Willie Redmond: time has come to settle the Irish Question
London, 16 December 1916 - The time has come for a full and satisfactory settlement of the Irish Question, said Major Willie Redmond in the House of Commons yesterday.
Major Redmond noted the excellent relations that existed between all Irishmen serving in the British Army on the Western Front.
He said: ‘Officers and men from Ulster and the other provinces had been in very close contact recently, and it was a remarkable thing that there had been nothing but the very best feeling between those who, in times of political controversy, were bitterly opposed to each other, but in the face of the common enemy they were brother Irishmen.’
‘Surely, if it were possible for them to sink their religious and political differences it ought to be possible for men holding similar views to come to an arrangement which would make it possible for Ireland in future to be governed in a satisfactory way, and make the recurrence of recent unfortunate events absolutely impossible.’
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Documents relating to a meeting held on Merrion Square, on 8 December 1916, calling for a settlement to the Irish Question. Click to enlarge. (Images: National Archives of Ireland, CSO/RP, 1916, 23488)
Major Redmond said that a proper settlement would make all Irishmen of different political backgrounds more ready to enlist and fight for the Empire.
He appealed to representatives of Ulster ‘to give up the memories of historical events, the Boyne and all the rest’.
He said that nationalists, for their part, would give up their celebrations and ‘would build up out of this war a newer and better country north and south, Catholic and Protestant, based on the recognition that all were Irishmen.’
Major Redmond continued: ‘If they could come together they were as capable of governing as were the citizens of any other part of the Empire.’
[Editor's note: This is an article from Century Ireland, a fortnightly online newspaper, written from the perspective of a journalist 100 years ago, based on news reports of the time.]
