By Robert Schmuhl, Contributor
February / March 2016

Éamon de Valera, the dominant political figure of Ireland’s 20th century, was an enigmatic figure to the end of his life. 

Éamon de Valera was sentenced to death for his involvement in the 1916 Easter Rising, but, under circumstances that are still a mystery, he escaped the firing squad and was instead shipped off to prison in England.

Later that year, in July, the United States Embassy in London, prompted by requests from de Valera’s relatives in America, contacted the British Home Office for a report on the prisoner’s status and for a statement from him about his citizenship.

Six weeks later, the Governor of Dartmoor Prison passed on the following information from the 33-year-old de Valera: “The prisoner gives New York as his place of birth. He states that he has asked his mother to find out whether his father – who was a Spaniard – became an American citizen. If so, he (the prisoner) claims to be such. If not, he is a Spaniard. He further states that he did not become a British citizen, but he would have become an Irish citizen if that had been possible.”

So then, vehemently not a Brit, and, if he couldn’t be an Irishman, happy to be an American or a Spaniard, de Valera enters public life as something of a mystery man. And, while his political career spanned half a century, and he served as President of the Irish Republic for two terms, from 1959 until 1973, questions about his origins and character continue to be debated today.

Complexities of citizenship aside, a person’s name doesn’t usually demand explanation. But that’s not the case with de Valera.

Born on October 14, 1882, his original birth certificate gave his name as “George de Valero.” A corrected birth certificate for “Edward de Valera” was issued by the State of New York in 1910. In addition to the birth certificates, two baptismal records exist – one for “Edward De Valeros,” and an amended one for “Eamon de Valera.”

De Valera lived in the U.S. for only two years before his mother, Catherine Coll, had her brother Edward take him to Bruree, Co. Limerick, to be raised by members of her family. At the local school, he was enrolled as “Edward Coll,” rather than “Edward de Valera.” And later, “Edward” morphed into “Éamonn,” a result of his participation in the Gaelic League. Then, for several years, “Éamonn” spelled his name with two n’s – but dropped one of them as he became more involved in public life.

During the almost six decades de Valera spent in the hurly-burly of politics, he consciously shaped his identity, which seems to have added to the sense of mystery about him. Making a new name for himself – Éamon – seems to have been the start of that process, one that would continue for years, as he became who he wanted to be seen to be.

De Valera’s first full-time employment was as a mathematics teacher, and he served at several colleges in Ireland. In November of 1913, he joined the Irish Volunteers and later, as the prospect of an insurrection loomed, the secretive, oath-bound Irish Republican Brotherhood.

Interestingly, de Valera harbored serious misgivings about the planning for the Easter Rising, and did not believe he would survive the impending skirmishes with the British Army. In his authorized biography, Éamon de Valera, the Earl of Longford and Thomas P. O’Neill write that, “he felt that death was almost inevitable.”

He survived Easter Week’s fighting, but, following his surrender, he was immediately staring death in the face again, this time by firing squad in Kilmainham Goal. He wrote letters of farewell to his family and friends, so he must have been surprised when he was reprieved, and sent to jail instead.

He was released in 1917, as part of a General Amnesty for Irish political prisoners, and immediately embarked on a career in electoral politics. He became president of Sinn Féin, a post he held until 1926, and he represented Clare in a parliamentary seat until 1959.

In early 1919, Sinn Féin members of the House of Commons formed a revolutionary Irish parliament, known as Dáil Éireann. And in April that year, following another stint in an English prison – and a movie-worthy escape from it – de Valera was elected Priomh Aire (Chief Minister) of the Dáil.

The exciting personal dramas that are part and parcel of de Valera’s life – dodging a firing squad bullet, his daring jailbreak – continued when he stowed away on a ship bound for the U.S., and arrived in New York on June 11, 1919. This was his first trip back to the land of his birth since he was a toddler. His visit lasted 18 months and, during that time, he solidified his reputation in the minds of Irish Americans as being the native son of U.S. soil that would emerge as a major figure in Ireland’s future.

De Valera’s purpose in coming to New York and travelling throughout the U.S. was to promote and get support and recognition for the idea of an Irish republic. He set the message for the visit during his first press conference at the Waldorf Astoria Hotel in New York, when he was introduced as the “President of the Republic of Ireland.”

In his book, With De Valera in America, Patrick McCartan, a Dáil member and Sinn Féin’s representative to the U.S., explained how the title “President of the Republic of Ireland” came about, since in reality, no republic existed. “De Valera pointed out that he was not President of the Republic of Ireland, but only Chairman of the Dáil,” McCartan writes.

But the spin doctors advising de Valera weren’t all that worried about falling foul of the niceties of constitutional law when projecting the best image for him. Since George Washington’s time, Americans had a clear understanding of the role of a president in a republic – he was the democratically elected leader of the state – and that is what de Valera became.

During his time in the U.S., “the president” spoke to massive crowds, raised millions of dollars, and made enemies with two key figures in the Irish-American republican movement – John Devoy and Daniel Cohalan.

While in the U.S., de Valera founded the American Association for Recognition of the Irish Republic as a vehicle to funnel financial support from Americans through his hands. This move angered Devoy, who had long been recognized as the voice of the Irish revolution in America. He used his weekly newspaper, The Gaelic American, to denounce de Valera for his guile, and later nursed a lifelong loathing of him.

Because of de Valera’s imprisonment and sojourn in the U.S., he was away from Ireland for most of the Irish War of Independence, which ended with a truce on July 11, 1921.

The following month, in the Dáil, de Valera pushed for a change to the 1919 Constitution to upgrade his office from prime minister, or chairman of the cabinet, to full president of the Republic. Ironically, two years after his American supporters had bestowed an invented presidential title on him, de Valera now assumed it, even though Ireland wasn’t a republic – and wouldn’t be until 1949. Even so, by making himself head of state he was able to argue that, since the British head of state would not attend the peace conference that led to the Treaty and the partition of Ireland he would not attend either. His maneuverings meant that, when the Treaty proved contentious, he was able to avoid any blame for it, because he had not been at the negotiating table.

When the Treaty was ratified on January 7, 1922, de Valera resigned as president and led a large minority of anti-treaty Sinn Féin T.D.s from the Dáil. By June, the pro- and anti-treaty sides were locked in a civil war that lasted until the following May.

For the first several years of the 26-county Irish Free State, the entity that had been established by the Treaty, de Valera was at odds with his former colleagues in government and struggled politically.

The Curragh Camp is an army base and military college located in The Curragh, County Kildare, Ireland.The Commonwealth War Graves Commission maintains the graves of 104 servicemen who died at the camp during World War I, which are scattered throughout the cemetery

The Curragh was so isolated, which led to stringent regulations about taxi fares. However, the camp was well provided for, recreational facilities (including, for the officers, hunting with the local gentry), several postal deliveries a day (last collection for England at 11 pm), and a daily Mass for Catholics at the East Church. By the end of the 19th century the Camp became a divisional headquarters and soldiers were trained there for fighting in the Boer War.

At the time of the passage of the Home Rule Act in 1914, the Camp became the scene of the Curragh Incident, where a number of officers proposed to resign rather than enforce Home Rule against the will of the Unionists.

After the Anglo-Irish War (21 January 1919 – 11 July 1921) the British Army handed over the Curragh Camp to the Irish Free State Army. The handover took place at 10 o’clock on Tuesday, 16 May 1922 when the camp was handed over to a party of Irish troops commanded by Lieutenant General O’Connell. On Monday evening the Union Flag was lowered for the last time. At 12 o’clock, noon, O’Connell climbed the water tower and hoisted the first tricolour to fly over the Curragh Camp. By tradition the British Army had cut down the flagpole requiring the Irish officers to physically hold the flagpole while the tricolour was raised. Both the Union Flag and the tricolour, which measures 10 ft × 18 ft (3.0 m × 5.5 m) are now preserved in the DFTC.

In 1928 the seven barracks were renamed after the executed leaders of the 1916 Rising, as follows:

• Ponsonby Barracks is now Plunkett Barracks.
• Stewart Barracks is now Connolly Barracks.
• Beresford Barracks is now Ceannt Barracks.
• A.S.C. Barracks is now Clarke Barracks.
• Engineer Barracks is now MacDermott Barracks.
• Gough Barracks is now MacDonagh Barracks.
• Keane Barracks is now Pearse Barracks.

In December 1922 seven men were executed in the Curragh Military Prison. The Leinster Leader of 23 December 1922 reported that a column of ten men had operated against railways, goods trains and shops in the vicinity of Kildare for some time. Five of them had apparently taken part in an attempt to disrupt communications by derailing engines on 11 December. Two engines had been taken from a shed at Kildare and one of them had been sent down the line into an obstruction at Cherryville, thereby blocking the line. It was also alleged that goods trains had been looted and shops robbed in the locality. The same column was also reported to have taken part in an ambush of Free State troops at the Curragh siding on 25 November.

On 13 December the men were surprised in a dug-out at a farmhouse at Moore’s Bridge, on the edge of the Curragh plains, by Free State troops. In the dug-out were ten men, ten rifles, a quantity of ammunition, and other supplies. The men were arrested and conveyed to the Curragh. The proprietress of the farmhouse was also arrested and lodged in Mountjoy Prison.

Controversy surrounds the circumstances of the death of Thomas Behan, one of the men. One version has it that his arm was broken when he was being apprehended and he was subsequently killed by a blow of a rifle butt on the head at the scene of the raid when he was unable to climb on the truck that conveyed the men to the Curragh. The official version was that he was shot when attempting to escape from a hut in which he was detained in the Curragh Camp.

Those that were executed:

• Stephen White (18) Abbey Street, Kildare
• Joseph Johnston (18) Station Road, Kildare
• Patrick Mangan (22) Fair Green, Kildare
• Patrick Nolan (34) Rathbride, Kildare
• Brian Moore (37) Rathbride, Kildare
• James O’Connor (24) Bansha, Co. Tipperary
• Patrick Bagnall (19) Fair Green, Kildare

A memorial to the executed men can be found in Kildare Town.

But then, in 1926, De Valera was instrumental in founding Fianna Fáil and, when it became the largest party in the Dáil, following the general election of 1932, he was appointed President of the Executive Council.

In that role, essentially prime minister of parliament – the title was changed to “Taoiseach” in late 1937.

The camp was used as a military detention centre for civil war prisoners and, later, members and suspected members of the Anti-Treaty IRA were interned on occasions between the 1920s and the 1950s. These included journalists who criticised the British rule.

Irish Republican Army internees

During The Emergency (1939-1946), internment of republicans was again instituted by the Fianna Fáil Government of Éamon de Valera. As a result, IRA members who were arrested by the Garda Síochána were interned in the Curragh for the duration of hostilities. The camp was usually called Tin Town (Baile an Stáin or an Bhaile Stáin) by the internees. According to historian Tim Pat Coogan, around 2,000 IRA men passed time in the internment camp during the war years.

According to Coogan,

“Gaeltachts, peopled entirely by Irish- speaking internees, were set up and Máirtín Ó Cadhain ran highly successful language classes. Other prisoners who had more education than these fellows gave tutorials in their own special subjects, and many a young country lad who had left school at age twelve emerged from the Curragh with a far better education than he could possibly have acquired any other way.”

Also according to Coogan, the years in internment left a great mark on the IRA veterans who remained there long term.

“Most men, on leaving the internment camp, were so unable to deal with ordinary life that it took upwards of six before any of them could screw up their courage to do normal things such as signing on at the Labour Exchange to draw unemployment benefits or applying for jobs. Even to cross the road was a terrible effort, the traffic, thin anough after the war, seemed fantastic after the years in the Curragh. The difference in women’s fashion frightened them and added to the general air of unfamiliarity. After years in confinement with adult men, children seemed fragile and small scale. Most remained republicans in sympathy, but had no means of solving the border problem. Some were broken and turned to drink or had nervous breakdowns.”

Internment of belligerents

It was also used to intern Allied and Axis personnel who had found themselves in Ireland during World War II. There were three sections in the camp at the time: one each for the IRA, Allied airmen and German mariners and airmen.

British personnel were interned at the Curragh, whereas US personnel were repatriated due to an agreement between the Irish and US governments, though one US citizen, whose nationality had been stripped by the US Government for fighting with the British (in No. 133 Squadron RAF) prior to the US entry to the war, was also interned. The British and US “Internees” at the Curragh were not always strictly contained, and many were allowed to attend social events outside the detention camp,own bicycles and travel into Dublin under supervision.^[Some of those interned at the Curragh eventually married into the area and remained in Ireland after the war, while others return frequently to maintain local contact.

There is a movie about the World War II detention camp, called “The Brylcreem Boys”

De Valera was head of the Irish government from March 9, 1932, until February 18, 1948.

The policy of Irish neutrality during World War II was adopted by the Oireachtas at the instigation of the Taoiseach Éamon de Valera upon the outbreak of World War II in Europe. It was maintained throughout the conflict, in spite of several German air raids by aircraft that missed their intended British targets and attacks on Ireland’s shipping fleet by Allies and Axis alike. De Valera refrained from joining either the Allies or Axis powers. While the possibility of not only a German but also a British invasion were discussed in the Dáil, and either eventuality was prepared for, with the most detailed preparations being done in tandem with the Allies under Plan W, De Valera’s ruling party, Fianna Fáil, supported his neutral policy for the duration of the war.

This period is known in the Republic of Ireland as the Emergency, owing to the wording of the constitutional article employed to suspend normal government of the country.

Pursuing a policy of neutrality required attaining a balance between the strict observance of non-alignment and the taking of practical steps to repel or discourage an invasion from either of the two concerned parties.

Despite the official position of neutrality, there were many unpublicised contraventions of this, such as permitting the use of the Donegal Corridor to Allied military aircraft, and extensive co-operation between Allied and Irish intelligence, including exchanges of information, such as detailed weather reports of the Atlantic Ocean. For example, the decision to go ahead with the Normandy landings was decided by a weather report from Blacksod Bay, County Mayo..

Later, in the 1950s, he served two more times as Taoiseach, prior to being elected head of state, as President of Ireland, in 1959.

Taken together, he was either head of government, or head of state, for a remarkable 35 years between 1932 and 1973, and to call this period “The Age of de Valera” is no understatement.

During his time at center stage, de Valera always kept an eye on the republic of his birth. He went on speaking and fundraising tours in the U.S. during the late 1920s to build support for his new Fianna Fáil party and himself.

During his visits, the issue as to whether his American citizenship had helped him escape a firing squad in 1916 became a recurrent story in the press, and the meme that an Irish rebel commandant was saved from British Army injustice because they had to bow to his U.S. heritage, was a popular one in Irish America, and even more broadly.

It’s a story that continued to engage. When John Kennedy, U.S. President, visited Ireland in 1963, he talked to de Valera about it the last night the American presidential party was in Dublin. In their book Johnny, We Hardly Knew Ye, Kennedy aides Kenneth P. O’Donnell and David F. Powers report that he asked his Irish host why he had not been shot in 1916.

“De Valera explained that he had lived in Ireland since his early childhood,” they write, “but he was born in New York City, and because of his American citizenship, the British were reluctant to kill him.”

Six years later, however, de Valera had changed his mind, if not the facts. He wrote: “The fact that I was born in America would not have saved me.” He added: “I have not the slightest doubt that my reprieve in 1916 was due to the fact that my court martial and sentence came late.”

Was the president of Ireland, then 86, privy to new information? Or was he continuing the process of shaping a preferred identity, this time one that would be seen not as half-Spaniard or half-American, but as completely Irish.

While de Valera did, in the end, become a world statesman and a quintessentially Irish leader who steered the nation he had helped create for most of his life, when biographers, historians, and journalists study his legacy, the footnote to an amazing life that never fails to engage them is, whether his seemingly miraculous escape in 1916, was due to an accident of birth, the slow grinding of his court martial, or simply pure blind luck.

Since the man himself gave two different reasons, at two different times, to account for his salvation, there’s every likelihood it will still be an engaging footnote another hundred years from now, and de Valera, man of mystery, will still be an enigma. ♦

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Robert Schmuhl is the inaugural Walter H. Annenberg-Edmund P. Joyce Chair of American Studies and Journalism at the University of Notre Dame, where he is also director of the John W. Gallivan Program in Journalism, Ethics & Democracy. The author or editor of a dozen books, his most recent is Ireland’s Exiled Children: America and the Easter Rising, published by Oxford University Press. His article in this issue is adapted from the chapter about Éamon de Valera in that book.