"Leopold Kerney was one of the most important Irish ambassadors to several European nations during the tumultuous 1920s and 1930s, and was accordingly drawn into much of the strife and diplomatic intrigue of that era. He is the subject of this book, as the work and life of Kerney is scrutinized and contextualized. Kerney had dealings in Paris during World War I, navigated a complex diplomatic climate in Franco-era Spain, and had perilous encounters with German military intelligence during World War II"--

Leopold Kerney was one of the most influential diplomats of twentieth-century Irish history. This book presents the first comprehensive biography of Kerney's career in its entirety from his recruitment to the diplomatic service to his time in France, Spain, Argentina, and Chile. Barry Whelan’s work provides fascinating new perceptions of Irish diplomatic history at seminal periods of the twentieth century, including the War of Independence, the Irish Civil War, the Anglo-Irish Economic War, the Spanish Civil War, and World War II, from an eyewitness to those events. Drawing on over a decade of archival research in repositories in France, Germany, Britain, Spain, and Ireland, as well as through unique and unrestricted access to Kerney's private papers, Whelan successfully challenges previously published analyses of Kerney's work and debunks many of the perceived controversies surrounding his career. Ireland's Revolutionary Diplomat brings to life Kerney's connections with leading Irish figures from the revolutionary generation including Michael Collins, Ernest Blythe, George Gavan Duffy, Desmond FitzGerald, Arthur Griffith, and Seán T. O’Kelly, as well as his diplomatic colleagues in the service. More importantly, the book illuminates the decades-long friendship Kerney enjoyed with Éamon de Valera—the most important Irish political figure of the twentieth century—and shows how the "Chief" trusted and rewarded his friend throughout their long association. The book offers a fresh understanding of the Department of External Affairs and critically assesses the roles of Joseph Walshe, secretary of the department, as well as Colonel Dan Bryan, director of G2 (Irish Army Military Intelligence), who both conspired to destroy Kerney's reputation and career during and after World War II. Whelan sheds new light on other events in Kerney's career, such as his confidential reports from fascist Spain that exposed General Francisco Franco's crimes against his people. Whelan challenges other events previously seen by some historians as controversial, including Kerney’s major role in the Frank Ryan case, his contact with senior Nazi figures, especially Dr. Edmund Veesenmayer and German military intelligence, and his libel case against an acclaimed Irish historian Professor Desmond Williams. This book offers new observations on how Nazi Germany tried to utilize Kerney, unsuccessfully, as a liaison between the Irish government and Hitler’s regime. Captured German documents reveal the extent of this secret plan to alter Irish neutrality during World War II, which concerned both Adolf Hitler and the leading Nazis of his regime.

“Finely researched and lucidly written . . . details the rise, ebb, and flow of the idea of a common Celtic identity linking Ireland and Wales.” —The New York Review of Books Who are the Celts, and what does it mean to be Celtic? In this book, Caoimhín De Barra focuses on nationalists in Ireland and Wales between 1860 and 1925, a time period when people in these countries came to identify themselves as Celts. De Barra chooses to examine Ireland and Wales because, of the six so-called Celtic nations, these two were the furthest apart in terms of their linguistic, religious, and socioeconomic differences. The Coming of the Celts, AD 1860 is divided into three parts. The first concentrates on the emergence of a sense of Celtic identity and the ways in which political and cultural nationalists in both countries borrowed ideas from one another in promoting this sense of identity. The second part follows the efforts to create a more formal relationship between the Celtic countries through the Pan-Celtic movement; the subsequent successes and failures of this movement in Ireland and Wales are compared and contrasted. Finally, the book discusses the public juxtaposition of Welsh and Irish nationalisms during the Irish Revolution. De Barra’s is the first book to critique what “Celtic” has meant historically, and it sheds light on the modern political and cultural connections between Ireland and Wales, as well as modern Irish and Welsh history. It will also be of interest to professional historians working in the field of “Four Nations” history, which places an emphasis on understanding the relationships and connections between the four nations of Britain and Ireland.

First of the Small Nations traces the ideas and aspirations of the revolutionary generation in Ireland from the 1890s to 1918 who dreamt of an independent Irish state and imagined how an Irish foreign policy might look. It follows attempts to put these ideas into practice during the campaign for independence and how they evolved into the first Irish foreign policy in the decade after independence. During these years, efforts were focused on asserting the young Irish state's independence as it pushed out the boundaries of Commonwealth membership, made a contribution at the League of Nations, and forged ties in Europe and America. Many of the ideas that continue to shape Irish foreign policy - small state and European country; honest broker and international good citizen; mother-country with a diaspora and bridge between Europe and America - have their roots in this period. There is a strong modern and internationalist vein running through Irish nationalism, including outside ideas on how the international order should be arranged - from the desire to pursue a policy based on values, to attempts to create an international rationale for independence, and an understanding of the influence of public opinion. First of the Small Nations also shines a light on interwar European relations and how small states managed their affairs in a world system dominated by their larger neighbours. Drawing on a rich vein of archival sources and private papers, this study charts the beginnings of Irish foreign policy and the aspiration to be 'first of the small nations'.

This book focuses on how Irish remembrance of the First World War impacted the emerging Irish identity in the postcolonial Irish Free State. While all combatants of the “war to end all wars” commemorated the war, Irish memorial efforts were fraught with debate over Irish identity and politics that frequently resulted in violence against commemorators and World War I veterans. The book examines the Flanders poppy, the Victory and Armistice Day parades, the National War Memorial, church memorials, and private remembrances. Highlighting the links between war, memory, empire and decolonization, it ultimately argues that the Great War, its commemorations, and veterans retained political potency between 1914 and 1937 and were a powerful part of early Free State life.

The historian A. T. Q. Stewart once remarked that in Ireland all history is applied history—that is, the study of the past prosecutes political conflict by other means. Indeed, nearly twenty years after the 1998 Belfast Agreement, "dealing with the past" remains near the top of the political agenda in Northern Ireland. The essays in this volume, by leading experts in the fields of Irish and British history, politics, and international studies, explore the ways in which competing "social" or "collective memories" of the Northern Ireland "Troubles" continue to shape the post-conflict political landscape. The contributors to this volume embrace a diversity of perspectives: the Provisional Republican version of events, as well as that of its Official Republican rival; Loyalist understandings of the recent past as well as the British Army's authorized for-the-record account; the importance of commemoration and memorialization to Irish Republican culture; and the individual memory of one of the noncombatants swept up in the conflict. Tightly specific, sharply focused, and rich in local detail, these essays make a significant contribution to the burgeoning literature of history and memory. The book will interest students and scholars of Irish studies, contemporary British history, memory studies, conflict resolution, and political science. Contributors: Jim Smyth, Ian McBride, Ruan O’Donnell, Aaron Edwards, James W. McAuley, Margaret O’Callaghan, John Mulqueen, and Cathal Goan.

Romantic Young Irelander, republican revolutionary, father of the Irish tricolour and political exile, Thomas Francis Meagher became a citizen of the United States and a leading ethnic spokesman in his adopted republic. Meagher's career remains as controversial today as it was during his own lifetime.

How did Irish and American diplomacy operate in Washington DC and Dublin during the 1930s era of economic depression, rising fascism and Nazism? How did the Anglo–American relationship affect American–Irish diplomatic relations? Why and how did Éamon de Valera and Franklin D. Roosevelt move their countries towards neutrality in 1939? This first comprehensive history of American and Irish diplomacy during the 1930s focuses on formal and informal diplomacy, examining all aspects of diplomatic life to explain the relationship between the two administrations from 1932 to 1939. Bernadette Whelan reveals how diplomats worked on behalf of their governments to implement Franklin D. Roosevelt and Éamon de Valera's foreign policies – particularly when Éamon de Valera believed in the existence of a 'special' transatlantic relationship but Franklin D. Roosevelt increasingly favoured a strong relationship with Britain. Drawing on a wide range of under-used sources, this is a major new contribution to the history of American and Irish diplomacy and revises our understanding of the importance of Ireland to a US administration.

Cover -- Front Matter -- Title Page -- Table of Contents -- Preface -- Introduction -- Mise-en-scéne -- Chapter 1 -- Chapter 2 -- Chapter 3 -- Chapter 4 -- Chapter 5 -- List of Plates -- Select Bibliography -- Index

This book arrives on foot of a decade of commemorations. Contemporary Ireland was founded during the fractious years of 1912-1923. This volume features essays by leading historians, journalists, civic activists and folklorists. The outstanding body of scholarship offers a complexity of new views in the debate how to commemorate a divided past.