Inghinidhe na hÉireann

Inghinidhe na hÉireann (‘daughters of Ireland’), nationalist women's organization founded by Maud Gonne in 1900. It grew out of the Patriotic Children's Treat Committee, created to provide a nationalist reponse to the Phoenix Park treat organized for children during Queen Victoria's visit in the same year. The Inghinidhe were proactively nationalist—as well as running Irish classes, and putting on plays and tableaux vivants, they promoted Irish‐manufactured goods and opposed recruitment to the British army. Their newspaper, Bean na hÉireann, appeared 1908–11; among other things it supported the introduction of school meals in 1908, going against the Catholic church and majority opinion in the Nationalist party. It also supported women's suffrage, though it prioritized national independence. Many of the women prominent in the non‐parliamentary nationalist movement from 1912—Constance Markievicz, Helena Molony, Louise Gavan Duffy—started off in the Inghinidhe, as did acctresses Sara Allgood and Máire O'Neill, cartoonist Grace Gifford, journalist Sydney Gifford, and many others. IE took part in the meeting of all Irish women's organizations to consider the failure of the conciliation bill on women's suffrage in 1912. Cumann na mBan, if it did not actually replace IE, became the major magnet for nationalist women after 1914.

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