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 Email: info@searcs-web.com Searc's Web Guide to 20th Century Ireland - Helena Moloney (1884-1967) |
 Helena Moloney (1884-1967) |
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Helena Moloney was born in Dublin. She joined Inghinidhe na hÉireann, [Daughters of Erin]
in 1903 and was editor of that organization's journal Bean na hÉireann in which she wrote a
column entitled 'Labour Notes' under the pseudonymn 'A Worker'. In 1907 Maloney encouraged James Connolly, then in America, to return to Dublin to organise workers into trade unions. In 1909 she helped Constance Markievicz found Na Fianna (the boys wing of the IRB) and in the same year she joined the Abbey Theatre. Moloney often addressed workers' meetings in the nearby Liberty Hall during intervals in productions at the Abbey Theatre. She was first imprisoned in 1911 for stone-throwing in Dublin's Grafton Street on the occasion of a protest at King George V's visit to Dublin. In September, 1911 Moloney became a founder member of the Irish Women's Workers' Union and she joined the Citizen Army in 1913. In 1915, when James Connolly's newspaper The Irish Worker was suppressed, Moloney became the nominal proprietor of its successor, The Workers' Republic, and was Secretary of the IWWU for a number of years in which capacity she was imprisoned many times. Maloney, a volunteer in the Citizen Army, partook in the attack on Dublin Castle in Easter Week, 1916. After the surrender she was imprisoned in Ailesbury Gaol, England. Moloney opposed the 1921 Anglo-Irish Treaty and took the republican side during the Civil War. She was elected President of the Irish Trade Union Congress and in the 1930's she was on the executives of Soar Eire and the League Against Imperialism. Maloney retired from politics in 1945. This extract is from Bean na hÉireann No.19, 1910.© The necessity for Irish Trades Unionists to apply their energies to form an Irish Federation of Labour independent of the English Amalgamated Societies, and also an Independent Labour Party to further their interests independent of politics, is daily becoming more evident, and it is a surprizing fact that it should have been so long neglected. In these Labour Notes we have brought the matter forward repeatedly, and it was stated that when the interests of the Irish Society clashed with the English Society that the English Labour Party would have to support the English Trade Unions to the detriment of the Irish local societies. Later events have fully justified us in our repeated warnings. In Mr James Larkin's case, we have surely a striking example of the vicious methods to which an English society will descend in order to crush a newly formed Irish society, and perhaps a revision of the history of the case will prove of interest to the readers of Bean na hÉireann. James Larkin was originally an organiser of the National Union of Dock Labourers (an English society) and in that capacity he was sent over to organise the Irish Dockers and form branches of the Dockers' Union. He was successful in organising Dublin and Belfast, and finally he was sent down to Cork. In the meantime the members of the Dublin branch had a dispute with their employers, which finally led to a lock-out, and the unfortunate men were thrown out onto the streets. When they applied for help from the English society the Dockers' Union refused to give any money to the Dublin workers on strike, and ordered Larkin to proceed to Aberdeen and leave the Irish workers in the lurch. This Jim Larkin most manfully refused to do, thereby throwing up a lucrative position and putting himself on the same level as the men on strike. The connection between the Dockers' Union and Jim Larkin immediately ceased. Larkin then devoted his energies and wonderful powers of organising to forming a purely Irish society, which was called the Irish Transport Workers' Union, which embraced all classes of unskilled workers, and which had its headquarters in Dublin and was governed by an executive body. In the meanwhile the Cork men who had originally started to organise their forces, with the intention of amalgamating with the English, hearing of the scandalous treatment of the Dublin workers, decided at a committee meeting to amalgamate with the Transport Union; as they were not amalgamated to the Dockers' Union, so they decided to support the Irish Society by joining forces with it. This was afterwards ratified by a general meeting, and they duly sent forward their affiliation fees to the Irish Transport Workers. In this we would imagine that they were quite entitled to join any organisation, either English or Irish, as up to that time they were not affiliated to any organisation. But the English Society thought differently, and was indignant at so much Irish money escaping from its money-grasping claws. Immediately musty Acts of Parliament were unearthed to discover under what headings the English Society could take action so as to make an Irishman send his money to England instead of investing it at home for the benefit of himself and his fellow workers. In a new Act under Edward VII they discovered a clause which makes it illegal for any committee or general meeting to vote money to any use, different to its original purpose, before first acquainting each individual subscriber of the proposed change of location of funds. On this one technical point they relied, although they supplemented it with twenty more items in the indictment. It is quite evident that the Crown must have been influenced to prosecute in the case, and every means were used to secure a conviction, and there can be no doubt that the money belonging to the English Society must have been freely circulated to bring several working men in Cork to come to Dublin to swear away the liberty of the man who had devoted his time and energy in the cause of labour. Never before has such a cruel and vindictive sentence been passed for such a small technical offence, and it is to be hoped that the Irish workers generally will recognise the fact that English laws have no sympathy with Irish labour, and it is also worth noting that no questions have been asked in the English House of Parliament, either by the English labour men, or by our own so-called Nationalist members who are always fond of boasting that they are the only friends of the Irish working classes, especially when approaching election times. © Searc's Web Guide 1997-2008 |
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