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Military Force and Civil Authority in the United Kingdom, 1914–1921

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  10 January 2014

Charles Townshend
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Extract

If liberal England died strangely, no moment in its passing was more bizarre than the close encounter it experienced between the army and a political system from which the military had been banished since the seventeenth century. Habitually all but invisible at home, confining its exploits to lands without the law, and maintaining a political silence equal—though in easier circumstances—to that of the neighboring grande muette, the British army moved to the center of the public stage. It obtained a popular following. This was not merely the result of Britain's involvement in world war. Manifestations of popular militarism, albeit sporadic or marginal, were evident in the later nineteenth century. The second Boer War accelerated a shift in social attitudes. Hostility to “pro-Boers,” if not beginning to resemble the hysteria of 1914, adumbrated the response of a shaken community temporarily recovering cohesion through warlike solidarity. Most public energy was expended in mafficking, but vocal groups continued to campaign for national efficiency and universal military service. The scout movement was the precipitant of a considerable mass sentiment, solidarized by suspicion of Germany and giving back a faint but clear echo of the leagues formed to support the expansion of the German army and navy.

Yet if a novel enthusiasm was eroding traditional aversion to the army, it was scarcely capable of creating a public tolerance for its involvement in domestic affairs. Unlike the navy, whose nature more or less precluded its domestic employment, the army was a suspect weapon. The cultivation of nonpolitical professionalism represented in part a functional response to such public suspicion. Modern major generals would not think of doing what their Cromwellian predecessors had done.

Type
Research Article
Information
Journal of British Studies , Volume 28 , Issue 3 , July 1989 , pp. 262 - 292
Copyright
Copyright © North American Conference of British Studies 1989

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References

1 Though these may sometimes be confused with “the guerilla cult which flourished in the later fifties and sixties.” See Anderson, O., “The Growth of Christian Militarism in Mid-Victorian Britain,” English Historical Review 86 (1971): 46–72Google Scholar. It is also difficult to distinguish between patriotism and recreation as motives for volunteering. See Cunningham, Hugh, The Volunteer Force: A Social and Political History, 1859–1908 (London, 1975)Google Scholar, “The Language of Patriotism, 1750–1914,” History Workshop 12 (1981): 8–33Google Scholar. See also Summers, A., “Militarism in Britain before the Great War,” History Workshop 2 (1977): 104–23Google Scholar.

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4 See R. B. Haldane's recollection of his colleagues' apathy: “Memories,” January 16, 1925, National Library of Scotland, Edinburgh, Haldane Papers 5291; French, David, British Economic and Strategic Planning, 1905–1915 (London, 1982), p. 78Google Scholar; Spiers, E. M., Haldane: An Army Reformer (Edinburgh, 1980)Google Scholar.

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9 This has not, however, been reflected in recent historical writing. The only special study of the incident, Neville, R. G. (“The Yorkshire Miners and the 1893 Lockout: The Featherstone [Massacre,]” International Review of Social History 21 [1976]: 337–57)CrossRefGoogle Scholar, merely follows the treatment of the Bowen Commission in Jenkins's, RoyAsquith (London, 1964), p. 69Google Scholar. Geary, R. (Policing Industrial Disputes, 1893 to 1985 [Cambridge, 1985], pp. 14–19) holds that the display of military force “lacked credibility,” though it is not clear whyGoogle Scholar.

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11 Report of the Departmental Committee Appointed to Inquire into the Disturbances at Featherstone, Parliamentary Papers (P.P.) 1893-94 (Command paper [C.] 7234), xvii.

12 Ibid.

13 Report of the Interdepartmental Committee on Riots Appointed by the Home Secretary, May 1894, P.P. 35 (C. 7650); PRO, Kew, War Office (WO) 32/6329.

14 Report of the Select Committee on Employment of Military in Cases of Disturbances, 1908, P.P. 7:365.

15 Except with reference to the particular issue of King's Regulation (Reg.) 949, covering the discretion of officers in the matter of unnecessary requests for military aid.

16 Compare Opinion of Law Officers, August 18, 1911, PRO, Kew, WO 32/8466. See also the view of the parliamentary draftsman, Courtenay Ilbert, in August 1896: “The elaboration of a statutory emergency code would appear to be an academic exercise on which a Government official would not be justified in spending his time unless he happened to be in the enjoyment of superabundant leisure,” memorandum by general staff, PRO, Kew, Cabinet (Cab.) 16/31, Emergency Powers (E.P.) 2, app. 3.

17 This officer's published account is in Macready, C. F. N., Annals of an Active Life (London, 1924), 1:137–57Google Scholar; his confidential notes ("Diary of Events,” PRO, Kew, HO 144/1553/199768) provide greater operational detailing of his careful methods. Compare the treatment in Porter, B., The Origins of the Vigilant Stale (London, 1987), pp. 174–75Google Scholar.

18 These were the paragraphs (nos. 4, 5) of the March 23 note unauthorized by the cabinet. Paragraphs 1–3 were written by Asquith personally.

19 This is the form of words given in Farrar-Hockley, Anthony, Goughie: The Life of General Sir Hubert Gough, GCB, GCMG, KCYO (London, 1975), p. 111Google Scholar, and repeated in Holmes, Richard, The Little Field-Marshal: Sir John French (London, 1981), p. 188Google Scholar. SirFergusson, James (The Curragh Incident [London, 1964], p. 152) claims the “precise form” of the last note to have been, “that the troops under our command will not be called upon to enforce the present Home Rule Bill on Ulster"—a materially different wordingGoogle Scholar.

20 A. P. Wavell to his father, March 23, 1914; quoted in Farrar-Hockley, p. 111.

21 Wavell to his father, March 23, 1914; quoted in Fergusson, p. 153.

22 Farrar-Hockley, p. 106. Notes of this interview were taken by General Macready.

23 Notes of interview with adjutant general, Bodleian Library (Bodl.), Asquith Papers 40, fols. 69-72. In his enthusiasm, MacEwen apparently did not even limit his obedience to “any lawful order.”

24 Farrar-Hockley, p. 106. Compare Spencer Ewart's diary, March 22, 1914, in Gooch, John, “The War Office and the Curragh Incident,” Bulletin of the Institute of Historical Research 46 (1973): 204 (cited hereafter as Ewart's diary)CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Gough's own record of his political views, favoring “decent” and “clean government” as against “corruption and graft,” “priest-ridden government,” and “Irish American low class politicians,” is printed in Beckett, I., ed., The Army and the Curragh Incident, 1914 (London, 1986), pp. 35–39Google Scholar.

25 See also notes for parliamentary questions, no. 63, May 25, 1914, Bodl., Asquith Papers 39.

26 His later phrase is “mutiny it was,” in Dangerfield, George, The Damnable Question: A Study in Anglo Irish Relations (London, 1976), pp. 85–86Google Scholar.

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28 Compare the highly political, if not altogether reliable, account in Ash, Bernard, The Lost Dictator: A Biography of Field-Marshal Sir Henry Wilson, Bt. GCB, DSO, MP (London, 1968)Google Scholar. Ash possibly exaggerates the Robespierrism of Wilson's assertion that “England quã England is opposed to Home Rule,” which may reflect only the common (if hypocritical) Unionist argument for an “English majority.”

29 Ewart's diary, March 22, 24, 1914.

30 Letter to Asquith, March 21, 1914, Bodl., Asquith Papers 40, fol. 27.

31 “Diary of Events,” March 20, 1914, Bodl., Milner Papers 157.

32 Number 1 “Scheme,” UVF Confidential Circulars, Public Record Office of Northern Ireland, Belfast (PRONI), D.1327/4/21. There is a sensible evaluation of information reaching the cabinet in Jalland, Patricia, The Liberals and Ireland: The Ulster Question in British Politics to 1914 (Brighton, 1980), p. 221Google Scholar.

33 Jalland, p. 229.

34 Amery.

35 As Sir Edward Carson privately admitted to Bonar Law, letter from Carson to Law, March 20, 1914, House of Lords Record Office (HLRO), Bonar Law Papers 32/1/36.

36 Koss, S., Lord Haldane—Scapegoat for Liberalism (New York, 1967), pp. 111–13Google Scholar.

37 Note of meeting in secretary of state's room, War Office, March 18, 1914. Seely's note, March 19, 1914, Bodl., Asquith Papers 40, fols. 8, 9. Macready (Annals [n. 17 above], 1:175) called it “ a not very clearly defined mission.” Paget told his officers that Macready would be “an independent commander directly under the War Office” and would be made “Military Governor of the Belfast district” and reinforced by certain troops from Scotland, if there was reistance or aggression by the UFV. Notes on instructions as communicated to officers at second conference, March 20, 1914, Bodl., Asquith Papers 40, fols. 25–26.

38 Sir John Simon to Secretary of State for War Seely, March 19, 1914, Bodl., Asquith Papers 40, fols. 13–14.

39 Macready, Annals, 1:188. He was recommissioned with more specific military duties in aid of the civil power on April 27 and with magisterial powers. War Office to commander-in-chief Ireland, and note by Macready, April 27, 1914, PRO, Kew, WO 32/5319. At this time, Redmond compared his position to that of Buller as special commissioner in 1888. Redmond to Asquith, April 27, 1914, Bodl., Asquith Papers 41, fols. 51–53.

40 Friend to Macready, March 20, 1914, Bodl., Asquith Papers 40, fol. 19.

41 For Ewart's warning in December, see Farrar-Hockley, Goughie, p. 87; cabinet memorandum by secretary of state for war, December 9, 1913, Bodl., Asquith Papers 40, fol. 1.

42 Note by Seely of discussion with C.I.G.S., adjutant general, and General Officer Commanding-in-Chief (GOC-in-C) Ireland, March 20, 1914, Bodl., Asquith Papers, fol. 19.

43 “This, in my view, was the correct attitude for the principal soldier of the Army to take up, but the Secretary of State has also to bear in mind the legal position” (by which, as the following two paragraphs show, he meant the political position). See Seely's memorandum, Bodl., Asquith Papers 40, fol. 1.

44 Statement of Major Kincaid-Smith, March 22, 1914, Bodl., Asquith Papers 40, fol. 40.

45 Milner, “Diary of Events,” March 18, 1914, Bodl., Milner Papers 157.

46 Dangerfield, George, The Strange Death of Liberal England (London, 1936), p. 91Google Scholar.

47 Wells, H. G., Mr. Britling Sees It Through (London, 1916), pp. 131–32Google Scholar.

48 Sir John Ross of Bladensburg to under secretary, July 27, 1914, Balfour Papers, British Library (BL) Add. MS 49821.

49 Ross to Chief Secretary for Ireland Birrell, January 12, 1915, Bodl., Asquith Papers 41, fol. 146.

50 The proclamations that caused such a stir when issued by the government in December 1913 “could not give any greater power than that contained in statute.” The point, as confirmed by the attorney general, was that the DMP (unlike the RIC) did not have the powers of His Majesty's Customs unless specially employed by the Board of Customs and Excise. They might have seized the rifles while arresting the marchers for other offenses but had no authority to seize arms as such. Simon to Birrell, July 31, 1914, PRO, Kew, Colonial Office (CO) 904/182. In the event, such rifles as they had seized were successfully reclaimed by the Volunteers.

51 Royal Commission on the Circumstances Connected with the Landing of Arms at Howth, P.P. 1914 (Command paper [Cd.] 7631). This remarkable statement was made in spite of testimony by two coast guards that they had been hit with rifle butts and threatened with shooting.

52 Ibid. Harrel has fared little better at the hands of recent writers; e.g., O'Halpin, Eunan, The Decline of the Union: British Government in Ireland, 1892–1920 (Dublin, 1987), pp. 104–5Google Scholar, convicts Harrel of bungling and, perhaps worse, of failing to consult the under secretary—a charge of which Sir John Ross, at least, forcefully exonerated him. O'Halpin notes that the legal power of the police to impound the weapons was “uncertain” but goes on to speak of “illegally imported weapons.” This was precisely the justification of Harrel and Ross that was repudiated by the Royal Commission.

53 Kitchener's secrecy was, perhaps, uniquely obsessive. Compare Hankey, Lord, The Supreme Command, 1914–1918 (London, 1961), 1:221Google Scholar; French (n. 4 above), pp. 124 ff.

54 Rogers, L., “The War and the English Constitution,” Forum (July 1915), pp. 27–37Google Scholar. Bowman, H. M., “Martial Law and the English Constitution,” Michigan Law Review 15(1916): 93–126CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Judge Advocate General (to Chief Secretary for Ireland, July 19, 1920, PRO, Kew, Cab. 24/109, CP 1662).

55 Memorandum by the general staff on the need for an emergency powers bill, Committee of Imperial Defence (CID) subcommittee, June 30, 1914, PRO, Kew, Cab. 16/31 E.P. 2, apps. 4, 5; “The Powers possessed by the Executive in Times of Emergency and War” ([1908], London, Kings College, Edmonds Papers IV/4) provides a more intemperate expression of military preference.

56 PRO, Kew, Cab. 16/31 E.P. 2, app. 2. Simon's point, made during the subcommittee discussion about his friend with a house on the east coast who would resist any interference with his property in peacetime but be the first to insist on the house being razed to the ground if necessary in war, aptly illustrated the erratic civilian view that the army found so baffling.

57 Townshend, C., “Martial Law: Legal and Administrative Problems of Civil Emergency in Britain and the Empire, 1800–1940," Historical Journal 25 (1982): 175CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

58 Presumably akin to the German Zustand drohende Kriegsgefahr, though incorporating the possibility of a nonwar emergency.

59 CID subcommittee on emergency powers, first minutes, PRO, Kew, Cab. 16/31 E.P. 2.

60 A questionable view that was, however, to be upheld in the Irish Court of Chancery in 1921. See below, pp. 289 ff.

61 Martial law regulations, April 26, 1916, Bodl., Asquith Papers 42, fol. 81; Proclamation, Bodl., Asquith Papers 42, fol. 81. Compare also “Orders for Troops disembarking” of the same day, PRO, Kew, WO 35/69/1.

62 Note by Sir M. Nathan, April 26, 1916, Bodl., Nathan Papers 476, fol. 295.

63 Holograph note, attorney general to under secretary [April 29, 1916], Bodl., Nathan Papers 476, fol. 677.

64 Memorandum by attorney general (Ireland), May 20, 1916, Bodl., Asquith Papers 42, fols. 148–49.

65 Chief secretary for Ireland to prime minister, April 28, 1916, Bodl., Asquith Papers 42, fol. 34.

66 Adulatory telegram to Maxwell, April 28, 1916, PRO, Kew, WO 32/4307; war committee reply, April 28, 1916, Bodl., Asquith Papers, 41; Asquith to King, April 27, 1916, Bodl., Asquith Papers 41, 42.

67 The picture painted by his private secretary, Lord Basil Blackwood. See Asquith, Lady Cynthia, Diaries, 1915–1918 (London, 1968), p. 163Google Scholar.

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69 Proclamation by chief justices, May 26, 1916, HLRO, Lloyd George Papers D/15/1/5.

70 Townshend (n. 57 above), p. 70. By contrast the Daily Express (July 25, 1916) viewed the continuance of martial law “with the greatest misgiving” largely because it meant “the ruthless guerilla opposition of the Irish Party in the House of Commons.” Boyce, D. G., “British Opinion, Ireland, and the War, 1916–1918,” Historical Journal 27 (1974): 583–84Google Scholar.

71 House of Commons (HC) Debates, 5th ser., vol. 82, c.2542.

72 Memorandum by GOC-in-C Ireland, June 16, 1916, Bodl., Asquith Papers 42, fols. 150–55.

73 O'Connor and Dillon to Lloyd George, June 9, 11, 13; Lloyd George to Asquith, June 10, 1916, HLRO, Lloyd George Papers D/4/2/24, 25, 27, 35.

74 Memorandum for cabinet, June 24, 1916: Report on the State of Ireland since the Rebellion, PRO, Kew, Cab. 37/150/18.

75 Maxwell to Long, July 18, 1916, enclosure in cabinet memorandum, July 21, 1916, PRO, Kew, Cab. 37/152/15.

76 And also the members of the Carlton Club who applauded Lord Lansdowne's affirmation that Maxwell should stay in Ireland “with the power that he now enjoys," July 7, 1916, HLRO, Bonar Law Papers 63/C/64.

77 Memorandum by chief secretary, September 1916, HLRO, Bonar Law Papers 63/C/64.

78 Memorandum by chief secretary, October 9, 1916, HLRO, Bonar Law Papers 63/C/47.

79 HC Deb. 5th ser., vol. 91, cc.1842-43; Boyce, D. G. and Hazlehurst, Cameron, “The Unknown Chief Secretary: H. E. Duke and Ireland, 1916–18,” Irish Historical Studies 20 (1977): 296–97CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

80 The Dicey of the Law of the Constitution, at least.

81 The judgment on Duke is that of W. Alison Phillips; Boyce and Hazlehurst's view of Duke's effectiveness seems to be a short-term one.

82 See Townshend, C., The British Campaign in Ireland, 1919–1921 (Oxford, 1975), pp. 10, 13, 105, 135, 148Google Scholar.

83 Ibid., pp. 10–11.

84 Holmes, French (n. 19 above), pp. 341–43; O'Halpin (Decline of the Union [n. 52 above], pp. 156–213) lays more blame on French himself for the failure of his “proconsular government.”

85 French to Macpherson, November 4, 1919, Bodl., Strathcarron Papers; Holmes, French, p. 350.

86 Memorandum by Lord Wimborne, February 17, 1917, Bodl., Asquith Papers 45.

87 Townshend, , British Campaign (n. 82 above), pp. 47ffGoogle Scholar. See also Jeffery, K., The British Army and the Crisis of Empire, 1918–22 (Manchester, 1984), pp. 80–83Google Scholar.

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89 GOC-in-C Ireland to C.I.G.S., September 28, 1920, Anderson Papers, PRO, Kew, CO 904/188 1.

90 Macready to Greenwood, July 17, 1920, HLRO, Lloyd George Papers F/19/2/12.

91 Townshend, , British Campaign, p. 134Google Scholar.

92 Ibid., pp. 104–5, 137, 194.

93 However, the general staff memorandum (June 1914, PRO, Kew, Cab. 16/31 E.P. 2) on martial law in the United Kingdom contained an intelligent review (pars. 9-21) of the problems of interpreting the Petition of Right and the uncertainty of subsequent doctrine on the civil courts.

94 Cabinet 51(20) App. 4, PRO, Kew, Cab. 23/22.

95 Townshend, [Martial Law] (n. 57 above), p. 182.

96 Cabinet 48(20), PRO, Kew, Cab. 23/22.

97 Jones to Lloyd George, July 24, 1920, in Jones (n. 88 above), 3:31.

98 Townshend, , British Campaign, p. 120Google Scholar.

99 Whereas, as the assistant under secretary Mark Sturgis put it, the soldiers hoped for “No more damn civilians.” Diary, December 14, 1920, PRO, Kew, PRO 30/59/3.

100 Cabinet 65A(20), December 1, 1920, in Jones, 3:42. Sir N. F. W. Fisher, Report of visit to Ireland, February 11, 1921, HLRO, Lloyd George Papers F/17/1/9. Churchill remarked somewhat ambiguously, “We thought it would wreck the scheme” (Jones, 3:42).

101 Cabinet Conference, May 31, 1920; Jones, 3:19.

102 Proclamation no. 3 by GOC-in-C and military governor, Ireland, April 14, 1921, PRO, Kew, WO 35/169; Sturgis's diary, April 19, 1921, PRO, Kew, PRO 30/594.

103 Townshend, “Martial Law,” p. 187. The judgment has not found favor among later jurists; see Keir, D. L. and Lawson, F. H., Cases in Constitutional Law (London, 1967), pp. 232–36Google Scholar.

104 Anderson to Macready, Jan 11, 1921, Anderson Papers, PRO, Kew, CO 904/188.

105 Secretary of state for war to chief secretary, June 3; War Office to GOC-in-C Ireland, June 16, 1921, PRO, Kew, WO 32/9573.

106 Greenwood to Worthington-Evans, June 28, 1921, PRO, Kew, WO 32/9572.