The Brian P. Murphy OSB Archive. (Series 9)

The Evolution Of British Policy And The Emergence Of a Sinn Fein Publicity Department In The Years After The Easter Rising.

Mss notes, 

Mss notes, Part 26.

‘The Trial of de Valera’

At a dramatic meeting of the Friends of Irish Freedom on 19th March 1920 at the Park Avenue Hotel, New York, Devoy and Cohalan charged de Valera with causing friction among Irish-Americans.  De Valera and Harry Boland attended the meeting.  The event was spoken of as ‘the trial of de Valera’.   Supporters of de Valera among the Friends of Irish Freedom, such as Joe McGarrity, Judge Goff and Bourke Cockran, combined to prevent the formulation of any critical resolution against de Valera and, at the end of the meeting, Bishop Turner, the President of the organisation, blessed all those present (Typed Memo. of William Maloney, 25 March 1920, in McGarrity Papers, 17521(2), NLI ?? Tansill and others).  A statement of the bald facts might imply that co-operation may have been possible after the blessing of Bishop Turner.   

The account by Harry Boland, of what he termed the “historic scene”, makes it clear that reconciliation was not a possibility.  In note form he recorded: 

“Cohalan hoist by his own petard;  de Valera refuses to budge… cheers, curses, challenges, shrieks and final blessing.  Chief magnificent… Dirty attempt to break Chief fails miserably.  Bubble burst and ends up in Bishop Turner blessing all while they are on their knees”.  

Boland admitted that he was crying;  that de Valera was shaken;  but that Devoy and Cohalan were licked (Boland Diary, 19 March 1920,  2172/1, UCDA).   

Armstrong, the British Consul in New York, reported his version of the meeting to London:  “As a matter of fact, the peace is not likely to last unless de Valera returns home at an early date leaving Judge Cohalan in control” (Armstrong to Sec. State, 6 April 1920, FO 371/4550, PROE).   He concluded that, whatever the differences over the Bonds and other matters, both sides were united in keeping the Irish question in the public eye.  

This judicious observation accurately portrayed the situation on the ground.  De Valera and Devoy might be at one another’s throats but they were both prepared to encourage the ever-willing American politicians to take a stand for Ireland.  As if to illustrate the point, on 18th March, the day before de Valera’s ‘Trial’, the United States Senate had added a reservation to its ratification of the Peace Treaty with Germany which expressed sympathy “with the aspirations of the Irish people for a Government of its own choice adopted by the Senate on 6 June 1919” (Carroll, American Opinion, p147. The reservation was only passed by 38-36 votes. ?? Hopkinson ?? Hachey).  

However, as with other resolutions sympathetic to Ireland, the motion reflected the ambitions of American politicians, anxious to secure the Irish vote, as much as any real concession to Irish demands for support.  

While these events were happening in America, even more dramatic events occurred in Ireland which were to affect policy and propaganda in both countries. 

Deaths Of MacCurtain And Bell   

On 20th March 1920 the Lord Mayor of Cork, Thomas MacCurtain, was assassinated and on 26th March Alan Bell suffered the same fate.  The impact of these two dramatic events unfolded against the simmering discontent provoked by the actions of the Sinn Fein prisoners who began a hunger-strike in Mountjoy prison, Dublin, at the start of April.  All of these events became part of the publicity war.  

Thomas MacCurtain was killed at his home soon after 1 am on the morning of Saturday 20th March.  His wife, his five children and other family members were in the house at the time.  He was shot during the hours of curfew and it was the morning of his thirty-sixth birthday (Florence O’Donoghue, Thomas MacCurtain, Soldier and Patriot, Tralee, 1971, first edition 1955, p166;  Antoin O’Callaghan, The Lord Mayors of Cork, 1900-2000, Midleton, 2000, pp43-36 for details of MacCurtain’s career and death).  

The inquest on his death began on the day of his murder and was immediately adjourned until 23rd March 1920.  It continued from that date, with certain adjournments, until 17th April (Thomas MacCurtain Inquest, CO 904/47B, PROE).  These days marked out the parameters of the publicity struggle regarding his death which has endured to this day. 

During the inquest Mrs. MacCurtain described how, on responding to a demand that she open the front door of the house, six men with blackened faces rushed in and some went upstairs and shot her husband.  Other witnesses testified to the movement of many policemen in mufti going toward the house and the presence in the area of uniformed policemen who restricted civilian access to the house.  It was alleged that a group of policemen had shot MacCurtain.  

A few hours after MacCurtain was shot, the house was raided by a military patrol which searched it thoroughly, including the dead man’s bedroom.  While press reports, and the Irish Bulletin, were daily publicising the Witness Statements of the inquest, British officials were attempting to preserve the good name of the army and police.   

In the course of their explanations some discrepancies appeared in their accounts.  General Strickland, Head of the Sixth Division, stated on 22nd March that “the tragic event of that night was not known”, when the army raid took place.  However, Macpherson, the Chief Secretary, informed the House of Commons on the same day that the army raid was intended to find evidence “which would help them to trace the murderers”.  

Strickland confided to his diary, with exclamation marks, that Macpherson had given “a different reason” for the presence of the troops at the Lord Mayor’s house (Strickland Diary, 23rd March 1920, Strickland Papers, P 353, IWM).  These inconsistencies in the British account were publicised in the Irish Bulletin of 23rd March, which also gave details of MacCurtain’s murder. 

(Irish Bulletin, 23rd March 1920 also noted that an attempt on Professor Stockley 18th March, the same day as the US senate [showed itself to be] favourable to self-determination for Ireland—not mention murder of RIC man.  O’Donoghue, MacCurtain, p189, mentions dead RIC man)  

Subsequent issues of the Irish Bulletin continued to give prominence to the Witness Statements at the inquest and to focus on the responsibility of the Crown forces for MacCurtain’s death.  For example, the speech of Jeremiah MacVeagh MP in the House of Commons, in which he claimed that MacCurtain’s killing was “a police murder”, were reported on 24th March (Irish Bulletin, 24th March 1920 reporting MacVeagh’s speech of 22nd March).

While the inquest on MacCurtain was taking place, Sir John Taylor’s closest ally, Alan Bell, was shot dead on 26th March 1920.  The first newspaper reports provided the basic information that he had left his home at Belgrave Square, Monkstown, and boarded a tram to the city centre in Dublin;  that a gang of unmasked men had dragged him off the tram and shot him in broad daylight at the junction of Simmonscourt Road and Merrion Road;  that he had a loaded revolver in one of his pockets;  and that he had been offered a residence inside Dublin Castle and police protection on his journey to work, but that he had rejected both offers.  One witness at the inquest observed that the killers “were respectable-looking young gentlemen”.  It was recorded that Lady Taylor had conveyed the news of Alan Bell’s death to his wife (Freeman’s Journal, 27th and 29th March 1920)  

The horror of the crime, as portrayed in the press, was heightened by the circumstances: the victim, a Resident Magistrate of legal standing was of no political significance;  the killers, operating without disguise, in the full light of day, and of apparently respectable appearance.  

The Freeman’s Journal offered a brief caution to the uncritical acceptance of this scenario by noting that Bell—

“presided at the investigation held recently in Dublin under the Jubilee Coercion Act into alleged relations between Irish banks and Sinn Fein organisations” (Freeman’s Journal, 27th March 1920). 

For all those involved in the Sinn Fein movement and all readers of the Irish Bulletin, the real significance of Alan Bell was only too well known.  It was for that reason that Michael Collins had directed the Squad to assassinate him.  Collins, acting as Director of Intelligence of the IRA, had, by the assassination of Bell, preserved the financial assets of Sinn Fein for which he was responsible as Minister of Finance of Dail Eireann.   

Members of the Squad have recorded their own version of the shooting of Bell.  James Slattery recalled that, under the direction of Mick McDonnell, he had selected a section of the Squad to conduct the attack on Bell.  Sitting on the tram, Slattery heard McDonnell call out “we want you”, as he caught Bell by the shoulder just before he was shot.  Vinnie Byrne, another member of the Squad who was also on the tram, recounted that several previous attempts had been made on Bell’s life.  Both men stated that the Squad had been ordered to act against Bell because his investigations into the finances of Dail Eireann made him a danger to the movement (James Slattery, Witness Statement, 445, pp7,8, Bureau Military History, Military Archives:  nb agent called Molloy shot before; Vincent Byrne, Witness Statement,  423, pp38-41, BMH, MA and nb role of Tom Cullen).

Sir John Taylor was very active after Bell’s murder.  On 29th March, in consultation with Lord French, he requested the Lord Chancellor, James Campbell to see if legal constraints might be used to compel witnesses to his murder to give evidence;  and on the 30th March, in response to a cable from the Irish Office, he requested Colonel Johnstone, Chief Commissioner of the DMP. to provide a report on the police protection for Bell (Taylor to Lord Chancellor, 29th March 1920;  Taylor to Johnstone, 30th March 1920, in file ‘Police Protection for Mr Alan Bell’, CO 904/193, PROE).

Johnstone’s report, which was urgently required to answer a question tabled in the House of Commons, revealed that Bell had been told that “he was in danger and should have police protection”, but that he had refused to live inside Dublin Castle and had declined to accept plain clothes surveillance of his home.  However, he did accept police protection of his home, on his journey from his home to the tram, and from the tram to Dublin Castle.  In fact, while Bell may be criticised for a degree of casualness, the real weakness of the police security and the strength of Collins’s Intelligence network lay in the fact that the Squad was aware that the only place where he did not have some form of police protection was on the tram (Memo. by Johnstone on Bell’s protection, 30th March 1920, CO 904/193, PROE).

The assassination of Bell dealt a severe blow to Taylors’s plans to damage Dail Eireann’s institutions at their source and the manner of his killing became an integral part of the publicity campaign.  In order to accentuate the horrific nature of the crime, official sources simply described him as an elderly Resident Magistrate peacefully going about his legal business.  Although [Major] Street reported that he was “specially dangerous” to Sinn Fein because he was “examining the relations between Sinn Fein and certain Irish banks”, he did not expand on the extraordinary legal powers that had been conferred upon Bell (Street, Administration Of Ireland, pp80,81;  and pp223,224).  

Pollard took the same line as Street, adding that Bell’s work might have exposed “the whole joint financial mechanism behind Sinn Fein and the IRB [Irish Republican Brotherhood, ed.] (Pollard, Secret Services, p. 185; Phillips, Revolution, p175).  The Dail Eireann Publicity Department, having exposed the Police and Intelligence background to Bell’s career before his death, gave no publicity to his assassination.   

Childers, however, without naming Bell, spelt out the special position that he held by defining the ‘Star Chamber’ clause of the Crimes Act, which empowered him—

“to hold a secret inquiry into an offence committed in a proclaimed district and to compel to appear before him, to be examined on oath, any persons whom he pleases, adults or children, under pain of six months’ imprisonment” (Childers Military Rule, p30, from Daily News, 27th April 1920).  

Despite the draconian powers that Bell enjoyed, many in the Sinn Fein movement, as Frank Gallagher was soon to admit, disapproved of the his assassination, but they accepted it as a cruel necessity.  If they had known the full scope of Bell’s work, as Michael Collins presumably did, they would have become aware of another reason to assassinate him.   

Bell’s private papers reveal that, not only that was he acting against the Dail Eireann banking system, but also that he was leading the investigation into the killings of policemen, including the leaking of information from the DMP [Dublin Metropolitan Police] to the IRA.  Among his files on the finances of Sinn Fein, are other files on the Shooting of Mr. Redmond and the Attempted Murder of Constables (Crime Enquiries of Mr A. Bell and other matters, CO 904/177/1).  

It was noted, somewhat cryptically, that Bell’s inquiries “were interrupted by his murder”, and should be put in a safe place (CSO to Hemming, 21 Jan. 1922, Ibid.; Michael Hopkinson, The Irish War Of Independence, Dublin, 2002, p55).  

Lord French was well aware of Bell’s true significance, having appointed him to act on a special committee to report on the DMP, and he noted on the day of Bell’s death that he was engaged in “an important investigation” (French to Macready, 8th March 1920, French Papers 75/46/9, IWM;  and French Diary, 26th March 1920, French Papers 75/46/3, IWM)  

(To be continued)  

General F.P. Crozier: The Men I Killed (1937), Irish Memoirs and other writings. Introduction by Brendan Clifford. 152 pp. Index. ISBN 0 85034 085 3. AB, 2002. €14, £11.50 Major C.J.C. Street: The Administration Of Ireland, 1920; with a substantial extract from his Ireland In 1921 and a review of his other writings on Britain’s world role, and inter-war Europe. Introduction by Dr. Pat Walsh. Intelligence Officer Street produced this exceptionally informative justification of the Black and Tan War in Ireland, using the secret archives of Dublin Castle (with many captured IRA documents and officials statistics of incidents.) 192pp (9.5″ x 6″). Index, Bibliog. ISBN 0 85034 089 6. AB, 2001. €18, £15