Why Irishmen joined up - Queens Uni, Belfast.

The standard, public reason for joining up was the moral purpose of the war. At the time it was widely seen as a kind of crusade against 'Prussian militarism'. Tom Kettle, an Irish nationalist who had actually been in Belgium buying guns for the nationalist paramilitary Irish Volunteers, argued that men went because the cause was a just one. It was, said Kettle, the cause of small nations threatened by large ones, of Belgium and Serbia, which Germany and Austria had outraged, and Britain and her allies had taken up. This made it right for Ireland to fight on England's side, especially since England had (at last) granted Home Rule for Ireland. Kettle himself joined up and died on the Somme in September 1916.

Home Rule had been the aspiration of Irish nationalists for fifty years and, finally, in 1914 it appeared that the deed was done. On 18 September 1914 the third Irish Home Rule Bill became law, although its operation was suspended for the duration of the war. No-one (at least on the nationalist side) thought that this would be for very long, but the passage of the legislation was crucial for John Redmond, the leader of the Irish nationalist movement. On 20 September he made a celebrated speech at Woodenbridge, county Wicklow, in which he said that 'the interests of Ireland, of the whole of Ireland, are at stake in this war'. He drew out the high moral purpose of the struggle against the Germans and Prussian militarism: 'This war is undertaken in defence of the highest interests of religion and morality and right, and it would be a disgrace for ever to our country, a reproach to her manhood, and a denial of the lessons of her history if young Ireland [note the allusion here to 1848 and the traditions of Irish nationalism] confined their efforts to remaining at home to defend the shores of Ireland from an unlikely invasion, and shrinking from the duty of proving on the field of battle that gallantry and courage which have distinguished their race all through its history'. Stirring words indeed, and words which clearly found a response among many young Irishmen.

But high patriotic duty was not the only possible reason why men might join up. Another factor was a simply desire for adventure. For many at home the war offered excitement and the chance of glorious opportunity. Tom Barry, later to become a leader of the IRA in Cork, enlisted in June 1915. Seventeen years old, he said he 'had decided to see what this Great War was like … I went to the war for no other reason than that I wanted to see what war was like, to get a gun, to see new countries and to feel like a grown man'. This was nearly a year after the war had started, and provides some evidence that the recruiting rush of the early days does not tell the whole story.

And if Irish nationalists were responding to their 'patriotic duty' as articulated by John Redmond, so Irish unionists, too, in Ulster and elsewhere, also joined up for patriotic reasons. Having pledged their loyalty to the Crown and the link with Great Britain, they could hardly stand back when the 'Mother Country' was in its hour of need. 'We do not seek to purchase terms by selling our patriotism', said Carson. 'England's difficulty is our difficulty.'

There were also economic motives for joining up, as there always had been. Service in the army, after all, was a steady job, and one with a pension at the end. Even in wartime, with the heightened risks of military service, many men were undoubtedly attracted by the rates of pay which the military offered (and the family allowances which accompanied them). The August 1914 rush to the colours was also boosted by the fact that across Ulster many factories laid men off, or put them on short time, when war broke out because of uncertainties in the economic situation. Irish linen mills specialised in the quality end of the market—fine table and bed-linen, high quality shirting and so on—just the sort of products which people might stop buying (as they did) because there 'was a war on'. Export markets in continental Europe and the USA were disrupted. Thus, just at the moment when there was a stirring and insistent call for troops, many workers were put out of a job, evidently making enlistment more attractive than might otherwise have been the case.

Nor were these the only possible motives for joining up. Some men enlisted through family tradition, for others it was merely a kind of emigration, though one which was not necessarily so permanent as going to America. Looking especially at big urban centres like Belfast, it is also evident that many men joined up in groups, with 'peer pressure' carrying them into the army with friends and work mates. By one account, Francis Ledwidge, the poet from Slane (and a socialist and nationalist), enlisted 'on the rebound' from being rejected by a sweetheart. Whether true or not, it adds another possibility to the wide range of motivations to joining up.

Looking at the recruiting figures, and taking into account the many possible reasons behind enlistment, it is impossible facilely or glibly to generalise about these fellows, about who they were or why they joined up. No single or simple explanation will do, and in many cases it must have been a combination of factors. Patriotic feeling might have been significant but not in itself sufficient to impel a man to enlist. Yet combine it with uncertain prospects at work and the urging of a next-door neighbour—'Come on, John, it'll be great crack'—and the lure might be irresistible. What, in any case, we can say about these men—who were both 'ordinary' and extraordinary at the same time— is that they became victims of circumstances well beyond their control.

http://www.qub.ac.uk/sites/irishhistorylive/IrishHistoryResources/Articlesandlecturesbyourteachingstaff/IrelandandtheFirstWorldWar/

Jim Carroll