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            <title type="main">Letter from Sir Bertram Windle to Augustine Birrell, 30 March 1916.</title>
            <title type="sub">Letters 1916-1923</title>
            <author>Bertram Coghill Alan Windle</author>
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            <p>This work was originally published by Maynooth University in Ireland in <date>2017</date>. In 2026 this data, stored in a relational database was extracted and converted into this TEI/XML document.</p>
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            <publisher>Austrian Centre for Digital Humanities</publisher>
            <pubPlace>Vienna, AT</pubPlace>
            <date>2026</date>
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               <p>This letter was written by Sir Bertram Coghill Alan Windle (1858–1929) to Augustine Birrell (1850-1933).
Windle was a scholar and university president in Cork. . He  came up against Sinn Féin resistance on numerous occasions as he was accused of  trying to consolidate pro-British, pro-unionist control of University College Cork. Alfred O'Rahilly (1884–1969) was one of the men involved in mobilizing anti-Windle opinion for personal and political reasons.
Birrell was the chief secretary for Ireland. He was appointed chief secretary in January 1907. In 1916 Birrell resigned as he willingly accepted the political responsibility for the outbreak of the Rising in 1916.
The letter contains Windle's endorsement of John Robert O'Connell for the position of chief crown solicitor, stating that he is a good lawyer and the hardest worker.</p>
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              <date>1916-03-30</date>
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            <hi rend="underline">Private</hi>  LISTARKIN,<lb/>UNION HALL,<lb/>Co. Cork. <lb/><lb/> March 30. 1916.    Dear Mr Birrell,   I have fled to my cottage here,<lb/>my place refuge &amp; a little one from the<lb/>ravages of influenza which has just had<lb/>my wife &amp; myself in its clutches. It is<lb/>lovely spring, like weather in this para.<lb/>dise &amp; one reads with astonishment of<lb/>the blizzards in England. But even<lb/>here the rumours of the world pene-<lb/>trate &amp; hear that my friend &amp; bene-<lb/>factor Sir J.R. O'Connell is a candi-<lb/>date for the position of Chief Crown<lb/>Solicitor. You will let me, I hope, take<lb/>the liberty of urging his claims seeing<lb/>how much I have seen of him on all<lb/>sides &amp; especially perhaps the legal. He 
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             is the hardest worker &amp; the most dogged<lb/>devil I ever met &amp; nothing can turn him<lb/>from his end nor is the money coined I<lb/>am sure which could buy him. I was<lb/>with him in the troublesome legal compli—<lb/>cations over the purchase of the Hostel, nor<lb/>(thanks to him) a triumphant success &amp; no—<lb/>thing but his skill &amp; determination<lb/>could have pulled the thing through as<lb/>it was pulled. I need as well repeat<lb/>that he has done more than any man<lb/>to push on the Cork College &amp; has got for it<lb/>somewhere between £50000 &amp;£60000 tho'<lb/>I think that will appeal to you but I<lb/>urge his claims on the lines they <seg type="unclear">should</seg><lb/>   <seg type="unclear"/>these of being a good<lb/>lawyer &amp; an absolutely honest &amp; fear.<lb/>less man. Don't reply &amp; don't forward    Yours sincerely   Bertram Windle     
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            <noteGrp><note target="item__0701.xml" type="mentions">Letter from Seamus Fitzgerald to his aunt and uncle, 5 June 1916</note><note target="item__1784.xml" type="mentions">Letter from Andrew Philip Magill to Sir Bertram Coghill Alan Windle, 1 April 1916.</note><note target="item__1786.xml" type="mentions">Letter from Sir Bertram Windle to Augustine Birrell, 30 March 1916.</note><note target="item__2776.xml" type="mentions">Letter from Dr. Daniel Colohan, Assistant Bishop of Cork, printed in ‘Free Press', 20 May 1916</note><note target="item__5113.xml" type="mentions">Letter from Amy to May Daly, 15 March 1923</note></noteGrp></place>
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               <persName>Bertram Coghill Alan Windle</persName>
            <noteGrp><note target="item__1784.xml" type="mentions">Letter from Andrew Philip Magill to Sir Bertram Coghill Alan Windle, 1 April 1916.</note><note target="item__1786.xml" type="mentions">Letter from Sir Bertram Windle to Augustine Birrell, 30 March 1916.</note></noteGrp></person>
            <person xml:id="letters1916_person-0534" n="Augustine Birrell">
               <persName>Augustine Birrell</persName>
            <noteGrp><note target="item__0060.xml" type="mentions">Letter from Brother Vincent O'Kelly to the Chief Secretary, 3 April 1916</note><note target="item__0094.xml" type="mentions">Letter from Patrick Joseph Brady to Augustine Birrell, 27 Mar 1916</note><note target="item__0095.xml" type="mentions">Letter from Thomas Gerrard to Augustine Birrell, 29 March 1916</note><note target="item__0096.xml" type="mentions">Letter from James P. Farrell et al. to Augustine Birrell, 7 April 1916</note><note target="item__0120.xml" type="mentions">A letter from Francis E. Meehan to Augustine Birrell, 3 April 1916</note><note target="item__0137.xml" type="mentions">Letter from James Patrick Farrell to Augustine Birrell, 27 March 1916</note><note target="item__0151.xml" type="mentions">Letter from Edmund Loftus Wickham to Augustine Birrell, 1 May 1916</note><note target="item__0204.xml" type="mentions">Letter from Margaret May Loughren to Augustine Birrell, 26 March 1916</note><note target="item__0234.xml" type="mentions">Letter from Hugh O'Brien Moran to Augustine Birrell, 4 May 1916</note><note target="item__0259.xml" type="mentions">Letter from Lord Hugh Gough to Augustine Birrell, 28 April 1916</note><note target="item__0265.xml" type="mentions">Letter from Joseph Dowdall to Augustine Birrell, 18 April 1916</note><note target="item__0278.xml" type="mentions">Letter from William Field to Augustine Birrell, 14 April 1916</note><note target="item__0287.xml" type="mentions">Letter from J. G. Swift MacNeill to Augustine Birrell, 17 April 1916</note><note target="item__0617.xml" type="mentions">Letter from William Johnson to the chief secretary, 14 April 1916</note><note target="item__0815.xml" type="mentions">Letter from Miss Helen Augusta Crofton to Augustine Birrell, 3 May 1916</note><note target="item__0816.xml" type="mentions">Letter from A. J. Loughborough Ball to Augustine Birrell, 1 May 1916</note><note target="item__1138.xml" type="mentions">Letter from Mr MJ Murphy to Mr Augustine Birrell, chief secretary for Ireland, 10 November 1916</note><note target="item__1144.xml" type="mentions">Letter from James Neazor to Augustine Birrell, 6 January 1916</note><note target="item__1373.xml" type="mentions">Letter from William O'Brien to Augustine Birrell, 26 February 1916</note><note target="item__1450.xml" type="mentions">Letter from Scott Alexander to Augustine Birrell, 3 March 1916</note><note target="item__1659.xml" type="mentions">Letter from John Clear to Augustine Birrell, 23 February 1916</note><note target="item__1666.xml" type="mentions">Letter from Thomas O'Donnell to Augustine Birrell, 9 April 1916</note><note target="item__1715.xml" type="mentions">Letter from P. Burrowes Shiel to Augustine Birrell, Chief Secretary for Ireland, 27 March 1916.</note><note target="item__1752.xml" type="mentions">Letter from William Field to Augustine Birrell, 29 March 1916</note><note target="item__1758.xml" type="mentions">Letter from Alfred Bryne to Augustine Birrell, 30 March 1916</note><note target="item__1760.xml" type="mentions">Letter from Edward W. Mooney to Augustine Birrell, 4 April 1916</note><note target="item__1761.xml" type="mentions">Letter from Augustine Birrell to Edward W. Mooney, 5 April 1916</note><note target="item__1777.xml" type="mentions">Letter from Thomas Henry Grattan Esmonde to Augustine Birrell, 7 April 1916</note><note target="item__1782.xml" type="mentions">Letter from William Howell Davies to Augustine Birrell, 10 April 1916</note><note target="item__1783.xml" type="mentions">Letter from Jonathan Pim to Augustine Birrell, 29 March 1916</note><note target="item__1786.xml" type="mentions">Letter from Sir Bertram Windle to Augustine Birrell, 30 March 1916.</note><note target="item__1788.xml" type="mentions">Letter from Cecil Harmsworth to Augustine Birrell, 31 March 1916</note><note target="item__1799.xml" type="mentions">Letter from Jeannie Horner to Augustine Birrell, 4 April 1916</note><note target="item__1806.xml" type="mentions">Letter from William Seddall to Augustine Birrell, 14 April 1916</note><note target="item__1817.xml" type="mentions">Letter from Thomas Francis Smyth to Augustine Birrell, 27 March 1916</note><note target="item__1849.xml" type="mentions">Letter from A. Ross to Augustine Birrell, 30 April 1916</note><note target="item__1977.xml" type="mentions">Letter from Richard Creighton to Augustine Birrell, 25 April 1916</note><note target="item__2017.xml" type="mentions">Letter from Joseph Michael Stanley, 29 March 1916</note><note target="item__2390.xml" type="mentions">Letter from W. A. Tait to the Chief Secretary for Ireland, 13 April 1916</note><note target="item__3185.xml" type="mentions">Letter from A. Stanford to Augustine Birrell, 1 May 1916</note><note target="item__4221.xml" type="mentions">Letter from Edmund Blayney Clarke to Augustine Birrell, 29 May 1916</note><note target="item__4222.xml" type="mentions">Letter from Edmund Blayney Clarke to Augustine Birrell, 23 May 1916</note><note target="item__5641.xml" type="mentions">Letter from William O'Brien to Augustine Birrell, 26 February 1916</note><note target="item__5910.xml" type="mentions">Letter from Henry T. Gallagher to Augustine Birrell, the Chief Secretary for Ireland, 29 March 1916</note></noteGrp></person>
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