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Symbolic mirrors: commemorations of Edward Carson in the 1930s

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  21 March 2016

Gillian McIntosh
Gillian McIntosh*
Affiliation:
Institute of Irish Studies, Queen’s University of Belfast
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Extract

The 1930s in Northern Ireland was a period of rituals, performed for the population at large. Such unionist demonstrations and theatrical set pieces were unique manifestations of unionist culture. In a period of austerity and high unemployment in Northern Ireland, and increasingly aggressive nationalism in the Irish Free State, they were also a response to political developments. The demonstrations of the 1930s provided unionists with a common political tradition with which to identify, as well as an affirmation of the state, particularly through unionist involvement in royal occasions. The colour and drama of these ceremonies was forcefully conveyed through the pages of the main unionist papers, the Belfast Newsletter, the Northern Whig and the Belfast Telegraph, as the theatricality of the third home rule drama had been. The attention given to these rituals in the press in Northern Ireland is important because it was through the press that these often elitist events were made accessible to the population at large. Through press coverage, which was as comprehensive as it was dramatic, the masses were at least given a sense that they were participating in the collective life of their community. The major ceremonial festivals of this decade were those which celebrated Edward Carson: the opening of the Stormont parliament, which was presented as the first monument to the former unionist leader; the unveiling of the statue honouring him in 1933; his funeral in 1935; and the unveiling of a plaque in his honour in 1938. Andrew Gailey has already outlined the way in which Carson’s ‘performances’ were orchestrated in the period of the third home rule crisis. Carson’s appearances were, he argues, limited to ‘maintain an air of mystery’, while unionist meetings were made a ‘social occasion to remember, with large crowds, local bands and choirs and with the entertainment of theatrical parades, inspections, mounted escorts of lancers’. In the 1930s similar theatrical techniques were employed; unionist commemorations in this period were marked by distinctive ceremonial settings, formal speeches and, often, impressive dress. Loudspeakers were installed at the opening of parliament, and also at the unveiling of the Carson statue and during his funeral, in order to enable the audience to feel more intimately involved in the proceedings.

Type
Research Article
Information
Irish Historical Studies , Volume 32 , Issue 125 , May 2000 , pp. 93 - 112
Copyright
Copyright © Irish Historical Studies Publications Ltd 2000

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References

1 The press’s interests were catered for assiduously: see Gailey, Andrew ‘King Carson: an essay on the invention of leadership’ in I.H.S., xxx, no. 117 (May 1996), p. 75Google Scholar.

2 In addition, Carson was honoured in an impressive three-volume biography, Marjoribanks, Edward and Colvin, Ian, The life of Lord Carson (3 vols, London, 1932-6)Google Scholar.

3 Gailey, ‘King Carson’, p. 74.

4 ‘The loudspeakers will enable those standing at a distance to follow the proceedings as if they were close to the pedestal’ (Belfast Weekly Newsletter, 6 July 1933).

5 ‘Marking devices’ are those characteristics (distinctive dress, decorations, content of speeches) which indicate that an event is special, a formal ritual or celebration for instance. There is a long history of theatrical unionist demonstrations: Lord Randolph Churchill’s visit in 1886, the Ulster Unionist Convention of 1892, the signing of the Solemn League and Covenant in 1912, and the activity of the Ulster Volunteer Force during the third home rule crisis.

6 Chaney, David, ‘A symbolic mirror of ourselves: civic ritual in mass society’ in Collins, Richard, Curran, James, Garnham, Nicholas, Scannell, Paddy, Schlesinger, Philip and Sparks, Colin (eds), Media, culture and society: a critical reader (London, 1986), p. 248Google Scholar.The three major festivals he considers are the Victory Parade of 1946, the Festival of Britain in 1951, and the coronation of Elizabeth II in 1953.

7 ‘In a “garrison” colony, if the garrison is to be maintained up to full strength, there is no place for independent opinion on any subject’ (Armour, W.S., Facing the Irish question (London, 1935), p. 58Google Scholar).

8 Chaney, ‘Symbolic mirror’, p. 250.

9 The Ulster Unionist Council’s annual report for 1932 identified those enemies as ‘political opponents in the south’ and nationalists and socialists in the north (P.R.O.N.I., D/1327/20/2/15).

10 In the Belfast Weekly Newsletter editorial of 14 July 1932 the editor expressed clearly his view of present and future: ‘Times are again not without cause for anxiety, and in the circumstances it is well that Ulster should make clear to all concerned that she stands where she has always stood, and that what she has she is resolved to hold.’ Alvin Jackson sees Carson’s unionism as of the romantic and nostalgic variety (Jackson, Alvin, Sir Edward Carson (Dundalk, 1993), p. 60Google Scholar).

11 King George VI and Queen Elizabeth paid a coronation visit in 1937. ‘In the grim and rapidly changing Belfast of the 1930s popular imperialism offered a culture of consolation: an explanation for the carnage of 1914–18, and a nostalgic retreat to a more distant age of full employment, national pride and colonial promise... [Empire] offered an exotic distraction, and a colourful stimulus to the imagination which could not be supplied by impoverished, threatened Ulster’ (Jackson, Alvin, ‘Irish unionists and the Empire, 1880–1920: classes and masses’ in Jeffery, Keith (ed.), ‘An Irish Empire’? Aspects of Ireland and the British Empire (Manchester, 1996), p. 140Google Scholar).

12 Bardon, Jonathan, A history of Ulster (Belfast, 1992), p. 533Google Scholar.

13 It was the Protestant population, rather than the Catholic community, which most worried the unionist hierarchy. ‘Proportional representation in parliamentary elections was abandoned by the Ulster Unionists at the first possible opportunity. But this, contrary to the general belief, was done to consolidate the Protestant vote rather than to underrepresent the Catholic. Protestant splinter groups were seen as the prime danger to security; Catholic alienation did not matter’ (MacDonagh, Oliver, States of mind (London, 1983), p. 138Google Scholar).

14 Northern Whig, 13 July 1935.

15 Irish Times, 16 Nov. 1932. The final estimate for the erection of Stormont was £1,125,000, which included Northern Ireland’s 10 per cent contribution (P.R.O.N.I., FIN/19/4/4-5).

16 ‘Public buildings often reflect the power of a dominant group and form part of a quest for legitimacy by new régimes’ (Greer, Alan, ‘Sir James Craig and the construction of Parliament Buildings at Stormont’ in I.H.S., xxxi, no. 123 (May 1999), p. 374)Google Scholar.

17 Irish Times, 16 Nov. 1932.

18 The processional route to Stormont was not only an architectural device designed to underline the building’s importance, and intended to make up for the loss of the proposed dome, but also provided unskilled employment (Greer, ‘Craig & Stormont’, p. 384).

19 Draft of Craigavon’s speech for the opening of Stormont (P.R.O.N.I., FIN/18/12/59).The distinguished architect referred to was Sir Arnold Thornely.

20 ‘Ulster needs British protection and she is jealous of all that tends to weaken her connections with the Mother Country’ (Maxwell, Henry, Ulster was right (London, 1934), p. 9Google Scholar.) Later it was the B.B.C. and rituals such as the Festival of Britain which fulfilled this function.

21 The poem continues: ‘Stand fast like our forefathers, who for freedom heard the call, / Did close the Gates and man the guns on historic Derry’s Wall, / Remember our Boys at Thiepval — “No Surrender” was their cry, / When for that dear old Union Jack they volunteered to die. / Get out you Bolshie Sinn Fein band, we know of your vile hate, / Just strike your tents, get on the march before you are too late, / With our Navy Boys upon the sea and our soldiers hand to hand / Together we have always stood for freedom of our land / With England we will still unite and let our enemies see / Wherever the Union Jack doth fly, all men are equal free. / Together we’ll shout with all our might and loud its echo ring, / Let Honour and Truth be our Guiding Star, / God Bless Our Gracious King’ (Robert Waddell, ‘A Welcome to the Prince’ (P.R.O.N.I., FIN/19/10/14)).

22 R. F. Foster makes this point in relation to the Protestant ascendancy’s drive to build magnificent public and private buildings in the eighteenth century (Foster, R.F., Modern Ireland, 1600–1972 (Harmondsworth, 1988), p. 194Google Scholar).

23 Text of the speech of the prince of Wales at the opening of Stormont 16 Nov. 1932 (P.R.O.N.I., FIN/18/12/59).

24 Foster, Modern Ireland, p. 528.

25 Belfast Weekly Telegraph, 26 Nov. 1932. The City Hall in Belfast, constructed in 1904, was perhaps more impressive structurally, but the Stormont parliament had a more dramatic setting.

26 Marjoribanks, Carson, i, 2–3.

27 Colvin, ibid., iii, 401.

28 Although, as has been pointed out, ‘it was Craig, and not Carson, who enthusiastically commended, and facilitated, the creation of a parliament for the six-county “Northern Ireland”’ (Jackson, Carson, p. 59).

29 ’The magnificent building is the embodiment of a great Imperial tradition, the symbol of Ulster’s unique constitutional position within the Empire, and it will stand for all time like a sentinel, guarding the rights and liberties of the people’ (Ulster Unionist Council annual report, 1932 (P.R.O.N.I., D/1327/20/2/5)).

30 Belfast Weekly Newsletter, 14 July 1932.

31 Belfast Weekly Telegraph, 2 July 1932.

32 Letters pertaining to attacks on Roman Catholics returning from the Eucharistic Congress (P.R.O.N.I., CAB/9B/200/1).

33 Salis to Craigavon, 26 July 1932 (ibid.).

34 Cabinet secretariat to Frank O’Reilly, 13 Mar. 1931 (ibid.).

35 Belfast Weekly Telegraph, 25 June 1932.

36 Ibid., 2 July 1932.

37 For example, many people listened to the service on the steps of the Mercy Hospital in Cork, where the nuns had set up a radio for the purpose (personal information from the writer’s father). This serves to illustrate that even those without radios in the 1930s were able to have access to important broadcasts, and also points to the communal nature of radio.

38 For more on the centenary of Catholic emancipation see McIntosh, Gillian, ‘An act of “national communion”: the celebrations for the centenary of Catholic emancipation’ in Augusteijn, Joost (ed.), Ireland in the 1930s (Dublin, 1999), pp 83–95Google Scholar.

39 Belfast Newsletter, 13 July 1933.

40 Kennedy, Dennis, The widening gulf: northern attitudes to the independent Irish state, 1919–49 (Belfast, 1988), p. 167Google Scholar, commenting on report in Irish Times, 18 Mar. 1935.

41 Craig in an interview in the Belfast Newsletter, 22 Sept. 1911.

42 Andrew Gailey has argued that Carson’s retirement in 1921 ‘enabled him to achieve as the founding father of Northern Ireland a status in myth that he never had in the past’ (Gailey, ‘King Carson’, p. 87).

43 Ibid., p. 79.

44 Belfast Weekly Newsletter, 11 July 1935.

45 R. J. Lynn to Carson, 26 Oct. 1933 (P.R.O.N.I., Carson papers, D/1507/E/3/29).

46 The statue was the gift of the Ulster Unionist Council. The relevant file (P.R.O.N.I., D/l327/14/6/38) is closed.

47 Belfast Weekly Telegraph, 15 July 1933.

48 Ibid., 14 July 1933.

49 Colvin, Carson, iii, 439.

50 Jackson, Carson, pp 29–41.

51 In 1919, at the commemoration of the Solemn League and Covenant, unionist leaders focused on the Ulster Unionist Convention of 1892, recalling it as a moderate but effective example of Protestant determination to resist a government measure of which they did not approve. In 1933, at the unveiling of the Carson statue, they recalled their resistance to the third home rule bill and focused on the Solemn League and Covenant as resistance to British government policies through the threat of civil war. In the aftermath of the First World War, it was inappropriate to use the threat of military force; in the 1930s, when that war was a more distant memory, it was less of a problem.

52 Belfast Weekly Telegraph, 15 July 1933.

53 Ibid.

54 Jackson, Carson, pp 29–30.

55 Gailey, ‘King Carson’, p. 86.

56 Hansard N.I. (Commons), xvii, 2674 (22 Oct. 1935); Belfast Telegraph, 23 Oct. 1935; Northern Whig, 23 Oct. 1935.

57 Ervine, St John, Craigavon: Ulsterman (Belfast, 1949), p. 526Google Scholar.

58 In the Belfast Newsletter jubilee supplement, 4 May 1935, a contributor wrote of the Lame gun-running in terms of a Boys’ Own adventure: ‘Colonel Fred Crawford was the daring Ulsterman who carried out this dangerous undertaking.’ See also P.R.O.N.I., CAB/9B/225/3.

54 Belfast Newsletter, 10 July 1933.

60 Belfast Weekly Telegraph, 15 July 1933.

61 Maxwell, Ulster was right, p. 57.

62 Hamilton, Lord Ernest, The soul of Ulster (London, 1917)Google Scholar; idem, The first seven divisions (London, 1916); idem, The Irish rebellion of 1641 (London, 1920); Falls, Cyril, The history of the 36th (Ulster) Division (Belfast, 1922)Google Scholar; idem, The birth of Ulster (London, 1936); idem, The history of the first seven battalions: the Royal Irish Rifles (Aldershot, 1925)Google Scholar; Phillips, W.A., The revolution in Ireland, 1906–23 (London, 1926)Google Scholar; Logan, James, Ulster in the x-rays (London, 1922)Google Scholar. For more recent research on these and related themes see Jackson, Alvin, ‘Unionist myths, 1912–1985’ in Past & Present, no. 136 (1992)CrossRefGoogle Scholar, and other works by the same author cited in the present article; Miller, David, Queen’s rebels: Ulster loyalism in historical perspective (Dublin, 1978)Google Scholar; Loughlin, James, Ulster unionism and British national identity (London, 1995)Google Scholar.

63 Logan, Ulster in the x-rays, p. 53.

64 Hamilton, Soul of Ulster, p. 195.

65 Belfast Weekly Telegraph, 19 July 1919.

66 The Observer, 9 July 1933.

67 The Times, 1 July 1933.

68 Northern Whig, 10 July 1933.

69 Gailey, ‘King Carson’, p. 75.

70 According to Gailey, Carson’s ‘dominance’ fell apart after 1914, ‘reducing [him] to an icon of Ulster Unionism whose myth was very much in the grip of his guardians’ (ibid., p. 67).

71 Henry Maxwell, in his coverage of the prince’s visit to open Stormont looked forward to the unveiling: ‘The Prince drove away down the long processional avenue, at the head of which a yet unfilled pedestal stood in quiet expectation’ (Maxwell, Ulster was right, p. 10).

72 Northern Whig, 29 June 1933.

73 Belfast Telegraph, 29 June 1933.

74 Belfast Newsletter, 6 July 1933.

75 Chaney, ‘Symbolic mirror’, p. 249.

76 Belfast Newsletter, 30 June 1933.

77 Ibid., 10 July 1933.

78 Northern Whig, 29 June 1933.

79 The Observer, 9 July 1933; Belfast Newsletter, 10 July 1933.

80 Northern Whig, 10 July 1933.

81 The Craigavon demonstration was also noted for its diverse audience: ‘masters and men of all grades were in the ranks’ (Belfast Newsletter, 25 Sept. 1911).

82 Rolston, Bill, An oral history of Belfast in the 1930s (Belfast, 1987), p. 18Google Scholar.

83 Colvin, Carson, iii, 368.

84 Jackson, ‘Irish unionists and the Empire’, p. 140.

85 The report continued: ‘Recognising that fact the Ulster Unionist Council took charge of the arrangements for to-day’s ceremony, which was attended by thousands of Orangemen who marched to Stormont, by members of the Ulster Unionist Council, and by a very large representation of the general public’ (The Observer, 9 July 1933).

86 Belfast Newsletter, 10 July 1933.

87 Jackson, ‘Unionist myths’, p. 184.

88 Sunday Times, 9 July 1933.

89 Belfast Newsletter, 10 July 1933. Alvin Jackson argues that this represents a unionist nostalgia for what was ‘a more vital and coherent political faith’ (Jackson, ‘Unionist myths’, p. 167).

90 Belfast Newsletter, 10 July 1933.

91 Jackson, ‘Unionist myths’, p. 173.

92 Belfast Telegraph, 22 Oct. 1935.

93 Hansard N.I. (Commons), xvii, 2674 (22 Oct. 1935).

94 Northern Whig, 23 Oct. 1935.

95 Cabinet Conclusions, 4 June 1935 (P.R.O.N.I., CAB/4/343).

96 Ibid.

97 Craigavon called him a a man of ‘indomitable courage, coupled with a charming simplicity, transparent honesty and a passionate love of country in its widest interpretation’ (The Listener, 30 Oct. 1935). Carson’s biographer looked to his origins to understand the man: ‘To understand him we must call to mind his origin — his mother, a Lambert, that is to say a “Cromwellian”, his father a professional man of Dublin, a city time out of mind owing much to the English, the capital of the Pale, the centre of English culture, commerce and law... “People”, he said, “do not easily tire who are fighting for their lives.” He fought for the lives of his people’ (Colvin, Carson, iii, 441).

98 Daily Mail, 23 Oct. 1935.

99 Morning Post, 24 Oct. 1935.

100 According to Bishop MacNeice, Carson ‘stressed the things which appealed inside and outside Ulster. He did not worry about the Pope. He reminded Ulstermen of their birthright’ (quoted in Stallworthy, Jon, Louis MacNeice (London, 1995), p. 34Google Scholar).

101 Belfast Telegraph, 25 Oct. 1935.

102 Belfast Newsletter, 13 July 1935.

103 In a letter of condolence the Rev. Mr Hewitt described to Carson’s widow how his only three brothers had died in the First World War, two of them as members of the 36th (Ulster) Division: ‘They both fell together on July 1st 1916, at the Somme. One of them had a large framed photograph of your distinguished husband, signed “Edward Carson”. After my brother’s death it passed into my possession, and I am proud, as he was, to have it’ (Hewitt to Lady Carson, 25 Oct. 1935 (P.R.O.N.I., Carson papers, D/1507/E/4/398)).

104 Northern Whig, 13 July 1935.

105 Ibid., 24 Oct.l938.

106 The U.W.U.C worked with a sub-committee of the U.U.C to erect this memorial to Carson. The cost to the U.W.U.C was £60, and each association was asked to subscribe £1 1s. or £1 10s. (minutes of U.W.U.C. annual meeting, 25 Jan. 1938 (P.R.O.N.I., D/1098/l/3)).The U.W.U.C also maintained a ‘floral tribute’ on Carson’s grave, at a cost of 10s. to each association (minutes of U.W.U.C. meeting, 20 Feb. 1936 (ibid., D/1098/1/2). I am grateful to Dr Diane Urquhart for drawing my attention to this source.

107 Northern Whig, 24 Oct. 1938. Henry Maxwell similarly described Carson’s physical appearance in heroic terms: ‘Tall, dark, and slender, with the uncompromising, almost menacing set of his countenance, the tremendous jaw and the whole indefinable strength and dignity of his bearing, he was in very truth the beau-ideal of a born leader of men’ (Maxwell, Ulster was right, p. 56). A. T. Q. Stewart continued the tradition of depicting Carson’s appearance as a physical manifestation of his political ideology and that of his party: ‘His height and powerful frame, and the determination of his features, gave an impression of immense strength and energy. His public face was set permanently in a scowl of righteous defiance’ (Stewart, A. T. Q., The Ulster crisis: resistance to home rule, 1912–14 (London, 1967), p. 39Google Scholar.)

108 Belfast Newsletter, 24 Oct. 1938.

109 The newspaper’s editorial drew parallels with the third home rule crisis: ‘During the Home Rule agitation Irish Nationalists joined British Liberals in denouncing Ulster Loyalists for their obduracy in refusing to accept safeguards and guarantees under the rule of a Dublin Parliament. They are now being given a demonstration of the value of such safeguards as were inserted in the Free State constitution’ (Belfast Weekly Newsletter, 11 Apr. 1933).

110 Maxwell, Ulster was right, p. 15.

111 Unionists were, however, concerned that the British, ‘in their desire for an over-all settlement with the Irish Free State’, would ‘allow the future of Northern Ireland to be written into the agenda’ (Mansergh, Nicholas, The unresolved question: the Anglo-Irish settlement and its undoing, 1912–72 (London, 1991), p. 305Google Scholar).

112 ‘Generations of Unionist politicians have vindicated themselves through genuflecting to the men of 1912 . .. Rival Unionist sects sought to annex the Carson mystique and thereby to consolidate their claims over the tradition as a whole’ (Jackson, ‘Unionist myths’, p. 169).

113 In 1919 Carson, speaking to the unionist faithful at the Twelfth of July commemorations, addressed the question of the British government versus the British people: ‘I believe’, he said, ‘that when we appeal to the Great British Constituencies, which know the part we have taken in the war, whatever the Government may be, they will be with us to a man’ (Belfast Newsletter, 19 July 1919).

114 Ibid., 24 0ct.l938.

115 MacDonagh, States of mind, p. 14.

116 I would like to thank the Deputy Keeper of the Records, Public Record Office of Northern Ireland, for permission to consult and to refer to documents in his care.