(1905-74)

Became A Nationalist At Oxford 

The   IRISH PRESS   Archive:  No. 1

The IRISH PRESS Archive

(We are indebted to Jack Lane for this look into the past!    Editor)

Robert Barton Became A Nationalist At Oxford

At first sight a man like Robert Barton seems out of place in the First Dáil.  His immediate ancestors had been strongly opposed to the idea of Home Rule for Ireland.  They were substantial farmers in Co. Wicklow and neighbours of Charles Stewart Parnell but the friendship between the families received a severe setback when Parnell took up Home Rule.

Besides, Barton was a Protestant, and apart from Ernest Blythe, the only Protestant in the First Dáil.

He had been educated at Oxford—another unlikely qualification for membership of an Irish revolutionary assembly.  But at Oxford he became friendly with other Irishmen of his own class who were interested in Irish Ireland movements like the Gaelic League and Sinn Fein.  Robert Barton still recalls how one of his contemporaries at Oxford in the early years of the century, Claude Chevasse, used take down his history notes in Irish.

So by the time he left Oxford Barton was already interested in Irish nationalism.  He became a member of the Irish Volunteers and acted as secretary to Col. Moore.  Like so many other Volunteers answering John Redmond’s call he joined the British Army.

He returned to Dublin while the Rising was in progress in 1916 and was unable to collect his officer’s uniform because of the disturbed state of Dublin.  After the Rising and with so many of the insurgents in prisons, Barton was given the job of officer in charge of the prisoners’ effects.

In this capacity he met once again the friends of his early Volunteer days—prisoners like Sean T. O’Kelly and Darrell Figgis and soon his sympathies were drawn to the reorganised Sinn Fein.

When the 1918 election came he was chosen as Sinn Fein candidate for Wicklow-West.  Most of the Sinn Fein candidates were in prisons at the time of the election but Barton was one of the minority who was free to conduct his own campaign.

He remembers cycling from one meeting to the next through the Wicklow mountains in December of 1918.  He was very impressed by the way that Sinn Fein headquarters in Dublin organised the election campaign.  He remembers reporting to headquarters about his campaign in Wicklow and feeling that he was being briefed by superior officers for a military campaign.

When Mr. de Valera nominated his first ministry on April 2, 1919, Robert Barton was accepted as head of the Department of Agriculture.  Barton spent a great deal of the period either in jail or on the run, but he did manage to give some attention to his Department.  Looking back on the work of the Department of Agriculture he feels that it accomplished a certain amount of good work in the circumstances.

The Land Bank worked successfully and his efforts to persuade farm-labourers and small farmers to join co-operatives and share profits did not altogether fail.

Irish Press, 21st January 1969