Meeting of Anti-Treaty Army Executive

Introduction from Chronology

Anti-Treaty Executive meets in Mrs Nugent's, Poulatar, Ballybacon, Co. Tipperary and decides on the minimum terms that would be accepted in any peace negotiations.  Also agrees to the formation of an Anti-Treaty Government and pledges this Government support and allegiance "while it functions as the Government of the Republic".  De Valera was to be ‘President of the Republic and Chief Executive of the State’. 

More Detail

The minimum peace terms included a stipulation that Ireland must not be part of the British Empire.  It also said that any arrangement the Republican Government made with the British or Free State governments had to be submitted to the Executive for ratification. (In other words, they decided that the Executive alone would have the last word on the issue of war and peace.)  

Ten of the sixteen members of the Executive were present at the meeting.  Four were prisoners (Rory O'Connor; Liam Mellows; Joe McKelvey and Peadar O'Donnell) so they were replaced by Sean Lehane (for O'Donnell); Sean McSwiney (for Mellows); Con Moloney (for O'Connor) and Frank Aiken (for McKelvey).  They also set up an Army Council consisting of Liam Lynch; Ernie O'Malley; Liam Deasy; Tom Derrig and Frank Aiken.  (Joe O'Connor; Con Moloney; and Michael Kilroy are appointed to replace any member of the Army Council who is shot or captured.) 

The declaration calling for the setting up of the Republican Government is signed by 13 people as follows:  Lynch as Chief of Staff; Deasy as Deputy Chief of Staff; O’Malley as Assistant Chief of Staff; Con Moloney as Adj-Gen; Tom Derrig as Asst Adj-Gen; Sean Lehane as OC 1st and 2nd Northern Divisions; Aiken as OC 4th Northern Division; Frank Barrett as OC 1st Western Division; Seamus Robinson as OC 2nd Southern Division; Tom Barry of Operations Staff; Sean Moylan as OC Cork No.3 Brigade; Pax Whelan as OC Waterford Brigade and Joe O’Connor as OC, 3rd Battalion, Dublin 1st Brigade.  The two absent members (Michael Kilroy and PJ Ruttledge) arrive after the meeting had ended and endorse the decisions made.

The Executive agree unanimously to execute all the members of the Dáil who voted for the Public Safety Bill.  However, instead of issuing a general order to this effect, Lynch subsequently orders his men in Dublin to kill nine members of the pro-Treaty government and two TDs to be arrested. This was later enlarged – see Nov-27-22/1.

Hopkinson notes that this was the first meeting of the Executive since the attack on the Four Courts in late June except (as O’Donoghue notes) a meeting of the eight available members in Fermoy on July 15th.

Kissane says that a major spur to the formation of the anti-Treaty government was the RC Bishops’ pastoral (see Oct-10-22/3) which stated that the pro-Treaty government was “the government set up by the nation”.  The anti-Treaty Executive claimed that the pro-Treaty government was a usurpation and derived its authority from the English parliament. 

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