Origins
In his famed memoir of his experiences during the Irish War of Independence, the renowned IRA leader, Tom Barry, did not hold back in his disdain for the town of Skibbereen and its residents. According to Barry ‘its inhabitants were a race apart from the sturdy people of West Cork’ who ‘with a few exceptions were spineless, slouching through life meek and tame, prepared to accept ruling and domination from any clique or country’. In his prolonged condemnation of the town he also remarked that the town posed no threat to the IRA as the citizens of Skibbereen ‘lacked the energy and gumption to be actively hostile to anything’.106 Whatever about the supposed indolence and docility of the town’s populace, Skibbereen had at least shown an energy and enthusiasm for the newspaper trade that was not evident anywhere else in the county outside of the city of Cork. At the start of the twentieth century, Skibbereen, quite remarkably, was the only town in County Cork to have sustained a local press of any significance.107 Indeed, by this time the town was served by two successful newspapers, the aforementioned Skibbereen Eagle and the Southern Star, which was first published in 1890.
According to Mathew Potter ‘the perceived pro-British and Protestant tone of the Eagle’ led to the establishment of ‘the much more strongly nationalist Southern Star’.108 The paper was founded by John O’Sullivan with the assistance of his brother Florence. Little is known of John O’Sullivan except that he was involved in the printing trade while Florence O’Sullivan was a qualified solicitor. However, the O’Sullivan brothers did not retain a controlling interest in the paper for very long. In 1892 the Southern Star was sold to a consortium led by Monsignor John O’Leary of Clonakilty. The consortium consisted of
106
Tom Barry, Guerilla days in Ireland (Dublin, 1981), p.89 107
Southern Star 1889-1989: Centenary Supplement (11 November 1989) 108 Potter, op. cit., p.53
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ten shareholders, two of whom were also priests (Father Michael Cunningham and Father Daniel O’Brien), once again signifying the highly notable clerical involvement in Irish provincial newspapers during this period.109 Nonetheless, unlike many other provincial titles the Southern Star was not dominated by an individual personality as was the case at other newspapers such as the Westmeath Examiner (J.P. Hayden), Kilkenny People (E.T. Keane), and Roscommon Herald (Jasper Tully). Accordingly the paper experienced a rather high turnover of editors in the first two decades of its existence.
During this period the Southern Star appears to have had as many as six different editors. Florence O’Sullivan was succeeded by J.J. Comerford while others who edited the paper included Michael J. Flynn, Patrick O’Driscoll, and Seumas O’Kelly. Flynn later moved to the Freeman’s Journal but ended his career at the Brisbane Courier in Australia, having emigrated there after his health became impaired.110 O’Driscoll’s tenure as editor was quite brief, lasting only from 1901 until 1902. He then established the West Cork People in his home town of Clonakilty, one of the very few papers in the county to be established outside either Cork City or Skibbereen. The paper only lasted a few years, however, closing in 1907 due an expensive libel action. O’Driscoll was a brother-in-law of Michael Collins, having married his sister, Margaret. He later served on the editorial staff of the Cork Free Press as well as acting as Irish correspondent of the Catholic Herald.111 O’Kelly became editor of the Southern Star around 1903 before moving on to the editorship of the Leinster Leader about three years later. He subsequently developed a close friendship with Arthur Griffith and even edited Nationality for brief spell during 1918 while Griffith was imprisoned. Seumas O’Kelly died suddenly in November 1918 after being taken ill at the Sinn Féin offices at Harcourt Street in Dublin.112 However, the most celebrated editor of the Southern Star in its first twenty years of publication was Daniel David (D.D.) Sheehan. Originally from Kanturk, County Cork, D.D. Sheehan was a teacher prior to embarking on a journalistic career. He initially worked at the Glasgow Observer and the Catholic News of Preston while he also served on the staff of the Cork Constitution. His time in the editorial chair of the Southern Star was actually quite brief (1898-1901) as he resigned the post after being elected MP for Mid-Cork in 1900. He retained this seat until 1918, being
109
Southern Star 1889-1989: Centenary Supplement (11 November 1989) 110 Irish Times, 15 Oct. 1928
111 Southern Star, 7 Sept. 1940; Southern Star 1889-1989: Centenary Supplement (11 November 1989); 112
Irish Independent, 15 Nov. 1918; Irish Times, 6 Oct. 1969; Seumas O’Kelly is additionally remembered as a noted playwright and was also a brother of Michael O’Kelly, who succeeded him as editor of the Leinster
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returned unopposed on a number of occasions, but did not stand at the general election in December of that year.113
Suppression, takeover, suppression
Any disruption that the Southern Star may have experienced due to the high turnover of editors in its first twenty years pales into insignificance in comparison to the turbulent times it endured from around 1916 onwards. The first instance of such turbulence arrived on 13 November 1916 when police seized the paper’s plant and machinery and duly suppressed the Southern Star. As tended to happen in such instances no specific reason was given for the action. Nonetheless, the Irish Independent reported that the Star’s editor believed the suppression was due to the publication of an article entitled “Masons and Mollies” that dealt with police agitation.114 At the time the editor was James Michael (J.M.) Burke who had been appointed shortly before the Easter Rising and was to have a long association with the paper.115 The matter of the paper’s suppression was raised in the House of Commons by Joseph Devlin of the Irish Parliamentary Party. After questioning why such action was taken against the paper Devlin was brusquely informed by the Chief Secretary, Mr Duke, that the suppression was due to the publication of statements likely to cause disaffection.116 The Southern Star was permitted to resume publication just under a month later though little indication was forthcoming as to why it was allowed recommence operations at that stage.117 The curious aspect of the suppression was that at that time the paper had no real or perceived link to Sinn Féin, which was a factor common to the actions taken against other provincial newspapers in the months following the Easter Rising. The absence of such a republican link was to change dramatically just over a year later.
113
Southern Star 1889-1989: Centenary Supplement (11 November 1989); Irish Independent, 29 Nov. 1948; Southern Star, 4 Dec. 1948; At the outbreak of World War I Sheehan joined the Munster Fusiliers while three of his sons also enlisted in the British Army, two of whom were killed in action. Along with William O’Brien he declared his support for Sinn Féin following the failure to implement Home Rule. He retired from active politics in 1918 and was engaged in journalism and business until his death in 1948. 114 Irish Independent, 14 Nov. 1916
115
Southern Star 1889-1989: Centenary Supplement (11 November 1989) 116
Irish Times, 18 Nov. 1916 117 Cork Examiner, 11 Dec. 1916
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On 26 December 1917 the Irish Independent reported that the Southern Star, ‘hitherto an advocate of the Irish Party, has been purchased by the Sinn Féin Party’ for £570.118 Prior to the Sinn Féin acquisition the paper was still owned by the consortium assembled by Monsignor John O’Leary over twenty-five years earlier. One of the main facilitators of the takeover was Peader O’Hourihane who was to play a significant role under the new ownership. Among the large group that constituted the new proprietorship were three men who were later to become TDs, Seán Buckley, Seán Hales, and Seán Hayes. Michael Collins (along with his brother John M. Collins) was listed as one of the early shareholders though Peter Hart further credits Collins with assisting in putting together the group of investors that bought the paper.119 Collins’s enthusiasm for the project no doubt stemmed from what Tim Pat Coogan describes as his ‘interest in newspapers which never left him’ after he worked as a very young man at the West Cork People, the paper owned by his brother-in-law, the aforementioned Patrick J. O’Driscoll.120 With such an overtly republican ownership in place it was highly unlikely that the paper would escape the attention of the British authorities for very long.
In total the Southern Star was suppressed three times between 1918 and 1919. The first of these took place in April 1918 when it was deemed by Lord Decies to be one of a number of newspapers whose tone was ‘distinctly bad, and likely to cause disaffection’. The suppression lasted four weeks though some of the other titles suppressed at the same time, most notably the Clare Champion, were subjected to longer periods of enforced closure.121 The second suppression began in late August 1918 and turned out to be the lengthiest. The reason given for the police action in dismantling and removing the printing machinery was the increasingly standard line that the paper had published content ‘likely to cause disaffection’.122 Local IRA commander Liam Deasy later claimed that the reason for the suppression was because the Southern Star had been the first newspaper to publish an account of an attempt by Crown Forces to capture Tom and William Hales, both brothers of Seán Hales. According to Deasy, the two
118
Irish Independent, 26 Dec. 1917 119
Southern Star 1889-1989: Centenary Supplement (11 November 1989); Peter Hart, Mick: the real Michael
Collins (London, 2005), p.121
120
Tim Pat Coogan, Michael Collins: a biography (London, 1990), p.15; At the West Cork People Collins ‘learnt to type, acted as a copyboy, and wrote up sporting events’.
121 Press Censorship Report, March 1918, CO904/166/2; The most notable of the other papers to be
suppressed at the same time were the Mayo News, Galway Express, Westmeath Independent, and Weekly
Observer.
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brothers had been involved in ‘hiding material that was intended for use in manufacturing shotgun bayonets’.123 While this may have been a contributory factor, Michael Collins believed there may have been another reason. In a letter to a local Sinn Féin activist Collins indicated that the suppression may have been due to the alleged production of some handbills (possibly relating to the upcoming general election) at the Southern Star plant.124
Whatever the reason for the action against the paper, it differed significantly from the enforced closure several months earlier in that it was not instigated by the Press Censor. This was confirmed by the paper’s business manager, Seamus O’Brien, in a letter to Ernest Blythe, then editor of the paper but imprisoned at Belfast following his arrest in March 1918. O’Brien stated that ‘Lord Decies knew nothing of the suppression and did not seem to like the idea of the military authorities taking the full power into their own hands’.125 With the suppression well into its fifth month O’Brien decided to write to the national newspapers to publicise the Star’s plight. In a letter to the Irish Independent he protested that no reason had been given for the banning of the paper, it had taken place without the knowledge of Lord Decies, and that requests to meet with the military authorities at Cork to try resolve the matter had not even merited a response.126
The Southern Star was eventually permitted to resume publication in April 1919 though no specific reason was provided for the lengthy suppression or why the ban was lifted at that particular time.127 In its first editorial upon its return the paper claimed that the only response to its many requests for information on the matter was that the ‘action was taken under the Defence of the Realm regulations’.128 The suppression of almost thirty weeks was one of the longest endured by any Irish provincial newspaper. However, It was not long before the authorities focussed its attention on the Southern Star once more. On 27 October 1919 a force of about a dozen policemen arrived at the paper’s offices and duly dismantled and removed its printing machinery.129 This third suppression resulted from
123
Liam Deasy, Towards Ireland free: the West Cork brigade in the War of Independence, 1917-1921 (Dublin, 1973), p.22
124
Collins to Kelly, 18 Nov. 1918 (U.C.D., Irish Volunteers papers, P16) 125 O’Brien to Blythe, 15 Jan. 1919 (U.C.D., Ernest Blythe papers, P24/1028) 126 Irish Independent, 17 Jan. 1919
127
Ibid, 31 Mar. 1919; Irish Times, 5 Apr. 1919; 128
Southern Star, 5 Apr. 1919
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the publication of the Dáil Éireann loan prospectus.130 Although a number of newspaper reports in January 1920 indicated that the ban had been lifted, this third suppression lasted until March 1920.131 In total the paper was banned for almost fifty-six weeks during the two year period from March 1918. Consequently the challenge faced by the new owners of the Southern Star was all the more difficult. The people behind the Star
Many of those who owned, managed, or edited the Southern Star from the time of the Sinn Féin takeover in late 1917 until the end of the War of Independence could well justify substantive scrutiny in their own right. In the case of Michael Collins, a shareholder in the paper, such detailed scrutiny already exists in abundance. Nevertheless, it is both worthwhile and instructive to consider some of the other figures centrally involved in the paper during these years. Seán Hayes, a member of the group that acquired the Southern Star in 1917 and who also edited the paper for a time, fought in the GPO in Dublin during Easter Week 1916 and was subsequently imprisoned at Frongoch internment camp in Wales. He was elected MP for the West Cork constituency in December 1918, was re-elected in 1921 and took a pro-Treaty stance.132
From about 1916 onwards Seán Buckley, another of those involved in the acquisition, was actively involved in Sinn Féin and the Irish Volunteers and was imprisoned at Belfast during 1918. He was a member of the West Cork brigade of the IRA from 1919 until the truce of July 1921. Buckley took the republican side following the Anglo-Irish Treaty and endured further terms of imprisonment at Cork, Mountjoy, Newbridge, and Kilmainham.133 Seán Hales, also involved in the Sinn Féin takeover, had even stronger republican credentials. He joined the Irish Volunteers in 1915 and was imprisoned at Frongoch in Wales following the Easter Rising. He became a battalion commander in the West Cork brigade of the IRA and was involved in many operations during the Anglo-Irish conflict, most notably at Crossbarry in March 1921. Later that year he was elected to Dáil Éireann for the Cork mid, north, south, south-east,
130
Inspector General’s and County Inspectors’ monthly confidential reports, October 1919, CO904/110-250 131 Irish Independent, 15 Jan. 1920; Cork Examiner, 15 Jan., 16 Jan., 19 Mar., 1920; Freeman’s Journal, 15 Jan., 19 Mar. 1920; Irish Times, 27 Mar. 1920;
132 Southern Star 1889-1989: Centenary Supplement (11 November 1989); Irish Independent, 25 Jan. 1928; Hayes was also a close personal friend of Michael Collins and is not be confused with Seán Hayes of the Meath
Chronicle as detailed in chapter 3.
133
Irish Press, 2 Dec. 1963; Buckley later represented Fianna Fáil in Dáil Éireann for the West Cork constituency from 1938 until 1948 and for South Cork from 1948 to 1954.
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and west constituency and was the only IRA brigadier from Cork to support the Anglo-Irish Treaty. He was re-elected to Dáil Éireann in June 1922 but was shot dead by republican gunmen in Dublin in December of that year.134
Buckley and Hales had little involvement in the on-going management of the Southern Star but the republican connections of those who played a more significant role were also quite considerable. The main instigator of the acquisition, Peadar O’Hourihane (or Peader O’hAnnracháin as he preferred to be known) was a renowned Gaelic League organiser, which resulted in his activities being monitored by the RIC as early as June 1914.135 An early Sinn Féin activist in his home town of Skibbereen he was imprisoned at Wakefield and Reading following the 1916 Rising and later took an active part in the War of Independence.136 The aforementioned Seamus O’Brien, business manager at the paper for a time during this period, was arrested and imprisoned during the War of Independence and later married Nora Connolly, daughter of James Connolly.137 Similarly Dick Connolly, who succeeded O’Brien as the paper’s business manager during 1919, was a prominent IRA member and described as a ‘War of Independence courier for Michael Collins’.138 Connolly briefly edited the paper during 1920 and was one of a number of people to occupy the editorial chair between 1916 and 1921.139
In all there appears to have been seven different editors of the Southern Star between 1916 and 1921. By mid-1920 the aforementioned J.M. Burke, Peadar O’Hourihane, Seán Hayes, and Dick Connolly had each edited the paper for relatively short spells. They were succeeded by Arthur Nix in late 1920 and subsequently by Eoin Sharkey, both of whom had similarly brief terms in the editorial chair. Nix ultimately took a legal action against the paper for wrongful dismissal in which, by coincidence, he was
134
Maurice Cronin, ‘Hales, Seán’ in McGuire et al (eds.) 135
Police Reports, June 1914, CO904/120/4-98, May 1915, CO904/120/6-134, November 1915, CO904/120/9-197, December 1915, CO904/120/10-214; Inspector General’s and County Inspectors’ monthly confidential reports, January 1917, CO904/102-13;
136
Southern Star 1889-1989: Centenary Supplement (11 November 1989); Irish Times, 30 Mar. 1965; Peadar O’hAnnracháin also contributed to nationalist publications such as An Claidheamh Soluis and Irish Freedom and was a respected author in both Irish and English. His most noted work was Fé bhrat an chonnartha, a diary of his Gaelic League days.
137 Southern Star 1889-1989: Centenary Supplement (11 November 1989) 138 Ibid; Lawrence William White, ‘O’Brien, Nora Connolly’ in McGuire et al (eds.) 139
Cork Examiner, 16 Jan. 1920; Connolly’s term as editor seems to have been fairly brief but he signed himself as editor in a letter to the Cork Examiner in January 1920 to refute reports that the suppression of the Southern Star had been lifted.
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represented by Jasper Wolfe of the Skibbereen Eagle.140 The last of these seven editors also only enjoyed a brief tenure but was, nonetheless, the most famous figure to occupy the position. Ernest Blythe became editor of the Southern Star early in 1918, principally due to the influence of Peadar O’Hourihane.141 Blythe’s lengthy career is well documented; a member of the Gaelic League, the Irish Volunteers, the IRB, and Sinn Féin he was elected as an MP for North Monaghan in December 1918 and later held a number of different ministerial positions in the Free State Government. However, his time at the Southern Star was cut short when he was arrested in early March 1918 for contravening an undertaking to reside within a short distance of his father’s house in County Antrim.142
The editorial instability only ended late in 1921 when J.M. Burke was re-appointed editor. Burke’s connection to the Star pre-dated the Sinn Féin acquisition, which he did not favour as he did not appear to hold republican sympathies. Indeed, even after his re-appointment as editor in 1921 Burke had a frequently fractious relationship with the directors of the paper. Like many of his predecessors he was elected to political office, being returned as a Cumann na nGaedhael TD for West Cork in the 1933