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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 28 July 2016
(page no 154 note 1) We wish to express our gratitude to the present owner of the memoir for making it available and for his generous encouragement. A copy of the complete manuscript, in two volumes, is on deposit in the Northern Ireland Record Office.
page no 154 note 2 A sketch of Holmes’s personality appears in Healy, Maurice, The old Munster circuit: a book of memories and traditions (London, 1939), pp 276–7.Google Scholar
page no 155 note 1 There was a definite improvement in the spring of 1880—i.e. election time— but the anxiety aroused in the autumn of 1880 was not greater than that reached in the previous winter.
page no 155 note 2 This view is confirmed by another lawyer, John Ross (M.P. Londonderry City 1892-5), last lord chancellor of Ireland: ‘there can be no doubt that if he had desired to adopt a political career he would have become a great minister. But he loved the law too well to turn to anything else.’ ( Ross, John, Bt, The years of my pilgrimage (London, 1924), p. 201) Google Scholar
page no 156 note 3 One of these, delivered at a loyalist demonstration at the Rotunda, 24 Jan. 1884, was later published with the title Ireland under a Liberal government (Dublin, 1884). In it he accused the liberals of weakness in suppressing crime, despite the coercion act, because of their underlying sympathy with Parnell.
page no 157 note 4 At 1.45 a.m. on 9 June 1885, by 264 to 252.
page no 157 note 5 Holmes was returned unopposed on 30 June 1885.
page no 157 note 6 Rt Hon. Sir William Hart Dyke, Bt (1837-1931), M.P. (Cons.) for seats in Kent, 1865-1906: chief whip, 1874-80. Dyke, holding office outside the cabinet, was in no position to play a grand role, nor did he wish to. His recommendations were those of a former chief whip worried by the effect of Irish legislation on party unity and concerned to preserve a working alliance with the Parnellites (Dyke to Salisbury 30 and 31 July 1885, Salisbury MSS class E). On the most sensitive subjects, catholic education and home rule, he was content to follow Carnarvon‘s lead. The latter estimated him judiciously: ‘careful, clear, intelligent in business’, a plain country gentleman whose real berth was an undersecretary-ship (Carnarvon to Cranbrook 24 Jan. 1886, Cranbrook MSS T501/262).
Dyke’s appointment was part of a whole chapter of accidents. There were three names canvassed as Irish secretary: Sir M. Ridley, Bourke, and Dyke. Carnarvon, Gibson? Northcote, and R. Power (the Parnellite whip) would have preferred Ridley, but Salisbury insisted that Ridley was required as foreign office spokesman in the commons. Dyke was therefore chosen : but then Salisbury, under pressure to placate Bourke, offered him the foreign office post fully believing he would turn it down. Bourke accepted, while at the same time the other position which he might have taken, the Duchy, was again unexpectedly closed by Chaplin agreeing to take it, after an initial refusal, without a seat in the cabinet. Dyke himself at first refused Ireland, which would have let Bourke in there and vacated a place for Ridley at the foreign office: but Dyke too changing his mind, Ridley, everyone’s first preference, was left without a place (Iddesleigh’s diary, B.M. Add. MS 50063 A, typescript, f. 436, 27 June 1885). According to Ashbourne’s autobiographical notes written in 1891, Chaplin was also suggested as Irish secretary with Ashbourne’s approval, but Carnarvon thought he would ‘boss’ too much.
page no 158 note 7 This took the form of an amendment to the act of 1883. It increased the power of sanitary authorities over land and cottages. Local government improvement schemes became less liable to private obstruction. During the formation of the ministry, Power, the Parnellite whip, had offered his counterpart Winn support in return for an extended labourers‘ bill and a measure eliminating sheriff’s expenses in uncontested elections (Winn to Salisbury, 20 June 1885, Salisbury MSS).
page no 158 note 8 The tory Irish programme was provisionally agreed in the cabinet of 4 July. It was so designed that both the tory party (by the land purchase bill) and the Parnellites (by the labourers’ bill) should be propitiated (Carnarvon to Salisbury ι July, Carnarvon MSS, P.R.O. 30/6/53/54). The endowments bill was altogether a later addition, ‘worked up’ by Fitzgibbon in response to the catholic hierarchy’s agitation (Carnarvon to Hamilton 11 Aug. 1885, Carnarvon MSS, P.R.O. 30/6/56/75).
page no 158 note 9 Dyke moved the second reading of the land purchase bill on 4 August, Holmes speaking in support (Hansard, 3, ccc, cols 1113–7). Holmes assumed responsibility for it in committee, speaking 42 times on its behalf. The conduct of the Labourers (Ireland) Bill and the educational endowments bill was almost exclusively entrusted to Holmes. He moved the second reading of both (on 3 and 11 August respectively) and then steered them through committee. Altogether he rose 64 times in defence of them.
A suggestion that the land bill be read first in the lords was stamped on by Salisbury as ‘very inexpedient—if not positively a breach of privilege’ (Salisbury to Ashbourne, 16 July 1885. Ashbourne MSS).
page no 158 note 10 These were St John Brodrick, later i st earl of Midleton (1856-1942), then M.P. for West Surrey; Charles Edward Lewis, M.P. for Londonderry City since 1872; Arthur Loftus Tottenham, M.P. for Leitrim 1880-5; and Col. Edward Robert King-Harman, M.P. for Dublin County 1883-5. For Brodrick‘s quarrel with Churchill‘s opportunism, see Midleton, Earl of, Records and reactions 1856–1939 (1939), pp 61–4. Google Scholar
page no 160 note 11 Ashbourne sent his suggestions to Carnarvon and Holmes on 5 Aug. 1885 (Carnarvon MSS, P.R.O. 30/6/56/71).
page no 160 note 12 There is no reason to doubt the substantial accuracy of this account. Ashbourne, however, describing the cabinet of 11 Aug. 1885 in correspondence with Carnarvon and Sir Robert Hamilton (Carnarvon MSS, P.R.O. 30/6/36/73-4) claimed that the choice of the two commissioners proceeded from a cabinet decision ‘just before the house met’. Yet Holmes had announced the two names (John McCarthy and Stanislaus Lynch, both catholics) in the commons on the previous day, 10 Aug. (Hansard 3, ccc, col. 1622). As no cabinet had been held between 6 and 11 Aug., Ashbourne was perhaps trying to give a retrospective coherence to the choice (which conflicted with Carnarvon‘s recommendation), although this involved concealing the actual day on which announcement was made.
page no 160 note 13 Gerald Fitzgibbon (1837–1909), who was in 1877–8 Holmes’s immediate predecessor as Conservative solicitor-general for Ireland, had been a lord justice of appeal since 1878. A member of the Church of Ireland, he had known Churchill well since 1876.
page no 160 note 14 According to the D.N.B, (art. Fitzgibbon), nearly 1,500 schools or colleges and an endowment income of £140,000 a year were eventually affected by this Act.
page no 160 note 15 This passage appears to have been consulted by Winston Spencer Churchill when writing his Lord Randolph Churchill (1906), i, 435–6.
page no 161 note 16 ‘Fitzgibbon is very acute&has more knowledge on the subject [education] than anyone else in Ireland’ (Churchill to Carnarvon 27 Aug. 1885, Carnarvon MSS, P.R.O. 30/6/55/15).
page no 161 note 17 Fitzgibbon’s relations with Holmes were marred by incompatibility of temperament. In later years on the bench ‘they often differed during an argument, and then a great clash of mentalities arose’ ( Ross, , The years of my pilgrimage p. 201)Google Scholar. But Fitzgibbon had a high opinion of Holmes’s political abilities (Fitzgibbon to Churchill 11 Dec. 1885, Churchill MSS X/1161).
page no 161 note 18 Samuel Walker, Q.C., M.P. (Lib.) Londonderry County, 1884 (10 Jan.)-i885: solicitor-general for Ireland, 1883 (Dec.)–i885.
page no 161 note 19 John Naish (1841–90) entered the Irish bar in 1865, becoming a Q.C., 1880; law adviser to the Castle, 1880 : solicitor-general for Ireland, 1883 : attorney-general, 1884: Irish privy councillor and lord chancellor of Ireland, May-July 1885 and Feb.-June 1886: lord justice of appeal, 1886-90: a catholic and a Liberal.
page no 161 note 20 The act became law on the last day of the session, 14 Aug. 1885.
page no 161 note 21 But he was generous in giving praise where praise was not due. ‘I think you have done wonders as to this education question’ (Dyke to Carnarvon 23 July 1885, Carnarvon MSS, P.R.O. 30/6/58/136).
page no 162 note 22 Ashbourne for a short time regarded Monroe’s appointment as settled, considered it to be ‘admirable’ but thought Monroe too good for it (Ashbourne to Carnarvon 12 Aug. 1885, Carnarvon MSS, P.R.O. 30/6/56/82). Monroe and Holmes were firm friends and related by marriage.
page no 162 note 23 This was the first of three meetings between Holmes and Churchill in the vacation of Aug. 1885-Jan. 1886, the second being at Holmes’s house near Dublin early in October, and the third being Fitzgibbon’s Xmas party, also in Ireland. This in its way conveys the intense involvement Churchill maintained in Irish affairs during a period when his Indian burdens were exceptionally heavy.
page no 162 note 24 Sir Robert Nicholas Fowler, Bt., M.P. (Cons.) Penryn 1868–74 and City of London since 1880: father-in-law of A. E. Pease, M.P. (Lib.), York City.
page no 162 note 25 This visit is described by Churchill, Winston Spencer, Lord Randolph Churchill (1906), 1, 459–61Google Scholar. The biographer knew Holmes about the time he was writing the life, and the important dictum ‘Now, mind. None of us must have anything to do with home rule in any shape or form’, attributed to Lord Randolph on this visit, may well have been based on conversations with Holmes.
Churchill communicated his impressions to Salisbury: ‘ I had much talk with Holmes, att. gen. to whose house I went this morning on landing. He is very satisfactory r There is nothing alarming in the state of Ireland at all. … Holmes thinks that the development of boycotting has much to do with the desire of the National League to obtain funds by forcing the more affluent class of farmers&tradesmen to join’ (1 Oct, 1885, Salisbury MSS, class E and a reference in Curtis, L. P. jnr., Coercion and conciliation in Ireland, 1880–92 (1963), p. 55).Google Scholar
page no 163 note 26 Col. Edward James Saunderson (1837–1906), M.P. (Lib.) Cavan, 1865–74: (Unionist) North Armagh, 1885–1906: revived Orangeism in Ulster in the early 1880‘s, and became leader of the Irish protestants in the commons from 1885.
page no 163 note 27 ‘With regard to the party dispute in the N., I think in Armagh Monro (sic) ought to retire’ (Churchill to Carnarvon, 21 Sept. 1885, Carnarvon MSS, P.R.O. 30/6/55/21).
page no 163 note 28 See appendix v.
page no 164 note 29 In conversation with McCarthy on 6 July Carnarvon arranged to meet Parnell on 4 or 5 August. In the event the meeting took place in an unoccupied house at 15 Hill Street on 1 August. A full account of Carnarvon‘s version of the conversation is printed in Hardinge, , Carnarvon, 3, pp 178–81Google Scholar. The Ashbourne MSS show Ashbourne was kept fully informed by Carnarvon of the secret negotiations with Parnell.
page no 164 note 30 In P.R.O. 30/6/127/19 (3 copies) and in B.M. Add. MS 44681, ff 122-9. This took the form of a printed memorandum, dated 31 Oct. 1885. Hamilton began by stressing the extent and power of the nationalist movement. The question of granting Irish demands subject to the integrity of the empire and the protection of minorities was ‘not one of “never” but of “when” and “how”’. His own specific plan was for ‘a carefully devised constitution’ creating an Irish parliament with a second chamber, power over taxation and minority representation. A majority of two thirds was to be required in dealing with certain selected subjects, and the crown was to retain control of judicial appointments, armed forces and constabulary. The memorandum was circulated among the cabinet (P.R.O. CAB 37/16/57).
Hamilton sent two copies of his scheme to Spencer, 1 Feb. 1886: Spencer forwarded it to Gladstone on 9 Feb., and Gladstone gave it to Edward Hamilton to read on 11 Feb. (Edward Hamilton‘s diary, B.M. Add. MS 48643 ff 8–9).
page no 164 note 31 See appendix vi.
page no 165 note 32 Flanagan was evidently approached by Ashbourne in early Nov. 1885 with the idea of resignation. He agreed on the condition that he was given a seat in the English privy council. Salisbury refused the request and Carnarvon suggested that the matter should be allowed to rest. Ashbourne, in the interests of his brother‘s promotion, saw Flanagan a second time but could get no modification of condition. Carnarvon then wrote again to Salisbury on 15 Nov. stressing the need to grant Flanagan’s stipulation because ‘a whole chain of legal and judicial appointments depends on it’. Salisbury gave in on the 19th and Gibson wrote the next day accepting the appointment (Carnarvon MSS, P.R.O. 30/6/57/83–100). Salisbury was probably acting on Halsbury’s advice (Salisbury to Halsbury 16 Nov., Halsbury MSS).
page no 165 note 33 John George Gibson, younger brother of Lord Ashbourne, was appointed solicitor-general for Ireland in Nov. 1885. He was M.P. (Cons.) for Liverpool (Walton) at the time.
page no 165 note 34 In the new parliament, according to official sources, there were 249 conservatives, 335 liberals and 86 Irish nationalists (Annual Reg. 1885, p. 187).
page no 166 note 35 This is not strictly true. No liberal leader gave anything resembling a commitment to an Irish legislature and Hartington came out against any Dublin board even when shorn of legislative authority. But Chamberlain at Warrington (8 and 15 Sept.) proposed a modification of his central board scheme (removing any suggestion of legislative powers) and Düke supported the change. Gladstone was content with a principle that could barely be criticized : ‘every grant to portions of the empire of enlarged powers for the management of their own affairs is, in my view, not a source of danger, but a means of averting it’ (Midlothian address). What Holmes’s statement indicates is the traditional looseness in using the words ‘home rule’.
page no 166 note 36 Sir Edward Sullivan, Bt (1822–85), lord chancellor of Ireland from 11 Dec. 1883 to his death, 13 Apr. 1885.
page no 167 note 37 In a speech on the second reading of the home rule bill, 7 June 1886 (Hansard 3, cccvi, col. 1181).
page no 167 note 38 Following Gladstone’s visit to Eaton Hall on 15 Dec. 1885, a number of letters passed between Balfour and Gladstone in late December and early January They have been printed in Gladstone’s, Viscount After thirty years (London, 1928), PP 396–8.Google Scholar The originals, together with copies of some of them, are in the Gladstone MSS, B.M. Add. MSS 44493–4 and the Balfour MSS, B.M. Add. MS. 49692.
page no 167 note 39 The relations between Churchill and the Ulster tory M.P.s were extremely uneasy as a result of the Maamtrasna debate. On 16 Nov. 1885 Churchill had written to Salisbury bitterly attacking the ‘foul Ulster tories who have always ruined our party’ (Salisbury MSS, class E). Churchill made no secret of his attitude, writing to Carnarvon (21 Sept. 1885, P.R.O. 30/6/65/21) and Beach (25 Sept., St Aldwyn MSS, PCC/20) in the same strain. It was at the meeting referred to here (29 Dec.-i Jan.) that Col. Saunderson told Churchill of the extent of Ulster unionist dissatisfaction ( James, R. R., Churchill, p. 226)Google Scholar. The rapprochement which now began culminated in Churchill’s dramatic visit to Ulster in Feb. 1886. Savage’s, D. C. article ‘The origins of the Ulster unionist party 1885–6’, above, 12, p. 193 Google Scholar ff., described the nature of the loyalists’ campaign during the months when home rule seemed imminent.
page no 167 note 40 Peel was re-elected speaker on that day. The Queen’s Speech was not read until 21 January, the intervening time being spent in administering oaths.
page no 168 note 41 This interview probably took place in Beach’s room in the house of commons on 14 January. Beach writing to Churchill on that day mentioned that he had asked Holmes to come to his room at about 2.30 p.m. ‘so as possibly to escape the spies’ (Churchill MSS XI/1292).
page no 168 note 42 In other words the policy of Salisbury and the Iddlesleigh group. He had previously discussed the question with Carnarvon (Holmes to Carnarvon 13 Jan. 1886, Carnarvon MSS, P.R.O. 30/6/56/32).
page no 168 note 43 Dyke resigned on 16 Jan. 1886. ‘Last night Dyke came to Beach&afterwards to me— explained that he did not want to go on as Irish secretary—. that Carnarvon had never let him know anything that was going on— that for that,&for other reasons more special to himself he did not feel equal to doing the work in the house of commons’ (Salisbury to W. H. Smith, misdated, but 17 Jan., Hambleden MSS PS9/104).
page no 168 note 44 See appendix v.
page no 168 note 45 ‘I think there are three men in the government who would answer to the requirements of the position—Lord Cranbrook, Mr Smith, and (please don‘t be shocked) myself’ (Churchill to Salisbury 16 Jan. 1886, Salisbury MSS class E).
page no 169 note 46 This refers to the cabinet of 15 Jan. 1886. Churchill wrote to Salisbury on 13 January recommending Holmes’s attendance: ‘I would venture to suggest the extreme desirability of the cabinet hearing on Friday the 15th the views of the Irish attorney-general. He is at the present moment the soundest authority on fact’ (Salisbury MSS class E). Cranbrook afterwards recorded a disappointing performance : ‘the attorney-general for Ireland had no evidence, could get none of the palpable facts, offer none for our enquiry, and all was a problem ’ (Cran-brook’s diary, 16 Jan.). Holmes was evidently brought in by Churchill to provide proof of the need for strong executive action against the National League, before the meeting of parliament, and without parliamentary sanction. According to Cranbrook (acting in alliance with Churchill in this cabinet) he failed to do what was required of him.
page no 170 note 47 See appendix iv.
page no 170 note 48 On 4 Mar. 1886, in reply to Holmes‘s motion, Gladstone gave the following figures showing the development of agrarian unrest in Ireland:
February 1886 71 Gladstone was thus able to demonstrate that Conservative declarations of satisfaction over governing Ireland without coercion, which were prominent at the time of the general election, had in fact coincided with the peak of agrarian unrest (Hansard 3, cccii, cols 1946–7).
page no 170 note 49 Salisbury offered the appointment to Smith by letter on 17 Jan. (Hambleden MSS PS9/104, Cranbrook’s diary 18 Jan.). Carnarvon, who was not consulted, only learnt of the appointment after it had been announced. Salisbury, apologizing, claimed that it had only been settled on 20 Jan. (Carnarvon MSS, P.R.O. 30/6/53/69)- Evidently Smith had to be persuaded, and Churchill during a conversation with him on 20 Jan. used ‘every argument’ to get him to accept (Churchill MSS XI/1307b). The public announcement appeared in The Times of 21 Jan. Smith left for Dublin by the evening packet on Saturday, 23 Jan., and was sworn in on the 25th.
Cranbrook succeeded him as secretary of war on 23 Jan. 1886 though Smith continued to hold the seals of office. He resigned the chief secretaryship on 10 Feb. and the war office on 6 Feb. (Smith to Cranbrook 13 Feb. 1886, Cranbrook MSS T501/260). Smith, threatened in February with ‘pains and penalties’ for holding two offices at once, wrote to Salisbury to get the circumstances of his unusual position cleared up. Apparently Smith’s formal resignation, and Cranbrook’s acceptance, of the war office were to have taken place at a council on 28 or 29 January (Smith to Salisbury, 13 Feb., forwarded to Halsbury, 16 Feb., and in Halsbury MSS).
page no 171 note 50 In fact the 23rd. According to a mistaken report in The Times (25 Jan.) he was accompanied by Holmes and Ashbourne.
page no 171 note 51 i.e. 22 Jan. 1886.
page no 171 note 52 Hansard 3, cccii, cols 214–25. Holmes’s speech gave a clearer indication than any that had preceded it of a growing ministerial disposition to deal firmly and legislatively with the National League. Beach and Churchill alone were responsible for the failure to enunciate such a policy more decisively at this stage (Salisbury to the queen, 21 Jan., Letters of Queen Victoria, 3rd series, i, 13).
In the course of his speech Holmes gave the following details about the growth of the league:
page no 171 note 53 ‘The recalcitrant members of the cabinet [Churchill and Beach] have changed their minds about coercion, under party pressure, and a bill will probably be introduced in two or three days’ (Salisbury to the Queen, 24 Jan. in Letters, i, 17).
page no 171 note 54 25 Jan. 1886 (Smith to Salisbury, Salisbury MSS D/59/116).
page no 172 note 55 Other sources (Salisbury to the queen, 26 Jan., in Letters, p. 19; Cran-brook‘s diary, 26 Jan.; Churchill to Smith 26 Jan., Churchill MSS XI/1334) agree that the decision to introduce a bill to suppress the league was taken in cabinet on 26 January.
page no 172 note 56 Hansard 3, cccii, col. 416. Immediately on the resumption of business on 26 January, Beach announced that Smith would move a bill on Thursday 28 th ‘for the purpose of suppressing the National League and other dangerous associations, for the prevention of intimidation, and for the protection of life, property, and public order in Ireland’. A land bill would follow. If the debate on the address had not been concluded by the 28th, a postponement was to be moved.
page no 172 note 57 The coercion bill ‘is in fact drawn’ (Salisbury to the queen, 21 Jan., in Letters, 3rd series, i, 13). A bill was prepared by Ashbourne and discussed at the cabinet on 16 Janauary (Salisbury to Churchill, 16 January, Churchill MSS XI/1302b). No copy of a Conservative coercion bill is to be found in Parliamentary Papers and there is no copy preserved among either the Carnarvon, Salisbury, Smith, Ashbourne, or cabinet papers.
The existence of a later and probably largely distinct bill, drawn up afresh after a cabinet decision on 26 January, is however made clear in a letter from William F. Cullinan, the Irish Office draftsman, to Ashbourne in the Ashbourne MSS, dated 29 Jan. 1886:
‘I send you our draft bill for suppressing the Land League, reprinted with amendments marked in pencil. The first edition was dated 27th Jan., the day after Sir M. Beach announced the bill. This edition is dated 2 Feb., the amendment having been suggested by W. H. Smith after he returned from Ireland.
Copies of the bill have gone, by Mr Smith’s directions, to himself, to you, to Holmes, and to Lord Salisbury, and to no other person. I send also a memorandum on the peace preservation acts, 1782–1882.’
Smith wrote to Ashbourne on 29 January that he had been through the bill with Holmes and thought they could make a good measure of it, but was relieved that he would not have to introduce it.
page no 172 note 58 Ministers were defeated, 331–252.
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