Letter from Michael O'Riordan to Bishop E. T. O'Dwyer, 12 May 1916 Letters 1916-1923 Michael O'Riordan

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This letter was written by Monsignor Michael O'Riordan (1857-1919), rector at the Irish College in Rome, to Bishop Edward Thomas O'Dwyer (1842-1917), who served as the Bishop of Limerick from 1888 until his death. This letter concerns O’Riordan’s reaction to the Easter Rising. O’Riordan is critical of the excessive British response to the Rising. Had the executive shown greater leniency the insurgents, who were to become immortal heroes, would probably have been instead regarded as thoughtless youths. He also refers to the death of Francis Sheehy Skeffington (1878 – 1916), an Irish, pacifist, writer and feminist who had adopted his wife Hanna Sheehy's surname. Skeffington was executed on the morning of 26 April 1916, along with two other civilians who were shot by firing squad on the orders of Captain John Bowen-Colthurst, an experienced officer of the Royal Irish Rifles. Colthurst would later be court-martialed by the British authorities for his actions. O' Riordan states that the execution was lawless and stupid.

 Limerick Diocesan Archive LDA/BI/ET/I/1, LDA/BI/ET/I/1 https://letters1916.ie/item/633 English Michael O'Riordan 1916-05-12 Irish College, Rome, Italy Edward Thomas O'Dwyer Ireland Male Easter Rising Ireland 1916 World War I (1914-1918)

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 Irish College Rome 12 May 1916 My Lord Bishop I enclose a receipt. I suppose the Censor is at work again. If he opens this letter he will have an opportunity of revising his Latin — if he ever knew any. The Government Executive seems to be as foolish as the insurgents. Mr Skeffington never had any sense. But he should have had a trial; to shoot him without one was lawless and stupid. It will probably be sought now to impress on the public conviction that all were executed without trial. If the (executive) showed living under their natural provocation the the insurgents who are now likely to become immortal heroes could probably have lived in the public memory of Ireland as impulsive thoughtless youths the the scorn of wisdom there is not a pin to choose between the executive and the insurgents. We are still in the dark here as to what directly led up to the trouble. I take no notice of what politicians & journalists say on any side since the war began. They have made lying an art and a virtue — it is amoral duty to lie if it pays It is a literal truth that I have not read one sentence about the battle of Verdun and I seem to know as much about it as those who study it with maps — more because I am aware of my ignorance. I have heard that some persons here have sent a telegram to Mr Redmond on the trouble in Dublin as from 'the Irish in Rome'. I know nothing of it and the Augustinians & Franciscans know nothing of it. I am told that the sender of it (who the were I cannot say) was born in Scotland. So we have a Foaley St in Rome as in London and there are traitors in it too. It is a foolish thing for nearly all the Irish in Rome are students or nuns. I am My Lordyours obediently M O'Riordan P S As I have these remarks on the troubles in Dublin I havenot put 'a priest sends sermon' on the envelope Michael O'Riordan Letter from Michael O'Riordan to Bishop E. T. O'Dwyer, 12 May 1916Letter from Michael O'Riordan to Bishop E. T. O'Dwyer, 27 May 1916Letter from Michael O'Riordan to Bishop E. T. O'Dwyer, 10 June 1916Letter from Michael O'Riordan to Bishop E. T. O'Dwyer, 23 October 1916Letter from Michael O'Riordan to the Right Rev. Monsignor Denis Hallinan, 23 October 1916 Edward Thomas O'Dwyer Letter from Michael O'Riordan to Bishop E. T. O'Dwyer, 12 May 1916Letter from Eoin McNeill to Bishop E. T. O'Dwyer, 18 April 1916Letter from C. Moran to Bishop E. T. O'Dwyer, 15 August 1916Letter from W. H. Grattan Flood to Bishop E. T. O'Dwyer, 15 September 1916Letter from R. Barry O'Brien to Bishop Edward Thomas O'Dwyer, 12 February 1916Letter from General John Grenfell Maxwell to Bishop Edward Thomas O'Dwyer, 6 May 1916Letter from General Sir John Grenfell Maxwell to Bishop Edward Thomas O'Dwyer, 12 May 1916Letter from Arthur to Bishop E. T. O'Dwyer, 14 January 1916Letter from Fr. C. F. Maher to Bishop E. T. O'Dwyer, 16 April 1916Letter from Fr. Peter C. Yorke to Bishop E. T. O'Dwyer, 26 June 1916Letter from Michael O'Riordan to Bishop E. T. O'Dwyer, 27 May 1916Letter from Michael O'Riordan to Bishop E. T. O'Dwyer, 10 June 1916Letter from Michael O'Riordan to Bishop E. T. O'Dwyer, 23 October 1916Letter from M. M. Carroll to Bishop E. T. O'Dwyer, 1 June 1916Letter from the Limerick City Regiment of the Irish Volunteers to Bishop E. T. O'Dwyer, 14 September 1916Letter from Bishop Edward Thomas O'Dwyer to General John Grenfell Maxwell, 17 May 1916Letter from Patrick Carey to Edward O'Dwyer, D.D., 29 November 1915 Irish College, Rome, Italy Letter from Michael O'Riordan to Bishop E. T. O'Dwyer, 12 May 1916Letter from Michael O'Riordan to Bishop E. T. O'Dwyer, 27 May 1916Letter from Michael O'Riordan to Bishop E. T. O'Dwyer, 10 June 1916Letter from Michael O'Riordan to Bishop E. T. O'Dwyer, 23 October 1916Letter from Michael O'Riordan to the Right Rev. Monsignor Denis Hallinan, 23 October 1916 Ireland Letter from George A. Lyons to the Honorary Secretary of Sinn Féin, 5 April 1916Letter from Seán Mac Diarmada to Tom Clake, 5 April 1916Letter from Michael O'Riordan to Bishop E. T. O'Dwyer, 12 May 1916Letter from Eoin McNeill to Bishop E. T. O'Dwyer, 18 April 1916Letter from R. Barry O'Brien to Bishop Edward Thomas O'Dwyer, 12 February 1916Letter from Mairín Ní Ribhógh to James Ryan, 2 August 1916Letter from ‘One of the Hard Pressed’ to Mr. Samuel, 28 July 1916Letter from Emma Duffin to her aunts, 9 January 1916, Letter from Arthur to Bishop E. T. O'Dwyer, 14 January 1916Letter from Fr. C. F. Maher to Bishop E. T. O'Dwyer, 16 April 1916Letter from Michael O'Riordan to Bishop E. T. O'Dwyer, 23 October 1916Letter from Michael O'Riordan to the Right Rev. Monsignor Denis Hallinan, 23 October 1916Letter from Peter Mooney to his sister Katie Mooney, 4 February 1916.Letter from Father Willie Doyle S.J. to Fr Provincial Thomas V. Nolan, 25 January 1916Letter from Father Willie Doyle S.J. to Fr Provincial Thomas V. Nolan, 25 February 1916Letter from Father Willie Doyle S.J. to Fr Provincial Thomas V. Nolan, 31 December 1915Letter from Father Willie Doyle S.J. to Mai, 22 January 1916Letter from Father Willie Doyle S.J. to Mai, 11 February 1916Letter from MW O'Reilly to 'A Cara', 1 June 1916Letter from Francis M. Shaw to Fr Provincial Thomas V. Nolan, 1 March 1916Letter from Francis M. Shaw to Fr Provincial Thomas V. Nolan, 10 March 1916Letter from Nora Ring to Susan Daly, March 1923Letter from Douglas Campbell (later Major General Sir Douglas Campbell) to his sister Catherine Agnes Meta Campbell (later Wetherall), 28 October 1917Letter from William Upton Tyrrell to Victoria Mary Tyrrell, 19 November 1919Letter from Mary McDonagh to her daughter-in-law Annie McDonagh, early 1920