Imagine US beginning celebration of War of Independence by honouring Red Coats

SIR,

One acknowledges that those who recently organised the event to honour members of the RIC were well-meaning. However, in the context of celebrating the War of Independence such an event could not have been more inappropriate. Imagine the US beginning a celebration of the Revolutionary War with an event honouring the ‘Red Coats’.

It isn’t as if there are not members of the RIC who deserve to be remembered in the struggle for independence in 1920. The mutiny by members of the Royal Irish Constabulary in the police-barracks in Listowel in June 1920 was a significant event in Ireland’s War of Independence. Fifteen constables refused to be transferred and to hand their barracks to the military. As news of this spread throughout the RIC and later appeared in the press, the pace of members of the force taking early retirement or being dismissed quickened. Eventually, by March 1, 1921, some 2,570 members had left the force. Their places were taken by the hastily-recruited Black and Tans.

For the most part, these were ex-soldiers and they received little, if any, serious police training. Their indiscipline and the outrages for which they were responsible alienated the Irish people, most of whom had little enthusiasm for the policy and actions of Sinn Féin and the IRA.

The result was that the crown forces found themselves operating in an increasingly hostile environment which cast serious doubts on their capacity to successfully pacify the country.

Subsequently, the members of the RIC who continued in active service assisting the crown forces until the Anglo-Irish Treaty were generously rewarded by the British government.

The members who left the force for patriotic reasons or who were unwilling to be used as a paramilitary force and be at odds with their fellow countrymen and women were treated shamefully by successive Irish governments,

Sincerely,

J. Anthony Gaughan Newtownpark Avenue Blackrock, Co. Dublin