Professor Terence Dooley, Director, Centre for the Study of Historic Irish Houses and Estates, History Department, Maynooth University, and Nicola Kelly, Archivist, OPW-Maynooth University Archive and Research Centre, Castletown House.
Recruitment Fervour
In the summer of 1914 many Big House families in Ireland had been preparing, through the Unionist movement, to fight the implementation of Home Rule, in Ulster by force if necessary. However, just as Ireland seemed on the brink of civil war, attentions were turned to a European conflict of unimaginable magnitude. Elizabeth Bowen recalled a garden party at Mitchelstown Castle on 5 August 1914:
‘This was a time to gather…for miles round, each isolated big house had disgorged its talker, this first day of the war. The tension of months, of years – outlying tension of Europe, inner tensions of Ireland – broke in a spate of words.’
But those who had gathered scarcely realised the social, physical and emotional impact that total warfare would have on their families in the years ahead. Scores of relatives would go to war and many would never return; more would enthusiastically sacrifice their time, finances and energies to the war effort at home; and virtually all would be disgusted by the events of Easter Week 1916.
The enthusiastic response of the gentry was, in many respects, the natural response of a class with long traditions of military service, keen to get to the Front to do their duty to the empire. In 1916, a frustrated Arthur Maxwell, later Lord Farnham, wrote to a friend: ‘They don’t seem to be in a bit of a hurry to send me out bad luck to them…I had a letter from [?] the other day and he told me he was off. Lucky divel!’
On 3 August 1914, the leader of the Irish Parliamentary Party, John Redmond, told the House of Commons that ‘we offer to the government of the day that they may take their troops away, and that if it is allowed to us, in comradeship with our brethren in the north, we would ourselves defend the coasts of our country.’
Redmond’s speech had a profound impact on southern Unionists. In the days after, Sir John Keane of Cappoquin House appealed to all classes and religions ‘to pull together without prejudice to their political opinions’ so that at the war’s end they might discover that ‘political differences are not so acute as they appeared in the past’.
William Upton Tyrrell of Ballindoolin House in Kildare entered the Royal Military Academy at Sandhurst on the 15 April 1915, and subsequently joined the 3rd Reserve Battalion of the Royal Irish Rifles. During his training at the Royal Military Academy, he received news that he was second on the list for the Front; in a letter to his father, he exclaimed: ‘Hurrah! Hurrah! Hurrah! I am 2nd on the list for the front!’ Tyrrell was sent to France in March 1916 and was promoted to 2nd Lieutenant of the Royal Irish Rifles.
Unreturned Army
The novelty of war began to wear off as casualties mounted; William Upton Tyrrell sent sombre news of comrades who had died on active service: ‘there is no trace of poor Morgan & he certainly could not have been taken prisoner, I am afraid there is no hope.’ In the later stages of the War, Tyrrell longed to be transferred to the Royal Air Force, and was delighted when his transfer was approved in May 1918. He spent the final months of 1918 as a reconnaissance observer with the 22nd Squadron, Bristol Fighters.
Of 519 families listed for Ireland in Burke’s Landed Gentry of Ireland and Peerage & Baronetage, 82 per cent were represented at the Front by at least one member. Of those who served, around 25 per cent were killed in action or later died of wounds. The Irish gentry contributed proportionately far more than any other social group; as Ian d’Alton has noted, one-in-four gentry families suffered fatal casualties, compared to one-in-thirty of all Irish families during the Great War.
Hundreds of men returned home physically wounded, or mentally scarred for life. The role of the women of the Big House became vitally important as they acted as nurses and auxiliaries with the Voluntary Aid Detachment. It was said of Letitia Overend of Airfield, Dundrum that she ‘never tired of working for the poor wounded soldiers’.
Letitia was thirty-four when the First World War broke out. She recorded in her diary on 4 August 1914: ‘England declares War on Germany at 11pm.’ She spent her free time as a member of the Alexandra College Branch of Saint John Ambulance Brigade, rising to the position of Chief Superintendent of the Nursing Division.
Throughout the duration of the War, Letitia volunteered at the Irish War Hospital Supply Depot in Merrion Square, sending medical supplies to war hospitals. The Overends offered to care for convalescing soldiers at their home in Airfield. In 1916, Letitia noted in her diary: ‘bought cigarettes and chocolate for soldiers today.’ She was created Dame of Justice for the Order of Saint John in 1955, and in 1961 she was awarded an Honorary Doctorate from Trinity College Dublin for her extensive work with various charities.
Consequences of War
For some families, the death of an heir(s) had huge consequences. On 25 September 1915 at the Battle of Loos, Charles Annesley Acton of Kilmacurragh House was killed. His estate passed to his only surviving brother, Reginald who was also killed at the Battle of Ypres in May 1916. Thus, over an eight-year period Kilmacurragh had three successive owners and the death duties amounted to 120% of the value of the estate. The financial pressure became too much for Reginald’s widow and after 200 years of residence the Acton family left Kilmacurragh.
From 1918 the Irish gentry supported organisations such as the British Red Cross which, for example, provided advanced equipment for the Blackrock Special Orthopaedic Hospital, open from 1917 to 1931. Even after independence, some like the Marquis of Ormonde and Lady Bellingham served on War Pensions Committees to administer to the financial, medical and re-training needs of veterans in their localities, or on Free State advisory committees to the British Ministry of Pensions.
The Country House and the Great War Exhibition is a collaborative effort between the Centre for the Study of Historic Irish Houses and Estates (History Department), and the OPW-Maynooth University Archive and Research Centre at Maynooth University. As part of Maynooth University’s Commemoration 2018 Programme, it offers a unique perspective of the Great War, focusing on the experience of Big House families, on this the 100th nniversary of Armistice. The exhibition draws on material from more than ten country house archives, most of them now in the keeping of OMARC, the University Library and the CSHIHE, and it displays previously un-exhibited material from the archives of Ballindoolin House, Co. Kildare and Airfield, Dundrum.
The Exhibition is on display in the Russell Library for Culture Night on Friday 21 September and until 28 September.
On 4 October, the exhibition will be officially launched in the University Library at 7.15 p.m. The launch will be preceded by a talk at 6pm in Maynooth University Library by Dr Ian d’Alton,‘“The Unreasoning Adventure”: How the Great War Took the Irish Gentry Prisoner’, and accompanied by a reception.
Anyone interested in attending should RSVP to library.bookings@mu.ie before 27 September.
This exhibition has been supported by the University Executive as part of Maynooth University’s Commemoration Committee 2018 programme, and by The Ireland Funds, and the OPW.
MU Library Treasures 