In the early hours of Friday April 21 1916, two days before the Easter Rising was scheduled to begin, a German submarine surfaced off the Kerry coast, and three men set out for the shore in a small dinghy. On board were Sir Roger Casement, and two other men Robert Monteith and Daniel Bailey. As they neared the shore the dinghy capsized, and the men arrived on Banna Strand in Tralee Bay, drenched and exhausted.
Casement, suffering in addition from a bout of malaria, which had plagued him since his time in the Congo, rested in a cave while the other men went off to try and make contact with members of the Volunteers. After some time Casement was found by an RIC constable and arrested.
Casement was a prize captive. He was a senior activist in the British colonial service, with two sensational reports to his name. He was better known abroad than at home. He was knighted for his work which highlighted the wretched conditions under which the natives of the Congo and the Amazon, worked; exploited by ruthless rubber barons.
In August 1913 he retired from the Foreign Office having spent more than thirty years in Britain, Africa and South America; and only then, aged almost 49, did he began to play a significant role in Irish affairs.
He first became interested in an independent Ireland with its own language and culture during a holiday in the West of Ireland, when he championed the islanders on Tawin and their struggle to build an Irish language school. Events, however, soon became far more serious than a language affair. The threat by the highly armed Ulster Volunteers, who vowed to resist any attempt to impose Home Rule on Ireland, led to a counter development in Dublin, the Irish Volunteers, led by the Irish scholar and Irish language enthusiast, Eoin MacNeill.
Casement created a spectacular event in July 1914, when together with Erskine Childers, Alice Stopford, Bulmer Hobson and others, he organised and financed the purchase of 1,500 rifles and ammunition in Belgium and its transportation to Howth, Co Dublin. Now the Irish Volunteers had the means to strike at the enemy; and the Volunteers attracted men with ambitions to secure Ireland’s independence by force.
Even before the arms arrived, however, Casement, always impatient and impetuous, was in New York with the aim of raising funds. He was greeted as a hero by Clan na Gael, with its old Fenians, and their dreams of a free Ireland, led by John Devoy. It was to be a mixed-blessing.
German officers
Casement was convinced that Ireland could only win its independence with the help of German weapons, and actual German troops on the ground. In August 1914, at the outbreak of World War I, Casement and Devoy met the German ambassador to the United States, Count Bernstorff. He supported Casement’s plan that if Germany would supply guns to the Irish revolutionaries, and provide military leaders, the Irish would revolt against England, diverting British troops and attention from the Western Front.
In October Casement decided to go to Germany, via Norway* with plans to recruit an Irish Brigade from the estimated 2,300 Irishmen serving in the British army who were then prisoners of war. He was very well received by the German diplomatic and army command, which emboldened Casement to ask for German officers and trained gunners to accompany the delivery of arms to Ireland. His friend in Berlin, Agatha Bullitt Grabisch, who wrote letters on his behalf to German ministers, later recounted that Casement had expectations that ‘an [German] army corps was the least that should accompany the expedition’. The German government agreed in principle. If such an invasion was to happen it would want the Irish people to know ‘that it is inspired by good will towards a country and people for whom Germany desires only national prosperity and national freedom.’
However, because of British naval presence around German ports, and protecting its own home ports on these two islands, the plan was dropped. It ‘ became impossible to slip 40,000 German soldiers through the blockade.’
Cancel the Rising
Casement’s next attempt was to recruit the Irish prisoners of war. Again it was practically a complete failure. After touring the prison camps only 56 men agreed to join his brigade. He felt let down by the German authorities, his health was poor, and he became depressed by his mission failure.
But now Casement was aware from Clan na Gael sources, that the Rising was planned for Easter Sunday. There was little time to be lost. He must return to Ireland to urge the Volunteers to cancel the Rising as no meaningful help was coming from Germany.
The Germans obligingly him sent home by submarine, which would rendezvous in Tralee Bay, on Good Friday April 21, with the Aud Norge, a German merchantman, disguised as a Norwegian steamer, with 20,000 rifles, machine-guns and explosives on board.
The British authorities were now seriously alarmed by Casement’s activities. Messages to him from Clan na Gael were intercepted, and the HMS Bluebell was waiting for the Aud as she rounded Kerry Head. Bluebell demanded its surrender. Instead captain Karl Spindler scuttled his ship with pre-set explosive charges. It now lies at a depth of 40 metres, and with it the hopes for an all-Ireland armed rebellion. Its surviving crew became prisoners of war.
There was no one to meet Casement and his two followers. In a strange quirk of fate three Volunteers were sent to make contact, but lost their way, and were drowned when their car drove off a pier.
Monteith and Bailey were arrested for ‘acting suspiciously’ which led to a search on the beach and the discovery of Casement. He was immediately brought to London, and during his interrogation in Scotland Yard on Easter Sunday morning, he asked for permission to contact the rebel leaders in Dublin, to persuade them to cancel the Rising as no help was coming from Germany. His request was refused.
Next week: Dublin had its own problems trying to get the Rising off the ground.
NOTES: *British authorities were following Casement’s movements with growing concern. When his ship stopped in Norway, word was discreetly made known that a reward of £5,000 was on offer for Casement’s capture.
Information this week gleaned from an excellent new book: Voices from the Irish Free State, edited by Eoin and Niamh Ó Dochartaigh, Ardcru Books, Newcastle, Galway; and from Michael Laffan’s essay on Casement, Dictionary of Irish Biography.
Listen to Tom Kenny and Ronnie O'Gorman elaborating on topics they have covered in this week's paper and much more in this week's Galway Diary Podcast.
