War of Independence not sectarian in the Banner

WAR of Independence historian Pádraig Óg Ó Ruairc has written a thought-provoking essay in the most recent issue of The Other Clare, in which he argues that the 1919-21 conflict wasn’t based on sectarianism in the Banner County.
The Meelick man, who is the author of Blood on the Banner, says the notion that the conflict was based on sectarianism is quite recent and he believes it doesn’t stand up to real scrutiny.
“The allegation that the War of Independence was sectarian was first raised by a Canadian historian called Peter Hart. His work has been largely discredited since and the only people that continue to make that allegation today are some media commentators,” he claims.
According to his essay, the 1911 census showed that Clare had a Protestant population of just 1,913. This was the smallest of any county and over 98% of people in Clare were Catholic.
His essay outlines how in September 1911, two Protestant members of the Clare Unionist Club, Colonel George O’Callaghan Westropp and HV Macnamara made speeches in Down and Macnamara made a number of allegations about the mistreatment of Protestants in Clare.
A report in The Clare Champion of the day quoted Macnamara as saying, “A man’s children were liable to be annoyed by Catholic children and he was subject to the receipt of threatening letters and continuous pinpricks of that sort were even harder to bear than big troubles.
“If the victim were a shopkeeper, his windows were broken; if a farmer, his cattle were maimed and if these outrages did not prove sufficiently effective, shots were fired into his house and even attempts at murder were made.”
The report on the two men’s speeches can still be seen on microfilm at the Clare County Library’s local study centre and after it appeared, The ’Champion published letters from a number of his fellow Protestants and Unionists, rebutting the claims.
FC Pilkington stated, “I have never met with the smallest inconvenience or discourtesy from my Roman Catholic brethren on account of my religion. On the contrary, I have lived all my life among them, on terms of the best friendship and goodwill. It is my experience that our county is happily free from religious intolerance and if anyone here has been subjected to persecution, it is not on account of his religion but for some other reason.”
Pádraig says there is ample evidence to suggest that relations were quite good between Catholics and Protestants at the time, as the letters suggest.
“Protestants were elected to the county council, despite the fact that there were only a handful of Protestants in the area, often beating Catholic candidates. Protestants ran successful businesses, they weren’t boycotted and generally there were normal relations between religious groups in Clare at the time.”
Macnamara may have made the allegations to bolster the anti-Home Rule case and to confirm the suspicions of Northern Unionists, he suspects.
“Unionists in the North argued that Home Rule was Rome Rule and both men would have been opposed to Home Rule at the time. I suppose they invented these stories of religious persecution to try and give evidence to the slogan about Home Rule but there was no truth to it.”
O’Callaghan Westropp was to change his spots over the next decade, Pádraig says.
“He received far more abuse, including death threats and arson attacks from the Black and Tans than he ever suffered from the IRA. Those speeches in the North were made in 1911 and in 1920 and 1921, O’Callaghan Westropp’s attitude had changed and he was now in support of Home Rule. Basically, he had changed his politics.
“I’m not sure he would have been a Republican but he had changed his views on Home Rule. He started making speeches about this. These were reported in the press at the time and as a result of this, he got death threats from the anti-Sinn Féin society, in other words the Black and Tans and the British forces. Some of his property was burned, again by the British forces.”
On April 17, 1920, the Protestant Church in Clarecastle was destroyed in an arson attack, while on June 29, the Protestant Church in O’Briensbridge was the target of a similar attack. However, Padraig says these attacks were not carried out by the IRA.
“The local Sinn Féín councillor sent an expression of remorse after the burning of the church in Clarecastle, so he certainly didn’t approve of it. The second church that was attacked was in O’Briensbridge and the RIC reported that Sinn Féiners and Republicans arrived to put out the fire. That would imply that they didn’t start it.”
During the Civil War, the Protestant Church at Miltown Malbay was also burned down and this was strongly condemned by local IRA commander, Anthony Malone, who is quoted in the article in The Other Clare.
Pádraig claims those who were suspected of collaboration with the authorities were treated similarly, regardless of their religion and he says the only three civilians executed as suspected spies by the IRA in Clare during the War of Independence were all Catholics.
In general, he believes sectarianism was quite confined at the time. “The further you got from Belfast, the less there was of it generally.”
However, he feels there were genuine fears among the Protestant population, although these proved to be misplaced.
“I think there was fear that the anti-Catholic pogroms, in Belfast in particular, would spur a backlash in other areas. But certainly by July of 1921 when the War of Independence ended, that hadn’t happened,” he concludes.