A century on, how the Anglo-Irish Treaty was done

On June 24 1921, the British public was presented with extraordinary news. Prime minister David Lloyd George had invited Éamon de Valera, the leader of Sinn Féin, to meet him for talks in London with the object of ending the war in Ireland. Up to then, imminent and overwhelming use of military force to settle the Irish question had been widely expected. Now the leader of rebels in open war with Britain, a man described by the chief secretary for Ireland as “[belonging] to a race of treacherous murderers”, was coming to parley in Downing Street. As Winston Churchill later wrote: “No British Government in modern times has ever appeared to make so sudden and complete reversal of policy.”

The events that followed Lloyd George’s invitation would resonate for a century. A year later Ireland was plunged into civil war. The partition of Ireland, consolidated by the Anglo-Irish Treaty of December 6 1921, created a longing for a united Ireland that contributed to the Troubles and has underpinned Irish republican activism ever since. Today, the border that runs through Ireland has been disinterred as an external EU frontier, and the spectre of customs posts returning to reverse the gains of the Good Friday Agreement haunts the ongoing Brexit protocol negotiations.

I was immersed in the dramatic events of 1921 as part of my research for a novel when Ireland suddenly went into pandemic lockdown. Libraries, bookshops and universities shut their doors; my preferred sources were blocked. Shortly afterwards, I went to a shelf of books that had once belonged to my father, a row of venerable spines I had been staring at for decades but never really seen. Soon I realised that these old memoirs and biographies, many annotated in the 1960s and early 1970s, had probably been read back then by Dad as the 50th anniversary of Ireland’s independence had approached.

Like many of my generation, I had been brought up with only the bare bones of modern Irish history, served with partisan seasoning. My family from Waterford in the south-east was strongly anti-de Valera, their opinions formed not only by his activities in 1921 but also because my grandfather’s livestock exporting business had been devastated by the tariffs that had arisen in the 1930s from de Valera’s “economic war” with Britain. Families all over Ireland had taken opposing sides from the time of the treaty. But as I read, I was riveted not only by the many twists and turns in the drama but by the fascinating personalities of those involved.

Lloyd George had in de Valera someone not directly associated in British minds with shooting British officers. The Irishman, whose death sentence for his part in the 1916 Easter Rising had been commuted, had subsequently escaped from Lincoln prison and in May 1919 gone incognito to America where he had remained until the end of 1920. The Liberal prime minister needed cover to appease the Conservative party on whose support his coalition government increasingly relied. De Valera, already with the aura of power about him, provided that cover in a way that an infamous figure such as Michael Collins could not.

Unless we crush the [Irish] murder gangs this summer we . . . lose Ireland and the empire

Nor, it seemed, would the English electorate now tolerate an earth-razing campaign of the kind needed to subdue Ireland, advocated by those like Sir Henry Wilson, the intransigent chief of the British Imperial General Staff. “Unless we crush the [Irish] murder gangs this summer we . . . lose Ireland and the empire,” he noted even as reprisals by the Black and Tans were being greeted with dismay in parts of the British press and by the clergy.

De Valera had already been in receipt of overtures made on Lloyd George’s behalf by General Jan Smuts, prime minister of South Africa. Following further contacts through back channels and a conciliatory speech by King George V at the inauguration in Belfast of the Northern Parliament in June, a truce was called. Prominent Sinn Féin members, including Arthur Griffith, already frail at 50 years of age, were released from prisons, and talks began in London on July 14.

Negotiating with de Valera, a man of labyrinthine disposition, was, Lloyd George complained, like trying “to pick up mercury with a fork”. (“Why doesn’t he use a spoon?” de Valera is said to have responded.) Both men irritated each other. The prime minister, who addressed the Irishman as “Mr de Valer-era”, was inclined to make asides in Welsh to his secretary, Tom Jones, to which Dev (his name to most of Ireland) responded by speaking Irish with his own delegation.

Although these talks settled nothing, they established a platform for going forward in an atmosphere that, for the moment, was a hopeful alternative to the resumption of war. After a summer of false starts and diplomatic hedge-hopping, de Valera promptly accepted Lloyd George’s September 29 invitation to a conference in London in October to settle the issue. Preparations in Dublin and in London began.

Ireland’s goal was to be recognised by Britain as a sovereign, independent island state, and for Britain to renounce all claims over Ireland. De Valera proposed a form of external association with the British empire. Britain, however, was resolved to grant only a limited form of home rule to 26 of Ireland’s 32 counties, and dominion status within the empire, but no autonomy when it came to defence or matters fiscal.

Overshadowing all was Northern Ireland, already established under the Government of Ireland Act 1920 as a separate parliament with limited autonomy and a defined land border. The act had envisaged parliaments north and south, both answerable to a crown-appointed viceroy, and nominating delegates to a “Council of Ireland”. But, by 1921, the south, with its own Dáil, or parliament, albeit proscribed, wanted nothing to do with such a British-centric proposal.

Some hope remained for a united Ireland. Substantial Catholic minorities were “trapped” in Northern Ireland’s border counties. The Irish would be given reason to believe that Britain, through a Boundary Commission, could force a redrawing of Northern Ireland’s border to bring in these Catholics under a southern parliament. In such circumstances, the logic went, the subsequent much-reduced size of Northern Ireland would make the statelet unviable and force her into unity with her larger southern neighbour.

The picking of Irish delegates rested with de Valera. Dev, ever enigmatic, announced he would not go to London. Collins, the Dáil’s minister for finance, at 31 already a national hero, pleaded with him to change his mind. De Valera was adamant. His reasons have been the subject of extensive analysis from that time forward, for within his crucial decision lay the seeds of the tragic outcome that would eventually unfold. His closest allies, out-and-out Republicans such as Cathal Brugha, the incendiary minister for defence, and Austin Stack, minister for home affairs, were fundamentally opposed to dialogue on the basis offered, and were fully prepared to go down fighting, which in Brugha’s case would be a destiny fulfilled.

The Irish team was named. Griffith, minister for foreign affairs, and Collins were the backbone. Robert Barton, 40, an ascendancy landlord from County Wicklow, was a staunch de Valera ally and minister for economic affairs. Another Dev ally, George Gavan Duffy, had defended Sir Roger Casement, the Irish nationalist hero prosecuted in 1916 for treason. Eamonn Duggan, a veteran of the 1916 Easter Rising, was appointed liaison officer.

Two secretaries were nominated: John Chartres, a civil servant who had Griffith’s confidence, and Erskine Childers, an Englishman, who had not. Childers, Barton’s first cousin, was a character fiction could not have outdone. Author in 1903 of the bestselling spy thriller, The Riddle of the Sands, in 1914, with Molly, his American wife, they had sailed their yacht into Howth, County Dublin, with a consignment of German rifles destined for the Irish Volunteers. Regarded by de Valera as a constitutional genius, Childers was distrusted by Collins and detested by Griffith.

On the insistence of de Valera, who had become “a particularist in the niceties of statecraft”, according to one biographer, the Irish delegates were appointed as plenipotentiaries by the Irish Dáil — but again, Dev’s ambivalent hand intruded. At a final cabinet meeting, in a scribbled pencil note to Griffith, he instructed that the plenipotentiaries make no decision without prior sanction of the cabinet, a seeming contradiction of the terms under which the delegates had just been appointed.

The main Irish delegation to London, 25 persons including six female secretaries and a cook, sailed in the first week of October. (Collins and his entourage crossed separately some days later.) The conference was set to begin in Downing Street on Tuesday October 11.

The British appointees were seasoned politicians and unrepentant Unionists whose distaste for Irish rebels could not be overstated. Compared to the Irishmen, without experience in world affairs, the English side had recently concluded the Treaty of Versailles. Austen Chamberlain, leader of the house, emphatically opposed any autonomy for Ireland. Winston Churchill, secretary of state for the colonies, was the dogged son of Lord Randolph Churchill, a legendary champion of Ulster. The secretary of state for Ireland, Hamar Greenwood, a shameless apologist for the Black and Tans, was someone Collins had sworn never to shake hands with. The Earl of Birkenhead, in 1916, as attorney-general had successfully procured the death sentence for Sir Roger Casement.

Little was known in London of the Irishmen, which had led Birkenhead to privately commission résumés. The resulting dossier summarily relegated the lesser players: “Duggan (Catholic) . . . completely under the influence of Collins; recognises that he is not one of the strong men . . . Barton (Protestant) . . . educated at Rugby and Christchurch; . . . a substantial farmer; has no outstanding quality . . . Gavan Duffy (Catholic) . . . vain and self-sufficient, likes to hear himself talk.”

Then the two remaining Irishmen: “Arthur Griffith (Catholic) . . . will start somewhere about AD1100 and argue up to the sovereign independent right of every nation . . . usually silent . . . is more clever than de Valera, but not so attractive; is the real power in Sinn Féin. Michael Collins (Catholic). “Minister of Finance” [sic] . . . full of physical energy; quick thinker, a Cork man, therefore impetuous and rather excitable; the strongest personality of the party . . . ’

The dossier concluded: “All the delegates will be very nervous and ill at ease . . . In overcoming their nervousness they may be a bit rude and extravagant in speech.”

In overcoming their nervousness they may be a bit rude and extravagant in speech

At the opening session Lloyd George placed the delegates on opposite sides of the conference table before introducing them. Collins’ ability to quickly sum up men is evident from the notes of his first impressions: he disliked Lloyd George, distrusted Churchill and loathed Greenwood. Of Birkenhead: “Concise. Clearness of ideas . . . A good man.” Later, he wrote: “I prefer Birkenhead to anyone else.”

Over the remaining weeks, the English in essence negotiated with Griffith and Collins as the other Irish delegates were pushed out into sub-conferences. Progress was slow. After work, Collins usually withdrew to his separate quarters in Cadogan Gardens, provided to him by Lady Hazel Lavery, while Griffith went to the theatre or played chess in his delegation’s rented quarters in Hans Place. Disaster was narrowly averted following the uninvited intervention of Pope Benedict XV, whose message of goodwill for the talks to King George V elicited a response from the sovereign which seemed to confirm Ireland as a de facto member of the imperial family.

Now the Conservative party conference loomed and Lloyd George, closeted with Griffith, pleaded with the Irishman not to allow the talks to break down over Ulster, the core Unionist issue, for fear the Conservatives would bring down his government. The prime minister hinted at a Boundary Commission; Griffith privately promised to forbear.

On December 3, the Irish delegates were back in Dublin with a bleak draft for cabinet. Ireland was to be granted no more than dominion status; Northern Ireland’s established position would remain unchanged; some concessions on defence could be expected. Brugha, combustible to an alarming degree, accused Griffith and Collins of betraying the core Irish position. The bitter split in Sinn Féin was now clear. The draft proposals were rejected and the delegates, divided among themselves, returned in gloom that night to London.

On December 4, discussions resumed and Irish counterproposals were presented. The Irish suggestion of external association with the empire was once again rejected. Again and again Griffith insisted he would accept association with the crown only on conditions of Irish unity, notwithstanding the confirmed status of Northern Ireland as a separate legislative entity. All the emphasis was on the political with scant attention paid to financial or economic details. A clause that transferred part of the UK’s national debt to the Irish state-in-waiting went undisputed, with economic implications that would lie unattended until 1925.

On December 5 one last attempt began. In Ireland, rosary vigils for peace were being held as two armies faced each other under an increasingly uneasy truce. Griffith, to the surprise of his colleagues, was reminded by Lloyd George of his promise not to break on the question of Ulster; Griffith hotly confirmed his promise, made albeit in a different context. Birkenhead’s legal skills were then called on to provide a form of words in the oath to the sovereign acceptable to both sides. After much discussion on defence, Churchill yielded that the new Irish state be permitted to construct naval vessels to protect revenue and fisheries.

Griffith then agreed Ulster be excluded from further discussion provided a government-appointed Boundary Commission be established. The British agreed.

In a final bid, Lloyd George offered fiscal autonomy but the Irish still demurred. At that point, the prime minister’s tone changed. The British Army garrisoned in Ireland was on high alert, he said with force. The alternative to agreement that night was “immediate and terrible war”. The chastened Irish left Downing Street having agreed to return by 10pm with a final decision.

“I have never,” wrote Churchill of Collins, “seen so much pain and suffering in restraint.”

Shortly afterwards, Collins announced to his colleagues that he would support Griffith. Duggan indicated likewise. For hours Griffith and Collins entreated Barton to sign. Barton eventually agreed; Gavan Duffy followed Barton’s example. At 11pm the exhausted delegates returned to Downing Street where a sombre British side awaited. The Irish announced that they would sign the treaty creating the Irish Free State.

I may have signed my actual death warrant

As the Downing Street typewriters clattered out the final draft, Birkenhead would recall how the reserve between the two sides collapsed and how they “laughed and jested until copies of the treaty were brought in for signature”.

“I may have signed my political death warrant tonight,” Birkenhead remarked to Collins, who replied: “I may have signed my actual death warrant.” 

Seven months later, Ireland was ravaged by civil war fought between pro-treaty and anti-treaty forces. On August 22 1922, Collins was ambushed and shot dead less than 20 miles from his birthplace in County Cork.

Ninety-nine years later, in June 2020, Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil, the political descendants of the respective Irish civil war belligerents, along with the Green party, entered government in Ireland together for the first time, something my grandfather would never have thought possible.

‘Freedom is a Land I Cannot See’, a novel by Peter Cunningham, is published by Sandstone Press

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