Ecclesiastes urges – “Let us now praise famous men and our fathers who begat us.”. It seems to me that some people think he meant that we should Brown-Nose every man or woman with a title or a gong, a castle or a big car or a. prominent profile in the media, whatever their merits or de-merits. You may have read my BLOG – “Good Times, Bad Times and Dirty Rotten Scoundrel Times, focussing. on THE TIMES of London. And the previous BLOG letting you know that the monthly Irish Democrat issues from 1939 to 2000 were available on line, free, gratis and for nothing. None of its contributors was paid a penny, nor any of its distributors, often the same persons, who trudged around Camden Town, Kilburn and Stockwell in London in all weathers on Saturday nights, and in other towns and cities in Britain, selling the paper in the pubs. Its Editor, Desmond Greaves advised me that our typical readers would as soon read the racing or football pages of other papers as look at our offerings and that trying to ape Bernard Levin’s hi-falutin’ style in THE TIMES was a mistake. Desmond, a first-class research chemist used earn over £1,000 a year in his early 20s, before the Second World War and, after working in Woolwich Arsenal during that conflict worked full time as a political agitator, organiser and writer for next to no remuneration. There were many altruistic, committed men and women associated with the movement campaigning for amongst other good causes for safety on building sites, the release of the Birmingham Six and other victims of miscarriages of justice. They got no Knighthoods, nor Vice-Chancellorships in Oxbridge, nor TV accolades, nor would they have accepted them if offered. You might say that they worked PRO BONO before that expression came to mean something cheap.
You may have read the piece on Brexit and on Britain’s centuries old game-playing with Europe published in CHURCH AND STATE, a quarterly Irish History Magazine & cultural review of Ireland and the world. It is published by the Irish Political Review Group and edited by Pat Maloney. The. Group Publishes the monthly Irish Political Review and the Quarterly Irish Foreign Affairs. Neither the Editors. nor contributors are paid a penny you for their work. In addition they have reissued key works necessary for an informed study of modern Irish History. It appears to not be fully appreciated that the Defence of the Realm Act, the Official Secrets Act, and various British decrees restricted and suppressed free speech, freedom of association, and freedom of the Press in Ireland and that journalists were imprisoned and even murdered by Crown Forces. The elected Parliament of Ireland established THE IRISH BULLETIN in 1919 and effectively informed journalists and politicians throughout the world of conditions in Ireland. At that time THE IRISH TIMES printed handouts from the British administration, masquerading as its own journalism. Neither Academic Historians in Ireland, nor today’s professional journalists have bothered to examine the Bulletin, even to pick holes in it. Those involved in its production included Lawrence Ginnell, Erskine Childers, Robert Brennan, Desmond Fitzgerald and Frank Gallagher – a galaxy of stars, and they risked their lives in doing so. Three volumes, covering July 1919 to January 1921 have been reprinted by the Belfast Historical and Educational Society and the Aubane Historical Society (which are associated with the Irish Political Review Group and further volumes will follow covering the period up to December 1921 when Articles of Agreement (miscalled “The Treaty” were signed in London. The 3 Volumes published so far cover almost 1700 pages. The Bulletin was a publication that any self-respecting nation would be proud of and is a fundamental requirement for an understanding of the founding of an Irish democracy. But its reproduction, an exacting task has been left to concerned private citizens.
Ireland and Ireland’s friends owe a debt of gratitude to Jack Lane, Chairman of the Aubane Historical Society and his helpers, including Jenny O’Connor, Sean McGouran, Cathy Winch, Philip O’Connor and Angela and Brendan Clifford. Praiseworthy Men and Women.
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