Irish Civil War

Irish Civil War (1922–3), fought between two factions of the republican movement over the acceptance of the Anglo‐Irish treaty. Although widely supported by the population, the treaty split Sinn Féin and the IRA. The pro‐treaty side dominated the political arena and established the Provisional Government, while the majority of the IRA went anti‐treaty and became known as the Irregulars. The latter included the most experienced and numerically strongest units from the south‐west and Dublin. The factionalism and local independence which had developed in the Anglo‐Irish War allowed individual units to go against the decision of the politicians and their own central leadership regarding the treaty. The long stand‐off which followed its signing gave invaluable time to the Provisional Government under Michael Collins to set up an army with the aid of the British government, undermining the initial numerical superiority of the Irregulars.

Hostilities finally broke out on 28 June 1922 when government troops attacked the headquarters of the Irregulars in the Four Courts building. The factionalism of the Irregulars seriously affected their success on the battlefield. Due to a lack of co‐ordination their opponents were able to take out their strongholds one by one. Fighting in Dublin was over in less than two weeks, and by August the pro‐treaty side had taken control of all the urban areas. The Irregulars then reverted to the guerrilla tactics employed during the Anglo‐Irish War, but despite some initial successes they were virtually defeated by December. The stringent measures taken by the government, including large‐scale internment and the introduction in September of the death penalty for those found in possession of arms, played a major part in this process. However, an end to the hostilities became possible only after the death of Liam Lynch, the irreconcilable chief of staff of the Irregulars. His successor Frank Aiken called a unilateral ceasefire on 30 April 1923, and on 24 May 1923 the IRA ordered its men to dump their arms and wait for another day.

Although the fighting now stopped there was no negotiated peace and consequently the Civil War was never officially ended. Recent research has revealed that the Civil War not as bloody as previously thought. After a summer of heavy fighting, the number of casualties dropped sharply, leaving a total of 927 people dead by June 1923, including 77 executed by the government. Nevertheless, the depth of the divisions left a lasting legacy on the Irish political scene.

In historiography the Civil War has long been treated as the consequence of the actions of individuals, or alternatively as an inevitable result of the independence struggle which had brought a disparate group of people together. Both the inevitability of the Civil War and the crucial role of individuals in its making are now slowly being contested, but the legacy of the conflict is still so divisive that historical research remains far behind that into the Anglo‐Irish War.

Bibliography

Kissane, Bill , The Politics of the Irish Civil War (2005)
Garvin, Tom , 1922: The Birth of Irish Democracy (1996)
Hopkinson, Michael , Green against Green: The Irish Civil War (1988)

Joost Augusteijn