British national anthem. The crowd around College Green increased further when TCD students hoisted three flags from the flag staff, in ascending order: a Union flag, a USSR flag and lastly a French flag.25 One eyewitness, Mr G.W. Chesson, described the atmosphere as being jovial, with the temper of the crowd said to have been ‘friendly’.26
By 3.15pm, however, the mood of the assembly darkened. ‘Booing and cat-calls’, now accompanied the singing.27 A section of the crowd took particular offence to the fact that when the three flags were re-hoisted the Irish Tricolour was placed at the bottom. Ernest A. Alton, provost of TCD, conceded privately at the time that there was ‘no doubt that an insult was offered to the tricolour’.28 In retaliation, at approximately 3.30pm, a number of youths arrived at College Green ‘from the direction of O’Connell Street’, carrying what was described as a Catholic Emancipation flag. Subsequently, one of the group climbed the tramway standards outside Messrs Fox’s Tobacconist Shop, ‘and tying a small Union Jack to the support-wire, proceeded to set it on fire and burn it, amidst howls of derision from the students on the College roof’.29
In response, according to Chesson’s account, a TCD student opened one of the windows in the front of the college and ‘thrust out a stick upon which were hanging three garments of lady’s underwear, coloured – green, white and orange’.30 A group of TCD students then took down the hoisted Irish Tricolour and attempted to set it on fire. Unable to set the flag on fire the TCD students ‘rolled it up and threw it down into the fore-court in front of the wicket gate of the College’.31 Immediately there was a rush of people who rescued the Irish flag.32
News of this fracas soon reached UCD students in Earlsfort Terrace. It was reportedly Haughey who organised a counter demonstration and led a march of UCD students, some allegedly ‘bearing Nazi swastika flags’, to TCD.33 According to Bruce Arnold, it was Haughey, along with a friend, Seamus Sorohan (law student and future barrister), who ripped down a Union Jack that was hanging on a lamp-post at the bottom of Grafton Street and proceeded to burn it.34 It was at this stage that ‘the attitude of the crowd became really ugly’,35 and some within the crowd, including several young women, reportedly made several attempts to break into TCD.36
The rioters rushed the front gates and made it through the main entrance, but were stopped by a large number of Civic Guards from ‘entering the College courtyard’. There were three or four baton charges before ‘the vicinity of the College was cleared’.37 Eventually, the Gardaí were forced to intervene, however, the melée continued towards the direction of the Wicklow Hotel, where several young men attacked the building, with cries of ‘Give us the West Britons’.38 It was further reported that a section of the crowd broke away and later stoned the residence of the British representative and the offices of the United States Consul-General. In total, twelve people were treated at Mercer’s Hospital for slight injuries.39
Haughey’s actions during this brief but memorable riot reflected a prevailing anti-British mood among many Irish people at the time; unlike the unscrupulous young Haughey, however, very few people would have actually been involved in burning a Union Jack. Although ‘neutral’ – Éire did not officially take part in the war effort – the country did suffer. Economically, Ireland was crippled by trade restrictions with the result that the country, as Haughey himself recounted, was effectively ‘down to subsistence level’.40 There was extensive unemployment and rationing, censorship of the press, private motor cars virtually vanished from the roads and sustained emigration.
Apart from blaming Éamon de Valera’s Fianna Fáil wartime administrations for their cultural, economic and social woes, many living in Ireland, including Haughey, vented their anger and frustration towards the British government in London. Indeed, in Ireland, under the banner of the IRA, there existed a small Republican fringe movement who hoped for a Nazi victory over the Allies, clinging to the worn-out idiom that ‘England’s difficulty is Ireland’s opportunity.’ As on VE Day, such pervasive feelings of Anglophobia occasionally transfixed the Irish psyche. Indeed, Martin Mansergh later noted that during this period Haughey certainly held some ‘personal hang-ups’ regarding British–Irish relations and retained a strong sense of Anglophobia.41
With the war at an end Haughey’s attention quickly shifted to his employment prospects. Having ruled out a career in the Irish army he decided to put his commerce degree to best use. Following his graduation from UCD in 1946 he was articled to the accountancy firm Michael J. Bourke of Boland, Bourke and Company. In 1948 he won the John Mackie memorial prize of the Institute of Chartered Accountants (ICA). The following year, after studying at King’s Inns, he was called to the bar, but never practiced. He became an associate member of the ICA in 1949 and a fellow in 1955.42 It was towards the end of the 1940s, as his burgeoning career in the world of accountancy progressed, that Haughey’s interest with Irish politics and specifically with Fianna Fáil first surfaced. Although he had no traditional Fianna Fáil roots, through his friendship with two former classmates at St Joseph’s, Harry Boland (with whom he established a successful accountancy practice, Haughey and Boland in 1951) and George Colley, that Haughey’s political career first began.
Shortly before his passing in 2006, Haughey recalled with some amusement that his involvement in politics was ‘accidental’. He noted that he fell into politics through his close friendship with Boland and Colley. ‘It was as simple as that,’ he said.43 Haughey’s reluctance to join Fianna Fáil prior to this period may have also stemmed from not wishing to upset his father, who was known to have ‘despised’ Éamon de Valera.44 Following the death of his father in 1948, however, Haughey was convinced by Boland and Colley to join them in the Fianna Fáil Tomas Ó Cléirigh cumann, Dublin North-East.45 Haughey was an active member of cumann affairs from the start. With other young members he became involved in the writing of a pamphlet, Fírinne Fáil, on Fianna Fáil policy and outlook.46 In September 1951, he cemented his links with Fianna Fáil, following his marriage to Maureen Lemass, the eldest daughter of Seán Lemass, a co-founder of the organisation.
Haughey’s rising fortunes as an emerging protégé within Fianna Fáil, coupled with being the son-in-law of the second most powerful man in the party, did not, however, ensure his immediate breakthrough into national politics. At the 1951 Irish general election and again in 1954, he unsuccessfully ran as a Fianna Fáil candidate in Dublin North-Central. In 1953, he was, however, co-opted onto the Dublin Corporation; although he had to suffer the ignominy of losing his seat on the Corporation in the local government elections in 1955. Despite numerous disappointments on the national stage, by 1954, Haughey, now twenty-nine years old, had steadily climbed the Fianna Fáil ladder in his own constituency of Dublin North-East, securing the position as honorary secretary of the Tomas Ó Cléirigh cumann and also honorary secretary of the Dublin Comhairle Dáilceanntair.47
‘Guerrilla warfare’: the Tomas Ó Cléirigh cumann memorandum on partition, 1955
It was Haughey’s prominent role with the Tomas Ó Cléirigh cumann that exposed the true extent of his visceral anti-partitionism.48 In January 1955, in his capacity as honorary secretary of the Ó Cléirigh cumann, Haughey sent a memorandum devoted to the subject of partition to Fianna Fáil headquarters.49 A six-page typed document, the Ó Cléirigh memorandum on partition offered an aggressive case as to why Fianna Fáil should use physical force to secure Irish unity.50 If it had been made public, its contents would have proved highly controversial. It was produced in response to Seán Lemass’s determination to revitalise the Fianna Fáil organisation following the party’s general election defeat in May 1954, and in the context of the renewed IRA activity along the North–South border during this period.
After the 1954 election which resulted in Fianna Fáil’s relegation to the opposition benches, Lemass was appointed as the party’s national organiser. He led a team with responsibility for formulating and developing new policy initiatives, pruning the organisation of any dead wood and listening to what policy areas truly mattered to grass-roots members.51 As part of this consultative process between September 1954 and January of the following year, Lemass contacted every registered Fianna Fáil cumann throughout the Irish Republic, requesting they submit any views that its members had on either local or national issues.52 It was in response to this request that on 15 January 1955, Haughey sent the aforementioned memorandum to the Fianna Fáil national executive.