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Papers by John O'Donovan

Article published in the 'Cork Examiner' series on 1916 on Monday 8 February 2016

This paper examines the reaction in west Cork to the war in South Africa from October 1899 to the... more This paper examines the reaction in west Cork to the war in South Africa from October 1899 to the 'khaki election' of October 1900. It concentrates on the printed reaction contained in the rival papers the 'Southern Star' and the 'Eagle' while putting the events into some sort of context. It also touches on the growth of the United Irish League and the conservative anti-Catholic nationalism that was prevalent prior to 1898 and the democratisation of local government.

This paper briefly sets out some thoughts about the relationship between the All-for-Ireland Leag... more This paper briefly sets out some thoughts about the relationship between the All-for-Ireland League and the Irish Parliamentary Party during the period 1910-1918, and offers some brief thoughts on the Decade of Centenaries.

This paper gives a brief overview of the All-for-Ireland League, a Cork-based splinter constituti... more This paper gives a brief overview of the All-for-Ireland League, a Cork-based splinter constitutional nationalist group that existed between 1910 and 1918.

Gabriel Doherty (ed.): Revisisting Canon Sheehan of Doneraile (1852-1913): Author, Activist, Priest, Nov 25, 2014

This paper examines the connection between Canon PA Sheehan (1852-1913) and the Fenian movement i... more This paper examines the connection between Canon PA Sheehan (1852-1913) and the Fenian movement in his life and writings. Growing up in north county Cork before and after the events of the abortive 1867 rising, Sheehan retained the sense of the hopelessness of these "martyrs for old Ireland", and created characters in his later novels shaped by not only his memories of that period, but by his sense of despair at the degeneration of the Ireland of his youth. Canon Sheehan's Fenians are not just a nostalgia for an Ireland dying; they are a bulwark against the new, materialistic Ireland.

Defying the Law of the Land: Radical Agrarians in Irish History (Dublin: The History Press Ireland), Oct 1, 2013

This essay examines the narrative of violence in Cork City and County during 1910. It argues that... more This essay examines the narrative of violence in Cork City and County during 1910. It argues that the violence was both a product of the subaltern tensions present since the Parnell Split and antecedent events and also a harbinger of the violent decade to come.

This essay briefly examines the narrative of two riots in Cork County in 1910. It also examines t... more This essay briefly examines the narrative of two riots in Cork County in 1910. It also examines the reactions to the disturbances and the aftermath.

Talks by John O'Donovan

This lecture was given to the monthly meeting of the Mallow Field Club on Tuesday 9 January 2018.... more This lecture was given to the monthly meeting of the Mallow Field Club on Tuesday 9 January 2018. It deals with the life and career of William O'Brien, born in the town in 1852 who was a journalist, agrarian agitator and political leader.

The National Convention of the United Irish League (UIL) and Irish Parliamentary Party (IPP) held... more The National Convention of the United Irish League (UIL) and Irish Parliamentary Party (IPP) held in the Mansion House Dublin in February 1909 has entered historical lore as being one of the most turbulent ever held in the building. For some nationalists, it was the culmination of years of tension and conflict within the Party and the UIL. For others, it was the first public example of the firm grip which the Ancient Order of Hibernians (AOH) now had on the political machinery of Irish constitutional nationalism. This paper will outline the narrative of the build-up, conduct and reaction to the Convention and its turbulent sessions. It will demonstrate the extent to which the leadership of the IPP and the UIL had become in thrall to the militant AOH, and how this would inform subsequent Irish history.

In 1910 James Connolly published his pamphlet Labour, Nationality and Religion in response to ser... more In 1910 James Connolly published his pamphlet Labour, Nationality and Religion in response to sermons delivered by Fr Kane, a Jesuit priest in north inner city Dublin. This was just the latest in a line of skirmishes between Connolly and the Catholic Church, fearful as the latter was of the march of socialism into Ireland.

In 1912 Canon PA Sheehan of Doneraile, Co Cork published a novel called Miriam Lucas where, in part, he sought to indirectly reply to Connolly. This paper will examine this novel in the contexts of when it was written (Canon Sheehan had been working on a novel about socialism for the past seven years, perhaps at the behest of his American contact Fr Hermann J Heuser of Pennsylvania), and when the novel was read.

Connolly never replied directly to Canon Sheehan, but the juxtaposition of these two events in the years before the Lockout of 1913 gives them an extra frisson. In particular, Sheehan’s description of working-class life in Dublin eerily prefigures the scenes witnessed during the Lockout. In this, the centenary year of the Lockout, it is worth examining the clash between Connolly’s socialist message and that of the Catholic Church, at a time when the latter’s power and influence were on the wane.

This talk traces the relationship between Canon Sheehan and the Fenian movement, both in person a... more This talk traces the relationship between Canon Sheehan and the Fenian movement, both in person and on paper, from 1867 to 1916 and the Easter Rising. Sheehan's final novel 'The Graves at Kilmorna' while conceived and written in a period of intra-nationalist turmoil, was read during a period where the Irish Republican Brotherhood, and Patrick Pearse in particular, were growing in militance, if not strength. Therefore the contexts are different, and are explored in this presentation.

Power relationships within nationalism as a whole defined politics in Edwardian Ireland, as vario... more Power relationships within nationalism as a whole defined politics in Edwardian Ireland, as various groups competed for the power to re-define Ireland’s constitutional relationship with Britain. Within the context of these relationships the struggle for control of the Irish Parliamentary Party and its grassroots organisation the United Irish League (UIL) was a significant, if protracted, episode. Founded in 1898, the UIL was designed with the intention of acting as a nationalist alternative ‘proto-state’. This alternative state witnessed a number of conflicting political and social groups struggling for legitimate representation. Tenants (settled and evicted, rural and urban), landless agricultural labourers, skilled and unskilled urban workers – all competed to have their grievances and opinions heard. Leading personalities rallied groups around them. This paper examines the Cork Advisory Committee, established in the wake of the passage of the Wyndham Land Act. If the UIL represented a legitimate alternative to the British state, then the Advisory Committee offered an alternative within the state to the paradigm of a Liberal Catholic Home Rule Ireland. The Advisory Committee and its members acted in the interests of wide strata in Edwardian Irish society, from landlords to landless. Its very existence and activities raises questions about the nature of Irish constitutional nationalism and the legitimacy of claims by pan-class movements to represent all the people at any given time. These questions have not been properly addressed by scholars until now.

Article published in the 'Cork Examiner' series on 1916 on Monday 8 February 2016

Gabriel Doherty (ed.): Revisisting Canon Sheehan of Doneraile (1852-1913): Author, Activist, Priest, Nov 25, 2014

Defying the Law of the Land: Radical Agrarians in Irish History (Dublin: The History Press Ireland), Oct 1, 2013

In February 1915 the final completed novel from the pen of Canon PA Sheehan of Doneraile, who had... more In February 1915 the final completed novel from the pen of Canon PA Sheehan of Doneraile, who had died just over eighteen months previously, was published. The Graves of Kilmorna was Sheehan’s final, pessimistic, salute to an Ireland which had “changed, changed utterly” since his youth. But it also, following the events of sixteen months later, has been latterly held up as a harbinger of the rebellion.

This paper examines not just Sheehan’s portrayal and use of Fenian characters and motifs in his novel. It also explores the wider context in which this novel was conceived and written. Sheehan and Pádraig Pearse were closer in their ideology than has previously been noted, and this will be teased out as much as possible. Although Sheehan gained huge fame in his lifetime for his popular Catholic novels, focussing on the lives and deeds of priests, this paper will argue that his political novels – of which Kilmorna was the last – have a lasting significance which has only been recently appreciated outside a small coterie of historians and enthusiasts.

Framing the overlapping networks of unionism, conservatism and loyalism in pre-revolutionary Irel... more Framing the overlapping networks of unionism, conservatism and loyalism in pre-revolutionary Ireland is a challenge. This becomes more acute the closer one gets to the twentieth century and the disappearance of political power from the unionist class. ‘Hard’ power became replaced with ‘soft’ power (much to the chagrin of diverse characters such as Lord Barrymore and DP Moran). The nostalgia of prudent management and benevolent dispersal of money and services became more acute as the acien regime was swept from their bastions of power following the passage of the Local Government (Ireland) Act 1898.

In the sphere of the press, conservatism, loyalism and unionism were quite obviously a minority taste, and only served by a few daily newspapers. The majority of these, however, only spoke to the commercial unionists and loyalists. Few newspapers took a stance in favour of nostalgic prudence, and loyalty to the government of the day. One such (as I will argue in this paper) was the eccentric Skibbereen Eagle.

The Eagle was first and foremost an outlet for the foibles and viewpoints of its founder, Fred Potter. Conservative viewpoints and loyalist outlooks were common, even more so after 1898 and during the first turbulent years of the twentieth century. Yet even after Potter’s death in 1907 the Eagle (under Catholic nationalist ownership) continued to transmit a modified version its founders’ outlook.

This paper will examine the Eagle’s worldview through its commentary on issues central to the shrinking loyalist population of its hinterland. It will argue that the paper deserves to be studied as the agent of a different kind of loyalism than that preached by its heavyweight counterpart, the 'Cork Constitution'.

The land agitations which succeeded the upheavals of the Land League era and the era of the Plan ... more The land agitations which succeeded the upheavals of the Land League era and the era of the Plan of Campaign towards the end of the nineteenth century have proved difficult for historians to contextualise, even more so given that they occur during a time of significant social and political flux. Of the agitations that sprung up in this period, the growth of the United Irish League (UIL) towards the close of the century and the 'Ranch War' which to some extent succeeded it do not fit into the pigeonholes erected by many historians for them.

The UIL was a composite social and political movement associated with, though not fully part of, ... more The UIL was a composite social and political movement associated with, though not fully part of, the Home Rule movement of the early twentieth century. This article explores that relationship through a case study of the movement in Cork, Ireland's largest county. The chosen area was varied enough geographically and socially for cleavages to occur. Narratives of resistance and counter-resistance ran through these cleavages e.g. rural versus urban, landed versus landless, the Catholic Church versus radical secular nationalists. Further modes of resistance also appeared, such as cultural resistance to creeping British influences. These wider modes transcended the schism in the wider Irish Party (the vehicle of the Home Rule movement) after the passage of the Wyndham Land Act in 1903. That this schism was centred on Cork city and county was in part due to the forceful personality of William O'Brien and the activities of a clique of his followers. From 1910 until 1916 a rejuvenated UIL in Cork was engaged in resisting the advances of O'Brien and his new organisation, the All-for-Ireland League (AFIL).

Resistance and counter-resistance are familiar tropes to those who labour in the garden of Irish ... more Resistance and counter-resistance are familiar tropes to those who labour in the garden of Irish nationalist history in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. From the armed rebellions inspired by the Irish Republican Brotherhood (IRB) in 1867 and again in 1916, to the agrarian struggles of the Land League, the Plan of Campaign and the United Irish League (UIL) in the 1870s, 1880s and early 1900s respectively, Irish nationalists sought to disengage from the hegemonic presence of the British state and its agents. Nationalists of all hues also sought to resist the creeping and insidious social and cultural influence of “England” through the foundation of the Gaelic League in 1892. Yet by far the most complex and comprehensive in terms of strategic resistance and the creation of a de facto alternative government was the UIL. This, by its very nature and appeal across a wide sector of nationalist support, meant that uneasy alliances were forged in the heat of battle which would be repudiated later.
These were further enhanced by the structures of the UIL which functioned as an Irish nationalist state in embryo. Local branches were organised into executives at parliamentary division level, with a National Directory providing governance at an all-island level; a Standing Committee organised the League on a day-to-day basis. Coterminous with these stood the local government structures put in place by the 1898 Local Government (Ireland) Act. These county, rural and urban district councils allowed the UIL membership to practise electoral and popular politics, all the while taking control of governance from the agents of the British state (bar, of course, the policing and military which remained an invidious presence). All of these representatives gathered annually (sometimes more often) at a National Convention in Dublin, ostensibly to pass judgement on the performance of their parliamentary representatives in the Irish Parliamentary Party (IPP) by scrutinising legislation recently passed at Westminster or forthcoming from the governments in power.
The structures of the UIL were designed to provide more representation for grassroots nationalism and more interaction with an IPP which clung to the structures and tenets set down during the heydays of Charles Stewart Parnell. A consequence of the paralysing and psychological effects of the violent and damaging split of 1890-1, the eddies of which were still reaching the shores at the turn of the twentieth century, the relationships between the lieutenants of Parnell – John Dillon, O'Brien and John Redmond, as well as the gadfly Tim Healy – were fraught by the time O'Brien founded the UIL in 1898. Over the following two years, a complicated series of negotiations ended with the UIL merging with the IPP, a merger ratified at a National Convention held in June 1900 which approved the UIL Constitution and Rules. This Convention signalled the beginning of the end of ‘phase one’ of the UIL growth, and ushered in ‘phase two’, a consolidation of the League and clarification of its modus operandi.
Consolidation somewhat blunted the UIL’s radical impulse, and brought to the surface tensions inherent within the movement.