed in. He was not just a wordmonger:
“The rest of the writer’s task must be essayed not with the author’s pen but with rifle of the Irish Volunteer.”
(The Crime Against Europe, New York, September 1914).
He was always sincerely committed to what he believed in, and acted accordingly. He had physical as well as moral courage.
Balfour illustrated perfectly the moral bankruptcy of the Empire. Casement’s moral case against WWI has been overwhelmingly vindicated—that crime against Europe was the seminal event which has given rise to every subsequent War—right down to today’s reality of genocide in Gaza!
A war on Germany and the reasons for it, as clearly stated by Balfour, turned Casement’s view of the Empire upside down. The Empire’s raison d’etre was at an end for him. He had believed, like millions of others, that the Empire had been built to bring civilisation to barbarians. In turning on Germany it was barbarians attacking a centre of civilisation. Why?
In acting in this way the Empire was now a destructive force, rather than the constructive force he had thought it was—and worked for throughout his life.
This was the essence of his case against the War on Germany.
This realisation was, to put it mildly, life changing for him. But he was not alone in the face of this British War on Germany, as others also had to come to terms with this new situation created by Britain: they too had to change their minds and their plans.
WHAT THE WAR DID FOR OTHERS’ PLANS
Many people had to change their minds because of the War Britain declared on Germany: and they would have reacted like Keynes when he was accused of changing his mind on some issue and replied “When circumstances change, I change my mind, what do you do, Sir?”
For example, Connolly had worked on the basis of an international socialist revolution arising from a war between the Empires. This did not materialise as hoped for when war was launched. So he decided to join with radical nationalists to pursue his cause. Ireland became for him, as for Casement, “the one bright spot”—to coin a phrase from Edward Grey in another context—in having forces within it that were prepared to challenge the Empire.
Pádraig Pearse had shared a meeting with Redmond in 1912, accepting Home Rule. But he had to radically change his views in the light of new realities of the war. The Declaration of War was used to reduce the promise of Home Rule to that of a piece of paper that would never now become a reality. That is why he decided other methods were needed. Hence 1916.
Erskine Childers, also a hero of the Empire, changed his mind—but after the War—and was executed as an unrepentant republican.
The Results Of The ‘Great War’
The war on Germany turned the world upside down and nothing has had such long-term consequences, right down the present day—the Gaza Genocide being the most extreme example today. My grandmother used to say “The world went mad in 1914 and has never been right since”. She was right up to a point. But the War was, not caused by madness, but by design—but the world has not recovered from its consequences. The world did not sleepwalk into that War, as is sometimes said and as Mr. Balfour made absolutely clear.
Casement’s indictment of the War has been amply vindicated by history since. That War declared on Germany on 4th August 1914 was nothing less than the pivotal event for the subsequent history of Europe and for the world with its continuing wars. That is why Casement remains relevant: he presaged the consequences of this War, an event which was in a real sense the beginning of modern history.
It led to a series of revolutions, each caused by the War—the Revolution in Russia and all that followed from that being the most significant.
The propaganda to justify the war—‘for the freedom of small nations’—which was intended to promote differences within other Empires into national movements—was ironically the very thing that led to the end of the British Empire itself: by the success of the subsequent national liberation movements that arose. The propaganda rebounded on the Empire.
The US, in joining the War on the basis of support for self-determination for nations—added fuel to the flames of national liberation wars against the British, and other European, Empires.
The price exacted by the US for getting the British Empire to be on the winning side (not the winners) in that War was that in due course they replaced the British Empire, a price which Britain had to pay as it had become a debtor to the US. The US hurried up the demise of the Empire—and the end of the Empire was the cost Britain eventually paid for launching WWI and its continuation, WW2.
Britain started that War but could not finish it, as also with the Second World War. What happened to the British Empire with regard to the US justifies Kissinger’s warning that “To be America’s enemy is dangerous, to be its friend is fatal”.
The way WWI ended with a punitive Versailles Agreement ensured that another war would happen—which duly arrived with the British Declaration of War on Germany again in 1939—and the upshot of that was the destruction of Europe and Britain as World Powers. America took over—along with “the new kid on the block”, the Soviet Union, which arose from the Bolshevik Revolution of 1917 that was caused by the breakdown of Czarist Russia, Britain’s ally, under the stresses of WWI.
Between them, both Wars destroyed Europe: and Casement’s description of WWI—that began that process—proved very apt: “The Crime Against Europe”.
The destruction of Europe and the undermining of the British Empire was not intention of the parties to this War but it was an unintended consequence which Casement heralded. Hence his ongoing relevance.
The Reaction To Casement’s Conviction
When convicted and sentenced to hang for High Treason, Casement’s standing made many notable people in various walks of life seek clemency for this ‘traitor’. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle organised a petition of very distinguished people. The cream of the literati—writers such as Chesterton, Arnold Bennett, John Masefield, Jerome K Jerome, C.P. Scott (Editor of The Guardian), the Webbs; Ben Tillett, Robert Blatchford, some Professors, some Knights of the Realm, some Bishops and others. Douglas Hyde organised a similar petition in Ireland.
The Archbishop of Canterbury had spoken for a reprieve but the ‘Black Diaries’ (i.e. the police typescripts) changed his mind: and that of others. Shaw and Yeats worked for a reprieve, despite them.
Opinion in the US was so strong that the US Senate voted for a reprieve. The only comparable person in modern times with such a reputational influence would be Nelson Mandela.
Casement’s standing was so high that these eminent people, seeking clemency for him, were saying his reputation should override the High Treason verdict of execution: even though that treason was committed in the middle of a ‘life and death’ war for the Empire.
Why This Appeal For Clemency?
This was an extraordinary situation and confirms Casement’s moral standing. And his views on Germany, and against War with it, were fully shared by the leading Liberals and by Liberal opinion before the War was actually declared. But they ha abandoned their position as soon as War was declared, when “the drums began to roll”. Blatchford’s cry became operative for them – “My country right or wrong.”
They betrayed and debased themselves, while Casement had remained a consistent Liberal and acted on his beliefs—and was thereby a stinging rebuke to the moral cowardice of his fellow Liberals. In their hearts they knew he was right about Germany and the War. And, to coin a phrase “they did not like it up ’em!” The appellants for clemency tried to salve their conscience as best they could.
Casement thereby touched a raw nerve in the English psyche—he punctured its self-righteous war morality—and that wound has never healed, and has never been forgiven. England would not be England if it did forgive him: because War is an existential necessity for England since the so-called Glorious Revolution.
Wikipedia and ChatGPT tell us that “The United Kingdom’s forces (or forces with a British mandate) have invaded, had some control over or fought conflicts in 171 of the world’s 193 countries that are currently UN member states, or nine out of ten of all countries.” This is not a complete picture as there were more than one war with/within many countries.
And since WWI these Wars have been peoples’ wars—with the masses, the democracy, engaged—which was not the case previously. The masses were somewhat like spectators in earlier wars.
Such Wars could not be “sold” to the masses as transactional issues à la Belfour’s admission to the American Ambassador! So the moral case had to be the focus, i.e. the wars became wars between Good against Evil, Right against Wrong and always against demons, who appear as regular as clockwork when required right across the world! The moral self-righteousness became an absolute necessity in waging these Wars.
Casement personified the opposition to all this, in opposing the greatest war that England ever launched and labelling it a crime and supporting the enemy to defeat the Empire. Failure did not prove him wrong!
What he did to England was more detrimental to it than what he ever did for Ireland. To misquote “Shakespeare” he “did the State some disservice and they know it.”
That was the real Casement and why he had to hang.
Creating The Fabricated Casement
Casement had to be countered and fast. This is why the fabricated Casement had to be urgently created and promoted. It’s easy to kill a person but not so easy to kill his reputation and his ideas and their subliminal effect. So a more powerful weapon was needed to obliterate him. But what do? How to discredit such a man?
The old reliable weapon used was sex—a sex scandal. That always captures the English imagination and is part and parcel of its socio-political life. This was the well tried and often successful weapon of choice for such a purpose in Puritan England with its “nonconformist conscience”. And its use may not yet be at an end.
Within the then living memory it had worked against Dilke, Rosebery, Parnell—and had been tried earlier with O’Connell. Many more, but less famous people, before and since were treated likewise and were victims.
But, despite being one of best known people in the world, with countless friends in every walk of life across four continents, with every door open to him—and bedroom doors as well if he wished—no evidence could be found of a sex scandal.
When Devoy heard about the allegations of homosexuality coming from the Foreign Office he remarked along the lines, “I am not surprised, they know all about that. They are obsessed with it over there in that place.”
But nobody from the Foreign Office or elsewhere came forward with any information to make or confirm a scandal: despite his hundreds, if not thousands, of friends and colleagues he had known across three decades.
And it was not for the want of trying. Agents were even sent to Peru to find some evidence but to no avail (seeIrish Political Review, January 2025).
As there was no evidence of such a scandal attached to Casement, it had to be created and fast: because Casement’s surprise arrival in Kerry caused consternation: this famous open traitor had to be tried and dealt with as soon as possible for public morale—as the Empire was then at its lowest point in the War and it was touch and go as to whether it would win or lose.
Creating The ‘Black Diaries’
Hence the creation of the ‘Black Diaries’ as the most potent weapon to discredit and paint such a person as one that hardly deserved to belong in society. He should become a non-person.
To fill the need, the police created typescripts of a ‘diary’ which tapped into the virulent homophobia of Puritan England. These first appeared in the Metropolitan Police’s Submission of Evidence to the Director of Public Prosecutions in mid-May1916. This is a defining document among the hundreds devoted to Casement and today it would be called the Book of Evidence for the Prosecution.
It is a large six-volume file, with lots of the most minute details and photographs of evidence. Included here are: a sausage wrapping of Casement’s, a German train ticket, and some scraps of notes about his journey from Germany. (Birkenhead later claimed this was his ‘Black Diary’.) All supplied by the very diligent Royal Irish Constabulary in Tralee. These items became official exhibits at the Trial.
The police threw the proverbial book at him—but there was no diary—nor even a photograph of one! To mix metaphors: there was no ‘smoking gun’ but plenty of smoke (see the file at the Public Records Office, Kew: TNA DPP 1/46).
Homphobia In Victorian England
Because different attitudes apply today, many people find it hard to imagine the then virulent homophobia of England. Other countries did not share such a virulent phobia about homosexuality.
Just one example was a contemporary hysterical campaign led by MPs that claimed the War was being lost because the “moral fibre” of the nation was being corrupted by the Government—by Asquith and his wife in particular—in promoting a culture of homosexuality and lesbianism. It led to a famous libel case against the campaigners, but they were not convicted. It was a readymade English version of the “The stab in the back” thesis if England lost the War (See “Salome’s last veil – the trial of the century” by Michael Kettle).
So virulent was this homophobia in Puritan England that, even 40 years later, the war hero and computer genius, Alan Turing, was chemically castrated for his homosexuality.
Some decades ago I got to know Seán McGouran, the well known, and very cultured gay rights activist in Northern Ireland for over 50 years. He regarded the behaviour attributed to a man in Casement’s position as incredible and laughable!
The persona created in the Government typescripts has been well described as a “thoroughly repugnant pederast, obsessed with the male sex organ, indiscriminately promiscuous, addicted to prostitutes, an immoral priapic sex addict… unstable and incapable of affection and ordinary discretion” (Paul Hyde interview, Irish Political Review, June 2025).
And the most lurid creations were set in Peru : exactly where the authorities tried and failed to find any evidence!
Casement was to be made an unmentionable person, a non-person! I think the behaviour recorded in the forged diaries would be today described as that of a serial child sex abuser.
All Casement’s countless friends and acquaintances were shocked at this portrait and not one of them ever gave it any credence: then or since.
And in this era I would guess that most homosexuals, past and present, have been ‘outed’ or ‘come out’ and are now proud of that. But Casement does not appear anywhere in that category.
Casement On Sex
In one of his most passionately honest entries in a genuine diary—when reflecting on the genocidal behaviour of the gangster owners of the company he was investigating (mentioned earlier) in Peru—he bared his soul, confessing that:
“I swear to God, I’d hang for every one of these band of wretches with my own hands if I had the power to do it with the greatest pleasure. I have never shot game myself with pleasure. I have in fact abandoned all shooting for that reason, that I dislike the thought of taking life. I have never given life myself to anyone and my celibacy makes me frugal of human life but I’d shoot or exterminate these infamous scoundrels more gladly than I should shoot a crocodile or kill a snake” (29/9/1910, “The Amazon Journal of Roger Casement”, edited and published by Angus Mitchell).
Nobody ever accused Casement of hypocrisy and nobody could honestly believe that the person who confessed the above could be harmonised with the rampant sexual behaviour of the Black Diaries.
In the pre-Freudian world people were not as defined by sexual activities or orientation, as is common today. Celibacy was not then regarded as some sort of affliction as it is now. It was in those days a choice often made for many reasons.
Success Of The Vilification In Ireland
But the vilification worked for the purpose at hand and Casement was hanged. It was challenged in Ireland for generations but the lurid story has now become accepted here as a depiction of the real Casement.
The success of this vilification here was confirmed for me by RTE’s ‘resident historian’, Myles Dungan, just last September 29th. I was taken aback, listening to his interview with Casement’s latest ‘biographer’, Roland Philipps, on RTE Radio 1. Dungan concluded the interview by saying that it was obvious that Casement had “mental health issues” (RTE, Radio 1, 29 Sept. 2024).
The claim is ridiculous! A person with such a psychological condition would most likely be at his lowest point when on trial and facing the hangman. Bur anyone who has ever read Casement’s speech from the dock—and Dungan must have done that—must know that it was one of the most powerful and well-argued speeches ever made—and that is how it was described recently by Norman Lamont, a former Tory Chancellor of the Exchequer in the UK.
Casement’s analysis of the legal basis of the case against him showed it to be farcical. His philosophical and historical narrative justifying what he had done in opposing the War was so searing an indictment of his Prosecutor, Birkenhead, the powerful Attorney General, that it drove him from the courtroom. Hardly the indication of a person with mental problems!
Dungan was faithfully reproducing the portrait created by the Casement recent biographer, Roland Philipps—who he was interviewing—which in turn was essentially repeating the case made by Birkenhead at the Trial—that Casement was a mental case!
Philipps’s evidence for the ‘mental health case’ is based on his own psycho-babble—and Dungun’s agreement with itspeaks volumes for the puerile state of historical understanding here at the moment.
Philipps’ unique contribution to Casement studies was to claim that he planned “a doomed invasion of Ireland”.
But, as homophobia does not have the traction it once had in disparaging people, the ‘mental health affliction theory’ is getting more emphasis. This shows that the vilification of Casement is being honed and updated to suit a different audience today: Mental illness is a more comprehensive and more sustainable form of it. And, if Dungan is representative, that means it is working a treat in Ireland.
Casement cannot be left rest in peace—his disparagement must be kept up to date. Watch this space! I understand yet another biography is with a publisher in the US.
The Good News!
But the good news is that the most compelling and conclusive case for proving that these ‘diaries’ were forged has been made over the past 5/6 years by Paul Hyde in books, articles and on the internet. It is based on up-to-date research in the British National Archives and elsewhere.
But Paul Hyde’s main book of 2019 has not been reviewed in the MSM [Main Stream Media, ed.], or in broadcasting, or in academic or political outlets—including those that claim to be devoted to history, such as History Ireland.
Village Magazine and the Irish Political Review are the only, and honourable, exceptions. I would suggest you consult the May issue of Village this year for an example of Paul Hyde’s latest forensic approach, and the June edition of the Irish Political Review where I interview him. Both are available at the City Library here in Cork city.
Hyde’s main work is his book “Anatomy Of A lie – Decoding Casement”. It is available via the Internet from Wordwell Books. He has also published: “Casement: Decoding false history” (Aubane Historical Society); along with articles in Village magazine, in The Irish Political Review and on the website and Podcast at Decoding-Casement.com.
Angus Mitchell, who is today recognised as the leading Casement expert, says of the Anatomy book:
“Hyde exposes the patterns of duplicity, misinformation and selective framing which have produced the contemporary consensus… he makes the crucial distinction between the police typescripts which were shown in the weeks before Casement’s execution and the bound diaries which were not shown in 1916… biographers treat the typescripts as if they were true copies of diaries for whose existence at the time there is no independent witness testimony… the book draws to a close a century of obfuscation, secrecy, and acres of academic and speculative waffle.”
Anyone interested should get that book from Wordwell
at a cost of about 20 Euro.
This talk is just a very brief outline of the real and fabricated Casement, and I look forward to any questions and discussion that time allows. The subject is wide and deep, fascinating at many levels and vital to an understanding of modern history.
Jack Lane (Aubanehistoricalsociety.com)
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Some publications
“England’s Care for the Truth – by one who knows both” by Roger Casement, edited by Jack Lane. Published by Athol Books, 2018
These articles by Sir Roger Casement, originally published in The Continental Times of Berlin, have lain forgotten for over a century. Now, for the first time, they are published as a collection by Athol Books to bring the authentic Casement to the general public. They take up the theme of his only published book, The Crime Against Europe: British Foreign Policy and how it brought about the First World War. They reveal Casement as a consistent Liberal when English Liberalism failed its great test in the ultimate moment of truth in August 1914. They show Sir Roger as a consistent Irish Nationalist when the Home Rulers collapsed into Imperialism. The ground shifted under his feet but he remained solid. For Casement action was consequent upon thought and knowledge. Remaining true to his principles he attempted to forge an Irish-German alliance. Not for Casement “My country right or wrong”, but who was right and who was wrong. This collection explains why Casement did what he did and how it led him to Easter 1916. It shatters the British narrative of the Great War by “one who knew”. It shows why Casement was the most dangerous Irishman who ever faced up to Britain and why they had to hang him and attempt to foul his memory. In the latter, they have not succeeded.
The Crime Against Europe – A Possible Outcome of the War of 1914
Published by Athol Books.
The Crime Against Europe is Roger Casement’s only published book. It is a book about British foreign policy and, because of what followed from its publication, it is a book of Irish foreign policy. It states the definite view that British foreign policy was the cause of the World War that began in August 1914 and that the most desirable outcome of that war was the defeat of Britain by Germany. It represents the British declaration of war as an act of aggression which gave effect to the foreign policy of the preceding years.
John Redmond on August 3rd gave support in Parliament to the British Declaration of War on Germany without consulting the Home Rule Party in Parliament or in the country. Six weeks later, following the simultaneous enactment and suspension of the Home Rule Act, he directed the Irish Volunteers to join the British Army for the purpose of making war on Germany.
Blockading The Germans! With an overview of 19th century maritime law
The evolution of Britain’s strategy during the First World War, Volume 1
Eamon Dyas
Belfast Historical and Educational Society 2018
This is the first volume of a Trilogy examining overlooked aspects of the First World War and its aftermath from a European perspective. Comprehensively sourced with scholarly research, it explains how Britain used a continental blockade to force the capitulation of the Kaiser’s Germany by targeting not just military, but also civilian, imports, particularly imported food supplies, upon which Germany had become dependent since its industrial revolution.
After joining the European War of August 1914—and elevating it into a World War—Britain cast aside the two maritime codes agreed by the world’s maritime powers over the previous almost 60 years—the Declaration of Paris in 1856 and the Declaration of London in 1909. In defiance of these internationally agreed codes, Britain aggressively expanded its blockade with the object of disrupting not only the legitimate trade between neutral countries and Germany but trade between neutral countries themselves.
Britain’s policy of civilian starvation during the First World War was unprecedented in history. Whereas it had used the weapon of starvation against civilians in the past, in such instances this was either through the exploitation of a natural disaster to bring about famine (Ireland and India) or the result of pre-conceived policy against a non-industrial society (France during the Revolutionary Wars). Its use against Germany was the first time in history where a policy of deliberate starvation was directed against the civilian population of an advanced industrial economy.
This volume traces the evolution of Britain’s relationship with international naval blockade strategies from the Crimean War through the American Civil War and the Boer War culminating in its maturity during the Great War. It also draws out how the United States—the leading neutral country—was made complicit in Blockading The Germans during the war and brings the story up to America’s entry into the War.
Eamon Dyas is a former head of The Times newspaper archive, was on the Executive Committee of the Business Archives Council in England for a number of years, and was Information Officer of the Newspaper Department of theBritish Library for many years
Starving the Germans
The Evolution of Britain’s Strategy During The First World War Volume 2
Eamon Dyas
Belfast Historical and Educational Society 2020
This is the second volume of a Trilogy that examines the manner in which the First World War was fought by Britain and its Allies against the civilians of Germany and the Central Powers and the way in which the outcome of that war distorted the prevailing trajectory of European history.
The first volume ‘Blockading the Germans’ explored the way in which Britain as the world’s primary naval power shaped the use of the naval blockade as a weapon against civilians from the time of the Napoleonic Wars to the advent of the First World War. It also dealt with the way in which United States’ actions as the main supplier of munitions and financial credits to the Allies compromised its neutrality and made the British pursuit of that war possible.
This current volume begins at the point when the United States formally joined the War in April 1917. It shows how, through the use of food embargoes on the northern neutral countries, the United States completed Britain’s food strangulation of Germany and brought misery and death to the civilian populations of those countries in the process.
It explains the way in which the terms of the November 1918 Armistice were arbitrarily expanded by the Allies to ensure that Germany was made malleable to the British demand that it accept total responsibility for the War and at the same time hampered its chances of a post-War recovery.
It further explains the impact of the Armistice on the food supply mechanism that had been established in the United States to supply its own troops and the Allies during the war. In addition it reveals the way in which the post-Armistice attempts by Herbert Hoover and the American Food Administration to use the American food surplus to feed Europe were thwarted by obstacles placed in its path by France and Britain.
Finally, the volume reveals Britain’s role in formulating the reparations demanded of Germany in the face of initial American opposition. The volume ends with an examination of the way in which the powers of the Reparations Commission undermined the incipient democratic institutions established in Weimar Germany.
Irish Political Review 