On this day in 1922, the Third Tipperary Brigade of the IRA looted and destroyed the offices of The Nationalist newspaper.
The South Tipperary Brigade’s belief was that an independent Irish Republic had been declared on 24 April 1916 and ratified at the General Election in 1918. Therefore, in their eyes, the Anglo-Irish Agreement of 6 December 1921 (which partitioned the country and contained an Oath of Allegiance to the monarchy) was illegitimate.
The Brigade demanded that the local press help spread this anti-treaty stance. A letter was written to the editor on 17 January stating:
“Seeing that you have already refused to publish an article submitted to you by the OC batt. 5, 3rd Tipperary Brigade IRA, I, as an officer of the above Brigade, do hereby order you to publish said article, the consequence of refusal being suppression.”
The Nationalist refused to alter their stance, insisting that their editorial output would reflect the will of the people. On 19 January 1922, the Nationalist offices were looted and its printing machinery was destroyed.
The newspaper managed to publish again just two weeks later. In the editorial section, it was made clear that the newspaper remained unbowed:
“Ireland, exercising her self-determination has made her choice; she has decided on a definite course of action. She has won her greatest battle…There is no limit to her national development now. The Nationalist was with her in the dark and evil days and will be with her as steadfast in the future. The paper suffered in the past at the hands of the common enemy for its loyalty to principles, and it is regrettable that, in the early days of our new national existence, she has suffered at the hands of fellow workers in the cause, and in a manner foreign to national traditions. It is however consoling to know that the doings in Clonmel have been condemned by the Irish Press and people, and reprobated by the Irish Government, and though many workers have been rendered workless for a time, we have preserved our independence and liberty as Irish journalists and asserted our right to untrammelled freedom and discretion in the work we are engaged in”.
Sources:
Denis G. Marnane and Mary Guinan Darmody, ‘County Tipperary 1921-1923 – a history in 60 documents’, p9.
The Nationalist, 4 February 1922, p5.
Lady Clementina Maude (nee Hawarden) died on this day in 1865. She has been described as ‘the most pioneering Victorian female photographer during the 1860s’ and she began experimenting with photography while living on the family’s Dundrum estate in County Tipperary.
Little is known of Lady Clementina’s life as she didn’t keep a diary and few of her letters survive. We do know that she was the daughter of Admiral Charles Elphinstone Fleeming and Catalina Paulina Alessandro. In 1845,she married Cornwallis Maude, 4th Viscount Hawarden, and they moved to his family’s estate in Dundrum some years later.
It was here in Tipperary that she began to further herinterest in photography, initially by taking stereoscopic images (capturing two slightly offset images to create a 3D effect) of the landscape around Dundrum. After moving back to London, she switched her focus from stereoscopic images of the landscape to standalone images focussing on her daughters.
Hawarden was the first female photographer to receive critical recognition for creating technically perfect prints. She gained many admirers including Lewis Carroll, author of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. She exhibited her work with the Photographic Society of London in 1863 and 1864 and was awarded the Society’s silver medal for both.
Lady Hawarden’s career as a photographer was restricted in two respects by virtue f her being a woman. Firstly, as a woman of her social position it was not considered appropriate for her to sell her photographs.Secondly, being a woman, she was forced to stay at home to work, unlike her male counterparts who would set off to explore distant foreign locations with their camera.
Nevertheless, she pushed new boundaries of art photography with her careful choice of props, clothing and use of mirrors. Her photographs ‘demonstrate immense technical innovation and she became quite the expert on indoor photography’.
Lady Hawarden’s career proved to be very short as she died in 1865 at the age of 42. It has been suggested that her immune system may have been severely compromised from her constant exposure to photographic chemicals. Despite the brevity of her career, she had been prolific- producing 800 photographs in seven years.
Sources:
https://jvc.oup.com/2020/07/24/lady-clementina-hawarden-photographic-pioneer/
https://www.vam.ac.uk/articles/lady-clementina-hawarden-an-introduction
