The ''Freeman's Journal'', which was published continuously in
Dublin
Dublin (; , or ) is the capital and largest city of Republic of Ireland, Ireland. On a bay at the mouth of the River Liffey, it is in the Provinces of Ireland, province of Leinster, bordered on the south by the Dublin Mountains, a part of th ...
from 1763 to 1924, was in the nineteenth century Ireland's leading
nationalist
Nationalism is an idea and movement that holds that the nation should be congruent with the state. As a movement, nationalism tends to promote the interests of a particular nation (as in a group of people), Smith, Anthony. ''Nationalism: Th ...
newspaper.
Patriot journal
It was founded in 1763 by
Charles Lucas
Sir Charles Lucas, 1613 to 28 August 1648, was a professional soldier from Essex, who served as a Royalist cavalry leader during the Wars of the Three Kingdoms. Taken prisoner at the end of the First English Civil War in March 1646, he was rel ...
and was identified with radical 18th-century
Protestant
Protestantism is a Christian denomination, branch of Christianity that follows the theological tenets of the Reformation, Protestant Reformation, a movement that began seeking to reform the Catholic Church from within in the 16th century agai ...
patriot
A patriot is a person with the quality of patriotism.
Patriot may also refer to:
Political and military groups United States
* Patriot (American Revolution), those who supported the cause of independence in the American Revolution
* Patriot m ...
politicians
Henry Grattan
Henry Grattan (3 July 1746 – 4 June 1820) was an Irish politician and lawyer who campaigned for legislative freedom for the Irish Parliament in the late 18th century from Britain. He was a Member of the Irish Parliament (MP) from 1775 to 18 ...
and
Henry Flood
Henry Flood (1732 – 2 December 1791), Irish statesman, son of Warden Flood, Lord Chief Justice of the King's Bench for Ireland, was educated at Trinity College, Dublin, and afterwards at Christ Church, Oxford, where he became proficient ...
. This changed from 1784 when it passed to Francis Higgins (better known as the "Sham Squire") and took a more pro-British and pro-administration view. In fact Francis Higgins is mentioned in the Secret Service Money Book as having betrayed
Lord Edward FitzGerald
Lord Edward FitzGerald (15 October 1763 – 4 June 1798) was an Irish aristocrat who abandoned his prospects as a distinguished veteran of British service in the American War of Independence, and as an Irish Parliamentarian, to embrace the caus ...
. Higgins was paid £1,000 for information on FitzGerald's capture.
Voice of constitutional nationalism
In the 19th century it became more nationalist in tone, particularly under the control and inspiration of
Sir John Gray (1815–75).
''The Journal'', as it was widely known as, was the leading newspaper in Ireland throughout the 19th century. Contemporary sources record it being read to the largely illiterate population by priests and local teachers gathering in homes. It was mentioned in contemporary literature and was seen as symbolising
Irish newspapers for most of its time. By the 1880s it had become the primary media supporter of
Charles Stewart Parnell
Charles Stewart Parnell (27 June 1846 – 6 October 1891) was an Irish nationalist politician who served as a Member of Parliament (MP) from 1875 to 1891, also acting as Leader of the Home Rule League from 1880 to 1882 and then Leader of the ...
and the
Irish Parliamentary Party
The Irish Parliamentary Party (IPP; commonly called the Irish Party or the Home Rule Party) was formed in 1874 by Isaac Butt, the leader of the Nationalist Party, replacing the Home Rule League, as official parliamentary party for Irish nation ...
(IPP). The weekend edition of the paper was known as ''The Weekly Freeman'', which began featuring large format political cartoons in the 1870s.
It was challenged on all sides by rivals. On the nationalist side some preferred ''
The Nation
''The Nation'' is an American liberal biweekly magazine that covers political and cultural news, opinion, and analysis. It was founded on July 6, 1865, as a successor to William Lloyd Garrison's '' The Liberator'', an abolitionist newspaper tha ...
'' founded by
Thomas Davis while others, including radical supporters of Parnell, read the ''
''. The
Anglo-Irish establishment in contrast read the historically
Irish unionist
Unionism is a political tradition on the island of Ireland that favours political union with Great Britain and professes loyalty to the British Crown and constitution. As the overwhelming sentiment of Ireland's Protestant minority, follow ...
''
The Irish Times
''The Irish Times'' is an Irish daily broadsheet newspaper and online digital publication. It launched on 29 March 1859. The editor is Ruadhán Mac Cormaic. It is published every day except Sundays. ''The Irish Times'' is considered a newspaper ...
''. With the split in the IPP over Parnell's relationship with
Katherine O'Shea
Katharine Parnell (née Wood; 30 January 1846 – 5 February 1921), known before her second marriage as Katharine O'Shea, and usually called Katie O'Shea by friends and Kitty O'Shea by enemies, was an English woman of aristocratic background ...
, its readership split too. While ''The Journal'' in September 1891 eventually went with the majority in
opposing Parnell, a minority moved to read the ''
Daily Irish Independent
The ''Daily Irish Independent'' was an Irish newspaper launched in the 1890s to promote the pro- Parnellite cause following the split in the Irish Parliamentary Party over Parnell's continuing leadership. The party had split following the revela ...
''. It was also challenged from the turn of the century by
William O'Brien
William O'Brien (2 October 1852 – 25 February 1928) was an Irish nationalist, journalist, agrarian agitator, social revolutionary, politician, party leader, newspaper publisher, author and Member of Parliament (MP) in the House of Commons o ...
's ''Irish People'' and the ''
Cork Free Press
The ''Cork Free Press'' (11 June 1910 – 9 December 1916) was a nationalist newspaper in Ireland, which circulated primarily in the Munster region surrounding its base in Cork, and was the newspaper of the dissident All-for-Ireland League p ...
''. With
Thomas Sexton becoming Chairman of the Board of Directors (1893–1911), the Journal languished under his spartanic management.
Superseded by the ''Irish Independent''
The collapse of the IPP in 1918, and the electoral success of
Sinn Féin
Sinn Féin ( , ; en, " eOurselves") is an Irish republican and democratic socialist political party active throughout both the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland.
The original Sinn Féin organisation was founded in 1905 by Arthur G ...
, saw a more radical nationalism appear that increasingly was out of step with the moderation of the Journal. The ''
Irish Independent'', the successor to the ''Daily Irish Independent'', was more aggressively marketed. Just prior to the outbreak of the
Irish Civil War in March 1922, the Freeman's Journal printing machinery was destroyed by
Anti-Treaty IRA
The 1921 Anglo-Irish Treaty ( ga , An Conradh Angla-Éireannach), commonly known in Ireland as The Treaty and officially the Articles of Agreement for a Treaty Between Great Britain and Ireland, was an agreement between the government of the ...
men under
Rory O'Connor for its support of the
Anglo-Irish Treaty
The 1921 Anglo-Irish Treaty ( ga , An Conradh Angla-Éireannach), commonly known in Ireland as The Treaty and officially the Articles of Agreement for a Treaty Between Great Britain and Ireland, was an agreement between the government of the ...
. It did not resume publication until after the outbreak of civil war, when the Irish Free State re-asserted its authority over the country.
''The Freeman's Journal'' ceased publication in 1924, when it was merged with the ''
Irish Independent''. Until the 1990s, the Irish Independent included the words 'Incorporating the Freeman's Journal' in its mast-head over its editorials.
In fiction
James Joyce
James Augustine Aloysius Joyce (2 February 1882 – 13 January 1941) was an Irish novelist, poet, and literary critic. He contributed to the modernist avant-garde movement and is regarded as one of the most influential and important writers of ...
drew on his recollection of his visits to the Freeman’s office in 1909 in his novel ''
Ulysses
Ulysses is one form of the Roman name for Odysseus, a hero in ancient Greek literature.
Ulysses may also refer to:
People
* Ulysses (given name), including a list of people with this name
Places in the United States
* Ulysses, Kansas
* Ulysse ...
''. As the place of
Leopold Bloom
Leopold Bloom is the fictional protagonist and hero of James Joyce's 1922 novel '' Ulysses''. His peregrinations and encounters in Dublin on 16 June 1904 mirror, on a more mundane and intimate scale, those of Ulysses/ Odysseus in Homer's epic ...
's employment, the depiction of the paper's offices in the Aeolus chapter has been deemed "an authentic portrait" at a time when the newspaper was "moribund – the ''Irish Independent'' having supplanted it as the most popular daily newspaper in Dublin." Its decline is reflected in "the anxious question posed in Aeolus about the Freeman’s editor, WH Brayden: 'But can he save the circulation?'"
Leading proprietors, editors and contributors
*
Matthias McDonnell Bodkin
Matthias McDonnell Bodkin (8 October 1850 – 7 June 1933) was an Irish nationalist politician and MP. in the House of Commons of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland and Anti-Parnellite representative for North Roscommon, 1892–9 ...
*
Henry Brooke
*
Edward 'Doc' Byrne
*
Wilson Gray
Moses Wilson Gray, known as Wilson Gray (1813 – 4 April 1875) was an Irish-born barrister, member of the Victorian Legislative Assembly and district judge in New Zealand.
Gray born in Claremorris, County Mayo, Ireland, the son of John Gray ...
*
Sir John Gray
*
Charles Lucas
Sir Charles Lucas, 1613 to 28 August 1648, was a professional soldier from Essex, who served as a Royalist cavalry leader during the Wars of the Three Kingdoms. Taken prisoner at the end of the First English Civil War in March 1646, he was rel ...
*
James Winder Good
*
William O'Brien
William O'Brien (2 October 1852 – 25 February 1928) was an Irish nationalist, journalist, agrarian agitator, social revolutionary, politician, party leader, newspaper publisher, author and Member of Parliament (MP) in the House of Commons o ...
*
Thomas Sexton
See also
*
Pádraig Ó Domhnaill
References
{{Authority control
1763 establishments in Ireland
1924 disestablishments in Ireland
Daily newspapers published in Ireland
Defunct newspapers published in Ireland
Newspapers published in Ireland
Publications established in 1763
Publications disestablished in 1924