Éamon de Valera: A Will to Power

328 Pages·2015·6.515 MB·English

by  Ronan Fanning

Éamj3fr^e,ÿajéra: a WШ to Power
by the same author
FATAL path: BRITISH GOVERNMENT AND IRISH REVOLUTION
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Earn on de Valera
A WILL TO POWER
Ronan Fanning
FABER & FABER
First published in 2015
by Faber and Faber Limited
Bloomsbury House
74-77 Great Russell Street
London WC1B 3DA
Typeset by Agnesi Text
Printed in the UK by CPI Group (UK) Ltd, Croydon cro 4YY
All rights reserved
© Ronan Fanning, 2015
Map © Richard Curry, Circus Graphic Design
The right of Ronan Fanning to be identified as author of this work
has been asserted in accordance with Section 77 of the Copyright,
Designs and Patents Act 1988
A CIP record for this book
is available from the British Library
ISBN 978-0-571-31205-4
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In memory of
Virginia
and our four decades together

Contents
List of Illustrations ix
Map: Éamon de Valera’s Homes in Blackrock xi
Introduction l
1 From Bruree to Blackrock 3
2 The Greening of Edward de Valera 20
3 Éamon de Valera and the 1916 Rising 34
4 The Assumption of Power, 1916-19 47
5 Mission to America, 1919-20 70
6 1921: War and Peace 89
7 Catastrophe 108
8 A Glass Wall 130
9 The Path Back to Power 143
io The Attainment of Independence, 1932-8 159
il Independence Affirmed: Neutrality in
World War II 182
12 De Valera’s Ireland 199
13 Marking Time, 1948-59 225
14 Last Laps, 1959-75 246
Conclusion 260
References 271
Select Bibliography 288
Acknowledgements 293
Index 295
vii

List of Illustrations
Unless otherwise stated, all images are reproduced
by kind permission of UCD-OFM Partnership.
1 Éamon de Valera waving to crowds in New York, 1919-20
2 Catherine (Kate) Coll, de Valera’s mother
3 Edward (Ned) Coll, de Valeras uncle
4 De Valera at school in his last year in Charleville in 1898
and at Blackrock College in 1899
5 De Valera with the teaching staff at Rockwell College in 1903
6 De Valera with a hunting rifle at Rockwell, 1904
7 Éamon de Valera and Sinéad Flanagan on their wedding
day, 8 January 1910
8 Commandant de Valera leading the 3rd Battalion of
the Dublin Brigade of the Irish Volunteers under escort
by British troops to Ballsbridge Barracks after his surrender
on 29 April 1916
9 De Valera with cheering supporters at the East Clare
by-election in July 1917
10 De Valera with Richard Mulcahy and Cathal Brugha
on the morning of 6 December 1921, the day of
de Valera’s decision to oppose the Anglo-Irish Treaty
signed in London hours earlier
11 De Valera and Arthur Griffith in Dublin, 13 August 1921
12 De Valera en route to speak at Ennis on 15 August when
he was arrested by Irish Free State troops
IX
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
13 De Valera with J. W. Dulanty en route to a meeting of the
Council of the League of Nations in Geneva in 1932
(Source: Central News)
14 De Valera with Malcolm MacDonald on 24 April 1938»
the day before de Valera signed the Anglo-Irish agreements
that represented his greatest diplomatic achievement
15 De Valera with Winston Churchill in London in 1953
(Source: The Irish News Agency)
16 De Valera in New Delhi in June 1948 with the Indian prime
minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, and Lady Edwina Mountbatten,
the wife of the Governor-General
(Source: Press Information Bureau, Government of India)
17 De Valera with Joseph P. Walshe and Frank Aiken during
a visit to the Vatican in 1950
18 President de Valera kissing the ring of the Catholic
Archbishop of Dublin, John Charles McQuaid, at the
cutting of the first sod for the science building in
University College Dublin on 7 June 1962
19 President de Valera with John F. Kennedy during
the US president’s visit to Ireland in June 1963
(John Dominis/The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images)
20 General Charles de Gaulle with President de Valera
at Aras an Uachtarâin in June 1969