In 1934, in an attempt to have a claim for compensation reviewed under the 1933 Damage to Property (Amendment) Act, James McCabe, an egg-dealer from Arva, County Cavan, set forth his family’s republican credentials:

I had 3 sons one a Captain in the Volunteers who has since died and the other is now seeking a Pension and I know of no man in this or surrounding counties who gave the same support or treated as harshly as I was. Any of the then existing officers or men of the 3 surrounding counties can corroborate me as it was the means...

In June 1920, Constable Daniel O’sullivan resigned from the RIC. O’sullivan was a 31-year-old native of Limerick who had joined the force in 1908, spending his career stationed in kerry.¹ O’sullivan had not been shot at, held up and disarmed, ambushed while on patrol, or defended his barracks against a late night attack. He was at home on leave in Limerick when a gang of masked men entered the family home and told him to resign from his job or he would be shot. O’sullivan refused, and as the gang attempted to drag him outside his mother tried to intervene,...

One of the most ambitious experiments by the underground Dáil Éireann was their takeover of local government from the British LGB. In April 1919, W. T. Cosgrave was appointed Dáil minister for local government, with Kevin O’Higgins later taking up position as his assistant. The ministry was unable to achieve much until the 1920 local elections saw landslide victories for Sinn Féin candidates. In June 1920, while the local elections were still under way, the Dáil local government department issued instructions to all local bodies to pass resolutions declaring their allegiance to Dáil Éireann and refusal to communicate with the...

Chapter 2 has introduced civilian defiance and IRA coercion in the context of the local machinations of Dáil Éireann, specifically through local government and the collection of the poor rate. It has also shown the centrality of violence and intimidation (subtle or otherwise) to the upholding of the republican counter-state at a local level. This chapter will explore civilian non-cooperation, and its motivation, more broadly from three perspectives. It will begin by exploring two illustrative examples of Dáil Éireann edicts enforced by local IRA units: the Dáil courts and the Belfast boycott. The courts and the boycott are among the...

In his seminal work on irregular conflict,The logic of violence in civil war , Stathis Kalyvas argued that political actors invariably seek the exclusive collaboration of the whole population. Active collaboration – such as sharing information, carrying or hiding arms, and providing supplies or accommodation – is only required from a minority but compliance from the rest of the population should be exclusive. Collaboration with the opposition must also be prevented. Armed actors, therefore, ‘prefer exclusive but incomplete collaboration to nonexclusive collaboration (such as neutrality or hedging) … they prefer a low level of collaboration to no collaboration at all’. Allowing defiance...

The violence that took place in Belfast between 1920 and 1922 was unique in revolutionary Ireland. Peter Hart has described the conflict there as ‘a communal war and a sectarian war, fought on the basis of ethnic mobilisation rather than paramilitary organisation’.¹ Violence comprised rioting, sniping, bombing, burning, reprisal killing, and forced expulsion. Belfast followed its own revolutionary timeline and, in A. C. Hepburn’s words, ‘appeared to be one of the most peaceful places in Ireland’ until it witnessed a wave of rioting in July 1920 that coincided with the removal of thousands of Catholic workers from the city’s shipyards.²...

The Truce that came into effect on 11 July 1921 officially ended what is now most often referred to as the War of Independence and came as the culmination of the most violent six months of the war.¹ Relieved civilians celebrated the arrival of peace and Volunteers returned home to bask in newfound freedom, safety, and adulation.² Violence did not come to a complete stop at 12 p.m. on 11 July but the weeks following the ceasefire are notable for the relative absence of political violence. Total attacks against the RIC, their families and suppliers, for instance, remained in single...

Examining the local, the everyday, and the ‘minor’ acts of revolutionary violence in Ireland brings a more common experience to the fore. It is not necessarilythe common experience, but one closest to that felt by most on the island. It also brings into question the dominance of the spectacular and the seedy among studies of the Irish Revolution and suggests that the culmination of many small threats or harmful acts, repeated over a period of time, more suitably defines the period of conflict between 1917 and 1922. Similarly important are the small, repeated acts of loyalty, defiance, or betrayal....