british history chapter 18

• Easter Rising

  1916
• General response of the Irish to the outbreak of war was to join the army
• Group of 'advanced' nationalists saw the outbreak of war as an opportunity to start plotting an insurrection in Ireland
• Groups involved in the Easter Rising

  • Arthur Griffith, founder of Sinn Fein
  • Members of IRB
• Griffith's demands

  Dublin parliament which controlled Irish affairs but would retain monarchy
• Demands of the Easter Rising

  Independent republic
• Calls for Catholic nationalism and expression of anti-British sentiment not taken seriously
• Republican groups involved


  • IV split from NV and joined IRB
  • ICA
• The provisional government of ireland to the people of ireland signed, proceed with insurrection
• Pearse and Collony proclaimed Ireland a republic, end on 29th


  24th April, 1916
• Participants were shot or hung as traitors
• Death penalties seen as mishandling by british gov, authorities thought they had acted with restraint
• Problem of ulster remained with majority of ulster Protestants determined to remain part of Britain
• Lloyd George's stubbornness made compromise impossible
• Attempt of the British gov to impose conscription on Ireland in March 1918 met with anger
• 73 Sinn Reiner's elected as MP's for Irish constituencies


  December 1918
• Sinn Fein refused to take up seats in Westminster, set up an unofficial Parliament in Dublin and declared Ireland a republic
• Declared a state of war existed that could never end until British forces were evacuated
• Sporadic attacks on police, gov treated as police matter, called in the Black and Tans and the Auxiliaries
• Lloyd George pushed through Government of Ireland Act that set up separate parliaments in Dublin and Belfast, was rejected


  1920
• Act: council of Ireland sets up with representation from both parliaments, both Ulster and south to remain within UK with representation at Westminster
• Britain's overriding concern was to maintain its sovereignty over ireland, rather than accept independence
• Britain reversed policy

  May and June 1921
• Pressures that led to policy reversal

  • Press
  • Archbishop of Canterbury
  • Politicians from all parties
  • Public growth of sympathy
  • USA
  • George V
  • IRA reached point of exhaustion
• LG insisted Ireland has to remain within the British empire and accept crown
• Ulster government not represented at the talks
• LG threatened resumption of hostilities, Collins finally agreed to accept a peace treaty which included giving Ulster independence from the rest of Ireland
• Treaty signed

  December 1921
• Set up Irish free state in south of ireland
• Lot of anger in Britain against LG, Unionists remained bitter at the partition
• Divisions within Sinn Fein, those that accepted the treaty like Collins and Griffith and those that rejected it, such as De Valera
• Collins murdered by group of pro-republicans
• Didn't end hostility in Ireland
• Storming, NI Parliament established
• Nationalist parties in NI


  • Several small parties mainly representing catholics, largest was uNION
• Sir James Craig first pm of NI, Unionist, resisted efforts to make NI subordinate to the Dublin parliament
• Constituency boundaries and local gov boundaries set to maximise Unionist advantage
• Unionists won following five Stormont elections between 1921 and 1938
• Sectarian violence time to time between Catholics and Protestants
• Statute of Westminster gave Britain's dominions the right to control their own parliaments


  1931