Letter from Hugh de Fellenberg Montgomery to Vernon, 15 June 1916 Letters 1916-1923 Hugh de Fellenberg Montgomery

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This is a letter from Hugh de Fellenberg Montgomery (1844-1924), to Vernon. Originally a Liberal and a strong supporter of Gladstone, Montgomery was also a firm Unionist, but by 1916 he believed that Ulster Unionists had no choice but to accept Lloyd George's proposal for a six-county Northern Ireland. The letter concerns a case regarding the Lendrums on the Colebrooke estate. The letter then discusses the matter of Home Rule, stating that James Craig (1871-1940) and Edward Carson (1854-1935), Unionist leader, informed him that any opposition to the six county scheme i.e. the partition of Ireland, would be met with alienation by other British parties. The letter also discusses John Redmond (1856-1918), Irish Parliamentary Party leader, and his view that the scheme is only temporary for the war period, however Montgomery also notes Carson's determination that the six counties are excluded from Irish Home Rule. The letter also comments on the exclusion of Donegal, Cavan and Monaghan from the scheme, going on to comment on Herbert Henry Asquith (1852-1928), prime minister, and his ability as leader.

 Public Record Office of Northern Ireland Montgomery of Blessingbourne Papers, D/627/429/32 https://letters1916.ie/item/2237 English Hugh de Fellenberg Montgomery 1916-06-15 Vernon Male 1924 Politics Politics

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 Copy 13th June, 1916. My dear Vernon, Many thanks for your letter and for the nomination for Miss Lendrum. I troubled you in this matter after George Brooke had written to say he did not think he could do anything. I had applied to him first, as these Lendrums were tenants on the Colebrooke estate, and George Brooke always professes to take an interest in the pit from which he was digged. George Brooke, however, told me last Thursday that he had had a form sent to Miss Lendrum. I am writing to Lendrum to tell him if his daughter receives two forms to fill that she should fill them both, and in sending the second explain that she is the same person as sent the first. I hope this will not create any inconvenience. We had a choice of evils before us at Belfast yesterday. I think we choose the least. If the information given us in private by Carson and Craig as to the condition of public opinion including Unionist opinion in England is correct it is clear that whatever party first placed difficulties in the way of this preposterous settlement would alienate the sympathy of all parties in Great Britain. We did the best we could; but as Redmond says he understands the proposal to be for a temporary arrangement during the war, and Carson says he will have nothing to say to it unless it is understood that the six counties are permanently excluded from the provisions of the Home Rule Act, I do not see how the negotiations are to go on; and we may perhaps be made responsible. for their rejection after all. I am afraid the Nationalists and Radicals are much clevere r than we are. The case of Cavan, Donegal & Monaghan is a difficult and distressing one. Your protest is very well worded. I hope the action of the representatives of the six counties in taking the responsibility for an arrangement leaving them outside the excluded Ulster will not be very bitterly resented. What you have lost or given up is a big thing as regards sentiment, but in substance it was really not worth twopence. We could have done nothing for you, even before the war upset all our calculations. It was well known that General Richardson held that if it came to fighting the first thing he would have to do would be to withdraw all the Covenanters from these three counties within the borders of the six. The choice we had was really between all Ireland being placed under a Home Rule Parliament, or all Ireland minus six counties and I believe, odious as the position is, that we choose right. What is difficult to understand is (1) how the American pressure to which the Cabinet has unanimously yielded can be strong enough to justify their action, and (2) how it is possible that the sort of Home Rule it is proposed to give can satisfy the feeling that is at the back of this pressure. If the country was under the government of a great man instead of an Asquith some other way would surely have been found to meet the American and other pressure: as it is Carson, who is not the man to be frightened by bug bears seems to regard the forces at the back of Lloyd George's proposal to be for the moment irresistible. I am sure you know how deeply we sympathise with you about your sailor boy. I would have written had I not felt that letters of condolence are terribly futile things under such circumstances. Yours very truly, Hugh de Fellenberg Montgomery Letter from Hugh de Fellenberg Montgomery to William Coote, 25 March 1916Letter from Hugh de Fellenerg Montgomery to Edward Carson, 31 May 1916Letter from Hugh de Fellenberg Montgomery to Edward Carson, 9 June 1916Letter from Hugh de Fellenberg Montgomery to Willis, 10 June 1916Letter from Hugh de Fellenberg Montgomery to Edward Carson, 9 June 1916Letter from Hugh de Fellenberg Montgomery to 'Canon', 10 June 1916Letter from Hugh de Fellenberg Montgomery to W. G. Vance, 13 June 1916Letter from Hugh de Fellenberg Montgomery to Vernon, 15 June 1916Letter from Hugh de Fellenberg Montgomery to Willis, 15 June 1916Letter from Hugh de Fellenberg Montgomery to Hamilton, 10 June 1916Letter to Hugh de Fellenberg Montgomery from Walter Long, 2 June 1916Letter from Hugh de Fellenberg Montgomery to George Francis Stewart, 17 June 1916Letter from Hugh de Fellenberg Montgomery to James Stronge, 3 June 1916Letter from Hugh de Fellenberg Montgomery to John Edward Fowler Sclater, 3 June 1916Letter from Hugh de Fellenberg Montgomery to James Stronge, 9 June 1916.Letter from Hugh de Fellenberg Montgomery to Mr Glasgow, 18 June 1916Letter from Hugh de Fellenberg Montgomery to George Francis Stewart, 18 June 1916Letter from Hugh de Fellenberg Montgomery to Hugo, 27 June 1916Letter from Hugh de Fellenberg Montgomery to Maurice Headlam, 19 June 1916Letter from Hugh de Fellenberg Montgomery, 1916Letter from Hugh de Fellenberg Montgomery to Charles Hubert Montgomery, 30 June 1916Letter from Hugh de Fellenberg Montgomery to William Hovenden Ffolliott, 2 August 1916Letter from Charles Hubert Montgomery to Hugh de Fellenberg Montgomery, 29 May 1916Letter from Hugh de Fellenberg Montgomery to John Ross, 27 May 1916Letter from Hugh de Fellenberg Montgomery to William Coote, 27 May 1916Letter from Hugh de Fellenberg Montgomery to William Coote, 22 May 1916Letter from Hugh de Fellenberg Montgomery to Waldron, 26 June 1916Letter to Hugh de Fellenberg Montgomery from Sir John Ross, 2 June 1916.Letter from Hugh de Fellenberg Montgomery to Sir Richard Dawson Bates, 23 June 1916Letter from Hugh de Fellenberg Montgomery to William Coote, 9 Spetember 1916Letter from Hugh de Fellenberg Montgomery to Walter Long, 31 May 1916Letter from M. E. Sinclair to Hugh de Fellenberg Montgomery, 18 September 1916