Remembering Joseph Whitty, The Young Wexford Man Who Died On Hunger Strike

The last few years have seen the commemoration of many monumental events in our nation’s history, the period of 1916-1923 saw a momentous shift in the political landscape of Ireland and now a century on we commemorate those who struggled for independence in that period. However, this year marks the centenary of the beginning of the brutal, bitter and vicious Irish Civil War.

Commemorating a disastrous conflict which has engrained a deep and lingering bitterness was never going to be a simple task; the state commemoration for the Civil War was held recently and so it seems timely to reflect on the life of a young man from Wexford who suffered one of many tragic deaths in the Irish Civil War.

Early Life:

Joseph Whitty was born in 1904 in Wexford Town, he grew up on Connolly Street. Joseph was born at a time which allowed him to grow up seeing some of the most tumultuous events in Irish and world history. He would’ve seen the failure of the Irish Parliamentary Party to secure Home Rule following the First World War, he would’ve seen many Wexford men sign up to fight in the Great War along with this he would’ve the rebirth of the republican movement during the Easter Rising of 1916.

This rejuvenated nationalist movement was bound to capture the imagination of any young man in Ireland during this period and Whitty was no different. Although the Irish War of Independence began in 1919 when Whitty was merely 15 years of age, along with his brother he became of a Volunteer in the South Wexford Brigade of the Irish Republican Army.

Treaty Split:  

Following the decision of the Irish delegation to sign the Anglo Irish Treaty in 1921 and the subsequent narrow passing of the Treaty by Dáil Eireann in 1922 the Dáil, IRA and Sinn Féin Party all split along the lines of the pro and anti-treaty. Whitty found the terms of the Treaty to be intolerable and sided with the Anti Treaty IRA or the ‘Irregulars’ as they were otherwise known. Attempts were made to reconcile the Pro Treaty IRA which had reorganised as the National Army and the Anti Treaty IRA yet mounting tensions and increasing pressure from the British Government to deal with the IRA occupation of the Four Courts lead to the outbreak of the Irish Civil War in 1922. Intense fighting broke out across the country as former comrades turned their arms on one another.

Imprisonment

The fighting in the beginning was brutal however some figures on the Pro Treaty side such as General Michael Collins, Commander in Chief of the National Army and President of the Irish Free State Arthur Griffith were unwilling to resort to brutal tactics against former comrades. However following the death of General Collins and Arthur Griffith within ten days of one another in August 1922 more extreme and vicious figures such as W.T. Cosrgave and Kevin O’Higgins took charge of the Pro Treaty war effort and the results was a wave of merciless brutality against the ‘Irregulars’. Executions and internment became commonplace under the new look Free State administration. Wexford had become deeply divided and a hotbed of IRA and National Army activity. Skirmishes and ambushes became routine in Wexford. As such Joseph Whitty who was but 18 years of age when the Civil War broke out was on the frontlines of the Civil War as an active IRA Volunteer.

Whitty’s brothers who were prominent republicans and were well known to Free State authorities. However Whitty’s brothers were proving frustratingly elusive for the National Army. Joseph was an active IRA Volunteer and doubtlessly a great asset to the republican movement however  his brothers were allegedly deeply involved in the IRA, deeply enough to have proven a thorn in the side of the Free State. In October of 1922 there was a largescale round-up of republicans and suspected IRA Volunteers in Wexford.

Whitty was among those arrested and interned without trial, no charges  were formally placed against Whitty however it is alleged he was arrested due to the fact that the Free State authorities could not get their hands on his brothers, equally so Joseph Whitty was active in the IRA and hence would’ve been a person of interest to Government forces. Joseph was originally imprisoned in a prison in Wexford town however he was later transferred to the Curragh Camp. The Curragh was then as it is now, the main base of operations for the National Army, it had served as the main barracks of the British Army before the establishment of the Free State. As such Whitty was now imprisoned in the heart of Free State territory.

Hunger Strike:

The conditions in the Curragh Camp were no doubt wretched, in protest at the squalor in which republican prisoners were being held and against the way in which republicans were being so viciously treated by Free State Forces Joe Whitty embarked on an independent Hunger Strike. Prominent republicans such as Thomas Ashe and Terence MacSwiney had garnered international attention during their Hunger Strikes and this international focus had placed immense pressure on the British governments of the time. Whitty doubtlessly hoped similar pressure would be placed on the Free State government by the international community or perhaps that the Free State government would be unwilling to allow such a young man and a veteran of the War of Independence to die in such a manner in a Free State jail.

Very little is known about Whitty’s hunger strike due to the strict censorship imposed by the Free State government. On the 2nd of September, 1923 Joseph Whitty passed away following his Hunger Strike at the tender age of 19. It is indeed a tragedy that such a young man was left to perish by the government of the Irish Free State and by the National Army, a young man who had dedicated his formative years in service to the Irish nation had given his life for his cause and for his country at such a young age. Whitty’s young age and the nature of his death adds to the palpable tragedy of his passing, the Civil War has countless examples of tragic deaths and Whitty’s is no exception. He was buried in Ballymore Cemetery in Killinick in his native Wexford.

Censorship:

One may wonder why Whitty’s hunger strike did not act as a lightning rod for the frustration of the Irish people with the brutality of the Civil War, surely the sacrifice and suffering of such a young man would’ve drawn the attention of the entire nation as MacSwiney and Ashe had. However the fact of the matter is the Free State administration were acutely aware of the fact that hunger strikes could turn public opinion against the government and as such strict censorship and secrecy surrounded the conditions in which republican prisoners were held. The Free State censors held strict control of media in the Free State an overwhelming majority of which were Pro-Treaty to begin with. As such the Hunger Strike of Wexford’s Joseph Whitty remains an often overlooked story of the Irish Civil War.

It could be said that through his sacrifice Whitty served as an inspiration to his interned comrades who later in that year embarked on a mass hunger strike which saw many senior IRA figures such as Wexford’s Sean Etchingham take part in this hunger strike protesting prison conditions and the Free State government. Later in that same year of 1923, IRA Chief of Staff, Frank Aiken and political leader of the Anti-Treaty movement Eamon De Valera called for a ceasefire and an IRA arms dump. The Civil War had ended and Free State forces emerged victorious.

Commemoration:

Although at the time of his death Joseph Whitty may not have garnered the same attention as MacSwiney or Ashe had, in the fullness of time the sacrifice of Whitty has been rightfully recognised. An annual commemoration is held for Whitty each Easter Sunday and a Wexford Sinn Féin Cumann bears his name. In the national cemetery of Glasnevin in which Parnell, O’Connell, Collins, Boland, Markievicz and De Valera are buried there stands a monument erected by the National Graves Association there stands a memorial to all Irish republicans who died on hunger strikes from Ashe to Mickey Devine. There in the midst of names such as Terence MacSwiney, Frank Stagg and Bobby Sands the name of Wexford’s Joseph Whitty is engraved. There and in the minds of Irish republicans in Wexford and all over Ireland he shall be remembered as a man who gave his life for his country.

In the coming years of commemoration, it is worth reflecting on the story of Joseph Whitty and other Wexford combatants both Pro and Anti Treaty who lost their lives in the bitter struggle that was the Irish Civil War.

Sources: 

Joe Whitty (republican-news.org)

The Forgotten Hunger Strikes

Remembering the Past: Post-Civil War hunger-strikes | An Phoblacht

Darragh Sinnott

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