Disquieting Scenes in Inch, Co. Clare

On the Great Famine National Commemoration Day a group of people gathered in St. Mary’s Cemetery, Athy to remember those who died in the local Workhouse during the famine years of the 1840s and later. Events in Dublin and County Clare during the previous week prompted remembrance of the million and a half Irish men, women and children who left Ireland during the 1840s to seek refuge in America or Great Britain. How many left Athy or South Kildare for a new life overseas during those years we cannot say. What we do know is that those Irish who sought refuge in America was subjected to harassment and rejection by many Americans who came together in what was known as the ‘Know Nothing Party’. In England but not so much so in Wales or Scotland the Irish who sought refuge were subjected to rejection which was highlighted by notices such as ‘blacks or Irish need not apply’. I wonder did the people of Inch, Co. Clare who appeared to have been given free rein by the Garda Siochana to block with impunity access to public roads, think of the times when their ancestors were refugees. County Clare was like most western seashore counties severely affected by the failure of the potato crop from 1845 onwards. In the Kilrush union area almost 900 houses were knocked down and made uninhabitable between November 1847 and July 1848 by landlords seeking to limit their contribution to the Board of Guardians annual expense. Almost 4,000 men, women and children were left without homes as a result and those who did not enter the local Workhouse struggled to flee Ireland. It was a scene replicated almost 40 years later in the same county of Clare when evictions started on the Bodyke Estate in East Clare in June 1887. The following year the Vandeleur evictions in Kilrush took place. The two evictions are well remembered, especially in County Clare, as are the Luggacurran evictions of the same period which are remembered here in Athy. How some women and men of County Clare acted in recent weeks in opposing refugees being placed in their area is a sad acknowledgement that they have not learned any lesson from their own past history. During the Bodyke evictions Clare women played a leading part in opposing the bailiffs. Indeed at Court hearings following the evictions 22 out of the 26 persons were charged with assault or obstructing the bailiffs were women. Michael Davitt, founder of the Land League, later presented medals to the Bodyke women to show his appreciation for their courageous stand against the landlord, Colonel O’Callaghan, the bailiffs and the R.I.C. who were in attendance at the evictions. The disquieting scenes in Inch, Co. Clare were a reversal of the roles played out by the women of County Clare in the 1880s. There will be no medals for the Clare women folk or their men folk whose stand against refugees is a reminder of what faced the Irish refugees who arrived in America and Great Britain during and after the Great Famine. What I wondered is one to make of the standoff by the Gardai, whose leader Commissioner Drew Harris, seemed to see merit in not dealing with the public ‘road blockers’ by claiming that the Garda inaction showed that the Gardai Siochana was not reacting to ‘right wing forces’. I am frankly puzzled by the Garda Commissioner’s comments and surprised at the failure of the Garda Siochana to deal with the Co. Clare blockades as they are empowered to do by law. There is a perceptible lack of morale amongst many present members of the Garda Siochana. Recruitment to the force is at a low level, while many relatively new members of the Gardai have resigned within the last year or two. The recent decision of the Office of the Director of Public Prosecution to proffer charges against an unnamed Garda following the death of three criminals during a pursuit on the motorway adds further to the concerns of serving Gardai. The Garda in question who put his/her own life at risk in an attempt to arrest criminals now finds himself/herself subject to legal sanction. No wonder Garda morale throughout the country is at a low ebb. James Durney, Historian in Residence for County Kildare has produced another superb book, this time a biographical dictionary of republican activists from County Kildare. His work covers the 10 years between 1913 and 1923 and has been published with the assistance of the Royal Irish Academy and the County Kildare Decade of Commemoration Committee. The Committee has done wonderful work during the past decade, with several publications which have opened up previously unknown aspects of our local history. The latest publication ‘Stand You Now for Ireland’s Cause’ will be the subject of a future Eye on the Past. In the meantime the book is for sale in all good Irish book shops.