In Honor Of The Anniversary Of The Irish Easter Uprising, 1916-Sean Flynn’s Fight-Take Two
A word on the Easter Uprising
In the old Irish working-class neighborhoods where I grew up the aborted Easter Uprising of 1916 was spoken of in mythical hushed reverent tones as the key symbol of the modern Irish liberation struggle from bloody England. The event itself provoked such memories of heroic “boyos” (and “girlos” not acknowledged) fighting to the end against great odds that a careful analysis of what could, and could not be, learned from the mistakes made at the time entered my head. That was then though in the glare of boyhood infatuations. Now is the time for a more sober assessment.
The easy part of analyzing the Irish Easter Uprising of 1916 is first and foremost the knowledge, in retrospect, that it was not widely supported by people in Ireland, especially by the “shawlies” in Dublin and the cities who received their sons’ military pay from the Imperial British Army for service in the bloody trenches of Europe which sustained them throughout the war. That factor and the relative ease with which the uprising had been militarily defeated by the British forces send in main force to crush it lead easily to the conclusion that the adventure was doomed to failure. Still easier is to criticize the timing and the strategy and tactics of the planned action and of the various actors, particularly in the leadership’s underestimating the British Empire’s frenzy to crush any opposition to its main task of victory in World War I. (Although, I think that frenzy on Mother England’s part would be a point in the uprising’s favor under the theory that England’s [or fill in the blank of your favorite later national liberation struggle] woes were Ireland’s [or fill in the blank ditto on the your favorite oppressed peoples struggle] opportunities.
The hard part is to draw any positive lessons of that national liberation struggle experience for the future. If nothing else remember this though, and unfortunately the Irish national liberation fighters (and other national liberation fighters later, including later Irish revolutionaries) failed to take this into account in their military calculations, the British (or fill in the blank) were savagely committed to defeating the uprising including burning that colonial country to the ground if need be in order to maintain control. In the final analysis, it was not part of their metropolitan homeland, so the hell with it. Needless to say, cowardly British Labor’s position was almost a carbon copy of His Imperial Majesty’s. Labor Party leader Arthur Henderson could barely contain himself when informed that James Connolly had been executed. That should, even today, make every British militant blush with shame. Unfortunately, the demand for British militants and others today is the same as then if somewhat attenuated- All British Troops Out of Ireland.
In various readings on national liberation struggles I have come across a theory that the Easter Uprising was the first socialist revolution in Europe, predating the Bolshevik Revolution by over a year. Unfortunately, there is little truth to that idea. Of the Uprising’s leaders only James Connolly was devoted to the socialist cause. Moreover, while the Irish Volunteers and the Irish Citizen Army were prototypical models for urban- led national liberation forces such organizations, as we have witnessed in later history, are not inherently socialistic. The dominant mood among the leadership was in favor of political independence and/or fighting for a return to a separate traditional Irish cultural hegemony. (“Let poets rule the land”).
As outlined in the famous Proclamation of the Republic posted on the General Post Office in Dublin, Easter Monday, 1916 the goal of the leadership appeared to be something on the order of a society like those fought for in the European Revolutions of 1848, a left bourgeois republic. A formation on the order of the Paris Commune of 1871 where the working class momentarily took power or the Soviet Commune of 1917 which lasted for a longer period did not figure in the political calculations at that time. As noted above, James Connolly clearly was skeptical of his erstwhile comrades on the subject of the nature of the future state and apparently was prepared for an ensuing class struggle following the establishment of a republic.
That does not mean that revolutionary socialists could not support such an uprising. On the contrary, Lenin, who was an admirer of Connolly for his anti-war stance in World War I, and Trotsky stoutly defended the uprising against those who derided the Easter rising for involving bourgeois elements. Participation by bourgeois and petty bourgeois elements is in the nature of a national liberation struggle. The key, which must be learned by militants today, is who leads the national liberation struggle and on what program. As both Lenin and Trotsky made clear later in their own experiences in Russia revolutionary socialists have to lead other disaffected elements of society to overthrow the existing order. There is no other way in a heterogeneous class-divided society. Moreover, in Ireland, the anti-imperialist nature of the action against British imperialism during wartime on the socialist principle that the defeat of your own imperialist overlord in war as a way to open the road to the class struggle merited support on that basis alone. Chocky Ar La.
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Here is a little commemorative piece based on the exploits of Frankie Riley from the old neighborhood grand-uncle’s, Sean Flynn, who gave a good account of himself when the time for fighting came:
Funny, Sean Flynn thought, about how words and phrases can capture a moment, capture an Irish poetic moment, of which in the benighted history of this benighted isle there were few and far between. He had been reading, really re-reading, William Butler Yeats’ homage to the men of Easter 1916, his men (although he had been a mere slip of a boy, if a tall manly looking boy then), and about that powerful refrain that ended a few verses -“a terrible beauty was born.” Yes, Sean thought, that phrase fit the occasion to a tee, fit those working men like himself and his brother, Seamus, who gave their all those bloody April days to free Ireland from the English yoke. Yes, funny too how an Anglo-Irishman, a bloody heathen if you really thought about it, captured the spirit of those times, of those times when men, a few men , had to step up and be counted. Ordinary working men mostly, the ones from his Irish Citizens’ Army, the one Jimmy Connolly (the late lamented martyred James Connolly to most) put together to defend the neighborhoods against the bloody reprisals after the big 1914 strike. The others too, too few others in Dublin no question what with all the confusion, mainly poets and students caught up in some professor’s exaltations.
Sean remembered, distinctly remembered, how nervous he had been waiting, eternally waiting for the sign of the uprising to take place-he knew for sure it would not be like some Wolfe Tone thing, or the rising of the moon. Not this time not when the Irish finally had the British at a disadvantage. That big war in Europe was actually to their benefit. Oh no, not at first when everybody, even hot-headed Irishmen if one could believe that, was ready to give his or her all for the bloody King of England against the damn Huns. No, rather later once everybody knew that England was so desperate to beat the Huns in Europe with everything they had that a small military encounter with whatever remnants the British left behind to garrison the Irish colony could be disposed of with ease and a free Ireland delivered at little cost. The question that made Sean nervous, made many a man nervous, was when. As 1915 slipped into 1916 those nerves only got more frayed since there were constant rumors that the war in Europe would soon be over and a chance to gain the upper hand would be lost.
Finally, finally word filtered down to the “boyos” that the Irish Citizens’ Army (meaning James Connolly above all others) would join with the Irish Volunteers (Patrick Pearse’s operation, among others) to declare a republic and stand and fight. Naturally there were more delays as the chieftains (now including the previously non-committal Irish Republican Brotherhood) argued about the necessity, the validity, and then the timing of a rising. (All this not known until later after the smoke had cleared and the survivors could take stock of who, and who did not, do what, who did, and did not, show up, and what else went wrong.) Then that Easter week came and the order to arm came. And all arms to head to Dublin, to the strategic General Post Office (their, the bloody English’s post office). Sean got there just in time to hear the Proclamation read and posted. The battle was on and suddenly all of Sean’s nervousness about being exposed, about not being a military man, about being shy around guns evaporated.
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