Irish War of Independence (Cogadh na Saoirse) / Black & Tan War

A staged photo, but shows what it would have looked like when a Black & Tan column with an armored car got ambushed on a small country road. The armored cars made attacking such columns very difficult, as the Volunteers has no weapons that could penetrate them.

Anglo Irish War 1 of 3

Anglo Irish War 2 of 3

Anglo Irish War 3 of 3

The Bureau of Military History 1913-1921 is a fantastic resource on the war. The Collection at Military Archives is a joint initiative of Military Archives and the National Archives and allows you to search throughout the BMH – free of charge - to help you in your research. 

(BMH) is a collection of 1,773 witness statements; 334 sets of contemporary documents; 42 sets of photographs and 13 voice recordings that were collected by the State between 1947 and 1957, in order to gather primary source material for the revolutionary period in Ireland from 1913 to 1921. The Bureau’s official brief was ‘to assemble and co-ordinate material to form the basis for the compilation of the history of the movement for Independence from the formation of the Irish Volunteers on 25th November 1913, to the 11th July 1921’ (report of the Director, 1957).

It has a searchable index of the witnesses HERE.

Thank you for these 1st class presentations of recent Irish History.

Terence McSwiney's view ... It is not those who inflict the most, but those who endure the most, will conquer... was borne out by his ultimate sacrifice. It seems de Valera was of the view that hunger strike demanded the ultimate sacrifice seeing any deviation as a humiliation to the objectives of the cause and the Irish people. By contrast a letter written by Michael Collins was of a different view..."I now order you to give up the strike as you will be ten times a greater asset to the movement alive than dead" 

A similar difference of opinion between these leaders arose when the decision by de Valera, more of a strategist, was taken to burn the custom House to show the world Ireland was formally at war with Britain, in attempts to redress the international press that the actions to date were of a small minority of rebels. Collins was mindful once again of the value of Volunteers and opposed to the idea of formal confrontation.

I think de Valera was right and the tragedy of McSwineys death brought focus and support more than any military engagement, attracting the attention of Clement Attlee and Mahatma Gandhi to Irelands cause. gandhi also engaged in hunger strike and studied the concept of peaceful protest through Daniel O'Connell's movement.

I am happy that suicide bombings were unheard of in those times.

You're welcome, Michael. And thank you for mentioning Terence McSwiney. It reminded me that I'd written an article about him that I forgot to add to this list of articles. It's here: Terence MacSwiney: Irish Martyr. I would imagine that Collins and McSwiney may have known each other for some time, both being from Co. Cork. So Collins view on McSwiney dying on hunger strike or not may have been influenced by friendship, whereas de Valera's view wouldn't have been.

How many volunteers declined to make statements and were they all asked and by whom? Did all who made statements and who would have been entitled to the princely veterans pension claim it? How did the Trucealeers fare out in their endeavours?

They interviewed 1,773 participants, but many from the Republican side didn't participate. On the issue of who took part the site has this on their "about" page:

The BMH and the Civil War

While the BMH succeeded in collecting a huge and extremely diverse body of source material on the revolutionary period that is of international importance, it failed to secure the cooperation of many survivors of the 1913-1921 period who subsequently rejected the Anglo-Irish Treaty of December 1921, many of whom perceived it as a ‘Free State’ project. Consequently, the BMH does not include detailed statements from prominent Anti-Treaty survivors such as Tom Barry and others. On the State side, there was also a reluctance to seek witness statements and original records concerning the Irish Civil War in 1922/23, due to the prevailing political climate in Ireland during the 1940s/50s, some 20-30 years after the events recorded by the BMH took place. However, much of the material within the BMH does cover aspects of the Civil War, as many contributors submitted information that extended well beyond 1921.