A Shadow Over Europe
The Bolshevik revolution of 1917 and the disturbed aftermath of the First World War cast a very large shadow over Europe, as political and industrial unrest reached a fever pitch. In 1919, a wave of revolt and protest swept across the continent; bringing with it a soviet in Munich, an insurrection in Berlin, a commune in Budapest, a general strike in Vienna, the occupations of factories by Turin workers, the struggles for a forty-hour week in Glasgow and Belfast and big strikes in Liverpool, Southampton, Tyneside and London
In Limerick, many workers, led by the officers and executive committee of the United Limerick Trades and Labour Council, had grown in political and nationalistic consciousness. This development had been sharpened by a number of events, notably, the effects of the 1913 Dublin Lockout, the influence of the writings of James Connolly and the participation of the Citizen Army in the 1916 Rising.
Labour Day was celebrated by Limerick workers for the first time on May 1st 1918, when over 10,000 workers marched through the streets. The demonstration ended with speeches from three platforms at the Market’s Field, where the assembled workers passed a resolution, to the sound of a trumpet. The first part of this resolution read:
“That we the workers of Limerick and district, in mass meeting assembled, extend fraternal greetings to the workers of all countries, paying particular tribute to our Russian comrades who have waged such a magnificent struggle for their social and political emancipation.”
Thus it can be seen from the language used in the text of the resolution that the Russian Revolution had repercussions in Limerick and the expression of solidarity by the city’s workers shows the extent of their developing class consciousness.
Robert Bryne
On new years eve 1917, the home of Robert Byrne was raided by the RIC (Royal Irish constabulary). He was a member of the 2nd Limerick Battalion of the Irish Volunteers. Earlier that year, he had been sacked from his position as a telegraph operator by the Limerick GPO because of his involvement in the Trade Union Movement.
Byrne was on the watchlist of the RIC because he attended the funeral of John Daly; a leading member of the IRB (irish republican Brotherhood), and uncle to Kathleen Clark, founder of Cumann na mBan; a woman’s paramilitary organisation, who’s husband, Tom Clarck, was executed by British forced for his involvement in the 1916 rising.
At his house, an unloaded revolver was found, along with ammunition and a par of field binoculars, leading to his arrest. He was tried by Court Martial on January 21st, where he refused to recognise the authority of the British court. He was sentenced to 12 months hard labour in Limerick Prison.
In Prison, Byrne led 16 prisoners in a campaign of disobedience to win demand for political prisoner status; this culminated in a riot; they barricaded the doors and sang rebel songs so loudly that passerby on the surrounding streets could hear them. The protest was quelled by batton charge, and the prisoners shacked to their beds and placed in solitary confinement. On February 14th, following a meeting of the Trades Council, a resolution was passed, and later distributed throughout the city in leaflet form, protesting against the treatment being meted out to the prisoners. This protest was ignored and the prisoners went on hunger strike to try to secure their objective.
After 3 weeks, Byrns health had deteriorated so much, that he was transferred to the Limerick Union Workhouse Hospital. This action was most likely caused because Pierce McCann, TD for East Tipperary, died a week earlier due to the Spanish flu and the British authorities didn’t want any more deaths fearing the bad press, both domestic and international, this would generate.
A small bit of context is required to understand the series of events that followed.
In 1917, the Irish Volunteers ordered Peadar Dunne to organise a second Battalion in Limerick. This arose because of intense dissatisfaction locally and nationally at the disappointing performance of the original 1st Battalion, during Easter Week 1916.
Professor Eoin McNeill’s Countermanding Order, as the figure head Chief of Staff of the Irish Volunteers, cancelling the ‘manoeuvres’ planned for Easter Monday, caused utter confusion not just in Limerick but in many places outside of Dublin.
Prior to the Rising, the police had observed Thomas Clarke and Seán MacDiarmada (the military ‘brains’ of the Irish Republican Brotherhood) visiting Robert Byrne at his home, underlining his role and the importance of Limerick in the preparations. However, Limerick’s failure to act decisively in 1916 was compounded by the inexplicable, naïve decision to hand over their arms ‘temporarily’ to the British military, with the city’s unionist Mayor, Sir Stephen Quin, acting as intermediary.
The 2nd Battalion might be described as the ‘IRB’ Battalion in Limerick. In forming a battalion openly led and directed by their own men, the Irish Republican Brotherhood — the Fenians, described in the Easter Proclamation as Ireland’s ‘secret military organisation’ — were correcting a fault line that had lain at the core of the Volunteer organisation since their foundation in November 1913.
The formation of that battalion was part of a determination by the IRB that, in the post-1916 renewed struggle for independence, they would never again put non-IRB members, like Eoin MacNeill, in a position to thwart the organisation’s strategy or tactics.
So when Byrne was placed under 24hr armed guard, but kept in a public ward at The Limerick Workhouse Hospital. It was too good an opportunity for the Irish Volunteers to rescue him due to his importance to the IRB’s revolutionary efforts, and on the 6th of April, 1919, under the command of Micahel Stack, 20 volunteers entered the hospital. When they were in place, stack blew his whistle and their veneers rushed the guards and a melee ensued. One of Bryne’s guards drew his pistol, and shot Robbert Byrne point blank in the chest. One of the policemen guarding Byrne was killed and another was seriously wounded while others received injuries.
Byrne was taken to a safe house just outside the city in county clare — it was here, already weakened from the hunger strike, and suffering a gunshot wound to the abdomen, Robbert Byrne, passed away at 8 O’Clock that evening. It was here that the seeds of the Limerick Soviet 1919 were sown..
General Strike
The death of the policeman was not an isolated incident but part of a general state of guerilla harassment and attacks on the British military forces and the police. The British administration in the country was in the process of breaking down before the rising tide of Irish nationalism. So Byrne’s rescue attempt didn’t stand out as an isolated incident, but as part of a larger national trend. In March 1919 a report marked URGENT and stamped SECRET landed on the Inspector General of Royal Irish Constabulary’s desk. who informed the Chief Secretary’s Office for Ireland that
“In the prevailing discontent with the existing form of Government, should the extremists decide to take independent action, they could rely to a considerable on the co-operation of Labour organisation, and that they would certainly find a large number of fanatical Irish Volunteers through the country, ready to do their bidding. Ireland is unquestionably in a highly flammable condition and in my opinion at no time was there more urgent necessity for the presence of an overpowering military force.”
This helps set the scene for what was about to follow.
Robert Burne’s funeral was a tense and crowded occasion; His remains were brought from St.Johns Cathedral to Mount Saint Larnwers cemetery, bringing the city effectively to a standstill; a crowd estimated to between 10 and 15 thousand lined the street, including Sinn Fein sympathisers from across Limerick and the surrounding counties. The British military authorities became alarmed that a further outbreak of trouble was imminent. Armed soldiers and armoured cars lined the route of the funeral procession and two planes circled over the city.
On April 9th, three days after Byrne’s death, the British military authorities took a further step to deal with what they viewed as an imminent explosive situation: the city of Limerick was proclaimed a special military area under the Defence of the Realm Act, with the terms of the proclamation to take effect from Tuesday, April 15th. From that date, special permits would have to be used by all people entering the city.
Those who needed permits had to present themselves to Brigadier-General Griffin, at 78, O’Connell Street, where their height, weight, colour of hair and eyes, and other details were recorded before a permit was issued. In defining the places at which permits had to be furnished, the river Shannon was designated at the boundary on the south side, despite the geographical fact that the city extended far beyond this point to the large working class area of Thomondgate. Workers from this district would therefore have to show their permits and undergo examinations by military sentries four times a day at two bridges. Similarly, workers who lived on the other side of the Shannon but who worked in two of the city’s largest factories on the north side, Cleeve’s Condensed Milk Company and Walker’s Distillery, would also be forced to undergo the same military and police scrutiny.
Strong resentment spurred by the active nationalist forces, manifested itself among the workers against these restrictions. A special meeting of the Trades Council was called for on April 13th and was attended by representatives of thirty-five trade unions. The decision of the meeting was that the workers should not be forced to work under the conditions of the proclamation. A general strike of all the city’s workers was declared and the Limerick Soviet was under way.
A strike committee was elected to control the city and a subcommittee was appointed to take charge of propaganda, finance, food and vigilance. The strike was called at 11.30 p.m. on Sunday, April 13th and, with the help of a sympathetic printing works in Cornmarket Row, which worked night and day during the strike, within two hours the city was covered with the following proclamation :
“Limerick United Trades and Labour Council Proclamation. The workers of Limerick assembled in Council, hereby declare cessation of all work from 5 a.m. on Monday, April 14,1919, as a protest against the decision of the British Government in compelling them to procure per- mits in order to earn their daily bread. By order of the Strike Committee Mechanics’ Institute. Any information to the above can be had from the Strike Committee”
The Limerick Soviet
So the strike began and an estimated 15,000 workers obeyed the call. Through a unique coincidence, journalists from all over the world were then in Limerick to report on the proposed transatlantic flight by Major Wood, who had planned to land in the city for re-fuelling. Consequently, within twenty four hours, the striking Limerick workers had captured headlines in newspapers throughout the world.
For the duration of the strike, these journalists gave their readers a blow by blow account of the operation of the soviet. Four depots were established to supply food at fixed prices and the work of collecting and distributing the food was carried out by four City Councillors.
Certain shops were allowed to open and labour was provided for 27 bakeries, gas and electricity works and other essential industries. Only vehicles displaying the notice, “Working under authority of the Strike Committee”, were allowed to travel on the streets. Approval was given to some firms to save perishable goods and to transport such goods as coal, butter and flour from the docks and the railway station. Any company not carrying out instructions or engaging in profiteering or the unequal distribution of food was immediately closed down. James Casey, a printer, and one of the strike leaders and treasurer of the Trades Council, has written:
“Whilst the Trades Council and Strike Committee controlled all activities inside Limerick City, during the General Strike, the Irish Republican Army was busy without. Supplies of much needed food for the beleaguered population were systematically collected from neighbouring towns and villages. After nightfall, relays of boats with muffled oars were successfully used to run the food and other supplies through the blockade and to maintain communication with the citizens. Numerous stratagems were employed to elude the military cordons, and funeral hearses from the Union Hospital and other districts outside the city did not always have a corpse in the coffin.”
Every effort was made to prevent inconvenience, and equality of classes was the guiding principle of the strike committee. James Casey has recorded:
“It was generally admitted that the city was never guarded or policed so well previously. The people, for once, were doing their own work, and doing it properly … There was no looting and not a single case came up for hearing at the Petty Sessions.”
Outside, Martial law continued and the city remained cut off by the military road-blocks. The strike committee went on with the job of administering and policing the area. And the soviet began to receive widespread coverage in the national and international press. The Irish Independent, in its first report, headed “14,000 Workers Idle” , stated that John Cronin. president of the Limerick Trades Council had wired Mr. W. O’Brien. secretary of the Irish labour Party and Trade union congress:
“General strike here as protest against permit restrictions.”
The Irish Trade Union Council’s Tom Johnson arrived in Limerick on April 17th and stated
“I have authority for announcing that the full strength of the Labour movement in Ire 8 and, backed by the general public, would be exerted on behalf of the men and women of Limerick”
On that same day, Brigadier-General Griffin, commandant of the military operation, met the members of the Limerick Chamber of Commerce on April 17th and gave them authority to issue permits to their workers to go to work.
But soviet leaders rejected this, arguing that they were not prepared to ceed to the employers the right to decide who should be allowed to go to work, no more than they were prepared to ceed that to the British Military. This only led to an escalation in the Strike action.
On Saturday, April 19th, the Mayor of Limerick, Alphonsus O’Mara, called a meeting of the citizens to consider the situation. A large crowd, including Tom Johnson, attended and a resolution was adopted protesting against
“the imposition of the military area system and demanding the instant withdrawal of the military cordon which prevented the workers from having free access to their work”
The Irish Times carried a report on the op-position of British trades unions to the strike. On the following day, the same paper stated:
“Mr. J.H. Thomas, M.P., in a circular to all branches of the railwaymen’s union in Ireland.. .advises the members of the union not to take any official part in the movement without the authority of the executive committee.”
At the end of the first week, the strike committee had not received the anticipated amount of outside financial support. The committee, faced with dwindling food sup- plies and a serious shortage of money, attempted to head off a crisis by deciding to design and print its own money. Thousands of pounds, in denominations of 10/-, 5/- and 1/- notes, were issued — leading to an irish times reporter to note
“The country will note … the sorts of friends whom the Limerick Soviet has made in England. The great organisation of Labour remains [silent and aloof .Only the extreme socialists, a small and discredited body, take it to their bosom. It has earned the injurious raise of the British Socialist Party and of the independent Labour Party”
A number of ruses were carried out by the strike committee in attempts to confuse and harass the military. One such scheme involved the organisation of a bogus hurling match, on April 21st at Caherdavin, outside the city on the Clare side. Later the same evening, about a thousand men, including Tom Johnson, attempted to cross back over the Shannon to Limerick without per- mits. At Sarsfield Bridge, the British sentry, stationed in Shannon rowing club building fired warning shots into the air before the barricade on the bridge was manned; a confrontation developed between the military and the men but, following the intervention of a Franciscan priest, the men dispersed. Early the next morning the men walked to the nearby Longpavement railway station, where they boarded the incoming train from Ennis, and, despite the surveillance of the military, made good their return to Limerick.
The strike committee continued its work against a variety of difficulties and pressures. Daily discussions with Tom Johnson failed to bring the promised support from the Irish T.U.C. or from workers in other parts of the country. Some discussion developed within the committee on the failure of the T.U.C. to go any further than paper and verbal support for the strike. An effort was made to force this issue and the London Times stated:
“Various Labour leaders were converging upon Limerick yesterday, and it is understood that a decision will be reached today on the question of a general strike throughout Ireland. The prevalent opinion in Ireland appears to be any call of this kind will not meet with a widespread response.”
The Irish Times reached a similar conclusion: “The National Executive of Labour evidently is disappointed with the result of its appeal to the workers throughout Ireland.. . the strike cannot be universal because the sturdy and highly organised Labour of North-East Ulster will have nothing to say to it.” The Labour Party had earlier decided to give practical support to the striking workers. But on April 23rd., the Irish Times correspondent in Limerick stated:
“The failure of the national executive of the Labour Party to fulfil their engagement to meet here today is regarded as an indication that all is not well in Labour circles. Their action, taken in conjunction with the action of the British Labour leaders, forces one to the conclusion that the end of the strike cannot be far off”
A lot of money and food was collected and sent into limerick from rank-and-file members of the trade union movement across Ireland, but ultimately, there was no national strike action called.
On Thursday, April 24th, following discussions with the Roman Catholic Bishop of Limerick, Dr. Hallinan, and the Mayor of Limerick, Alphonsus O’Mara, the workers’ solidarity began to crumble. The strike committee, under strong pressure, shifted ground. After a long meeting, John Cronin addressed a big meeting outside the Mechanics’ Institute, the headquarters of the strike committee in Lower Glentworth Street, and announced the terms of the decision taken. He called on all workers who could resume work without military permits to do so, and those who could not to continue “in their refusal to accept this sign of subjection and slavery”.
The strike committee issued its final proclamation outlining the terms of the decision and ending on a hopeful if unrealistic note: “We.. . call upon our fellow-countrymen and lovers of freedom all over the world to provide the necessary funds to enable us to continue this struggle against military tyranny.”
Conclusion
What can only really be described as a defeat for Irish Labour, and a failure for a unified response across the Labour parties of Ireland, England and Scotland, this episode really highlights what can go wrong with a hierarchical labour union’s responses to spontaneous labour actions. This was a branch of the Irish Labour and industrial union, with significant influence from both working class causes, and the nationalist cause, culminating in a standoff with the imposition of British military rule that ultimately failed to capture the attention of the labour cause across industrial.
It signalled a death for Irish socialism and the socialist cause on this island as the immediate aftermath of this period was the Victory of the nationalist causes in the war for independence 1919–1921; followed by a period of civil war where the Irish Labour did not opposed the anglo-Irish treaty, the principle disagreement of the civil war and campaigned for peace between both pro-treaty and anti-treaty sides, but not actively involving the labour union in the struggle, essentially side-lining the cause of labour in the defining action of what republic would emerge from this civil war.
The legacy of the 1916 rising and the growing nationalist cause meant that Ireland experienced a unique combination of internal as well as these external influences that found their expression in working class movements. Traditionally the history of the period 1916–21 has been viewed mainly from the nationalist perspective; accounts of the deeds of the IRA and the political developments of Sinn Fein are the main issues dealt with by school history books. It is not generally known that the Irish trade union movement played a very important role in undermining the authority of the British Administration in Ireland during the war for independence. It’s for this reason that the Limerick Soviet is important, not because it succeeded, but because even recounting it’s failure possesses too ripe an expression of class consciousness, more ripe than the Bourgeois state is comfortable with.
References:
The Limerick Soviet | April 19191 — Episode 10: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pypaa7SVMs4
The Limerick Soviet: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=js0FR8GkBEo
Limerick City Library Records: http://www.limerickcity.ie/Library/LocalStudies/LocalStudiesFiles/L/LimerickSoviet/
The Limerick Soviet Exhibition: https://www.limerick.ie/sites/default/files/media/documents/2020-05/soviet-logo-merged-1-compressed_compressed-1-by-easepdfcomp.pdf
