John Redmond's Last Years by Stephen Lucius Gwynn
page 97 of 388 (25%)
page 97 of 388 (25%)
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days in jail.
But in Ireland more formidable symptoms soon made themselves manifest. Captain J.R. White, son of Sir George White, the defender of Ladysmith, was a soldier by hereditary instinct and had won the Distinguished Service Order in South Africa. But some strain in his composition answered to other calls, and upon Tolstoyan grounds he ceased to be a soldier, without ceasing to be a natural leader of men. His first public appearance was at a meeting in London in support of Home Rule addressed by a number of prominent persons who were not Roman Catholics. But his interests were plainly not so much Nationalist as broadly humanitarian; freedom for the individual soul rather than for the nation was his object: and he suddenly enrolled himself among Mr. Larkin's allies. His proposal was outlined to a great assembly of the strikers gathered in front of Liberty Hall: Mr. Larkin set it out. They must no longer be "content to assemble in hopeless haphazard crowds" but must "agree to bring themselves under the influences of an ordered and sympathetic discipline." "Labour in its own defence must begin to train itself to act with disciplined courage and with organized and concentrated force. How could they accomplish this? By taking a leaf out of the book of Carson. If Carson had permission to train his braves of the North to fight against the aspirations of the Irish people, then it was legitimate and fair for Labour to organize in the same militant way to preserve their rights and to ensure that if they were attacked they would be able to give a very satisfactory account of themselves." Thus began in a small sectional manner a national movement which led far indeed. Mr. O'Cathasaigh, from whose _Story of the Irish Citizen Army_ I quote, attributes the failure of that purely Labour organization chiefly to the establishment of the Irish Volunteers. |
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