British Evacuate Ireland After Hundreds of Years of Occupation

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British Evacuate Ireland After Hundreds of Years of Occupation

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Details

Location

Unknown

Year

1922

Date

23/01/1922 (of event)

Length

01min 04sec

Audio

silent

Format

35mm, film, intertitles

black and white

Source

National Film and Television Archive

Courtesy

British Film Institute

Rights Holder

British Film Institute

It is illegal to download, copy, print or otherwise utilise in any other form this material, without written consent from the copyright holder.

Description

Soldiers packing their bags and leaving for the railway on 23rd January 1922 - just a few days after the Dail had ratified the Treaty by a narrow margin.

Notes

After extensive debate in the Dáil it was decided that a five man delegation, led by Arthur Griffith and including Michael Collins would be sent to engage in negotiations in London. Collins did not relish the prospect, commenting ‘to me the task is a loathsome one. If I go, I go in the spirit of a soldier who acts against his better judgement at the orders of a superior officer. Collins said that he wasn’t sure if the treaty delegation was ‘being instructed or confused’ during its discussions with Lloyd George, adding ‘the latter I would say’. In a personal letter to Kitty Kiernan on the matter of signing the Treaty, Michael Collins reveals an optimistic hope for the settlement. Writing on the morning of 6 December (the agreement had been reached in the middle of the night) he poignantly states ‘I don’t know how things will go now but with God’s help we have brought peace to this land of ours – a peace which will end this old strife of ours forever’. Collins was not so optimistic about his own future, realising he 'just signed his own death warrant'. Eight months later, Collins was shot in an ambush in Co. Cork.

Shot List

'Topical Budget. British Evacuate Ireland after Hundreds of Years of Occupation. 60,000 troops pack up the Irish trouble in their old kit bags!' Individual soldier packing up his bag, long line of soldiers in horse drawn carts travelling on a country road. The soldiers at a railway station.

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