The Emergency (Ireland)

On 6 December 1922, following the Anglo-Irish Treaty that ended the War of Independence, the island of Ireland became an autonomous dominion, known as the Irish Free State. On 7 December 1922,[6] the parliament of the six north-eastern counties, already known as Northern Ireland, voted to opt out of the Irish Free State and rejoin the United Kingdom. This Treaty settlement was immediately followed by the bitter Irish Civil War between the pro-Treaty and anti-Treaty factions of the Irish Republican Army (IRA).

After 1932, the governing party of the new state was the republican Fianna Fáil, led by Éamon de Valera (a veteran of both Irish wars and Easter Rising). In 1937, de Valera introduced a new constitution, which had distanced the state further from the United Kingdom, and which changed its name to "Ireland". He had also conducted the Anglo-Irish trade war between 1932 and 1938.

De Valera had good relations with the British Prime Minister, Neville Chamberlain. He resolved the two countries' economic differences, and negotiated the return of the Treaty Ports—Berehaven, Cobh and Lough Swilly—which had remained under British jurisdiction under the Anglo-Irish Treaty of 1921. The major remaining disagreement between the countries was the status of Northern Ireland. The Irish saw it as rightfully Irish territory while the UK saw it as rightfully British territory. Within Ireland itself, armed opposition to the treaty settlement took the name of the anti-treaty IRA, seeing itself as the "true" government of Ireland. This IRA mounted a major sabotage/bombing campaign exclusively in England from January 1939 to March 1940 – the S-Plan in 1939. These attacks consisted of approximately 300 explosions/acts of sabotage and resulted in 10 deaths and 96 injuries.[7]

Frank Aiken, Minister for the Co-ordination of Defensive Measures, 1939–1945

Recruitment Poster for the Volunteer Reserve Forces, 1939.

On 1 September 1939, German troops invaded Poland from the west (followed on 17th September by the Soviet Union from the east), precipitating war with the UK and France, and their allies. On 2 September, de Valera told the Dáil Éireann (the lower house of parliament) that neutrality was the best policy for the country. In this he was almost universally supported by the Dáil and the country at large (although many joined the British military).[lower-alpha 1] The 1937 constitution was amended to allow the Government to take emergency powers, and then the Emergency Powers Act 1939 was passed that included censorship of the press and mail correspondence. The government was able to take control of the economic life of the country under the new Minister of Supply Seán Lemass. Liberal use was made of all of these powers. Internment of those who had committed a crime or were about to commit one would be used extensively against the IRA. Censorship was under the charge of the Minister for the Co-ordination of Defensive Measures, Frank Aiken. It was necessary to prevent publication of matter that might undermine the neutrality of the State and to prevent it becoming a clearing house for foreign intelligence, though over the period of the Emergency, the Act started to be used for more party political purposes such as preventing the publication of the numbers of Irish soldiers serving in the United Kingdom armed forces or industrial disputes within the state.[8] In addition, the information made available to Irish people was also carefully controlled. De Valera performed the duties of Minister of External Affairs, though the secretary for the Department of External Affairs, Joseph Walshe, was very influential.

On the declaration of the emergency, Walshe asked for assurances from the German minister in Dublin, Eduard Hempel, that Germany would not use its legation for espionage nor attack Irish trade with Great Britain. He then travelled to London on 6 September where he met the Dominions Secretary, Anthony Eden, who was conciliatory and defended Irish neutrality in subsequent Cabinet meetings. In addition, the appointment of Sir John Maffey as a British representative in Dublin was agreed.

For the Irish government, neutrality meant not displaying alignment with either side. On one hand, that meant the open announcement of military activity such as the sighting of submarines or the arrival of parachutists and the suppression of any foreign intelligence activity. Ireland's geographic position meant that this policy (which was, in the view of most historians, applied fully and consistently) tended to benefit the Allies more than Germany. For example, British airmen who crash-landed in the State were allowed to go free if they could claim not to have been on a combat mission; otherwise they were released "on licence" (promise to remain). Many chose to escape to Great Britain via Northern Ireland.[lower-alpha 2] Also, Allied mechanics were allowed to retrieve crash-landed Allied aircraft. There was extensive co-operation between British and Irish intelligence and the exchange of information such as detailed weather reports of the Atlantic Ocean; the decision to go ahead with the D-day landings was influenced by a weather report from Blacksod Bay, County Mayo.[12]

On the other hand, in the first few years of the war, the government did not show any overt preference for either side. This is partly because de Valera had to keep national unity, which meant accommodating the large swathe of Irish society that rejected anything to do with the British, some of whom admired Germany (which had failed in an attempt to supply a small cache of arms to the rebels of 1916) to some extent. These attitudes were shared by Aiken[13] and by Walshe.[14] Many, including de Valera and Richard Mulcahy, estimated Irish popular sympathies as favouring Germany due to anti-British hostility, and de Valera feared that joining the Allies would drive public opinion completely towards the Germans.[15][16] The Fianna Fáil government, headed by de Valera, ruled alone and did not accommodate any other party in decision making.[17]

In the early months of the emergency, the greatest threat to the State came from the IRA. In the Christmas Raid in 1939, one million rounds of ammunition were stolen from the Irish Army by the IRA (though it was mostly recovered in the following weeks)[18] and there were a number of killings, mostly of policemen.[lower-alpha 3] In addition, the existing emergency legislation was undermined by the obtaining of a writ of habeas corpus by Seán MacBride which resulted in the release of all those who had been interned. The government responded with the 1939 and 1940 Offences Against the State Acts, which established the Special Criminal Court, and rearrested and interned IRA activists.

During this time two IRA men died as the result of hunger strikes – demanding free association and to have two prisoners (IRA Volunteers Nicky Doherty of County Meath and John Dwyer) moved from the criminal wing to the Republican area within the prison (Mountjoy Jail).[20] On 17 February 1940 Tony D'Arcy was arrested and sentenced to three months for refusing to account for his movements and for not giving his name and address.[21] IRA volunteer D'Arcy died as a result of a 52 day Hunger-strike (16 April 1940) at the age of 32. At the time of his death D'Arcy left a wife and three young children.[22] On 29 December 1939 Jack McNeela and several others were arrested in south Dublin at a location where an illegal radio transmitter was operating. McNeela and three other IRA men were imprisoned in Mountjoy Jail, tried (and found guilty) by a military tribunal for "conspiracy to usurp a function of Government" by operating a pro-Irish Republican pirate radio station, with McNeela being sentenced to two years imprisonment.[23] With no concessions from the Irish Free State government, McNeela died on 19 April 1940 after 55 days on hunger strike in the Military Wing of St Bricin's Military Hospital, Dublin.[24]

Two IRA men (Patrick McGrath and Thomas Harte) were executed for the murder of two policemen in September 1940. The IRA became increasingly ineffective in the face of the resolute use of internment, the breaking of hunger strikes, and the application of hanging for capital offences. A total of seven IRA men were executed in Ireland between September 1940 and December 1944: Patrick McGrath, Thomas Harte, Richard Goss, George Plant, and Maurice O’Neill were executed by firing squad, while two others were hanged – Tom Williams in Crumlin Road Gaol, Belfast) and Charlie Kerins in Mountjoy Jail, Dublin. Maurice O'Neill and Richard Goss were the only people executed by the Irish state for a non-murder crime.[25]

During 1941, the IRA's hopes of a German invasion had faded and funding from the United States had been cut off. The IRA leadership were mostly interned within the Curragh Camp, where they were treated increasingly harshly, or on the run. Most internees accepted release on parole. The IRA remained barely active in Northern Ireland, but they were not a threat to the stability of Ireland. The IRA fostered links with German intelligence (the Abwehr) and Foreign Ministry, with men such as Francis Stuart travelling to Germany to talk, though these attempts were largely ineffectual due to a combination of Abwehr and Foreign Ministry incompetence and IRA weakness. Germans also came to Ireland, the most notable of whom was Hermann Görtz, who was captured in possession of "Plan Kathleen", an IRA plan that detailed a German-supported invasion of Northern Ireland. (See also Irish Republican Army–Abwehr collaboration.)

There was a reluctance on the part of the British to accept the policy of Irish neutrality. Anthony Eden, Dominions Secretary in the new British war cabinet, said "we do not want formally to recognise Eire as neutral while Eire remains a member of the British Commonwealth" as this he said would be in conflict with the "constitutional theory of the indivisibility of the crown".[26] A prevalent view in the UK was that Ireland was obliged to support the UK in the war. Winston Churchill said at the time that "Southern Ireland is at war, but skulking".[27]

After the German invasion of Norway in April 1940, Churchill became the British Prime Minister. The fall of France in June 1940 brought the war close to Ireland, as German troops occupied the French coastline across the Celtic Sea.

The United Kingdom was now the only major impediment to Germany. A major British concern was now whether Germany would invade Ireland. The British view was that the Irish Army was not powerful enough to resist an invasion for long enough for reinforcement from the UK, particularly with the IRA as a potential fifth column, and wished to be able to forestall this by stationing troops and ships within the Irish state. In addition, this view made the UK reluctant to provide military supplies because of the risk of their falling into German hands after an invasion. The Irish government's view was that they would be more successful against the Germans than the states already occupied, and there could be no agreement for joint military measures while partition continued, and would not commit themselves beyond neutrality for the whole island should it end.

Ports and shipping

Main article: Irish Mercantile Marine during World War II

A memorial erected in Dublin in 1991 to members of the Irish mercantile marine lost during the Emergency

The great majority of Ireland's trade was with the United Kingdom, and most of its supplies came from there. This created great difficulties for the Irish government as Germany tried to blockade the UK. Additionally the UK required Irish ships to operate under their 'navicert' system. In September 1940, a joint agreement on trade, shipping and exports fell through—"the main sticking point between the two sides was the prices on offer from Britain" [32] owing to the refusal to allow transshipment and repair facilities following German pressure, including the threat to blockade Ireland and the bombing of Ambrosetown and Campile in County Wexford.[33] In the autumn of 1940, the threat of German invasion had receded, but relations between the UK and Ireland deteriorated, largely as a result of the increased losses of Allied shipping to U-boat attack. To try to prevent some of these losses, the UK wanted sea and air bases in western Ireland.[34] On 5 November, in the House of Commons, Churchill complained:

The fact that we cannot use the South and West coasts of Ireland to refuel our flotillas and aircraft and thus protect the trade by which Ireland as well as Great Britain lives, is a most heavy and grievous burden and one which should never have been placed on our shoulders, broad though they may be.

The Irish government chose to interpret this sentence as a threat of invasion. Some sort of armed occupation was a real possibility (the UK had occupied Iceland in May 1940), but the balance of evidence is that there was never a serious threat.[35] Large elements of the British cabinet and government and those of its allies were opposed to any armed intervention in Ireland; however, in late 1940 and early 1941, relations between the two countries did worsen. The British stopped informing Ireland of their order of battle in Northern Ireland, while the Irish Army drew up plans for defence against the British. The United Kingdom also started to restrict trade to Ireland, reasoning that if Ireland would not do anything to protect the lives of those bringing in supplies, it should at least share in the deprivations being felt in the UK. Relations between the two countries only really eased in the middle of 1941 with the invasion of the Soviet Union by Germany and an agreement to allow Irish immigration to Britain to work in the war industries, resulting in up to 200,000 Irish people doing so by 1945.[36]

At the beginning of the Second World War, the United States President was Franklin Roosevelt. The United States was neutral, and Roosevelt's actions were circumscribed by neutrality legislation; however, Roosevelt was a vehement anti-Nazi, an unequivocal supporter of the UK in the war, and personally close to Churchill. The US minister to Ireland was David Gray, a personal friend of Roosevelt and his wife Eleanor. De Valera saw the US as a bulwark against invasion from any party, while the US saw the support of Britain in the war as the priority, and so while supportive of Irish neutrality was sceptical of it extending over the whole island and wanted an arrangement to be made with the UK over ports, possibly through the leasing of them.[38]

The sale of arms was a major issue. The declaration of war legally impeded the US from selling any arms to belligerents under the laws in force at the time; this led to Ireland being briefly considered as a possible conduit for arms sales to circumvent the law. However, in November 1939 Congress agreed to change the law to allow the sale of arms to all belligerents on a "cash and carry" basis. Nevertheless, the Irish government wanted the US to sell them arms. This was supported by Gray, and by the British government, but only if not at the expense of their own allocation. As a result, in 1940 all surplus US arms were sold to the UK and Canada.

The strong support of the UK by the Roosevelt administration led the Irish government to try to bolster anti-Roosevelt isolationist opinion in the November 1940 presidential election and a Christmas radio broadcast by de Valera to the US supporting isolationism. An attempt to influence Roosevelt's special emissary, Wendell Willkie, on a visit to Great Britain and Ireland in January 1941, failed. In a further attempt to obtain arms from the US de Valera decided that Aiken should visit Washington. Gray supported the idea of a visit, but had doubts over whether Aiken was the right person to make it, and stressed that the Irish were only likely to obtain arms if they co-operated with the British Purchasing Commission. Aiken left Ireland in March 1941. For his St Patrick's Day address, de Valera claimed that Ireland was under blockade from both sides and that neutrality protected Ireland from "the hazards of imperial adventure". Aiken's visit was disastrous.[39] His anti-British views and, in American eyes, overestimation of Ireland's military capabilities went across all the administration's policies towards the war. As well as alienating Roosevelt and other members of the administration, he failed to use the letters of introduction to senior Democrats, including Eleanor Roosevelt, provided to him by Gray. Aiken spent the last seven weeks of his visit on what was seen as an anti-administration speaking tour, associating closely with isolationist opinion. The result was that the US would not sell any armaments to the State, and relations between the two countries significantly worsened, the US becoming even more unequivocal in its support of the UK. In October 1941 on receiving a note from the Irish government asking for its intentions with regard to Northern Ireland on the stationing of personnel associated with lend-lease, the US State Department referred them to the British government as Northern Ireland was, they insisted, part of the UK.[40]

In pursuit of its policy of neutrality, the Irish Government refused to close the German and Japanese embassies. In 1939, the German Government had very little intelligence on Ireland and Britain. This is because Hitler had hoped for a détente or alliance with Britain, whom he considered the "natural allies" of Nazi Germany.[lower-alpha 7] When concerted efforts to build a reliable picture of British military strength did begin around 1939–1940, efforts were first made to infiltrate spies to Britain via Ireland, but these attempts consistently failed (see Operation Lobster and Operation Seagull). The Abwehr also made attempts to foster intelligence gathering links with the IRA, but found that the IRA was in no condition to be of serious use — these attempts were to occur during the period 1939–1943. The German military also drew up plans detailing how an invasion of Ireland might take place. These plans were titled Plan Green and any invasion was to act as a diversionary attack in support of a main attack to conquer Britain titled Operation Sea Lion. Both of these plans were shelved by 1942. When US Army troops began to be stationed in Northern Ireland in 1942, Plan Green was reprinted because there was a fear amongst the German High Command (and the Irish Government) that the US Army might attempt an invasion of Ireland, following its occupation of Iceland (after the British invasion) and Greenland in 1941. These fears led to another German intelligence plan – Operation Osprey – but it was abandoned when the feared American invasion failed to take place.

The British also had a plan to occupy the entire island as a response to any attempted German invasion. They had always sought to privately reassure de Valera that any invasion by their troops would be by invitation only. This scheme was titled Plan W and intricate details were worked out with the Irish government and military over how to react to a German invasion. The Irish military shared details of their defences and military capabilities with the British and troops stationed in Northern Ireland. The reassurances from the British did not altogether console de Valera however, and he was frequently suspicious, while German forces still threatened Britain, that the British might invade the territory of the State. He did not know that the Prime Minister of Northern Ireland, Craigavon, was urging London to seize the port at Cobh, or that attempts had been made to split the consensus over the Neutrality policy. Concessions such as relaxing of the claim on Lough Swilly to allow British navy and air force patrols did go some way to easing the tension. As the war turned against Nazi Germany in their eastern campaign, and as the Abwehr became less and less effective, around 1943–1944, operations in the island of Ireland ceased to be of interest to the German Government and military and therefore the British. Overall, during the period the focus of de Valera was maintaining Irish neutrality. The Irish authorities' pursuit of an aggressive campaign of internment against the IRA, including raising the Local Security Force (LSF), executions, and aggressive action by Irish Military Intelligence (G2) meant that the activities of the German Legation in Dublin were supervised closely and attempts to infiltrate spies into the country were quickly discovered.

On the occasion of the death of Adolf Hitler, de Valera paid a controversial visit to Hempel to express sympathy with the German people over the death of the Führer.[72] This action has been defended as proper given the state's neutrality. Sir John Maffey, the British Representative, commented that de Valera's actions were "unwise but mathematically consistent".[73] Douglas Hyde, Ireland's president, also sent condolences,[74] an action which enraged the United States minister[75] as no similar action had taken place on the deaths of President Franklin D. Roosevelt or the former British Prime Minister David Lloyd George.

De Valera's reluctance to recognise a difference between World War II and previous European wars was illustrated by his reply to a radio broadcast by the British Prime Minister, Churchill on V-E Day. Churchill praised Britain's restraint in not occupying Ireland to secure the Western Approaches during the Battle of the Atlantic:

the approaches which the southern Irish ports and airfields could so easily have guarded were closed by the hostile aircraft and U-boats. This indeed was a deadly moment in our life, and if it had not been for the loyalty and friendship of Northern Ireland, we should have been forced to come to close quarters with Mr. de Valera, or perish from the earth. However, with a restraint and poise to which, I venture to say, history will find few parallels, His Majesty’s Government never laid a violent hand upon them, though at times it would have been quite easy and quite natural, and we left the de Valera Government to frolic with the German and later with the Japanese representatives to their heart's content.

De Valera replied to Churchill in another radio broadcast, which was popular when broadcast in Ireland:[83]

Allowances can be made for Mr. Churchill's statement, however unworthy, in the first flush of victory. No such excuse could be found for me in this quieter atmosphere. There are, however, some things it is essential to say. I shall try to say them as dispassionately as I can. Mr. Churchill makes it clear that, in certain circumstances, he would have violated our neutrality and that he would justify his actions by Britain's necessity. It seems strange to me that Mr. Churchill does not see that this, if accepted, would mean that Britain's necessity would become a moral code and that when this necessity became sufficiently great, other people's rights were not to count ... that is precisely why we had this disastrous succession of wars – World War No.1 and World War No.2 – and shall it be World War No.3? Surely Mr. Churchill must see that if his contention be admitted in our regard, a like justification can be framed for similar acts of aggression elsewhere and no small nation adjoining a great Power could ever hope to be permitted to go its own way in peace. It is indeed fortunate that Britain's necessity did not reach the point where Mr. Churchill would have acted. All credit to him that he successfully resisted the temptation which I have no doubt many times assailed him in his difficulties, and to which, I freely admit, many leaders might have easily succumbed. It is indeed hard for the strong to be just to the weak, but acting justly always has its rewards. By resisting his temptation in this instance, Mr. Churchill, instead of adding another horrid chapter to the already bloodstained record of the relations between England and this country, has advanced the cause of international morality – an important step, one of the most important indeed that can be taken on the road to the establishment of any sure basis for peace. ...

Mr. Churchill is proud of Britain's stand alone, after France had fallen and before America entered the war. Could he not find in his heart the generosity to acknowledge that there is a small nation that stood alone not for one year or two, but for several hundred years against aggression; that endured spoliations, famine, massacres, in endless succession; that was clubbed many times into insensibility, but each time on returning to consciousness took up the fight anew; a small nation that could never be got to accept defeat and has never surrendered her soul?

The end of the Emergency was not declared until 1976, at the time of the Troubles. On 1 September 1976 a motion was passed in the Dáil "that the national emergency created by the armed conflict referred to in the Resolutions, pursuant to the said Article, of Dáil Éireann and Seanad Éireann of the 2nd September, 1939, has ceased to exist". The purpose of this was to allow the government to declare a new emergency, arising out of the conflict in Northern Ireland.[90]

• Caught in a Free State – a television drama series on German wartime spies in Ireland, made by RTÉ
• Glen of Imaal disaster – an accidental explosion which occurred during the Emergency and remains the greatest loss of life in a single incident involving the Irish Defence Forces
• History of the Republic of Ireland
• Minister for Supplies
• Ulster Defence Volunteers
• Oskar Metzke
• Glimmer Man

• Article on 'The Challenge Of The Irish Volunteers of World War II'
• Article on the 'Belfast Blitz' Archived 9 September 2005 at the Wayback Machine
• Largely anecdotal account related to the British position on Irish neutrality and contacts with U-Boats
• No.1 Internment camp "K-Lines" in the Curragh housed IRA, British, and German personnel