Covid offers us a chance to show generosity
‘TWO foreign old monarchs in battle did join/ Each wanted their head on the back of a coin/ If the Irish had sense they’d drown both in the Boyne/ And Partition throw into the ocean.” If you’re old enough to remember the Ludlows’ belting version of The Sea Around Us being number one in the hit parade in 1966, then you’re old enough to also remember it ceased to be a bit of fun just two years later when the North just exploded into a sea of violence.
The writer Dominic Behan, younger brother of the much-loved and dreaded Brendan, penned it and literally hundreds of other popular ballads like McAlpines’ Fusiliers, without which so many latenight sing-songs would be vastly duller. But then there’s the craic and there’s also political reality – and if only we could throw partition into the ocean.
If we have learned anything from the ‘Centenary of Commemorations’, we have certainly learned the years 1913-1923 were years of profound change happening at a hurtling pace. By comparison very little happened in the years of atrophy from the late 1920s until the 1960s.
But commemorating that hurtling decade of change has so far been easy with 2020 throwing up some popular history dream episodes like the murder of Kevin Barry, the tragedies of Lord Mayors of Cork MacCurtain and MacSwiney, the great atrocity of the burning of Cork city, the killings of British intelligence agents in Dublin and the follow-on massacre of Bloody Sunday at Croke Park, along with the heroism at the Kilmichael Ambush.
Granted, 1921 was also packed with action and IRA derring-do. There was the Dromkeen ambush in February 1921, close to where this writer grew up and which gave a much-needed morale booster to the Limerick rebels, who are always the best. There was military success at the Crossbarry ambush, between Bandon and Cork city in March 1921, in what was rated the nearest thing to conventional war in a definitive guerrilla conflict which was studied for decades after internationally.
But these and other bloody encounters had far more to do with psychological and propaganda wars. Big picture, this centenary year 2021 is really about recalling ‘Truce, Treaty and Split’, giving us a prelude to Civil War, along with the reality of the creation of Northern Ireland and partition which has dogged this island.
If anyone wants to contest that “pop history” view of things, we can give you the name of Frank Flood. The 19-year-old UCD engineering student was hanged in Mountjoy Jail in March 1921.
He was a great friend of Kevin Barry. But you never hear anyone murdering The Ballad of Frank Flood after closing time. In fact his remains and those of another nine other IRA rebels remained buried in Mountjoy until 2001.
It poses that great recurring question: Why do we remember and give retrospective stardom to some who have fallen while others rate, at best a footnote, in spite of heroism which was at least comparable to those who were iconised?
But all of that is for another day. Key point here is that 1921-2021 commemorations bring pretty ropey stuff with loads of potential for divisiveness and acrimony. It will test our collective capacity for stand-back reflection and call for a deal of generosity in our thinking.
Can we do this? Yes, certainly we can – provided we want to do such things.
Let’s recall that this very time last year, we were delivered the botch which was an attempt to commemorate the Royal Irish Constabulary and Dublin Metropolitan Police.
Granted, the planning of this commemoration was flawed and poorly thoughtout. But this writer has sat side by side in debate with opponents of this commemoration who have frankly confessed they would not have it any way it was to be done. They want a selective view of history in public discourse and commemorations where history fuses with politics.
These opponents evoked rhetoric about the DMP’s actions in the 1913 Dublin Lockout and the RIC’s role in backing up evictions in the Land War. These are valid arguments in themselves.
But the story of our first legitimate police forces is more complex and nuanced and they formed a template for An Garda Síochána which became a cornerstone of the new independent state. That response to a proposed commemoration lacked generosity of spirit and was of itself poorly thought-out. The noise that followed meant the commemoration was abandoned rather peremptorily. It all reeked of the bad history which has held us back for too long.
That episode does not bode well for how we are going in this centenary year 2021 to engage with recalling the prelude to a bitter Civil War, which killed far more people than the War of Independence, and the foundation of Northern Ireland.
This has an everyday importance far from the halls of academe or the middle-brow history buffs like this one. Soon our politics are very likely to intersect with our century of history.
Brexit has opened many new options – including the prospect of partition not exactly being thrown into the ocean but perhaps being realigned into the middle of the Irish Sea. Watch Scotland’s home-rule parliament elections next May because another victory for Nicola Sturgeon’s party may well increase the prospect of the country ending its 300-year-plus alignment with England and Wales. That would have a huge impact on Northern Ireland.
But people who claim Irish unity is the centrepiece of their political world have to think more seriously. This is not about the colour of the pillar boxes, be they red or green. It is about people finding a way of living together.
In Covid times this is all a chance to reflect with greater generosity on our past in a way which can help craft a far better future together.
There’s the craic and reality – if only we could throw partition into the ocean