1923 AD
January: The Irish Free State Government, were to join the League of Nations until 1932.
34
members of the anti - Treaty Irregular IRA
had been executed up to this month
in the
Irish Free State to try and stop their random
attacks.
James Larkin the Labour leader, was released by the Governor Al Smith in America from jail, and he founded the Workers Union of Ireland and tried to revive the Irish Socialist Party.
Richard
Mulcahy,
was to be the Minister for Defence
in the Irish Free State up until
1924.
February:
In the Irish Free State,
Liam Lynch
the anti - Treaty IRA Chief of Staff, extended reprisals to other
persons beside those previously nominated, and
Eammon de Valera
indicated
he understood why he was forced to adopt such drastic measures and personally stated
that, " If the Irregular IRA
Republicans, who had lost their lives, had lost them for nothing of
National value,
it would be awful."
March 10th: The Irregular IRA met on the run in the Nier Valley in Co. Waterford in the south - east of the Munster Province, were Eamonn de Valera voted to end the confrontation with the Irish Free State Government, but Liam Lynch the IRA Irregulars Chief of Staff would still not agree, and Eamonn de Valera put forward his Document No 2 again to them, as the answer to their problem with the Treaty. This upset the dead set Irish Republicans, especially Liam Lynch, so Eammon de Valera gave him a few home truths about the actual army position, and also told him that it was a political question and had nothing to do with him. Mary Mac Swiney attacked Eammon de Valera on his Document No 2, which from her point of view, basically still sold out Ireland as a Republic,
Kevin O Higgins
for the Irish Free State Government, was moved to comment
that, "This is not going to be
a draw, with a replay in Autumn" and
William Thomas Cosgrave the President of the
Irish Free State stated,
"Eammon de Valera wants a
dignified withdrawal, and we are not going to help him achieve it."
March 23rd:
In the Irish Free State, the anti - Treaty Irregular IRA Executive
held a meeting in Bleantasour
in Co. Waterford
in the south - east of the Munster Province, were
Eammon de Valera
was made
to wait until they let him attend
the session, while they
now also had to continually be on the move, as
the Irish Free State
troops
harassed whatever area they were in.
March 27th:
The anti - Treaty Irregular IRA,
were still endeavouring to hold their meetings wherever they could, and a motion calling for
cessation of the conflict was put forward,
"As further armed resistance against the
Irish Free State Government
will not further the ideal of total Independence,"
and it was
narrowly defeated at this time by only
6 votes to 5.
Monsignor Luzio, was sent as a Papal Delegate by the Pope, to inspect the actual conditions still existing in Ireland, and he tried to discuss the matter of bringing about peace with Eammon de Valera.
April 9th:
In the Irish Free State, after the Papal
delegate's visit,
Eammon de Valera
put it to
the other anti - Treaty members,
J.P. Rutledge
and
Austin Stack that the
Irish Civil War in
Ireland
must be brought to an end.
April 10th:
In the Irish Free
State, the members of the Irregular
IR.A.
met again at
Mullinahone in Co. Tipperary
in the north - east of the Munster Province,
were
Liam Lynch their Chief of
Staff was killed on
the way to the meeting, and
Austin Stack was captured,
which caused the Irregular IRA
members to meet again in
Dublin, where they then decided to call off the
Irish Civil War.
Frank Aiken then took over command of the
Irregular IRA, and
Eammon de Valera wrote to him to bring it to an end, as they had to
face the inevitable sooner or later.
April 20th:
The anti - Treaty Irregular IRA Executive
met at
Poulacappal again, were
Frank Aiken, who was now in charge, was convinced that it was time for
peace,
and
Eammon de Valera
obtained
an agreement from them to make peace, subject to
certain conditions.
Monsignor
Luzio the
Papal Legate, had previously
left
Ireland
feeling that he had gained
nothing, and was also on the outer with the
Irish Free State
Government
anyway, for
being involved with
Eammon de Valera
in the
first place.
Meanwhile
Eammon de Valera
had
contacted Senator
Douglas and
Senator
Jameson, to discuss with
William Thomas Cosgrave
the
President of the Irish Free State,
peace arrangements, subject to certain
conditions.
April 30th:
Frank Aiken
who had previously been the T.D.
for
Co. Louth
in the north - east of
Northern Leinster,
and who was now the
Irregular IRA Chief of Staff,
ordered the
ending of the anti - Treaty
campaign, and the anti - Treaty
forces and the
Irregular IRA
leaders then went into hiding
from the Irish Free State
Government.
May 2nd: 2 of the Irregular IRA prisoners were executed at Ennis in Co. Clare in the north - west of the Munster Province, which bought the number of Irregular IRA executions up to 82 over the previous 6 months under William Thomas Cosgrave who was the Taoiseach / leader / Priom Aire of the Irish Free State. He also informed Senator Douglas and Senator Jameson that he had ruled out all of the conditions that had been set down by Eammon de Valera and the Irregular IRA, to bring about peace in the Irish Free State.
May 13th - 14th:
In the Irish Free State,
the rival
Emergency Republican
Government, previously also set up by
Eammon de Valera
and the
Irregular IRA Council,
met
at Santry,
were it was decided
that Frank Aiken their Chief of Staff
was to
order a public cease fire anyway, and all their
arms were to be dumped.
May 24th:
The Irish
Civil War came
officially to an end under the leadership of
William T. Cosgrave as the
Taoiseach / leader
of the
Irish Free State
Government, when a ceasefire
was declared with
13,000 IRA
Irregulars still in jail, and in the meantime the Ascendancy
Official Unionists
had used the
Irish Civil War period, to further
consolidate
their own position in the 6 Counties artificially partitioned from the
9 in the
Ulster Province.
Some of the Irregular IRA officers, now wanted to destroy all their arms, but Eammon de Valera advised them to hide their weapons and await a more favourable opportunity to continue on with the struggle and to still not recognize the 3rd Dail Eireann / Irish Assembly, who he considered was not the legitimate Irish Republican government. He then replied to his detractors, whom he informed that he was guided by his own intelligence and conscience, as there was no military situation, and they were attacking him without any knowledge of the real situation. He now decided to get out of this awkward situation, with some chance of not destroying altogether whatever hope remained for his personal agenda, so he wrote to Monsignor Luzio to have the Pope intervene for a General Amnesty for all the Irregular IRA members, and remove any of their excommunications. Eammon de Valera, then tried to reorganize the political Sinn Fein Party instead, whose members were all to join with Frank Aiken as Irish Republicans, as there were 2,000 on the run, and thousands more in prison, and he further put forward the proposition that they should not be allowed to emigrate from Ireland, without a permit of permission.
July: The anti - Treaty Irregular IRA, under their organizers Frank Aiken, Patrick Mac Logan, David Fitz Gerald and James Killeen, met at the Elliot Hotel in Dublin, to draw up new rules and a Constitution, and they all agreed to not associate anymore with the Irregular IRA, and Noel Lemass was to be arrested, and his body was to be found in the Dublin Mountains three months later.
William T. Cosgrave
the Taoiseach of the
Irish Free State Government, called an election.
Eammon de Valera stated
from his hiding place, that he would stand as the
political
Sinn Fein Party representative for his old seat in
Co. Clare
in the north - west of the Munster
Province, where he was still in favour
with his followers there.
Desmond Fitz Gerald
the
Minister for External Affairs
in the Irish Free State
Government said. "Eammon de Valera and
every other enemy of the Country will have to go on the run."
August 12th:
Eammon de Valera,
set out with
Sean Hyde
to go to
Co. Clare in
the north - west of the Munster Province,
to stand as the political Sinn Fein Party representative, where
Captain
Fallon and the
Irish Free State
Government troops would be
waiting for him to turn up.
August 15th:
Eammon de Valera,
was able to make it onto the platform in
Ennis in Co. Clare,
near the
Daniel O Connell
monument, where he
was arrested at the
political
Sinn Fein
Party rally by the
Irish
Free State troops, and taken to
Arbour Hill Barracks, and
imprisoned for nearly a year
without being tried, as William T. Cosgrave believed
that that this might bring about
further bloodshed.
August:
In the
General
Elections
for the
Irish Free State, 44
of the representatives
from the political Sinn Fein
Party were elected
altogether, with
30 %
of these not taking up their seats, because of the
Oath of
Allegiance to the
British Crown,
with Eamonn de Valera receiving
17,762
votes
to
Eoin Mac Neill's
8,196, who was
standing for the
Cuman na Gaedhal
Party reorganized
under
William T. Cosgrave,
who all up
won 63
seats.
Eamonn de Valera and
Brian
O Higgins
another
political
Sinn Fein
Party
candidate, together with
C. Hogan
representing the
Farmers,
and
P. Hogan
from the
Labour
Party,
were all elected for
Co. Clare. Another
Tomas Derrig, was elected the
T.D. for
Co. Carlow
in the south of Southern Leinster
until 1954,
and for
Co. Kilkenny in the south -
west of Leinster up until
1973.
October:
Eammon de Valera
was transferred to
Kilmainham
Prison near
Dublin.
William T.
Cosgrave, the newly re - elected Taoiseach of the Irish Free State,
agreed to continue to pay the
Land Annuities to the
British
Treasury
for money raised from the
Irish
farmers to buy back their own
Irish land from
1891 AD to 1909
amounting to
5,000,000 pounds
a year.
Sean Mac Bride, was imprisoned until 1924, and would eventually found Amnesty International.
William Butler Yeats won the Nobel Prize for Literature this year.
November: Small parts of Co. Armagh and Co. Fermanagh were to be seceded to the Irish Free State and a part of Co. Donegal to the 6 Counties artificially partitioned from the 9 in the Ulster Province by the British Boundary Commission, and the Irish Free State representative, Eoin Mac Neill resigned in protest. James Craig the Ascendancy Official Unionist leader, now met with William T. Cosgrave the Taoiseach of the Irish Free State (26 Counties), in London, and they agreed to maintain the status quo, and the Boundary Commission Report was not released. James Craig and his group also met with Kevin O Higgins and his group, and a tripartite agreement retained the artificial border, between the 2 divided territories detailed in the British Government's Government of Ireland Act 1920, and they never met again.
The Irish Free State's Congested Districts Board / Land Commission was set up to purchase and re - distribute 450,000 acres of Ireland, back to 24,000 Irish Families, and eventually they were to be able to return 2,000,000 acres of Irish land back to the Irish people.
In the
6 Counties,
artificially partitioned
from the 9 in the Ulster Province,
under the
Ascendancy "Official" Unionist Government,
unemployment was running at
18%,
and a further
232
Irish people were
killed, during the time of the
Civil War there, and over
1,000
were
injured, with
2/3
of these
being Catholic
Irish, although they
now only made up
1/3
of the
population there.