Editing Irish War of Independence (section)

== Aftermath ==
{{Anchor|truce}}
===Truce: July–December 1921{{Anchor|Truce}}===
[[File:Crowd at Mansion House Dublin ahead of War of Independence truce July 8 1921.jpg|thumb|A crowd gathers at the [[Mansion House, Dublin|Mansion House]] in Dublin in the days before the truce]]
The war of independence in Ireland ended with a truce on 11 July 1921. The conflict had reached a stalemate. Talks that had looked promising the previous year had petered out in December when [[Prime Minister of the United Kingdom]] David Lloyd George insisted that the IRA first surrender their arms. Fresh talks, after the Prime Minister had come under pressure from [[H. H. Asquith]] and the [[Liberal Party (UK)|Liberal]] opposition, the [[Labour Party (UK)|Labour Party]] and the [[Trades Union Congress]], resumed in the spring and resulted in the truce. From the point of view of the British government, it appeared as if the IRA's guerrilla campaign would continue indefinitely, with spiralling costs in British casualties and in money. More importantly, the British government was facing severe criticism at home and abroad for the actions of British forces in Ireland. On 6 June 1921, the British made their first conciliatory gesture, calling off the policy of house burnings as reprisals. On the other side, IRA leaders, and in particular Collins, felt that the IRA as it was then organised could not continue indefinitely. It had been hard pressed by the deployment of more regular British soldiers to Ireland and by the lack of arms and ammunition.

The initial breakthrough that led to the truce was credited to three people: [[George V|King George V]], [[Prime Minister of South Africa]] General [[Jan Smuts]] and David Lloyd George. The King, who had made his unhappiness at the behaviour of the Black and Tans in Ireland well known to his government, was dissatisfied with the official speech prepared for him for the opening of the new [[Parliament of Northern Ireland]], created as a result of the partition of Ireland. Smuts, a close friend of the King, suggested to him that the opportunity should be used to make an appeal for conciliation in Ireland. The King asked him to draft his ideas on paper. Smuts prepared this draft and gave copies to the King and to Lloyd George. Lloyd George then invited Smuts to attend a British cabinet meeting consultations on the "interesting" proposals Lloyd George had received, without either man informing the Cabinet that Smuts had been their author. Faced with the endorsement of them by Smuts, the King and Lloyd George, the ministers reluctantly agreed to the King's planned "reconciliation in Ireland" speech.

The speech, when delivered in Belfast on 22 June, was universally well received. It called on "all Irishmen to pause, to stretch out the hand of forbearance and conciliation, to forgive and to forget, and to join in making for the land they love a new era of peace, contentment, and good will".<ref>''Britain Between the Wars, 1918–40'' by [[Charles Loch Mowat]] ({{ISBN|978-0416295108}}), pp. 84–85.</ref>

On 24 June 1921, the British coalition government's cabinet decided to propose talks with the leader of Sinn Féin. Coalition Liberals and Unionists agreed that an offer to negotiate would strengthen the government's position if Sinn Féin refused. [[Austen Chamberlain]], the new leader of the Unionist Party, said that "the King's Speech ought to be followed up as a last attempt at peace before we go the full lengths of martial law".<ref>''The Austen Chamberlain Diary Letters'' by Austen Chamberlain ({{ISBN|978-0521551571}}), p. 161.</ref> Seizing the momentum, Lloyd George wrote to Éamon de Valera as "the chosen leader of the great majority in Southern Ireland" on 24 June, suggesting a conference.<ref>[http://www.ucc.ie/celt/published/E900003-007/index.html Negotiations June–September 1921. UCC online – accessed Dec 2009] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110623122820/http://www.ucc.ie/celt/published/E900003-007/index.html |date=23 June 2011 }}.</ref> Sinn Féin responded by agreeing to talks. De Valera and Lloyd George ultimately agreed to a truce that was intended to end the fighting and lay the ground for detailed negotiations. Its terms were signed on 9 July and came into effect on 11 July. Negotiations on a settlement, however, were delayed for some months as the British government insisted that the IRA first decommission its weapons, but this demand was eventually dropped. It was agreed that British troops would remain confined to their barracks.

Most IRA officers on the ground interpreted the truce merely as a temporary respite and continued recruiting and training volunteers. Nor did attacks on the RIC or British Army cease altogether. Between December 1921 and February of the next year, there were 80 recorded attacks by the IRA on the soon-to-be disbanded RIC, leaving 12 dead.<ref>Niall C. Harrington ''Kerry Landing'', p. 8.</ref> On 18 February 1922, Ernie O'Malley's IRA unit raided the RIC barracks at [[Clonmel]], taking 40 policemen prisoner and seizing over 600 weapons and thousands of rounds of ammunition.<ref>Harrington p. 10.</ref> In April 1922, in the [[Dunmanway killings]], an IRA party in Cork killed 10 local suspected Protestant informers in retaliation for the shooting of one of their men. Those killed were named in captured British files as informers before the truce signed the previous July.<ref>Meda Ryan, Tom Barry, ''IRA Freedom Fighter'', p. 157.</ref> Over 100 Protestant families fled the area after the killings.{{Citation needed|date=May 2022}}
<!-- Deleted image removed: [[File:Plenipotentiary.jpg|thumb|right|The Letter of Accreditation signed by President de Valera in 1921<br />The letter defined the Irish delegates to the Anglo-Irish negotiations as plenipotentiaries.]] -->

===Treaty===
[[File:The peacemakers- George Gavan Duffy, Erskine Childers, Robert Barton and Arthur Griffith in a group (28455606301).jpg|thumb|Members of the Irish negotiation committee returning to Ireland in December 1921]]
Ultimately, the peace talks led to the negotiation of the [[Anglo-Irish Treaty]] (6 December 1921), which was then ratified in triplicate: by Dáil Éireann on 7 January 1922 (so giving it legal legitimacy under the governmental system of the Irish Republic), by the [[House of Commons of Southern Ireland]] in January 1922 (so giving it constitutional legitimacy according to British theory of who was the legal government in Ireland), and by both Houses of the British parliament.<ref>{{Cite web |date=7 January 1922 |title=Dáil Éireann – Volume 3 – 7 January, 1922 – Debate on Treaty |url=http://historical-debates.oireachtas.ie/D/DT/D.T.192201070002.html |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110607070232/http://historical-debates.oireachtas.ie/D/DT/D.T.192201070002.html |archive-date=7 June 2011 |website=historical-debates.oireachtas.ie |publisher=Oireachtas Parliamentary Debates Record}}; {{Cite book |last=Nicholas Mansergh | title=The Irish Free State – Its Government and Politics |publisher=Read |year=2007 |isbn=978-1-4067-2035-8 |pages=39–40}}</ref><ref name="bunburyCivil">{{Cite web |last=Turtle Bunbury |date=2005 |title=The Irish Civil War (1922–1923) |url=http://www.turtlebunbury.com/family/bunburyfamily_lisnavagh/TKMB/bunburyfamily_lisnavagh_tkmb1922-1923.html |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20181124220027/http://www.turtlebunbury.com/family/bunburyfamily_lisnavagh/TKMB/bunburyfamily_lisnavagh_tkmb1922-1923.html |archive-date=24 November 2018 |access-date=24 November 2018 |website=turtlebunbury.com}}</ref>

The Treaty allowed [[Northern Ireland]], which had been created by the Government of Ireland Act 1920, to opt out of the Free State if it wished, which it duly did on 8 December 1922 under the procedures laid down. As agreed, an [[Irish Boundary Commission]] was then created to decide on the precise location of the border of the Free State and Northern Ireland.<ref>{{Cite magazine |last=Michael Laffan |date=2004 |title=The Emergence of the 'Two Irelands', 1912–25 |url=https://www.historyireland.com/20th-century-contemporary-history/the-emergence-of-the-two-irelands-1912-25 |url-status=live |publisher=History Ireland |volume=12 |issue=4 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20181125073916/https://www.historyireland.com/20th-century-contemporary-history/the-emergence-of-the-two-irelands-1912-25 |archive-date=25 November 2018 |access-date=24 November 2018 |website=historyireland.com}}</ref> The republican negotiators understood that the commission would redraw the border according to local nationalist or unionist majorities. Since the [[Irish local elections, 1920|1920 local elections]] in Ireland had resulted in outright nationalist majorities in [[County Fermanagh]], [[County Tyrone]], the City of [[Derry]] and in many [[district electoral division]]s of [[County Armagh]] and [[County Londonderry]] (all north and west of the "interim" border), this might well have left Northern Ireland unviable. However, the Commission chose to leave the border unchanged; as a trade-off, the money owed to Britain by the Free State under the Treaty was cancelled (see [[Partition of Ireland]]).<ref>Bromage, Mary (1964), ''Churchill and Ireland'', University of Notre Dame Press, Notre Dame, IL, p. 106. {{LCCN|64-20844}}</ref>

A new system of government was created for the new Irish Free State, though for the first year two governments co-existed; an [[Dáil Ministry]] headed by President Griffith, and a [[Provisional Government of Ireland (1922)|Provisional Government]] nominally answerable to the House of Commons of Southern Ireland and appointed by the Lord Lieutenant.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Darrell Figgis |url=https://www.libraryireland.com/irishconstitution/article-50.php |title=The Irish Constitution Explained |date=2002 |publisher=Creative Media Partners, LLC |isbn=9781376884531 |quote=Section III – The Executive – (A) Executive Council/Aireacht |access-date=24 November 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180313082840/http://www.libraryireland.com/irishconstitution/article-50.php |archive-date=13 March 2018 |url-status=live}}</ref>

===Irish Civil War===
{{further|Irish Civil War}}
Most of the Irish independence movement's leaders were willing to accept this compromise, at least for the time being, though many militant republicans were not. A majority{{Citation needed|date=February 2020}} of the pre-Truce IRA who had fought in the War of Independence, led by [[Liam Lynch (general)|Liam Lynch]], refused to accept the Treaty and in March 1922 repudiated the authority of the Dáil and the new Free State government, which it accused of betraying the ideal of the Irish Republic. It also broke the [[Oath of Allegiance]] to the Irish Republic which the Dáil had instated on 20 August 1919.<ref>{{Cite web |date=20 August 1919 |title=Dáil Éireann – Volume 1 – 20 August, 1919 – Oath of Allegiance |url=http://historical-debates.oireachtas.ie/D/DT/D.F.C.191908200012.html |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120211135910/http://historical-debates.oireachtas.ie/D/DT/D.F.C.191908200012.html |archive-date=11 February 2012 |access-date=2 September 2012 |website=historical-debates.oireachtas.ie |publisher=Oireachtas Parliamentary Debates Record |df=dmy-all}}</ref> The anti-Treaty IRA were supported by the former president of the Republic, Éamon de Valera, and ministers Cathal Brugha and Austin Stack.<ref>{{Cite web |last=J. Anthony Gaughan |date=2011 |title=Stack, Austin (1879–1929) |url=http://treaty.nationalarchives.ie/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/Stack.pdf |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180424174838/http://treaty.nationalarchives.ie/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/Stack.pdf |archive-date=24 April 2018 |access-date=24 November 2018 |website=treaty.nationalarchives.ie |publisher=National Archives}}</ref>

[[File:Coffin of Michael Collins being carried from the Pro-Cathedral (15766239474).jpg|thumb|The funeral of [[Michael Collins (Irish leader)|Michael Collins]]<br />[[St. Mary's Pro-Cathedral]], Dublin, August 1922]]
While the violence in the North was still raging, the South of Ireland was preoccupied with the split in the Dáil and in the IRA over the Treaty. In April 1922, an executive of IRA officers repudiated the Treaty and the authority of the Provisional Government which had been set up to administer it. These republicans held that the Dáil did not have the right to disestablish the Irish Republic. A hardline group of anti-Treaty IRA men occupied several public buildings in Dublin in an effort to bring down the Treaty and restart the war with the British. There were a number of armed confrontations between pro and anti-Treaty troops before matters came to a head in late June 1922.<ref name="bunburyCivil"/> Desperate to get the new Irish Free State off the ground and under British pressure, Collins attacked the anti-Treaty militants in Dublin, causing fighting to break out around the country.<ref name="bunburyCivil"/>

The subsequent civil war lasted until mid-1923 and cost the lives of many of the leaders of the independence movement, notably the head of the Provisional Government Michael Collins, ex-minister Cathal Brugha, and anti-Treaty republicans [[Harry Boland]], [[Rory O'Connor (Irish republican)|Rory O'Connor]], [[Liam Mellows]], Liam Lynch and [[Executions during the Irish Civil War|many others]]: total casualties have never been determined but were perhaps higher than those in the earlier fighting against the British. President Arthur Griffith also died of a [[cerebral haemorrhage]] during the conflict.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Michael Laffan |date=2011 |title=Griffith, Arthur Joseph (1871–1922) |url=http://treaty.nationalarchives.ie/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/Griffith.pdf |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180424173520/http://treaty.nationalarchives.ie/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/Griffith.pdf |archive-date=24 April 2018 |access-date=24 November 2018 |website=treaty.nationalarchives.ie |publisher=National Archives}}</ref>

Following the deaths of Griffith and Collins, [[W. T. Cosgrave]] became head of government. On 6 December 1922, following the coming into legal existence of the [[Irish Free State]], W. T. Cosgrave became [[President of the Executive Council of the Irish Free State|President of the Executive Council]], the first internationally recognised head of an independent Irish government.{{Citation needed|date = November 2018}}

The civil war ended in mid-1923 in defeat for the anti-Treaty side.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Diarmaid Ferriter |date=2015 |title=Hearts of stone in Ireland's civil war |url=https://www.irishtimes.com/culture/heritage/hearts-of-stone-in-ireland-s-civil-war-1.2125800 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190212220428/https://www.irishtimes.com/culture/heritage/hearts-of-stone-in-ireland-s-civil-war-1.2125800 |archive-date=12 February 2019 |access-date=24 November 2018 |website=irishtimes.com |publisher=Irish Times}}</ref>