‘An inspiration to all who gaze upon it’

Speaking at the golden jubilee meeting of the Workers’ Union of Ireland (WUI) in September 1974, historian F.X. Martin supported the union’s attempt to have a monument erected on Dublin’s O’Connell Street in memory of James Larkin, the WUI’s inaugural general secretary from 1924 to 1947: ‘This burly, brass-throated orator with the magnificent frame which … Read more

Labour in waiting: the after-effects of the Dublin Lockout

In the short term, the Lockout was a pyrrhic victory for the employers. They did not abandon their central demand, the ban on Irish Transport and General Workers’ Union (ITGWU) members, but only its inspirer, Murphy, and a few others enforced it. The union was weaker but it survived. Its example inspired workers to organise … Read more

‘Bad, sad specimens of the human race’: nationalist opinion and the striking workers of 1913

Throughout the winter of 1913 the unskilled workers of Dublin were persistently labelled in print by respectable Catholic opinion as ‘scum’, ‘roughs’, ‘degenerates’ and ‘undesirables’. A brief review of provincial nationalist opinion reveals the profound antagonism towards the strikers’ plight and the visceral contempt for their very struggle to survive, indicative of the deep social … Read more

Policing the Lockout: the role of the DMP

Labour-related violence plagued Dublin from February 1913 to February 1914. During August and September 1913 alone there were fifteen distinct and separate riots, a number of which resulted in large-scale clashes between workers and the Dublin Metropolitan Police (DMP). Twelve occurred on Saturday 30 and Sunday 31 August (five and seven respectively). The findings of … Read more

Dublin Metropolitan Police batons

caption id=”attachment_18133″ align=”alignleft” width=”300″] Lar Joye on the weapons that made their mark on the streets of Dublin in 1913.[/caption] ‘Every afternoon a troop of policemen marched in solemn and majestic single file from the College Street police station. At regular intervals, one by one, a policeman stepped sideways from the file, adjusted his belt, … Read more