May 1921.
22 June 1921 was a day of pomp and ceremony as it ushered in a new era in Ireland’s history. Despite ‘dire warnings’, the king and queen came to Belfast to officially open the new parliament. Belfast was draped with flags and bunting; pavements and lamp posts were painted red, white and blue. On the city streets, many banners reading ‘We will not have Home Rule’ were visible.34 The irony seemed lost on the banner holders that this was a Home Rule jurisdiction, up and running before one in the south was. The event was boycotted by almost the entire Catholic community, with Cardinal Logue turning down his invitation to the opening ceremony due to ‘a prior engagement’.35 For the opening ceremony, Craig drafted a speech that ‘greatly distressed’ the king. ‘He feels he is being made a mouthpiece of Ulster in the speech rather than that of the Empire.’36 The king felt that Lloyd George, the British Prime Minister, and not Craig, should be responsible for the king’s speech; it was not up to Ulster to dictate the king’s utterances. The king’s speech was subsequently changed, partly written by Lloyd George and partly on the advice of Jan Smuts, South African Prime Minister. Smuts convinced King George V to use his speech as an olive branch to Sinn Féin, as the ‘establishment of the Northern Parliament definitely eliminates the coercion of Ulster’ and cleared the road ‘to deal on the most statesmanlike lines with the rest of Ireland’.37 In his pacifying speech, the king appealed ‘to all Irishmen to pause, to stretch out the hand of forbearance and conciliation, to forgive and to forget, and to join in making for the land which they love a new era of peace, contentment, and goodwill’, paving the way for the truce between Sinn Féin and British forces weeks later.38
Notwithstanding the fanfare surrounding the occasion and the conciliatory speech delivered by the king, violence and the threat of it permeated the new jurisdiction. On the day of the ceremony itself, ‘there was enormous security, with armed policemen placed in commandeered houses along the route’.39 To mark the occasion, the IRA attacked ‘a troop train returning from the official opening of the Belfast Parliament’, derailing it ‘at Adavoyle on the Louth/Armagh border. Four men and eighty horses were killed.’40 The majority of the first cabinet meetings of the northern government were dominated with security issues. On 23 June, Nevil Macready and John Anderson were present to highlight measures being planned to curb Sinn Féin and the IRA, including ‘the establishment of Posts along the Border of Ulster, and the invention of a very strict Passport system,’ which, it was hoped, would ‘curtail Passenger Service to less than one-fourth of its present dimensions’ into Ireland.41 Before the truce of 11 July 1921, the British military had proposed that in southern Ireland, ‘all males between the ages of 16 and 50 will be required to provide themselves with Identification Cards. The Identification Card will include a Photograph of the Bearer.’42 The authorities believed the identification system would be ‘ineffective unless the Government of Northern Ireland will consent to establish a similar system along a belt on the frontier line, running from the Coast of County Down to the Sea Coast on the Southern Border of Donegal’.43 The northern government promised to assist the British authorities by
introducing a Passport system similar to that in the South, but so arranged that the facilities for obtaining Passports by all loyal persons in the North should be as easy as possible. It was agreed that Passport Offices would be necessary in Londonderry as well as Belfast, but that Newry might reasonably be restricted owing to its being really in the ‘disturbed’ area.44
Wickham, commissioner of the Specials, doubted the system would be effective given that there were ‘110 roads across the Southern frontier of Northern Ireland’ and that ‘Sinn Fein gangs’ would be able to ‘congregate North of the Belt and commit their atrocities’.45 With the truce of 11 July, the identification system was abandoned. Whilst hostilities ceased in the south, the birth of Northern Ireland in the summer of 1921 had witnessed another wave of intense sectarian violence engulfing Belfast, resulting in ‘the highest number of casualties since the shipyard expulsions of the previous summer’.46
After a RIC constable was killed in Belfast on 10 June, three Catholics were dragged from their homes the following night and shot dead as a reprisal. Two more Catholics were killed similarly after a ‘B’ Special was shot on 12 June. There was intense rioting in York Street, where 150 Catholic families were driven from their homes. Catholic families were forced to live in schools, halls and other makeshift accommodation. A bomb was thrown into the Catholic Dock Lane, killing one man and injuring twenty. Fourteen people were killed in Belfast in June 1921 – ten Catholics and four Protestants.47 On the eve of the truce, 10 July 1921, fourteen people were killed and over 150 Catholic homes burnt down. It became known as Belfast’s ‘Bloody Sunday’.48 The timing of the truce, 11 July, a day before the most testing day in Ulster, further inflamed the sectarian violence. As a result of the truce, the Specials were demobilised, and the IRA was officially recognised, a move vehemently opposed by the northern government:
the withdrawal of the protection hitherto afforded, by which peace was secured in this area, cannot be justified, in view of the occurrences during the past week, beginning with the murderous attack by Sinn Fein Gunmen on the Police in Belfast on Sunday last, and culminating in last night’s riots, when many persons were shot, including a young girl killed, and Mr. Grant, M.P. [Labour Member for Duncairn], and District-Inspector of Police wounded.49
There were many Specials to demobilise. According to Michael Farrell, by July 1921, there were 3,515 ‘A’ Specials, just under 16,000 ‘B’ Specials and 1,310 ‘C’ Specials.50 The truce, which by and large held in the south, was ‘not observed by either side in the north,’ according to IRA member Tom Fitzpatrick. Another IRA member, Roger McCorley, claimed that in Belfast, ‘the Truce itself lasted six hours only’.51 The truce saw the IRA gain new respect from the Catholic community and many new recruits, mockingly dubbed ‘Trucileers’ by IRA veterans.52 With the demobilisation of the Specials, loyalists joined the revived UVF and new vigilante groups such as the ‘Imperial Guards’ and ‘Cromwell Clubs’. They filled the void left by the Specials until full responsibility of policing was handed over to the northern government in November 1921.53 This move, on top of transferring other services at the same time, further increased the legitimacy of the northern jurisdiction, which beforehand was seen merely as a ‘glorified county council’.54 Patrick Buckland maintains that even with services transferred, the northern government was ‘given responsibility without real power’.55
When Northern Ireland came into being in the summer of 1921, the jurisdiction had very limited powers. In its first year of existence, Westminster controlled about 88 per cent of Northern Ireland’s revenue and 60 per cent of its expenditure.56 Its fiscal functions were extremely restricted, with Westminster reserving the power to levy income tax and customs and excise.57 On the same day that the northern government came into existence, 7 June, the Belfast Gazette was issued for the first time to publish government notices, announcing the specific functions of each government department ‘without prejudice to the powers and duties of existing departments and authorities pending the transfer of services’.58 The northern domain had come into existence, but it needed to be equipped with government services. The transfer of services was stalled due to only one of the Irish jurisdictions being operational under the Government of Ireland Act. The British government insisted that both Irish governments needed to be in place in order for this to happen, something that was acutely embarrassing for the northern government. It had no control over its policing or its laws.
With the creation of a border, there were numerous teething problems, many of a legal nature. Soon after Northern Ireland came into being, the Manorhamilton Board of Guardians in County Leitrim heard a case of a man in distress seeking relief. The man had recently received four shillings of relief money from Enniskillen, now part of a new jurisdiction.59 A Donegal man who was summoned to the Derry Petty Sessions Court for selling adulterated buttermilk claimed the Derry magistrates had no jurisdiction over Donegal. The case was adjourned.60 Two judges, one who was County Court judge for counties Armagh and Louth and the other who was County Court judge for counties Monaghan and Fermanagh, solved the problem caused by partition, with one taking on responsibility for the two counties
