British cabinet told that reprisal allegations in Ireland are exaggerated
London, 2 October 1920 - The Chief Secretary of Ireland, Sir Hamar Greenwood, and the Commander of the British forces in Ireland, General Nevil Macready attended a British cabinet meeting yesterday at which the deteriorating Irish situation was discussed.
The meeting expressed its confidence in the conduct of the Irish administration in Dublin Castle and was presented with a report from General Macready in which he asserted that allegations of reprisals in Ireland were exaggerated and that in several cases the actions of the forces took place ‘in hot blood where the killing of police had been characterised by brutality.’ The report also stated that the policy of the government was that such reprisals should be stopped.
Macready's report echoed a statement issued last week by Sir Hamar Greenwood, that moved to put an end to claims that Britain’s coalition government supported or colluded in acts of retaliation in Ireland. Greenwood issued a defence of the crown forces in Ireland, stating that while nearly 100 policemen had been ‘brutally murdered’, and in spite of ‘intolerable provocation, the police forces maintain their discipline, are increasing in numbers and efficiency, and command the support of every law-abiding citizen. The number of alleged reprisals is few, and the damage done exaggerated.’
The Freeman’s Journal has denounced the Chief Secretary’s comments and accused Greenwood of making ‘some of the most absurd statements ever issued from an office renowned for its stupidities.’ In rejecting the assertion that the reprisals were few and exaggerated, the Freeman has republished a list of 100 incidents from the Irish Bulletin, beginning with the sack of Fermoy by troops on 9 September 1919, up to the destruction of Ardrahan by crown forces on 25 September this year. In the last 10 days alone, the towns of Ennistymon, Lahinch and Milltown-Malbay in Clare have been sacked, as have Balbriggan in Co. Dublin and Trim in Co. Meath; there have been attacks on newspaper offices and houses in Galway City; troops ‘ran riot’ in Tuam, which left two civilians dead; Athlone was ‘shot up’; and three civilians were shot dead in Belfast.
The Irish Independent, echoing the line of the Irish Bulletin and the Freeman’s Journal, has claimed that towns and villages in Ireland had been treated by the crown forces in a manner similar to how Belgian towns were treated during the Great War by Germany, ‘whose outrages upon humanity brought it to its doom.’
British Pathé footage of the damage done to Trim by crown forces in September 1920
[Editor's note: This is an article from Century Ireland, a fortnightly online newspaper, written from the perspective of a journalist 100 years ago, based on news reports of the time.]
