The Second Dáil

There were two elections in Ireland on 24 May 1921, as a result of the Government of Ireland Act 1920 to establish the House of Commons of Northern Ireland and the House of Commons of Southern Ireland. The election was used by Irish republicans as the basis of membership of the 2nd Dáil. The 2nd Dáil lasted 388 days.

The members who were elected as Sinn Féin candidates are listed below. 124 Sinn Féin candidates were returned unopposed from 26 geographic constituencies and the National University of Ireland constituency. The University of Dublin constituency returned four Independent Unionist candidates, also unopposed, but they refused to attend Dáil Éireann.

52 members elected from 9 geographic constituencies and the Queen's University of Belfast in Northern Ireland were also entitled to sit in the 2nd Dáil. Six Sinn Féin candidates were elected, 5 of whom had also been returned in the other part of Ireland. 40 Ulster Unionist Party and 5 Nationalist party (a remnant of the old Irish Parliamentary Party which had survived in Ulster) candidates were elected. One of the latter won two seats, making a total of six victories. They all refused to attend Dáil Éireann.

It was during the 2nd Dáil that the Anglo-Irish Treaty was debated. The treaty was ratified by the 2nd Dáil.

The list is given in alphabetical order by constituency. Those who attended Dáil Éireann called themselves Teachtaí Dála (TDs).


Members of the 2nd Dáil
Constituency Name Party
Armagh Michael Collins Sinn Féin
Carlow–Kilkenny Edward Aylward Sinn Féin
W. T. Cosgrave Sinn Féin
James Lennon Sinn Féin
Gearóid O'Sullivan Sinn Féin
Cavan Arthur Griffith Sinn Féin
Peter Galligan Sinn Féin
Seán Milroy Sinn Féin
Clare Brian O'Higgins Sinn Féin
Éamon de Valera Sinn Féin
Sean Liddy Sinn Féin
Patrick Brennan Sinn Féin
Cork Borough James J. Walsh Sinn Féin
Liam de Róiste Sinn Féin
Mary MacSwiney Sinn Féin
Daniel O'Callaghan Sinn Féin
Cork East and North East David Kent Sinn Féin
Thomas Hunter Sinn Féin
Séamus Fitzgerald Sinn Féin
Cork Mid, North, South, South East and West Seán MacSwiney Sinn Féin
Patrick O'Keeffe Sinn Féin
Michael Collins Sinn Féin
Daniel Corkery Sinn Féin
Seán Hales Sinn Féin
Seán Hayes Sinn Féin
Seán Moylan Sinn Féin
Seán Nolan Sinn Féin
Donegal Joseph O'Doherty Sinn Féin
Peter Ward Sinn Féin
Joseph Sweeney Sinn Féin
Patrick McGoldrick Sinn Féin
Joseph McGinley Sinn Féin
Samuel O'Flaherty Sinn Féin
Down Éamon de Valera Sinn Féin
Dublin County Michael Derham Sinn Féin
George Gavan Duffy Sinn Féin
Séamus Dwyer Sinn Féin
Desmond FitzGerald Sinn Féin
Frank Lawless Sinn Féin
Margaret Pearse Sinn Féin
Dublin Mid Seán T. O'Kelly Sinn Féin
Philip Shanahan Sinn Féin
Seán McGarry Sinn Féin
Kathleen Clarke Sinn Féin
Dublin North West Joseph McGrath Sinn Féin
Michael Staines Sinn Féin
Philip Cosgrave Sinn Féin
Richard Mulcahy Sinn Féin
Dublin South Constance Markiewicz Sinn Féin
Thomas Kelly Sinn Féin
Daniel McCarthy Sinn Féin
Cathal Ó Murchadha Sinn Féin
Fermanagh and Tyrone Arthur Griffith Sinn Féin
Seán Milroy Sinn Féin
Seán O'Mahony Sinn Féin
Galway Pádraic Ó Máille Sinn Féin
Liam Mellows Sinn Féin
Bryan Cusack Sinn Féin
Frank Fahy Sinn Féin
Patrick Hogan Sinn Féin
George Nicolls Sinn Féin
Joseph Whelehan Sinn Féin
Kerry–Limerick West Piaras Béaslaí Sinn Féin
Fionán Lynch Sinn Féin
Austin Stack Sinn Féin
Patrick Cahill Sinn Féin
Con Collins Sinn Féin
James Crowley Sinn Féin
Thomas O'Donoghue Sinn Féin
Edmund Roche Sinn Féin
Kildare–Wicklow Domhnall Ua Buachalla Sinn Féin
Robert Barton Sinn Féin
Christopher Byrne Sinn Féin
Art O'Connor Sinn Féin
Robert Erskine Childers Sinn Féin
Leitrim–Roscommon North Thomas Carter Sinn Féin
James Dolan Sinn Féin
Andrew Lavin Sinn Féin
Count Plunkett Sinn Féin
Leix–Offaly Patrick McCartan Sinn Féin
Joseph Lynch Sinn Féin
Francis Bulfin Sinn Féin
Kevin O'Higgins Sinn Féin
Limerick City–Limerick East Michael Colivet Sinn Féin
Richard Hayes Sinn Féin
William Hayes Sinn Féin
Kathleen O'Callaghan Sinn Féin
Londonderry Eoin MacNeill Sinn Féin
Longford–Westmeath Joseph McGuinness Sinn Féin
Lorcan Robbins Sinn Féin
Seán Mac Eoin Sinn Féin
Laurence Ginnell Sinn Féin
Louth–Meath John J. O'Kelly Sinn Féin
James Murphy Sinn Féin
Justin McKenna Sinn Féin
Peter Hughes Sinn Féin
Eamonn Duggan Sinn Féin
Mayo North and West John Crowley Sinn Féin
Thomas Derrig Sinn Féin
Joseph MacBride Sinn Féin
P. J. Ruttledge Sinn Féin
Mayo South–Roscommon South William Sears Sinn Féin
Tom Maguire Sinn Féin
Daniel O'Rourke Sinn Féin
Harry Boland Sinn Féin
Monaghan Ernest Blythe Sinn Féin
Seán MacEntee Sinn Féin
Eoin O'Duffy Sinn Féin
National University of Ireland Eoin MacNeill Sinn Féin
Ada English Sinn Féin
Michael Hayes Sinn Féin
William Stockley Sinn Féin
Sligo–Mayo East Frank Carty Sinn Féin
Alexander McCabe Sinn Féin
James Devins Sinn Féin
Francis Ferran Sinn Féin
Thomas O'Donnell Sinn Féin
Tipperary Mid, North and South Séamus Burke Sinn Féin
Joseph MacDonagh Sinn Féin
P. J. Moloney Sinn Féin
Patrick O'Byrne Sinn Féin
Waterford–Tipperary East Cathal Brugha Sinn Féin
Eamon Dee Sinn Féin
Frank Drohan Sinn Féin
Séamus Robinson Sinn Féin
Vincent White Sinn Féin
Wexford James Ryan Sinn Féin
Seán Etchingham Sinn Féin
Richard Corish Sinn Féin
Séamus Doyle Sinn Féin


The list is given in alphabetical order by constituency of the MPs who refused to be members of the 2nd Dáil.

Constituency Name Party
Antrim Milne Barbour Ulster Unionist
Robert Crawford Ulster Unionist
Joseph Devlin Nationalist (NI)
John Fawcett Gordon Ulster Unionist
George Boyle Hanna Ulster Unionist
Robert Megaw Ulster Unionist
Hugh O'Neill Ulster Unionist
Armagh Richard Best Ulster Unionist
John Dillon Nugent Nationalist (NI)
David Shillington Ulster Unionist
Belfast East Dawson Bates Ulster Unionist
Herbert Dixon Ulster Unionist
Thompson Donald Ulster Unionist
James Augustine Duff Ulster Unionist
Belfast North Lloyd Campbell Ulster Unionist
William Grant Ulster Unionist
Samuel McGuffin Ulster Unionist
Robert McKeown Ulster Unionist
Belfast South Crawford McCullagh Ulster Unionist
Julia McMordie Ulster Unionist
Thomas Moles Ulster Unionist
Hugh Pollock Ulster Unionist
Belfast West Thomas Henry Burn Ulster Unionist
Joseph Devlin Nationalist (NI)
Robert Lynn Ulster Unionist
William Twaddell Ulster Unionist
Dublin Universit Ernest Alton Independent Unionist
James Craig Independent Unionist
Gerald Fitzgibbon Independent Unionist
William Thrift Independent Unionist
Down J. M. Andrews Ulster Unionist
James Craig Ulster Unionist
Thomas Lavery Ulster Unionist
Robert McBride Ulster Unionist
Thomas McMullan Ulster Unionist
Harry Mulholland Ulster Unionist
Patrick O'Neill Nationalist (NI)
Fermanagh and Tyrone Edward Archdale Ulster Unionist
James Cooper Ulster Unionist
William Coote Ulster Unionist
Thomas Harbison Nationalist (NI)
William Thomas Miller Ulster Unionist
Londonderry Robert Anderson Ulster Unionist
Dehra Chichester Ulster Unionist
George Leeke Nationalist (NI)
John Martin Mark Ulster Unionist
Queen's University of Belfast John Campbell Ulster Unionist
Robert Johnstone Ulster Unionist
Hugh Morrison Ulster Unionist
John Hanna Robb Ulster Unionist

Refused to be Members of the First Dáil - William Archer Redmond

William Archer Redmond DSO (1886 – 17 April 1932) was an Irish nationalist politician and son of John Redmond the leader of the Irish Parliamentary Party from 1900 to 1918. He served as an MP in the House of Commons of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland as well as a Teachta Dála (Deputy) of Dáil Éireann, the lower House of the Irish parliament. He was one of the few people to have served in both the House of Commons and in Dáil Éireann. During World War I served as officer with an Irish regiment on the Western Front. He was one of a dynasty of Liberal and Irish Nationalist politicians who are commemorated in Redmond Square in the town of Wexford.

Redmond was educated at Clongowes Wood College and Trinity College Dublin. He was elected as MP for Tyrone East at the December 1910 general election and supported the passing of the Home Rule Act 1914.

When his father called for support for the British and Allied war effort in the First World War, Redmond joined with the National Volunteers in the New British Army and served on the Western Front for the duration of the war, first in the Royal Dublin Fusiliers and then in the Irish Guards, rose to the rank of captain and was awarded the DSO. His fellow MP and uncle Willie Redmond, John's brother, also joined up and was killed in 1917. Three other MPs also served, J. L. Esmonde, Stephen Gwynn, D. D. Sheehan and former MP Tom Kettle.

When his father died in March 1918, William Archer Redmond resigned his Tyrone seat and successfully defended his father's seat of Waterford. Famously he campaigned in his army uniform and wearing a black armband. His victory ended a run of Sinn Féin victories at by-elections and gave a big, albeit temporary, boost to the morale of supporters of the Irish Parliamentary Party.

In the general election of December 1918, he was re-elected for Waterford City, becoming one of only two Irish Parliamentary Party MPs outside the six counties of Northern Ireland, and he spoke out strongly in the House of Commons against British military policy in Ireland during the Irish War of Independence.

Following independence, Redmond was elected as an Independent Nationalist deputy and member of the 4th Dáil for Waterford in the 1923 Irish Free State election. In 1926, he co-founded the National League Party, appealing to former supporters of the Irish Parliamentary Party, ex-servicemen, and others, including Unionists, alienated by the policies of the Cumann na nGaedhael government. The new party did quite well, winning eight seats in the general election of June 1927.

However Redmond alarmed his supporters by entering into a voting pact with the Labour Party and Fianna Fáil to bring down the Cumann na nGaedhael government, and replace it with a minority Labour Party–National League administration supported from outside by Fianna Fáil. The attempt failed and in the ensuing general election in September 1927, the Party won only one seat in addition to Redmond's own. The following year the National League was dissolved and in 1931 Redmond joined Cumann na nGaedhael. He died in 1932 and was succeeded as Cumann na nGaedhael deputy for Waterford by his wife, Bridget Redmond.

This ends those who sat or did not sit in the First Dáil.

Refused to be Members of the First Dáil - Thomas Harbison

Thomas Harbison (1864 - 22 November 1930) was an Irish nationalist politician.

After growing up in Cookstown, Harbison studied at St Malachy's College in Belfast. He became active in the Irish Parliamentry Party, acting from 1906 until 1910 as the election agent for William Redmond and Thomas Kettle. In 1911, he was elected to Tyrone County Council.

After attending the Irish Convention, he was elected to Westminster at the East Tyrone by-election, 1918, after Redmond resigned it to contest Waterford City. At the 1918 UK general election, Harbison was elected in North East Tyrone.

At the Northern Ireland general election, 1921, Harbison was elected on an abstentionist platform in Fermanagh and Tyrone. In 1922, he was elected in the Westminster constituency of Fermanagh and Tyrone for the Nationalist Party. He stood down from the Westminster seat at the 1924 election, and in 1927 took his seat at Stormont. In 1929, he stood down from his Stormont seat, but was again elected to Westminster, serving until his death a year later.

Refused to be Members of the First Dáil - William Whitla

William Whitla

Sir William Whitla (15 September 1851 - 1933) was an Irish physician and politician.

Born at The Diamond, Monaghan, County Monaghan, Ireland, the fourth son of Robert Whitla, a woollen draper and pawnbroker, and his wife, Anne, daughter of Alexander Williams of Dublin. Educated at the town's Model School, he was articled at fifteen to his brother James, a local pharmacist, completing his apprenticeship with Wheeler and Whitaker, Belfast's leading pharmaceutical firm. Proceeding to study medicine at Queen's College, Belfast, Whitla took the LAH, Dublin, and the LRCP and LRCS of Edinburgh in 1873.

With his qualifications he obtained a post as resident medical officer at the Belfast General Hospital. He next spent some time in London, at St Thomas's Hospital, where he met his future wife, Ada Bourne (1846–1932), daughter of George Bourne, a prominent Staffordshire farmer. She was a ward sister and friend of Florence Nightingale, and a member of the Salvation Army.

The pair were married in 1876, setting up house at 41, Great Victoria Street, Belfast, where Whitla established a general medical practice. He was awarded the MD of the Queen's University of Ireland in 1877, with first class honours, gold medal, and commendation.

Sir William was appointed physician to the Belfast Royal Hospital in 1882, a post he held there and in the Royal Victoria Hospital, of which it was the forerunner, until his retirement in 1918. The Whitlas' move in 1884 to 8, College Square North, was an indication of a success by no means near its zenith. He succeeded Seaton Reid as professor of materia medica at the Queen's College in 1890; he was twice president of the Ulster Medical Society (1886–7, 1901–2), and was knighted for distinction in medicine in 1902. In 1906 the Whitlas moved to Lennoxvale, a suburban mansion, they also retained the professional house in College Square.

He served the British Medical Association as president (presenting each member who attended the annual meeting held in Belfast in 1909 with a copy of his most recent book, The Theory and Practice of Medicine, and entertaining them at Lennoxvale).

A strong unionist, he was elected to parliament in 1918, serving until 1923 as representative of the Queen's University at Westminster. He was appointed honorary physician to the king in Ireland in 1919 and was subsequently university pro-chancellor.

Sir William and Lady Whitla were childless, and they were wealthy. Together with his practice and books he had a flair for making wise investments, buying oil shares to his great financial advantage. The Whitlas travelled widely, visiting Russia, Canada, and many Mediterranean cities.
As a biblical scholar he contributed an introductory study of the nature and the cause of unbelief, of miracles, and prophecy to an edition of Sir Isaac Newton's Daniel and the Apocalypse published by John Murray in 1922. As the decade progressed his public appearances were fewer, and after a stroke in 1929 he was confined to his room. Lady Whitla died in 1932; he died at Lennoxvale on 11 December 1933, and was given a civic funeral two days later; he was buried at Belfast City Cemetery.

During Whitla's lifetime his gifts to his profession included the Good Samaritan stained glass window (commemorating the heroic behaviour of two Ulster doctors) erected in the Royal Hospital, and a building to house the Ulster Medical Society. At his death Lennoxvale was bequeathed to Queen's University as a residence for the Vice-Chancellor. The university also was his residuary legatee, and acted on his suggestion that the available funds should provide an assembly hall. The Sir William Whitla Hall was opened in 1949.

Refused to be Members of the First Dáil - Denis Henry

Sir Denis Stanislaus Henry, 1st Baronet KBE, QC (7 March 1864 – 1 October 1925), was a British-Irish lawyer and politician who became the first Lord Chief Justice of Northern Ireland.

Henry was born in Cahore, Draperstown, County Londonderry, the son of prosperous Roman Catholic businessman. He was educated at Marist College, Dundalk; Mount St Mary's College, Chesterfield, a Jesuit foundation; and Queen's College, Belfast (QUB), where he won every law scholarship open to a student and many other prizes and exhibitions. In 1885, he was called to the Irish Bar.

During the general election campaign of 1895 Henry spoke in support of unionist candidates in two constituencies: Thomas Lea in South Londonderry, Henry's native constituency, and E T Herdman in East Donegal.

Henry's legal career flourished - he became a Queen's Counsel in 1896, a Bencher of the King's Inns in 1898 and ultimately Father of the Northwest Circuit - but his interest in politics did not diminish. By March 1905 he was a delegate at the inaugural meeting of the Ulster Unionist Council and the Unionist parliamentary candidate for the ultra-marginal North Tyrone seat.

On 23 May 1916, in the first by-election to be held in Ireland after the Easter rebellion, he was elected MP for South Londonderry. The rebellion had had no discernible impact on the contest at all.

In November 1918, he became Solicitor-General for Ireland and in July 1919 Attorney General for Ireland. He later served as the first Lord Chief Justice of Northern Ireland from 1921 to 1925. In 1923 he was created a Baronet, of Cahore in the County of Londonderry. He died in 1925, aged 61, and was buried near his native Draperstown.

Refused to be Members of the First Dáil - Hugh Alfred Anderson

Hugh Alfred Anderson (26 November 1867 – 16 June 1933) was an Irish Unionist politician. He was elected Member of Parliament for North Londonderry in 1918, resigning early in 1919.

He was sworn in as an MP on 10 February 1919 but resigned his seat only three days later.

Refused to be Members of the First Dáil - Sir Edward Archdale, 1st Baronet

Sir Edward Mervyn Archdale

Sir Edward Mervyn Archdale, 1st Baronet PC (Ireland), DL (26 January 1853 — 1 November 1943) was a Northern Irish politician.

Archdale was born in Rossfad, County Fermanagh. He was educated at the Naval School in Portsmouth and entered the Royal Navy in 1866. He was promoted Lieutenant in 1875 and retired in 1880. In 1884, he was elected High Sheriff of Fermanagh. In 1898 he was elected Conservative Member of Parliament for North Fermanagh. He resigned in 1903, but regained the seat in 1916.

In 1921, he resigned to stand for the new Parliament of Northern Ireland and was elected for Fermanagh and Tyrone. He held that seat until 1929, and was then elected for Enniskillen, retiring in 1937.

From 1921 to 1925, he served as Minister of Agriculture and Commerce in the Government of Northern Ireland and continued as Minister of Agriculture from 1925 to 1933. As a landowner and practical farmer he was well-qualified for the job.

Archdale was appointed to the Privy Council of Ireland in the 1921 New Year Honours, entitling him to the style "The Right Honourable", and was created a baronet in 1928. He was succeeded by his eldest son, Vice-Admiral Sir Nicholas Edward Archdale, 2nd Bt.

Refused to be Members of the First Dáil - Robert Henry Woods

Robert Henry Woods

Sir Robert Henry Woods (1865 – 8 September 1938) was an Irish Independent Unionist Member of Parliament (MP) in the United Kingdom Parliament. He was born at Tullamore. He was knighted in 1913.

He attended Wesley College, Dublin and Trinity College, Dublin as well as studying in Vienna, before graduating in medicine in 1889. He became President of the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland 1910-11. He was Professor of Laryngology and Otology at Trinity College.

He was MP for Dublin University 1918-1922, having previously been defeated in a 1917 by-election for the same constituency.

Woods left the House of Commons at the dissolution of 1922 when his constituency ceased to be represented in the House of Commons.

Refused to be Members of the First Dáil - Arthur Warren Samuels

Arthur Warren Samuels

Arthur Warren Samuels (19 May 1852-11 May 1925) was an Irish Unionist Alliance Member of Parliament (MP) in the United Kingdom Parliament and subsequently a Judge. The Irish Unionists were the Irish wing of the Conservative Party.

He attended Trinity College, Dublin, before being called to the Irish Bar in 1877. He became a Queen's Counsel (QC) in 1894 and was called to the English bar in 1896.

Samuels was Solicitor-General for Ireland 1917-1918 and Attorney-General for Ireland in 1918-1919. He was also made a member of the Privy Council of Ireland in 1918.

He was MP for Dublin University 1917-1919, having previously been defeated in a 1903 by-election for the same constituency.

Samuels left the House of Commons when he was appointed to the office of Justice of the King's Bench Division of the Irish High Court in 1919, an office which he held until 1925.

Refused to be Members of the First Dáil - Maurice Dockrell

Sir Maurice Edward Dockrell (21 December 1850 – 5 August 1929) was an Irish businessman and politician from Dublin.

At the 1918 general election, he was elected as Irish Unionist Alliance Member of Parliament for Dublin Rathmines from 1918 to 1922.

The 1918 election was a watershed in Ireland. Following the Easter Rising in 1916, Sinn Féin had grown in popularity, eclipsing the Irish Parliamentary Party. Sinn Féin candidates treated the election as an Irish general election, pledging not to take their seats in the British House of Commons, but to unilaterally establish a separate parliament in Dublin.

At the election, the Dublin University constituency returned two Unionists, and Dockrell was the only other Irish Unionist returned outside Ulster. Rather than joining Sinn Féin in the First Dáil, Dockrell took his seat in the British House of Commons.

His son Henry Morgan Dockrell was later a Fine Gael Teachta Dála (TD), and Henry's sons Percy and Maurice were also long-serving Fine Gael TDs.

Maurice ran the Dockrell family business of builders' providers in Dublin.

Refused to be Members of the First Dáil - Daniel Martin Wilson

The Hon. Daniel Martin Wilson BA KC (1862-5 January 1932) was an Irish politician and judge.
He was born in Limerick, the son of Rev. David Wilson, and was educated at the Royal Belfast Academical Institution and at Trinity College, Dublin.

He was appointed a Bencher of King's Inns in 1911. He served as a 2nd Lieutenant with the Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers from 1914, was promoted to Captain in 1915, and resigned from ill health in 1916.

He was Unionist Member of Parliament for West Down from December 1918-1921 and served in government as Solicitor General for Ireland from 1919-1921. He stood down on appointment as Recorder of Belfast and as Land Judge of the Supreme Court of Northern Ireland in 1921.

Refused to be Members of the First Dáil - Jeremiah McVeagh

Jeremiah McVeagh (1870 – 1932) was an Irish nationalist politician and Member of Parliament (MP) in the House of Commons of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland.

He was first elected as the Irish Parliamentary Party MP for the South Down constituency at the 5 February 1902 by-election, and was again re-elected at the Irish general election, 1918 when he served until 1922 as member of the Nationalist Party (Northern Ireland).

Refused to be Members of the First Dáil - James Craig, 1st Viscount Craigavon

James Craig, 1st Viscount Craigavon

James Craig, 1st Viscount Craigavon PC (8 January 1871 – 24 November 1940) was a prominent Irish unionist politician, leader of the Ulster Unionist Party and the first Prime Minister of Northern Ireland. He was created a baronet in 1918.

Lord Craigavon was born at Sydenham, Belfast, the son of James Craig (1828–1900) a wealthy whiskey distiller; he had entered the firm of Dunville Whisky as a clerk and by aged 40 he was a millionaire and a partner in the firm. James Craig, Snr. owned a large house, Craigavon, overlooking Belfast Lough. His mother, the former Eleanor Gilmore Browne, was the daughter of Robert Browne, a prosperous man who owned property in Belfast and a farm outside Lisburn. He was the seventh child and sixth son in the family; there were eight sons and one daughter in all.

He was educated at Merchiston Castle School in Edinburgh, Scotland; his father had taken a conscious decision not to send his children to any the more fashionable public schools. After school he began work as a stockbroker, eventually opening his own firm in Belfast.

On his return to Ireland, having received a £100,000 legacy from his father's will, he turned to politics, serving as Member of Parliament for East Down from 1906 to 1918. From 1918 to 1921 he represented Mid Down, and served in government as Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Pensions (1919-1920) and Parliamentary Secretary to the Admiralty (1920-1921).

Craig rallied the Ulster unionist opposition to Irish Home Rule in Ulster before the First World War, organising the paramilitary Ulster Volunteers and buying arms from Imperial Germany. The Volunteers became the nucleus of the 36th (Ulster) Division during the Great War. He succeeded Edward Carson as leader of the Ulster Unionist Party in February 1921.

In the 1921 Northern Ireland general election, the first ever, he was elected to the newly created Northern Ireland House of Commons as member for County Down.

On 7 June 1921 (over two weeks before the opening of the Northern Ireland Parliament), Craig was appointed the first Prime Minister of Northern Ireland by the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland. A dedicated member of the Orange Order and staunchly Protestant, he famously stated, in April 1934, in response to Éamon de Valera's assertion that Ireland was a "Catholic nation":

The hon. Member must remember that in the South they boasted of a Catholic
State. They still boast of Southern Ireland being a Catholic State. All I boast
of is that we are a Protestant Parliament and a Protestant State. It would be
rather interesting for historians of the future to compare a Catholic State
launched in the South with a Protestant State launched in the North and to see
which gets on the better and prospers the more. It is most interesting for me at
the moment to watch how they are progressing. I am doing my best always to top the bill and to be ahead of the South.

He was made a baronet in 1918, and was in 1927 created Viscount Craigavon, of Stormont in the County of Down. He was also the recipient of honorary degrees from the Queen's University of Belfast (1922) and Oxford University (1926).

Craig had made his career in British as well as Ulster politics; but his premiership showed little sign of his earlier close acquaintance with the British political world. He became intensely parochial, and suffered from his loss of intimacy with British politicians in 1938, when the British government concluded agreements with Dublin to end the 'economic war' between the two states, on terms highly unfavourable to Northern Ireland. He never tried to persuade Westminster to protect Northern Ireland's industries, especially the linen industry, which was central to its economy. He was anxious not to provoke Westminster given the precarious state of Northern Ireland's position.

His desire to have Ulster treated like the rest of the United Kingdom was seen in April 1939, and again in May 1940, when he called for conscription to be introduced in the North (which the British government, fearing a nationalist backlash, refused). Lord Craigavon was still prime minister when he died peacefully at his home at Glencraig, County Down in 1940. He was buried on the Stormont Estate, and was succeeded as leader of the Northern Ireland Government by the Minister of Finance John Miller Andrews.

Refused to be Members of the First Dáil - David Reid

Sir David Reid, 1st Baronet (24 August 1872 – 23 March 1939) was the Unionist Member of Parliament for Down from 1922 until his death in 1939.

He attended Queens College, Belfast and New College, Oxford, graduating with 1st Class honours in History. He then became a barrister. He contested East Tyrone in 1910 before becoming a Unionist Member of Parliament (MP) for East Down from 1918 to 1922, when the constituency was abolished.

Refused to be Members of the First Dáil - Edward Joseph Kelly

Edward Joseph Kelly (31 March 1883 – 25 September 1944) was an Irish nationalist politician and MP in the House of Commons of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. He was a solicitor, barrister-at-law and Senior Counsel (SC).

He was the son of Peter Kelly JP of Ballyshannon, County Donegal, and of Rose Kelly. Born at Ballyshannon, he was educated at St Vincent's College, Castleknock and at the Royal University, Dublin, where he obtained a M.A. He was called to the bar in 1917, made a Senior Counsel of the Irish Free State in 1930, and became a Bencher of the King's Inns, Dublin in 1937. He married Mollie, second daughter of William Hickey of Clontarf.

He was first elected as an Irish Parliamentary Party MP at the January 1910 UK general election for the constituency of East Donegal, defeating the Unionist candidate Thomas Harrison by 3,415 votes to 2,202. He was then returned unopposed in the December 1910 UK general election. In the Irish general election, 1918 he had the distinction of retaining his seat in the face of the Sinn Féin landslide, obtaining 7,596 votes to the Unionist's 4,797 and a mere 46 votes for Sinn Féin. He chose not to be a member of the First Dáil but remained active in the UK House of Commons representing East Donegal until his retirement in October 1922 on the establishment of the Irish Free State.

11 September 2001

The Memorial Plaque at Shanksville

Flight 93 Crash Site

The Smokes Rises at Shanksville

The Field at Shanksville

The Crash Site at Shanksville

Pentagon Memorial View #4

Pentagon Memorial View #3

Pentagon Memorial View #2

Pentagon Memorial View #1

Overhead Aerial View of the Pentagon Destruction

Aerial View of Pentagon Destruction

Pentagon Destruction

First Responders Raise the Flag at Ground Zero

National Park Service 9-11 Statue of Liberty and WTC fire

Second Plane Crashes into the Twin Tower

Second Plane Crashes into the Towers

Twin Towers Afire

The Twin Towers Afire

This blog is dedicated to the history of all things Irish. Many Irish and Irish Americans gave their lives nine years ago today. We must remember their sacrifice.

The September 11 attacks (often referred to as September 11th or 9/11) were a series of coordinated suicide attacks by al-Qaeda upon the United States on September 11, 2001. On that morning, 19 al-Qaeda terrorists hijacked four commercial passenger jet airliners. The hijackers intentionally crashed two of the airliners into the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center in New York City, killing everyone on board and many others working in the buildings. Both buildings collapsed within two hours, destroying nearby buildings and damaging others. The hijackers crashed a third airliner into the Pentagon in Arlington, Virginia, just outside Washington, D.C. The fourth plane crashed into a field near Shanksville in rural Pennsylvania after some of its passengers and flight crew attempted to retake control of the plane, which the hijackers had redirected toward Washington, D.C. There were no survivors from any of the flights.

The death toll of the attacks was 2,996, including the 19 hijackers. The overwhelming majority of casualties were civilians, including nationals of over 70 countries. In addition, there was at least one secondary death – one person was ruled by a medical examiner to have died from lung disease due to exposure to dust from the World Trade Center's collapse.

The United States responded to the attacks by launching the War on Terror: it invaded Afghanistan to depose the Taliban, who had harbored al-Qaeda terrorists. The United States also enacted the USA PATRIOT Act. Many other countries also strengthened their anti-terrorism legislation and expanded law enforcement powers. Some American stock exchanges stayed closed for the rest of the week following the attack and posted enormous losses upon reopening, especially in the airline and insurance industries. The destruction of billions of dollars' worth of office space caused serious damage to the economy of Lower Manhattan.

The damage to the Pentagon was cleared and repaired within a year, and the Pentagon Memorial was built adjacent to the building. The rebuilding process has started on the World Trade Center site. In 2006, a new office tower was completed on the site of 7 World Trade Center. The new 1 World Trade Center is currently under construction at the site and, at 1,776 ft (541 m) upon completion in 2013, it will become one of the tallest buildings in North America. Three more towers were originally expected to be built between 2007 and 2012 on the site. Ground was broken for the Flight 93 National Memorial on November 8, 2009, and the first phase of construction is expected to be ready for the 10th anniversary of the attacks on September 11, 2011.

Early on the morning of September 11, 2001, nineteen hijackers took control of four commercial airliners en route to San Francisco and Los Angeles from Boston, Newark, and Washington, D.C. (Washington Dulles International Airport). At 8:46 a.m., American Airlines Flight 11 was crashed into the World Trade Center's North Tower, followed by United Airlines Flight 175 which hit the South Tower at 9:03 a.m.

Another group of hijackers flew American Airlines Flight 77 into the Pentagon at 9:37 a.m. A fourth flight, United Airlines Flight 93 crashed near Shanksville, Pennsylvania at 10:03 a.m, after the passengers on board engaged in a fight with the hijackers. Its ultimate target was thought to be either the Capitol (the meeting place of the United States Congress) or the White House.

In a September 2002 interview conducted by documentary-maker Yosri Fouda, an al Jazeera journalist, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and Ramzi Binalshibh stated that the fourth hijacked plane was heading for the United States Capitol, not for the White House. They further stated that al-Qaeda initially planned to fly hijacked jets into nuclear installations rather than the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, but it was decided not to attack nuclear power plants "for the moment" because of fears it could "get out of control".

During the hijacking of the airplanes, the hijackers used weapons to stab and kill aircraft pilots, flight attendants and passengers. Reports from phone callers from the planes indicated that knives were used by the hijackers to stab attendants and in at least one case, a passenger, during two of the hijackings. Some passengers were able to make phone calls using the cabin airphone service and mobile phones, and provide details, including that several hijackers were aboard each plane, that mace or other form of noxious chemical spray, such as tear gas or pepper spray was used, and that some people aboard had been stabbed.

The 9/11 Commission established that two of the hijackers had recently purchased Leatherman multi-function hand tools. A flight attendant on Flight 11, a passenger on Flight 175, and passengers on Flight 93 mentioned that the hijackers had bombs, but one of the passengers also mentioned he thought the bombs were fake. No traces of explosives were found at the crash sites, and the 9/11 Commission believed the bombs were probably fake.

On United Airlines Flight 93, black box recordings revealed that crew and passengers attempted to seize control of the plane from the hijackers after learning through phone calls that similarly hijacked planes had been crashed into buildings that morning. According to the transcript of Flight 93's recorder, one of the hijackers gave the order to roll the plane once it became evident that they would lose control of the plane to the passengers. Soon afterward, the aircraft crashed into a field near Shanksville in Stonycreek Township, Somerset County, Pennsylvania, at 10:03:11 a.m. local time (14:03:11 UTC). Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, organizer of the attacks, mentioned in a 2002 interview with Yosri Fouda that Flight 93's target was the United States Capitol, which was given the code name "the Faculty of Law".

Three buildings in the World Trade Center Complex collapsed due to structural failure on the day of the attack. The south tower (2 WTC) fell at approximately 9:59 a.m., after burning for 56 minutes in a fire caused by the impact of United Airlines Flight 175. The north tower (1 WTC) collapsed at 10:28 a.m., after burning for approximately 102 minutes. When the north tower collapsed, debris that fell on the nearby 7 World Trade Center (7 WTC) building damaged it and initiated fires. These fires burned for hours and compromised the building's structural integrity, which led to the crumbling of the east penthouse at 5:20 p.m. and to the complete collapse of the building at 5:21 p.m.

The attacks created widespread confusion among news organizations and air traffic controllers across the United States. All international civilian air traffic was banned from landing on U.S. soil for three days. Aircraft already in flight were either turned back or redirected to airports in Canada or Mexico. News sources aired unconfirmed and often contradictory reports throughout the day. One of the most prevalent of these reported that a car bomb had been detonated at the U.S. State Department's headquarters in Washington, D.C. Soon after reporting for the first time on the Pentagon crash, some news media also briefly reported that a fire had broken out on the National Mall. Another report went out on the Associated Press wire, claiming that a Delta Air Lines airliner—Flight 1989—had been hijacked. This report, too, turned out to be in error; the plane was briefly thought to represent a hijack risk, but it responded to controllers and landed safely in Cleveland, Ohio.

There were a total of 2,996 deaths, including the 19 hijackers and 2,977 victims. The victims were distributed as follows: 246 on the four planes (from which there were no survivors), 2,606 in New York City in the towers and on the ground, and 125 at the Pentagon. All the deaths in the attacks were civilians except for 55 military personnel killed at the Pentagon.

More than 90 countries lost citizens in the attacks on the World Trade Center. In 2007, the New York City medical examiner's office added Felicia Dunn-Jones to the official death toll from the September 11 attacks. Dunn-Jones died five months after 9/11 from a lung condition which was linked to exposure to dust during the collapse of the World Trade Center. Leon Heyward, who died of lymphoma in 2008, was added to the official death toll in 2009.

NIST estimated that about 17,400 civilians were in the World Trade Center complex at the time of the attacks, while turnstile counts from the Port Authority suggest that 14,154 people were typically in the Twin Towers by 8:45 a.m. The vast majority of people below the impact zone safely evacuated the buildings, along with 18 people who were in the impact zone in the south tower and a number above the impact zone who evidently used the one intact stairwell in the south tower. At least 1,366 people died who were at or above the floors of impact in the North Tower and at least 618 in the South Tower, where evacuation had begun before the second impact. Thus over 90% of the workers and visitors who died in the Towers had been at or above impact.

According to the Commission Report, hundreds were killed instantly by the impact, while the rest were trapped and died after tower collapse. At least 200 people jumped to their deaths from the burning towers (as depicted in the photograph "The Falling Man"), landing on the streets and rooftops of adjacent buildings hundreds of feet below. Some of the occupants of each tower above its point of impact made their way upward toward the roof in hope of helicopter rescue, but the roof access doors were locked. No plan existed for helicopter rescues, and on September 11, the thick smoke and intense heat would have prevented helicopters from conducting rescues.

A total of 411 emergency workers who responded to the scene died as they attempted to rescue people and fight fires. The New York City Fire Department (FDNY) lost 341 firefighters and 2 FDNY paramedics. The New York City Police Department lost 23 officers. The Port Authority Police Department lost 37 officers, and 8 additional EMTs and paramedics from private EMS units were killed.

Cantor Fitzgerald L.P., an investment bank on the 101st–105th floors of One World Trade Center, lost 658 employees, considerably more than any other employer. Marsh Inc., located immediately below Cantor Fitzgerald on floors 93–101 (the location of Flight 11's impact), lost 355 employees, and 175 employees of Aon Corporation were killed. After New York, New Jersey was the hardest hit state, with the city of Hoboken sustaining the most deaths.

Weeks after the attack, the estimated death toll was over 6,000. The city was only able to identify remains for about 1,600 of the victims at the World Trade Center. The medical examiner's office also collected "about 10,000 unidentified bone and tissue fragments that cannot be matched to the list of the dead". Bone fragments were still being found in 2006 as workers were preparing to demolish the damaged Deutsche Bank Building. That operation was completed in 2007. On April 2, 2010 a team of anthropology and archaeological experts began searching for human remains, human artifacts and personal items at the Fresh Kills Landfill on Staten Island. The operation was completed in June 2010 with 72 human remains found, bringing the total human remains found to 1,845. The identities of 1,629 of the 2,753 victims have been identified. DNA profiling in an attempt to identify additional victims is continuing.

Along with the 110-floor Twin Towers of the World Trade Center itself, numerous other buildings at the World Trade Center site were destroyed or badly damaged, including 7 World Trade Center, 6 World Trade Center, 5 World Trade Center, 4 World Trade Center, the Marriott World Trade Center (3 WTC), and the World Financial Center complex and St. Nicholas Greek Orthodox Church. The fall of the Twin Towers represented the only examples of total progressive collapse of steel-framed structures in history.

The Deutsche Bank Building across Liberty Street from the World Trade Center complex was later condemned due to the uninhabitable, toxic conditions inside the office tower, and is undergoing deconstruction. The Borough of Manhattan Community College's Fiterman Hall at 30 West Broadway was also condemned due to extensive damage in the attacks, and is slated for deconstruction. Other neighboring buildings including 90 West Street and the Verizon Building suffered major damage, but have since been restored. World Financial Center buildings, One Liberty Plaza, the Millenium Hilton, and 90 Church Street had moderate damage. They have since been restored. Communications equipment on top of the North Tower, including broadcast radio, television and two-way radio antenna towers, was also destroyed, but media stations were quickly able to reroute signals and resume broadcasts. In Arlington County, a portion of the Pentagon was severely damaged by fire and one section of the building collapsed.

The Fire Department of New York City (FDNY) quickly deployed 200 units (half of the department) to the site, whose efforts were supplemented by numerous off-duty firefighters and EMTs. The New York Police Department (NYPD) sent Emergency Service Units (ESU) and other police personnel, along with deploying its aviation unit. Once on the scene, the FDNY, NYPD, and Port Authority police did not coordinate efforts, and ended up performing redundant searches for civilians.

As conditions deteriorated, the NYPD aviation unit relayed information to police commanders, who issued orders for its personnel to evacuate the towers; most NYPD officers were able to safely evacuate before the buildings collapsed. With separate command posts set up and incompatible radio communications between the agencies, warnings were not passed along to FDNY commanders.

After the first tower collapsed, FDNY commanders did issue evacuation warnings, however, due to technical difficulties with malfunctioning radio repeater systems, many firefighters never heard the evacuation orders. 9-1-1 dispatchers also received information from callers that was not passed along to commanders on the scene. Within hours of the attack, a substantial search and rescue operation was launched. After months of around-the-clock operations, the World Trade Center site was cleared by the end of May 2002.

Deaths (excluding hijackers)

New York City

World Trade Center 2,606

American 11 87

United 175 60

Arlington
Pentagon 125
American 77 59

Shanksville
United 93 40

Total 2,977

Refused to be Members of the First Dáil - Sir Robert John Lynn

Sir Robert John Lynn (1873 – 5 August 1945) was an Ulster Unionist Party politician.

He was elected at the Member of Parliament (MP) for Belfast Woodvale from 1918 general election to 1922, and when that constituency was abolished for the 1922 general election he was returned for Belfast West, holding the seat until he stood down at the 1929 general election.

At the 1921 Northern Irish general election, Lynn was elected as a member of the Parliament of Northern Ireland for Belfast West, holding that seat until it was abolished for the 1929 Northern Irish general election. He was elected for the new North Antrim constituency, and held that seat until 1945. From 1937 to 1944, he was Deputy Speaker of the Northern Ireland House of Commons.

He was the Editor of the Northern Whig Newspaper and a leading contributor to educational debates.

Lynn was knighted in March 1924.

Refused to be Members of the First Dáil - Thompson Donald

Thompson Donald (1875-1944) was a Northern Irish Unionist politician.

Donald was elected to the House of Commons of the United Kingdom in the 1918 general election for the Belfast Victoria constituency and served as MP until the constituency's abolition in 1922. Donald was elected as one of the so-called 'Labour Unionists' of the Ulster Unionist Labour Association.

He was secretary of this group although as an MP for both Belfast Victoria and Belfast East in the Parliament of Northern Ireland (1921-1925) he was effectively an Ulster Unionist Party representative.

Refused to be Members of the First Dáil - Thomas Henry Burn

Thomas Henry Burn was an Ulster Unionist member of the UK Parliament and the Parliament of Northern Ireland. He represented Belfast St Anne's in the former from 1918-1922, and Belfast West in the latter from 1921-1929.

He was Assistant Parliamentary Secretary at the Ministry of Finance and Assistant Whip from 1921 until 1925.

Refused to be Members of the First Dáil - Herbert Dixon

Herbert Dixon, 1st Baron Glentoran OBE PC (NI) (23 January 1880–20 July 1950) was a Northern Ireland Unionist politician.

He was born in Belfast, the fourth son of Sir Daniel Dixon, 1st Baronet, and educated at Harrow and Sandhurst, being commissioned into the Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers, with which regiment he served in the Second Boer War.

After fighting with the British Army in the First World War, Dixon was elected Unionist Member of Parliament for the seat of Belfast Pottinger in 1918, becoming representative for Belfast East four years later. He was also sent to the Northern Ireland House of Commons in 1921 as a member for Belfast East, being appointed Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Finance, and was finally elected member for the seat of Belfast Bloomfield in 1929.

Dixon was appointed OBE in 1919 and admitted to the Privy Council of Northern Ireland in 1923. In 1939 he was raised to the peerage as Baron Glentoran, of Ballyalloly in the County of Down. He served as Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Finance and Government Chief Whip from 1921-1942 and as Minister of Agriculture in the Parliament of Northern Ireland from 1941 to 1943. In May 1950 he succeeded his elder brother Sir Thomas Dixon as third baronet.

Lord Glentoran married Hon. Emily Ina Florence Bingham, daughter of Arthur Bingham, 6th Baron Clanmorris, in 1905. He died in July 1950, aged 70, and was succeeded in his titles by his son Daniel. Lady Glentoran died in 1957.

Refused to be Members of the First Dáil - Thomas Moles

Thomas Moles (November 1871 – 3 February 1937) was an Ulster Unionist politician. Born in Belfast, Ireland in 1871, he was educated at the Collegiate School, Ballymena.

Moles was MP for Belfast Ormeau 1918-1922 and Belfast South at Westminster from 1922 until he retired in 1929. He was also an MP in the Northern Ireland House of Commons from 1921 to 1929 for South Belfast and for Belfast, Ballynafeigh from 1929 to his death in 1937, and Deputy Speaker there from 7 June 1921 until his death. He was the first ever member declared elected to the Northern Ireland House of Commons.

A journalist by profession, he was Leader Writer for the Belfast Telegraph from 1909 until 1924 and managing editor for that newspaper from 1924-1937. Irish representative on the British Press visit to Canada in 1911. Member of the Secretariat to the Irish Convention from 1917 to 1918. Chairman of the Ways and Means and Deputy Speaker of the Northern Ireland House of Commons from the 7th June 1921 until his death. Member of the Privy Council of Northern Ireland in 1923.

He was also a motorcycle enthusiast and helped to push through parliament the first Road Races Act, which made it legal for the roads on the Clady Course to be closed for the first Ulster Grand Prix motorcycle road race on 14 October 1922.

Refused to be Members of the First Dáil - Joseph Devlin

Joseph Devlin

Joseph Devlin, also known as Joe Devlin, (13 February 1871 – 18 January 1934) was an Irish journalist and influential nationalist politician. He was a Member of Parliament (MP) for the Irish Parliamentary Party in the House of Commons of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, and later a Nationalist Party MP in the Parliament of Northern Ireland.

He showed an early gift for public speaking when he became chairman of a debating society founded in 1886 to commemorate the first nationalist election victory in West Belfast. From 1891-1893 he was journalist on the Irish News than on the Freeman’s Journal when he became associated with the Ancient Order of Hibernians (AOH) which he helped to re-establish in 1890s becoming spokesman for the Catholic population and a lifelong opponent of its counterpart, the Orange Order. He then worked at Samuel Young MP.'s brewery for whom he managed a Belfast pub, which sustained him until 1902.

During the 1890s he was active as organizer in the anti-Parnellite Irish National Federation in eastern Ulster. When William O’Brien founded the United Irish League (UIL) in County Mayo in 1898, Devlin founded the UIL section in Belfast which became his political machine in Ulster. He was elected unopposed as Irish Parliamentary Party (IPP) Member of Parliament for Kilkenny North in the February 1902 by-election. His first political assignment came that year when the Party sent him to Irish Americas on the first of several successful fund-raising missions.
It was there that he encountered the power of the Hibernian Orders and on his return set about claiming it for constitutional nationalism, when in 1904 he became lifelong Grandmaster of the AOH in Ireland. Members of his Order, largely composed of earlier members of the Molly Maguires, a militant secret society also known as the Mollies, also became members of the Irish Party, deeply infiltrating it.

Already secretary of the London based UIL of Great Britain Devlin became General Secretary of O’Brien’s UIL, replacing John O'Donnell, through the initiative of deputy IPP leader John Dillon MP, with whom he held a close alliance and who had fallen under his influence. This "coup" gave them nation-wide control of the 1200 UIL branches, the organisational base of the IPP, depriving O’Brien of all influence.

For some years Devlin had been in bitter conflict with the bishop’s Catholic Association who wanted politics based on Catholic rights rather than on nationalism. Now in control of the three nationalist political organisations all sides succumbed to Devlin’s influence. The AOH continued the O’Connellite link between Catholicism and nationalism but under a lay controlled organisations. To the Irish party’s opponents the AOH was symptomatic with Catholic sectarianism, jobbery and patronage. Devlin represented in the main urban and national business interests, which contrasted with his advocacy of social reforms when he took up labour issues especially working conditions in the linen mills and textile trades.

In the 1906 general election, Devlin was re-elected to Kilkenny North, and also to Belfast West which he regained from the Unionists by 16 votes. Choosing to retain the Belfast seat, he served as its MP beyond 1918, when his popularity in Belfast and east Ulster survived the downfall of the IPP. He became a distinguished parliamentarian and gifted organiser, boasting to John Redmond leader of the IPP, that at Redmond's bid, his organisation could provide full attendance of suitable "supporters" at any meeting, demonstration or convention throughout Ireland, something Redmond and his Party often availed of.

Devlin became governor of the nationalist hinterland after his AOH political machinery rapidly saturated the country, acting through the UIL as the militant support organisation of the Irish Party. They were vehemently opposed by one nationalist organisation, the Munster based All-for-Ireland League (AFIL), an independent party founded by William O’Brien after he and his followers were attacked in December 1908 by 400 militant "Mollies" organised by Devlin to silence him and his followers at what became known as the "Baton Convention". O’Brien and the AFIL held Devlin’s AOH as being at the root of widespread religious intimidation and sectarianism. This ultimately displaced the parliamentary constitutional movement with physical-force violence, culminating in the partition of Ireland.

During 1919-1921 his leadership was reduced to six Nationalist MPs. He avoided any involvement in All-Ireland politics having accepted that the mandate had passed to Sinn Féin. Although, when he tried to bring up the Croke Park killings that occurred on Bloody Sunday at Westminster, he was shouted down and a scuffle broke out in the parliament. In the first election in 1921 for the Northern Ireland House of Commons after the Government of Ireland Act 1920 was enacted, so as not to allow the Ulster Unionists a “walk-over” he agreed a pact with de Valera that Nationalists would not stand against Sinn Féiners; both parties co-operated during the election and won 6 seats each, the Unionists 40. Devlin, who represented a more moderate nationalist view, was elected for both Antrim and Belfast West. He chose to sit for Belfast West although his seat in the seven member Antrim constituency was left vacant for the rest of the Parliament. He continued to sit at Westminster as leader of the Nationalist Party of Northern Ireland, as both small parties did not recognise the Stormont parliament.

Devlin was re-elected in Belfast West in 1925 when he decided to lead his small party out of abstentionism and sat for the first time in the Parliament of Northern Ireland as head of a powerless opposition, but so as to highlight Catholic grievances, especially in relation to education. He was returned for the four member constituency until Proportional Representation by the Single Transferable Vote was abolished for territorial constituencies and single member seats were introduced for the 1929 election.

From 1929 until his death, Joe Devlin was the Northern Ireland MP for Fermanagh and Tyrone. He won amendment to the Northern Ireland Education Act of 1930 which improved the funding of Catholic schools. Otherwise they were years of demoralisation for northern Catholics, and the party abstained after 1932 due to the abolishment of proportional representation, when frustration finally drove him and his followers out of the Belfast parliament again.

“Wee Joe” as he was popularly known, was held in high affection by his constituents for his charming and effervescent personality. He was a fluent and powerful orator. In later years he was comfortably off as director of the Distillery Company and chairman of the Irish News and enjoyed organising summer fêtes – “days of delight” - for Belfast children. His approach in life was ‘getting things done’. He lived most of his life in Belfast, though he spent some earlier years in London. He never married. An acknowledged spokesman and leader of Catholic nationalists in Ulster for decades, Devlin died in Belfast on 18 January 1934. He was buried at Milltown Cemetery. His funeral at St. Peter’s Pro-Cathedral, Belfast, was attended by leading members of both governments. The AOH hall in Ardboe, County Tyrone, is named after him.

Refused to be Members of the First Dáil - Edward Carson

Carson signing Solemn League and Covenant

Sir Edward Carson

We saw Edward Carson in the years preceding the Rising. He was an anti-Home Rule advocate. He stated he would by "all means necessary" resist Home Rule. It is, therefore, not surprising that he would not sit in the First Dáil.

On 25 May 1915, Asquith appointed Carson Attorney-General when the Coalition Government was formed after the Liberal government was bought down by the Shell Crisis. He resigned on 19 October, however, citing his opposition to Government policy on war in the Balkans, which had left two British and one French division in Salonica instead of being dispatched to support the Serbs, who were being attacked by Austria-Hungary from the north and Bulgaria from the east.

Carson then became the leader of those Unionists who were not members of the government, effectively Leader of the Opposition in the Commons. During Asquith's coalition government of 1915-1916, there was no formal opposition in either the Commons or the Lords. The only party not in Asquith's Liberal, Conservative, Labour Coalition was the Irish Nationalist Party led by John Redmond. However, this party supported the government and did not function as an Opposition. After Carson, the leading figure amongst the Irish Unionist allies of the Conservative Party, resigned from the coalition ministry on 19 October 1915, he then became the de facto leader of those Unionists who were not members of the government, effectively Leader of the Opposition in the Commons.

When Asquith resigned as Prime Minister, Carson returned to office on 10 December 1916 as First Lord of the Admiralty, becoming a Minister without Portfolio on 17 July 1917.

Carson was hostile to the foundation of the League of Nations as he believed that this institution would be ineffectual against war. In a speech on 7 December 1917, he said:

Talk to me of treaties! Talk to me of the League of Nations! Every Great Power in Europe was pledged by treaty to preserve Belgium. That was a League of Nations, but it failed.

Early in 1918, the government decided to extend conscription to Ireland, and that Ireland would have to be given home rule in order to make it acceptable. Carson disagreed in principle and again resigned on 21 January. He gave up his seat at the University of Dublin in the 1918 general election and was instead elected for Belfast Duncairn.

He continued to lead the Unionists, but when the Government of Ireland Act 1920 was introduced, advised his party to work for the exemption of six Ulster counties from Home Rule as the best compromise (a compromise he had previously rejected). This proposal passed and as a result the Parliament of Northern Ireland was established.

After the partition of Ireland, Carson repeatedly warned Ulster Unionist leaders not to alienate northern Catholics, as he foresaw this would make Northern Ireland unstable. In 1921 he stated: "We used to say that we could not trust an Irish parliament in Dublin to do justice to the Protestant minority. Let us take care that that reproach can no longer be made against your parliament, and from the outset let them see that the Catholic minority have nothing to fear from a Protestant majority." His warnings were largely in vain.

Refused to be Members of the First Dáil - Patrick Donnelly

Patrick Donnelly (1878 – 13 August 1947) was an Irish nationalist politician and MP in the House of Commons of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland.

Donnelly was first elected as member of the Irish Parliamentary Party at the by-election of 2 February 1918, and re-elected in the 1918 UK general election, representing the South Armagh constituency. It was one of the six seats won by the IPP at the election, when he defeated the Sinn Féin candidate, after which he served as a member of the Nationalist Party of Northern Ireland until 1922.

Refused to be Members of the First Dáil - William James Allen

Sir William James Allen (15 October 1866 – 20 December 1947) was a Northern Irish unionist politician.

He was elected to the British House of Commons at a by-election in 1917, as an Irish Unionist Party Member of Parliament (MP) for North Armagh, and retained his seat at the 1918 general election. The constituency was abolished for the 1922 general election, when he was re-elected as a member of the new Ulster Unionist Party for the new Armagh constituency.

He died, in 1947, two weeks after being hit by a lorry as he left a tram on the Lisburn Road, Belfast on 5 December. He was 81 and the second oldest MP in the House of Commons. Sir William was buried in Lurgan. He was survived by his second wife Lillah Irene, Lady Allen.

Refused to be Members of the First Dáil - James Rolston Lonsdale

James Rolston Lonsdale (31 May 1865 - 23 May 1921) was Unionist Member of Parliament (MP) for Mid Armagh from January 1918 until his death. He succeeded his brother John to this constituency on the latter's elevation to the Lords as Baron Armaghdale.

The son of James Lonsdale, DL, he was educated at The Royal School, Armagh and Trinity College, Dublin. In 1902 he married Maud Musker, daughter of John Musker, Shadwell Court, Norfolk.

High Sheriff of Co. Armagh

Refused to be Members of the First Dáil - Charles Curtis Craig

Charles Curtis Craig (18 February 1869 – 28 January 1960), was an Irish Unionst and later Ulster Unionist politician. He was Member of Parliament (MP) for constituencies in County Antrim from 1903 to 1929, taking his seat in the House of Commons of the United Kingdom. The son of a self-made millionaire whisky distiller, among his brothers was Northern Ireland's first Prime Minister, The Viscount Craigavon, PC.

Craig first stood for Parliament at a by-election in 1903 for the South Antrim constituency, after the sitting Unionist MP William Ellison-Macartney had left the Commons to take up the post of Deputy-Master of the Royal Mint. He defeated a Russellite opponent to win the seat, and held it through four subsequent general elections until the constituency was abolished for the 1922 general election.

He was then elected as one of the two MPs for the re-established Antrim constituency, and held that seat until he retired from Parliament at the 1929 general election.

Craig was sworn as a member of the Privy Council of Ireland on 5 December 1922, one of two new members admitted on the last day before the Anglo-Irish Treaty came into effect, on 6 December 1922. Although it was never formally abolished, the Irish Privy Council effectively ceased to exist with the creation of the Irish Free State, and on 12 December, ten members were sworn of a new Privy Council of Northern Ireland. Craig was not one of those first appointments, but was appointed on 27 Sep 1923 as the thirteenth member of the Privy Council of Northern Ireland.

In the 1922–1924 Conservative Government, led by Andrew Bonar Law and then Stanley Baldwin, Curtis was appointed in February 1923 as Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Pensions, and held that post until first Labour government took office in January 1924.

Refused to be Members of the First Dáil - Hugh O'Neill

Robert William Hugh O'Neill, 1st Baron Rathcavan PC (8 June 1883 - 28 November 1982) was an Ulster Unionist member of both the UK Parliament and the Parliament of Northern Ireland. He served as a Major in the British Army. First elected to the Westminster Parliament for Mid-Antrim in 1915, he later represented Antrim and then North Antrim.

O'Neill was also elected to represent Antrim in the Northern Ireland House of Commons in 1921 and served as its first Speaker, before standing down from his seat in 1929. In 1934, he was appointed High Sheriff of Antrim.

From 1933-39, he was the Chairman of the 1922 Committee. He also sat on the Privy Council of Ireland, its successor, the Privy Council of Northern Ireland and the Privy Council of the United Kingdom. From 1939 to 1940, he was the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for India and Burma, and was the Lord Lieutenant of Antrim from 1949 to 1959.

O'Neill retired from the Westminster Parliament in 1952, having become the Father of the House the previous year, and was created 1st Lord Rathcavan in 1953.

Refused to be Members of the First Dáil - Robert McCalmont-Peter Kerr-Smiley-William Lindsay-Samuel McGuffin-Thomas W. Brown-William Coote

There are no known articles on the following: Robert McCalmont, Peter Kerr-Smiley, William Lindsay, Samuel McGuffin, Thomas W. Brown, William Coote. These all refused to be members of the First Dáil.

Peter Kerr-Smiley intrigues me as my family is from the Kerr clan of Louth.

Members of the First Dáil - James Ryan

James Ryan (6 December 1891 – 25 September 1970) was a senior Irish politician. He was elected to the First Dáil at the 1918 general election and, apart from the Third Dáil (1922–1923), held his seat for Wexford until his retirement at the 1965 general election. During his long career he served as Minister for Agriculture (1932–1947), Minister for Health & Social Welfare (1947–1948 and 1951–1954) and Minister for Finance (1957–1965).

James Ryan was born on the family farm at Tomcoole, near Taghmon, County Wexford in 1891. The second youngest of twelve children he was educated at St Peter's College, Wexford and Ring College, Waterford. In 1911 Ryan won a county council scholarship to University College Dublin where he studied medicine. He passed his final medical exam in March 1917 and subsequently opened a medical practice in Wexford town. Four years later in 1921 Ryan moved to Dublin where he opened a practice at Harcourt Street, specialising in skin diseases at the Skin and Cancer Hospital on Holles Street. He left medicine in 1925 after he bought Kendlestown, a large farm near Delgany, County Wicklow. Ryan lived there and it remained a working farm until his death.

In July 1919 Ryan married Máirín Creegan, originally from County Kerry and a close friend of Sinéad de Valera throughout her life. Creegan, like her husband, had also fought in the Easter Rising and was subsequently an author of children’s stories in Irish. They had three children together.

One of Ryan’s sisters, Mary Kate, married Seán T. O'Kelly, one of Ryan’s future cabinet colleagues and a future President of Ireland. Following her death O'Kelly married her sister, Phyllis Ryan. Another of Ryan’s sisters, Josephine ('Min') Ryan, married Richard Mulcahy, a future leader of Fine Gael.

While studying at university in 1913 Ryan became a founder-member of the Irish Volunteers and was sworn into the Irish Republican Brotherhood the following year. During the Easter Rising in 1916 Ryan was the medical officer in the General Post Office (GPO). He was, along with James Connolly, one of the last people to leave the GPO when the evacuation took place. Following the surrender of the patriots Ryan was deported to Stafford Jail in England and subsequently at Frongoch. He was released in August 1916.

Ryan rejoined the Volunteers immediately after his release from prison, and in June 1917 he was elected Commandant of the Wexford Battalion. His political career began the following year when he was elected as a Sinn Féin candidate for the constituency of Wexford South in the 1918 general election. Like his fellow Sinn Féin MPs Ryan refused to attend the Westminster Parliament. Instead he attended the proceedings of the First Dáil on 21 January 1919.

As the War of Independence went on Ryan became Brigade Commandant of South Wexford and was also elected to Wexford County Council, serving as chairman on one occasion. In September 1919 he was arrested by the British and interned on Spike Island and later Beare Island until he was released after the truce with the other TDs to attend the deliberations of the Dáil concerning the Anglo-Irish Treaty which he voted against. Ryan was later imprisoned again during the subsequent Civil War, however, while interned he won back his Dáil seat as an abstentionist Sinn Féin TD in the 1923 general election.

In 1926 Ryan, as a Sinn Féin TD, supported the party leader, Éamon de Valera, in his attempt to bring the party into the Dáil. When this proposal failed Ryan left the party along with de Valera and dozens of other Sinn Féin TDs. One month after this he became a founder-member of the new Fianna Fáil political party. The new party entered the Dáil in 1927 and spent five years on the opposition benches.

Following the 1932 general election Fianna Fáil came to power and Ryan was appointed Minister for Agriculture, a position he would continuously hold for fifteen years. In agriculture the government’s policy was based on the idea of self-sufficiency. Ryan was given the task of implementing the following policies:

• Imports of wheat, sugar and other agricultural produce were restricted.
• Farmers were given a guaranteed price for wheat.
• Farmers were forced to use home-produced grain in animal feed and bakers had to use a certain percentage of Irish flour in their bread.
• The sugar beet industry was expanded with the opening of new factories.

While these policies saw increases in sugar-beet production and in the growing of wheat the small farmers of Munster and Connacht gained little, while the large farmers were the real beneficiaries. Ryan also faced severe criticism over the so-called Economic War with Britain. The economic war did serious harm to the cattle trade, Ireland’s main export earner. The government tried to compensate by giving bounties equal to the British duties, however, these had to be paid for by the taxpayer. The economic war ended in 1938 with the signing of the Anglo-Irish Trade Agreement between both governments, after a serious of talks in London between the British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain, de Valera, Ryan and Sean Lemass.

During World War II self-sufficiency in food became essential. The Department of Agriculture ordered every farmer was ordered to till one-eighth of his land. This was raised to three-eighths in 1944. In spite of strict rationing and severe shortages basic foodstuffs remained available. The end of the war saw farmer discontent emerge once again. A new political party, Clann na Talmhan, was established in the late 1930s to represent the interests of smaller farmers in the west of Ireland. Similarly, much of the country’s land had become exhausted due to increased productivity during the war and a shortage of fertilisers.

In 1947, after spending fifteen years as Minister for Agriculture, Ryan was appointed to the newly created position of Minister for Health & Social Welfare. As Minister, he brought the draft Health Bill to cabinet later that year. This was a radical and innovative piece of legislation which proposed to modernise the health service into two aspects – mother and child welfare and infectious diseases. De Valera was anxious about accepting these measures as government policy due to opposition from the Catholic Church. In fact, much of the legislation was controversially enacted by Noel Browne, Ryan’s successor as Minister from 1948 to 1951.

Following Fianna Fáil’s return to power at the 1951 general election, Ryan returned as Minister for Health & Social Welfare. During his second period in this office, he clashed with the Church once again over the implementation of the remaining aspects of the ‘Mother and Child Scheme’. Following negotiations with the hierarchy, adjustments on such issues as means testing and medical inspections were made and the legislation was passed in the Dáil. Following the 1954 general election Fianna Fáil lost power and Ryan moved to the backbenches once again.

Following the 1957 general election, Fianna Fáil were back in power and de Valera's cabinet had a new look to it. In a clear message that there would be a change in economic policy Ryan, a close ally of Seán Lemass, was appointed Minister for Finance, replacing the conservative Seán MacEntee. The first sign of a new economic approach came in 1958 when Ryan brought the First Programme for Economic Development to the cabinet table. This plan, the brainchild of T. K. Whitaker, recognised that Ireland would have to move away from self-sufficiency towards free trade. It also proposed that foreign firms should be given grants and tax breaks to set up in Ireland.

When Seán Lemass succeeded de Valera as Taoiseach in 1959, Ryan was retained in the Finance portfolio. Lemass also wanted to reward him for his loyalty by naming him Tánaiste, however, the new leader felt obliged to appoint Seán MacEntee, one of the party elders to the position. Ryan continued to implement the First Programme throughout the early 1960s, achieving a record growth rate of 4 per cent by 1963. That year an even more ambitious Second Programme was introduced, however, it proved to be too ambitious and had to be abandoned. In spite of this the annual growth rate averaged five per cent, the highest achieved since independence.

Ryan retired as a TD at the 1965 general election and, shortly afterwards, he was elected to Seanad Éireann where he joined his son, Eoin Ryan, Snr. His grandson, also called Eoin Ryan, is a former TD, Senator and was a Member of the European Parliament until 2009. Ryan served in the upper house of the Oireachtas until 1969 before retiring to his farm at Kendlestown in County Wicklow.
James Ryan died on 25 September 1970.