Dress for fashionable women changed dramatically between 1900 and 1925.

A Discussion of the Social, Political and Economic changes affecting design changes

in early twentieth century Ireland during the period of transition

from Viceregal rule to Home rule in Dublin and Belfast.

* * * *

Brendan Madden, Year 3 bDes (Hons) Textile Design

Coláiste Náisiúnta Ealaíne is Deartha, Báile áth Cliath

November 2008
 Dress for fashionable women changed dramatically between 1900 and 1925.

* * *
list of Internationally, the first quarter of the Twentieth century saw dramatic change in the dress
illustrations
of fashionable women. This essay aims to explore not the changes themselves, - the raising
The list of
illustrations is of a hemline or the foregoing of corset and bustle, nor even the international influences
this column
throughout the that brought about these changes. What we shall look at in this essay are the social, political
essay and thus
there is no an- and economic influences on dress for fashionable women within and unique to the island
cillary docu-
ment detailing of Ireland. Of course the international fashion scene influenced local fashions. Ads in the
illustrations or
their sources. Irish Times for the latest Lyon silk and articles following the prevailing styles of of conti-

nental Europe, Britain and America attest to this, and we shall touch on the international

social, political and economic influences briefly. We shall, however, explore in depth the

rapid and intentional destruction of the ‘old order of things’ within what had been ‘Ireland’

and the concurrent fabrication of a new ‘modern’ Twentieth century self-governing au-

tonomous nation. The enchanting personal memoirs of Elizabeth, Countess of Fingall,

the principle Roman Catholic peeress of the United Kingdom, and one of the leading so-

cialites of the day, serve as a backdrop to these changes, and we shall visit those memoirs

as a reference point through the essay.

The opening of the new century saw the emergence of the United States of America as a

world power in terms of trade, political influence and cultural colonialization. This ‘cul-

tural colonisation’ was the result of the cementing of Hollywood as the centre of the in-

ternational film industry. The cinema spread with it American fashions and values, - the

‘Gibson Girl’ personification of the feminine ideal for one, and secondly, the notion of a

society free of the class system in which ‘any man can make it’ to the top by virtue alone.

The colonized nations in Europe, such as Finland, Poland, Ireland and the Balkans began

to look inwards to their own culture and celebrate it with the same boldness with which

America celebrated hers. Another force of change was the rapid proliferation and democ-

ratization of new modes of transport and communications such as the motor car, railway

and electric tram, ocean liner, telephone, telegraph, camera and an improved postal system.

Shortly after these came the aeroplane. For the first time, the working classes and profes-

sional classes had the ability to travel to and communicate with those of a like mind across

the globe. This was to be much greatly capitalized on by the proponents of both answers

to the ‘Irish Question’ in the following years, Unionists and Nationalists.

page 1
 illustration 1
the bodies of dead
soldiers in the
trenches of france,
stripped of boots,
helmets and any
identifiable items,
they were burried
in mass graves.

(Photo Source:
Kendle, 1992)

As the Colonial powers of Europe sought to increase their landholding both in Europe

and in Africa, their inability to resist meddling in each others’ territorial affairs brought

about the Great War of 1914-18. This supposed ‘war to end all wars’, which was in reality

a war of attrition, saw nineteen million dead, and twenty-one million others seriously

wounded. What separated this war from all before was the fact that it was drafted civilians,

illustration 2
and not professional soldiers who
french fashion de-
signer Gabrielle
had born the brunt of the casual-
‘Coco’ Chanel
(Right) with a
ties and for the first time Death
friend in the mid-
1910s.
and destruction were brought
Note the casual jer-
sey outfit and
home to all the nations of Europe.
string of pearls,
her signature look.
The hardships of that war (illustra-

(Photo Source:
tion 1) were documented by poets,
Baudot, 2003)
journalists and photographers.

The UK lost nearly a million of

their men from a population of

45,400,000. The absence of skilled

men of a working age during the

war and their relative scarcity af-

terwards gave women the opportu-

nity to pursue jobs that had

page 2
 hitherto not been open to them, especially ones that involved skilled manual labour. Many

of the most fashionable ladies of the aristocracy set up hospitals both on mainland Europe

and in Britain and Ireland to care for the wounded soldiers and civillians, sometimes even

of both sides. The practical need to be able to work and move about freely and unhindered

by excessive clothing in the new spheres of factories and farms as well as in the hospitals

brought about a rationalisation of dress for all purposes, for all women at all levels of society,

especially dress for fashionable women because they could no longer find the servants to help

dress them in their impractical gowns. The women who would have performed these duties

were now doing the jobs of men, and after the war they had no intention of returning to

their old constricting clothes, roles and assumed behaviours. The fashions were refined and

the focus shifted from luxurious trimmings to luxurios fabrics and details. The look of the

period is very much epitomised by Coco Chanel, the French fashion designer (illustration 2).

illustration 3
Royal Dublin Soci-
ety Horse Show
(Photo Source:
National Library
of Ireland)

Library Reference
Number: EAS
1652

The life of a fashionable woman in Ireland in 1900 was pivoted on the annual the Social

Season which began with the Royal Dublin Society’s Horse Show in August (Illustration

3) (See also Appendix G) and ended with the Viceregal Ball in Dublin Castle in March.

and Several country gentry had their own houses in and around St. Stephen’s Green in

Dublin, but the vast majority spent the season at the Shelbourne Hotel (Illustration 4).

page 3
 illustration 4 The Shelbourne had become a town
The Shelbourne house for the Irish gentry who came
Hotel, St.
Stephen’s Green
up to Dublin for the social season.
This began in January and went on
(Photo Source: until March, taking in house parties
National Library
of Ireland) held in the castles of the gentry in the
vicinity of Dublin, and finishing with
the magnificent Viceregal Ball in
March at Dublin Castle. …In the
Shelbourne tearoom before the First
World War in the afternoons under
the exquisitely beautiful mantelpiece
a massive fire burned where the
young girls would sit waiting for their invitations to the Vice regal Ball. A plumed
messenger in army dress could be seen through the windows dismounting from his
horse and coming in with an invitation to the ball. Girls would twitter and gossip
among themselves nervously as they watched who was getting the sealed envelopes.
(O’Connor, 2007)

Although they would often spend time visiting at the mansions surrounding the city such

as St. Anne’s in Raheny (Illustration 5), Farmleigh in the Phoenix Park, The Chief Secre-

tary’s Lodge and of course the Vice Regal Lodge (Illustration 6).

illustration 5
St. Anne’s, Raheny
during a 1912
Garden Party
(Photo Source:
Sharkey, 2002)
illustration 6
Viceregal Lodge,
ca.1900
(Photo Source: National
Library of Ireland)

Life back home on the grand country estates was less glamorous than on the Dublin social

circuit, as Katherine Everett (nee Herbert) recounts in her memoirs below:

Our life in that great house was dull and may have been a little absurd, with its pomp
and formality, but there was a fine side to the tradition that was unbroken for gener-
ations - a tradition of mutual obligations and service recognized by all, from the owner
down to the humblest dependant. There existed a bond of pride and love of the place
among them all, pride perhaps more actively felt by the employees in their various
departments than by the owner, and everyone was assured of comfort and security.
(Everett, 1950, p.39)

The dress we see in the family photograph (Illustration 7) is almost like mourning dress in

its plainness. Unlike English fashionable ladies, however, the Anglo-Irish tended not to

bother with mourning wear etiquette, much to the surprise of the English (Fingall, 1937):

Although the day-to-day wear of the fashionable women of 1900s Dublin was quite simple,
page 4
 illustration 7
Earl of Bantry and
family in early 1900s,
Lord & Lady
Ardilaun are couple
on far right.
(Photo Source:
Everett, 1950)

illustration 8
Contemporary
photograph from
garden party in
Cambridge
in 1904
(Photo Source:
Personal Website)
they did have an opportunity to dress up for the Viceregal ball, for Wedding parties and

for Court vists to London. The dress worn at garden parties in Ireland was similar to what

was worn at the Horse Show (see the woman to the far right of illustration 3), and was es-

sentially similar to what was worn about town. This is quite different to Britain, where the

dress code for such events was far more formal (Illustration 8) with clothes with much more

structural padding and corsetry and drape than the Irish fashionable women wore.

The court dress of the Anglo-Irish, however, was splendid and compensated most lavishly

for the restraint of their day-to-day wear. Below we see Lady Olive Ardilaun

(Illustration 9)1 shown in her gown for the coronation of King Edward VII in 1902.
illustration 9
Lady Olive
Ardilaun in her
dress for the Coro-
nation of King Ed-
ward VII in 1902
(Photo Source:
Sharkey, 2002)

(illustration 10
Countess Con-
stance Gore-Booth
Markievicz

(Photo Source:
McCoole, 2003)

1 Also pictured in Illustration 7. She and her husband, Sir. Arthur Guinness, Lord Ardilaun, lived in St. Anne’s (Illustration 5) page 5
Illustrated here too, in a costume contrary her later radical military garb, is Constance

Gore-Booth (later Countess Markievicz) (Illustration 8), who came from an established

Anglo-Irish family with a Country seat at Lissadel in Co. Sligo and a Dublin mansion on

the beautiful Harcourt Terrace. For several years during the early 1900s she was the toast

of Society and ‘every man wanted to dance with her’ (Fingall, 1937).

The late 19th Century had seen huge developments in the democratisation of Ireland and

the gradual change from a semi-feudal system of “landlord and tenant” to the more egal-

itarian system of freehold farmers. Much of this was due to the work of Daniel O’Connell

and later, Charles Stewart Parnell and Michael Davitt in the Land League, although the

constructiveness and helpfulness of their policies of obstruction can be debated. Eitherway,

it brought to the British House of Commons the very real ‘Irish (Land) Question’.

The continued inactivity of the British government to help out both the Anglo-Irish land-

lords and their tenants caused a turning against the Westminster government and increased

calls for a return to Home Rule as had existed prior to the highly controversial 1801 Act

of Union. It wasn’t until the Chief-Secretaryship of Arthur Balfour that the question really

started to be tackled. Balfour introduced a Local Government Bill in 1892 which set up

Local Authorities and gave them authority over local issues. Around the same time several

government departments such as the Ministry of Transport and the Boards of Education,

Science and Art were devolved to Dublin. The new local authorities, especially Dublin

Corporation very quickly came to carry an Irish Nationalistic Catholic agenda and very

very vocally anti-union.

After his tenure as Chief Secretary, Balfour went on to become Prime Minister of the

United Kingdom and he appointed George Wyndham as Chief Secretary. Wyndham

brought in a series of Land Acts which helped tenants purchaes the freehold on their prop-

erties. He also increased the power of the Local Authorities and started a wave of govern-

ment provided housing for the rural working classes. Some have regarded the Wyndham

Land Act as a gigantic bribe to both sections of Irish society. (Fingall, 1937, p.384)

To get funding for this from Chancellor for the Exchequer, Mr. Ritchie, was a challenge,

but as Lady Fingall recalls in her memoirs, it was one that Wyndham tackled with skill:

page 6
 Ritchie, bent on safeguarding the national purse, would not give George Wyndham
one million, much less twelve. Wyndham suggested that the chancellor visit Ireland
and he agreed to do this. Then George Wyndham went to the Dudleys and said:
"Ritchie is coming to Ireland. I shan't be here. You must arrange it all."

We were to be joined by the Chancellor of the Exchequer, Mr. Ritchie, who was
coming to pay a visit to the Congested Districts, and Rachel Dudley had deter-
mined to let him see the very worst aspect of Irish poverty. He arrived at
Kingstown by the afternoon boat and was asked: "Would you like to see a little of
Dublin?" He said that he would, and he was driven slowly through he slums, the
fashionable quarters being carefully avoided. This occupied the time until his train
left for the West. He was put into the train in the dusk and when he arrived at the
end of his journey, driven out through the dark country to Rockingham. The next
day Lady Dudley took him out motoring. Again the route was carefully chosen,
through what George Wyndham called "the agricultural slums of Ireland." The
chauffeur had orders to drive slowly past the poorest cottages, where the parish
priest had seen to it that the most miserable looking children were on show. [per-
haps as in Illustration 9] If, by chance, a fairly prosperous cottage had to be passed,
the car went at full speed and Lady Dudley, putting out all her charms, distracted
the Chancellor's attention.
The programme was repeated daily during his visit. Sometimes he passed the same
place a second time without recognizing it. At the end of that visit to Roscommon,
Mr. Ritchie was taken back to the Vice regal Lodge and from there to the boat.
Returning to London, he declared: "My God! I did not know that in Western Eu-
rope such a country existed! The only two decent houses in it are the Vice regal
Lodge and Rockingham. All the others are slums and broken-down cottages."
(Fingall, 1937. p.282)
illustration 9
An Irish Cottage in
the early 1900s

(Photo Source:
Private website,
2002)

page 7
 The commitment of the Anglo-Irish to the cause of the Irish national good was clearly

present and admirable, but the almost one hundred years of ‘too little, too late’ meant that

Ireland was hungry for more autonomy to help themselves and not to have to plead for

the charity of the English. In a pamphlet pushing for such autonomy, Arthur Griffith, the

founder of the Sinn Fein movement puts forward a very strong argument.

The contrary policy consists in sending 103 men from Ireland to make laws for this
country in concert with 567 Englishmen and Scotchmen or in the proportion of
one Irishman to five and a half foreigners. It involves the abrogation of the Treaty
of 1783, the admission of the validity of the Act of Union, and it extends the
colour of consititutionalism to every action of the British Government in Ireland. It
is a political truism that no country can be governed constitutionally against its will,
but Ireland admits, by sending members to the British Parliament, that she is a con-
stitutionally governed country and that the laws made in Englan for her – tax laws
and coercion laws – are made by and with her authority and consent.
(Griffith, 1905, p.2)

And so the debate about the future government of Ireland began to rage in all circles of

the United Kingdom from about 1905 onwards, especially with the new nationalist voices

of the local authorities. In 1910, the Irish Parliamentary held the balance of power in the

British Parliament and as they sided with the Liberal Party, the Unionists cemented their
illustration 9 relationship with the Conservative
A British Unionist
advertisement to Party who controlled the House of
raise awareness
in mainland Lords. The sudden very real possi-
Britain of the
Irish Question. bility of a Dublin government
(Photo Source: pushed the Ulster Unionists to-
Kendle,
1992) wards their ‘Solemn League and

Convenant’, the foundation of the

Ulster Volunteer Force, and the

dramatic importation of German

arms on the eve of the Great War.

Central to the debate were the

most fashionable women in Ire-

land, most of whom wanted to see

some form of devolution. The pre-

cise form of devolution varied but

there were three main strands of

thought about how Ireland would

page 8
be run and what its new relationship would be to Britain. Most of the Unionists, both

British Unionists who did not want to see Ireland break away, and Irish Unionists, who

did not want to jeopardise their recent economic prosperity, supported a system of feder-

alism. The amazing thing is, that if that had been pushed through , who knows how history

would have changed, for almost certainly, the devolved Ireland would have been a united

one, united both in purpose and in national boundary.

In fact, the increasing radicalization of nationalist opinion in a crisis that seemed

destined to settle Ireland's future, brought a focus and clarity to a debate over con-
stitutional options that had not existed before. In this context, the monarchical di-
mension re-emerged in two distinct strands: Ireland having the status of an
imperial dominion under the Crown; and a more influential proposal pushed by
Arthur Griffith, of the revival of the Irish kingdom as it had existed before the Act
of Union, but with its independence more effectively secured - deemed to have an
Irish historical authenticity which the more recently created dominions lacked. The
appeal of a monarchical constitution option for nationalists was the possibility of
maintaining the unity of Ulster and the rest of Ireland. But Lloyd George put this
option to Ulster Unionists in 1921 without success: British Identity framed in terms
of allegiance to the King could only be authentically experienced within the
boundaries of the state of which he was the hegemonic emblem.
(Loughlin, 2007a, p.132)

[The Irish Viceroyalty] lacking the authenticity of the institution it aped, the state
of the country during the last years of British rule made impossible any ritual rep-
resentation of Ireland's membership of the United Kingdom.
(Loughlin, 2007a, p.134)

[Federalism] was a system of government that could accommodate diversity while

preserving unity, as it did in the United States, Canada, and Australia. Just before
war broke out in 1914, Long had admitted that a solution to the problems bedev-
illing the United Kingdom might lie in federalism and he had argued that the next
Unionist government should explore that option... He paid close attention to the
arguments in favour of devolution; home rule all round, and federalism that were
being debated with increasing intensity in private and public forums during the
winter of 1916-17. By the spring of 1917, he had decided that a federal solution
was the only logical answer.
(Kendle, 1992, p.133)

Still ongoing was the Cultural Nationalism movement started by Lady Augusta Gregory,

William Butler Yeats, George Bernard Shaw, and others, all of whom had their own opin-

ions on the political direction of Ireland, but were more concerned with the immediate

need to reassert her National culture, for without that the politics were worthless.
Debates about monarchy among cultural nationalists in the period up to 1914,
however, were essentially subordinate disputes. John Redmond's Irish Parliamen-
tary Party was still in control of nationalist Ireland, and the general elections of
1910, which left it holding the balance of power, allowed Redmond to force the
Home Rule issue on to the parliamentary agenda, thereby providing an Irish focus -
with an Ulster boiling point - for a much wider crisis of the British state that had
page 9
 developed over the Liberal government's social reforms and budgetary policy, and
its curtailment of the powers of the House of Lords by the Parliament act of 1911.
Furious at their exclusion from power and with a party leader in Bonar Law with
close Ulster Unionist connections, the Unionist leadership proceeded to push the
political crisis to the point of civil war, including providing assistance in the acquisi-
tion of arms by the Ulster Volunteer Force. (O’Beirne Ranelagh, p.183)
The tension and debate over the future of the Union was illustrated rather humorously

by an incident involving some students of Trinity College, who would essentially play a

game of Capture the Flag with the Mansion House, the Seat of the Lord Mayor of Dublin.

Shortly after one o'clock a party of students rushed through the College gates, and
passed up Grafton Street. On arrival at Stephen's Green they removed from of the
wreaths from the site of the Wolfe Tone Memorial, and passing along the north
side of the green turned into Dawson street, and marched towards the Mansion
House, in the grounds of which a new green flag was floating from the flagstaff.
Several of the students climbed the wall enclosing the grounds in order to take
down the flag, and were successful in accomplishing this, a small Union Jack being
run up in its place. Buckley, the house steward, ran into the grounds and tried to
prevent the capture of the flag, but was unable to do so. A porter named Joseph
Roe and another man came to Buckley's assistance, and a part of police appearing
on the scene, a struggle ensued for the possession of that trophy, which in a dam-
aged condition was eventually secured by the police. (Irish Times, 06.03.1906, p.6)

The struggle for power within the British Parliament between the Conservatives and the Lib-

erals hampered these genuine efforts as, typical of government and opposition, they opposed

the plans put forward by the allies of the opposing side. This meant that although essentially,

save for details and symantecs, the Unionists and Nationalists were in agreement as to the

future direction of Ireland (at least for the medium term), that agreement was to be ignored

and the British political parties set about to polarise the two groups for their own purposes,

especially with regard to the balance of power in the House of Commons, and in the case

of the Conservatives, who were allied with the Unionists, the house of Lords too. This po-

larisation made the ideas of a federal nation or a dual-monarchy more difficult to achieve,

and even caused family ties to be severed and prominent people to be taken off gustlists.

Initially, Theresa [Lady Londonderry] courted friends in all political camps, includ-
ing George Wyndham, Horace Plunkett, Lewis Harcourt and the Countess of Fin-
gall. The latter mused that the Londonderrys’ befriending such a self-proclaimed
‘rebel and Papist’ - as she was - an attempt to ‘prove their broadmindedness’, but
concluded that ‘their friendship was never failing and it made no difference to it
that we often fought on politics’. Unionist turned home ruler, Plunkett was another
rarely in agreement with Theresa’s political agenda, but he corresponded with her
from 1908 and enjoyed her hospitality, her company and her approach to life.

From 1912, both parliament and high society became increasingly polarised. Lord
Londonderry went as far as to ask his sister, Lady Allendale, wife of a Liberal Whip,
not to visit and, characteristically, Theresa made no attempt to hide the depth of her
page 10
 emotion, refusing a royal invite to spend Ascot week at Windsor because an Irish
pro-home rule peer would be present. And, when ‘feeling on Ireland was running
very high’: there were constant scenes in the house and out of it, and many former
friedns in opposite political parties wouldn’t sepak to each other. Lady London-
derry…showed her feeligns very openly…on the Terrace of the House of Com-
mons, Lady Pirrie, whose husband had rattled to the other side, rushed up to her,
and after greeting her said ‘What very changeable weather we are having’; Lady L.
sniffed loudly and replied, ‘I dislike change of any sort’, and turned her back on her.

Theresa’s invitation lists became more selective and increasingly the Countess of
Fingall was the lone dissenter at her receptions. Esentailly this was an indirect, but
effective, means of exerting influence. Indeed, during the third home rule crisis in-
vites to Mount Stewart provided an opportunity for english politicians and journal-
ists to witness the popular enthusiasm that opposition to home rule roused at first
hand. The down estate was, tehrefore, a Unionist tool to counter the mainland apa-
thy that so worried Theresa and Carson. The value of face to face meetings such as
these were inestimable. Conservative MP and founder of the Lady and Vanity Fair,
Sir Thomas Gibson Bowles was one of the many who admitted to Theresa, ‘When
we meet I will tell you things I dare not write’… Theresa was quick to adopt the Ob-
server’s J.L. Garvin as well as H.W. Gwynne, editor of the Morning Post and Geof-
frey Robinson of The Times. The latter two were invited to Mount Stewart and
subsequently promised full coverage of the Unionist cause. (Urquhart, 2007, p.108)

This led to the hugely controversial, disappointing and damaging partition of Ireland in

1922. In a way the story is very similar to the story of Solomen and the two women in dis-

pute over the baby (1 Kings 3:16-28), although the judgement exercised in Ireland was to

lead to a far murkier result. But all sides were impatient and a decision had to be made

with urgency for it was impossible for things to continue as they had done, although many

of those supporting the continuance of the Union in the North of Ireland wished for noth-
ing to change at all. The brutal violence of the 1916 rising was the final turning point

which made the continuation of the Union in its then form impossible. Initally the people

of Ireland were disgusted by the rebels and spat on them as they were paraded through

the streets of Dublin to prison, but after the trials and executions, the tides changed.

The war provided the opportunity for Irish separatists to mount the coup de the-
atre that was the 1916 rising, which, with the government's politically inept execu-
tion of the leaders, served to revive the Irish physical force tradition... By the end of
the first week in May, opinions were already changing. Redmonite National Volun-
teers patrolled Sackville Street after the rising, helping troops and police keep order.
Rebel prisoners were jeered and booed as they were marched to prison, but Red-
mond himself was worried by Maxwell’s handling of the situation. He realized that
public opinion was slowly swaying towards the rebels as a result of the executions
as people like the socialite Lady Fingall began to report that they were ‘watching a
stream of blood coming from beneath a closed door’. George Bernard Shaw
warned the government that they were canonising their prisoners.’ The prime min-
ister, Asquith, heeded these warnings and sent two telegrams to Maxwell saying
that he hiped there would be no more executions except in special cases. Maxwell
page 11
 illustration 11
Dublin during
the 1916
Easter uprising

(Photo Source:
Hegarty & O’-
Toole, 2006)

On the day of the rising, life in the suburbs went on as normal, and even the Races and

parties continued oblivious to what was happening in Dublin city, but from 1916 until

1923, the old order of things went into complete remission and scenes such as these on

these of the leaders of English society coming to Ireland for the Horse Show and for the

Races were gone forever (Illustrations 12, 13, 14) and were replaced with sadder scenes

like that of Mrs. Pearse putting a wreath on her son’s grave (Illustration 15).

It was against the backdrop of the chaos of the 1910s and 20s in Ireland that the New

Free State started to take its first steps a nation in its own right.

illustration 12
The Countess of
Arran and friends

(Photo Source:
MacCarthy Mor-
rogh,1998)

illustration 13
Lord Kitchener of
Khartaum and the
Countess of Iveagh
at the RDS
Horse Show

(Photo Source:
Hegarty & O’-
Toole, 2006)

page 12
 illustration 14
The King and
Queen during the
1911 Royal Visit

(Photo Source:
Hegarty & O’-
Toole, 2006)

illustration 15
Patrick Pearse’s
mother lays a
wreath on his
grave in
Arbour Hill

(Photo Source:
Hegarty & O’-
Toole, 2006)

Kenneth Clarke, in his book on Civilisation writes that:

Great Nations write their autobiographies in three manuscripts, the book of their
deeds, the book of their words, and the book of their art. Not one of these books
can be understood unless we read the two others, but of the three the only trust-
worthy one is the last. (Clarke, 1969, p.1)

The new Irish nation, however, chose not to write her own ‘autobiography’ as she had started to

do at the opening of the century with the new Abbey Theatre and the Gaelic Revival, but chose

instead to burn and destroy the manuscripts of history - quite literally (in the case of the Customs

House and the Four Courts where the only copies of two centuries of Irish History were held) as

well as figuratively (The attempts to dissolve and remove the influence of all public Protestant in-

stitutions and the Royal Dublin Society (see Appendix D & E).

page 13
 For their part, however, the new state authorities, alive to its negative symbolism,
marked their possession of the Castle by …[signalling] their contemptuous attitude
to the site through sartorial and presentational disregard: ‘a motley assemblage:
some in tweed caps and unpolished boots; others with the beard of yester-eve still
fresh on their chins; others with long lanky hair, collars and ties au pientre’.
(Periscope, ‘The last Days of Dublin Castle’, Blackwoods Magazine, 212 (Aug.
1922), p.188) (Loughlin, 2007b, p.321)
The outgoing Under Secretary, after witnissing the Rising and even being held captive for a

while, lamented that it had come to this. As he left Ireland, he wrote a letter to Lady Fingall
Sir Matthew Nathan, Under Secretary to the Chief Secretary of Ireland from
1914-1916: “Ought not the people who can influence thought in Ireland to initiate
a movement for combining the two ideas of maintaing the British connection and
developing the national individuality of Ireland? It has been one of the govern-
ment’s mistakes to treat the latter purpose as essentially antagonistic to the former,
with the result that they have made it so…” (Fingall, 1937, p.377)

The most unfortunate thing was, as touched on previously. Those who had aimed to do just

that had been marginalised from the debate, which had essentially become about who could
make up the balance of power in the British Parliament and how could they be given what

they wanted without giving the allies of the other side what they wanted. When Lady Gregory

and Yeats wanted to put on a play by Bernard Shaw that had already been banned in Britain,

they had much debate with the Chief Secretary and Lord Lieutenant.
That is, the Abbey assumed as its terrain not the British empire, whose monarch
had granted the theatre’s patent, but an emergent Irish state, one that in 1909 had
no military power to define its authority or its boundaries; performance of the play
in a space fortuitously free from British censorship grounded the Abbey in a tiny
patch of Irish independence. (McDiarmid, 1994, p.26)

When the Lord Lieutenant asked her quietly not to publicly advertise the play...
...her provocative, quasi-revolutionary rhetorical question "Are you going to cut off
our heads?" received a rebuke from Sir James: "This is a very serious business." At
the end of her fourth visit she flaunted a misquotation from Parnell: "Who shall set
bounds to the march of a Nation?" (Laurence and Grene 15, 34). While quoting
the most famous Irish home-rule leader in the face of the undersecretary for Ire-
land may not quite be so daring as citing Bernadette Devlin to Margaret Thatcher,
the line had an insubordinate air about it. Yet both the undersecretary and the lord
lieutenant, Lord Aberdeen, were home rulers and Liberals, who did not consider
themselves hostile to the more benign forms of Irish nationalism. That a titled
Protestant would not be more sensitive to their predicament never ceased to puzzle
them. "You have put us in a most difficult and disagreeable position by putting on a
play which the English Censor objected to," complained Sir James. And later: "It is
very hard on the Lord Lieutenant, you should have had more consideration for
him”. "It is hard on him," answered Gregory, "for he can't please everybody." In
their second meeting Sir James "implored" Gregory and Yeats to "save the Lord
Lieutenant from this delicate position." As if unaware that he was dealing with a
deliberate act of resistance, albeit only cultural, he added, "You defy us, you adver-
tise it under our very nose, at the time everyone is making a fight with the Censor."
(McDiarmid, 1994, p.44)
page 1
Shortly after independence, the intensity of attacks on the Anglo-Irish, including those

who had most vocally and courageuously fought for the national autonomy of Ireland,

was increased and every night scores of aincient mansions were burned down with all

their works of art and their memories, and all they represented. (See Appendix C)

The new Ireland was a place vastly different to, and almost a ghost of, the old one, no

longer were there going to be any grand balls or long winters in Dublin sititng by the fire

in the Shelbourne. The power had shifted into the hands of the elected representatives

of the people for the first time ever, and the people were fed up and angry. Some tried to

be optimistic:
The promenade before the grand stand and in the neighbourhood of the tea gar-
dens revealed a striking display of fashionable apparel. The morning, though gen-
erally fine, had not been altogether clear, but the majority of the ladies, apparently,
had decided that the day was suitable for the wearing of bright attire, though wraps
and umbrellas were brought against the chances of showers such as those which
came over so suddenly on Wednesday. ...The scene was near to recalling the days
when the Dublin Horse Show on a favourable day was accounted one of the sights
of Europe. The company, it might be said, was not so cosmopolitan as it has been
in the years of the show's pride, and English society had not been transported to
Dublin, as formerly it used to be for our August festival; but the home folk made a
good showing, and perhaps, in a few years they may find themselves vying again
with the social leaders of other lands. (The Irish Times, 04.08.1924, p.7)

Others still, tried to wake up to the reality that everything that had been before was now

gone. The wonderful gowns that had been worn to the Balls were redundant, and the

armies of servants were no more, reduced now to one or two housekeepers and nurses,

drivers and cooks. (See Appendix F, the 1911 Census returns for two households). The

return for the next census would have been vastly different. Baron Dunsany, a cousin by

marriage of Lady Fingall, wrote the following about the demise of the old:

Those who miss the splendours of the Vice-regal box and the entry of the Lord
Lieutenant in his carriage, and all these things brought in their train to Dublin, say
that the Dublin Horse Show is a thing of the past, end even avoid the show ground,
content with their memories of the days of Lord Dudley, and regretting that noth-
ing like them will come again for a long while; but others say that the horses are as
good as ever they were and the jumping in the ring as good to watch as any that
ever was; and they are right. And, after all, the principal object of going to a Horse
Show should be to look at the horses; so why not do that and never mind what is
lost? (Plunkett, 1937, p.264)

So how did the events of 1900-1925 directly change dress for fashionable women?

Well as outlined through the essay, their old world of life on the social season was no

longer a possibility and they had to adapt to the new order of things. The new Free
page 1
State government hated everything that represented the old order, and the majority of

the people did too. It is hard to comprehend today a desire to destroy such Gandonian

delights as the Four Courts or the Customs House, or to burn down the glorious country

mansions that speak so loudly of our history and our heritage, but only recently, in 1981,

many people in Dublin jubilated over the burning of the British Embassy in Merrion

Square. Things were not all doom and gloom though, and eventually a new day began

to dawn, or to populate the propegate the popular misinterpretation which gave the

Park at the centre of Irish history its name, ‘A phoenix was to rise from the ashes’.

The late 1920s saw the emergence of a new kind of guest at the Shelbourne. Apart from

politicians of the Free State government, tourists and those Anglo-Irish who had man-

aged to maintain something of their old position in society, a new middle class started to

rise to fill the gaps. This was brought about by the building boom in Dublin in the early

part of the 20th century. One of these new gap-fillers was the famed builder of much of

Glasnevin, Alexander Strain, a Presbyterian from Cremore in Armagh and later, to a

lesser extent, his Son-in-Law and occasional business partner, George Malcolm Linzell.

Linzell was a pioneering builder who was to erect as his own home, Ireland’s first mod-

ern house, and a new step forward in our visual culture.

The first individual modern house in Ireland was designed by the London Archi-
tect Harold Greenwood and completed in 1930. Wendon was built for the Dublin
housebilder G.M. Linzell in Glasnevin, Dublin… Concrete was considered the ide-
ologicall correct material for modern domestic architecture but the first concrete
houses in England did not appear until after 1928. (Rothery, 1991, p.199)
See Also (McManus, 2002, p.414) (Irish Times, 21.01.1932, p.7)
 Conceived to prove that
the last word in plan and
execution could be said
with Irish materials, plus
a preference for Com-
monwealth products
were native resources
were unable to comply
with the highest stan-
dards of durability and
amenity, concrete plays
the leading part in the
structure.
(Irish Builder & Engi-
neer, 1932),

The building of houses like Wendon meant that we could leave behind not only the bit-

ter first quarter of the Twentieth Century, but also the days when we needed scores of

servants simply to run a home. Wendon had central heating, a swimming pool, tennis

court, cocktail bar and drawing room, en-suite bedrooms, showers, a fridge, washing

machine and fitted kitchen, beautiful grounds and an apartment for just two servants, a

governess and a housekeeper. That might seem like a lot in our days when we have no

servants, but it was a radical departure from the households of old where entire wings

were required to accomodate servants, and to be honest, often even the occupiers of the

house thought they were unsustainable. Lady Ardilaun in her will had actually recom-

mended that St. Anne’s be pulled down and a more practical house erected in its place.

Similarly, Lady Katherine Everett’s father, the head of a junior branch of the Herberts

of Muckross, had pulled down his own aincient and beautiful Queen Anne mansion and

built in its place a house of concrete, quite unlike the striking Wendon, but a strong de-

parture from what had been before. Irish designer, Eileen Gray’s family had done the

same thing as the Herberts at their Wexford estate. Ireland’s affair with modern archi-

tecture developed rapidly from the 1930s onwards with the new Dublin Airport, the

scores of cinemas, garages and public libraries in the style around the country, and also

from the 1930s this new modernism began to enter into the realm of fashionable dress.

Some wonder if we will ever regain what was lost in the changes of the first quarter of

the twentieth century, and some accept that fashion has moved on, but eitherways, the

beautiful ballgowns and evenings in the castle are over and relegated to the museum.
page 1
Appendix A:
Fashion Pages from the Irish Times from August 1903 and August 1924

For long we have seen plainly that the full skirt was without doubt the admissible skirt
this summer. Many will be sorrowful over the disappearance of the plain skirt, for it was
becoming to almost every figure. However, the present style of skirt, if cut with care, can
be arranged to suit diverse figures, even the too, too stout one. The short skirt, although
so popular, is not intended for smart afternoon wear. The trottoir skirt is what its name in-
dicates, and is worn in the country and for morning wear or shopping. The modiestes are
making the afternoon gown still very long all round, although the long-trained effect is
considerably modified as to the train. The newest made skirts show various, if somewhat
subtle, differences in the cut. These differences should be noted by would-be purchasers.
The underskirts are still fitted very carefully around the hips, but the overskirts flow in
graceful straight lines from the waistline. The underskirts, so far, are made quite separate
from overskirts, and many of the lighter fabrics, such as linen, hop-sack &c, in the kilted
skirts are made with no lining, save that used for lining the hip-piece. The kiltings are
stitched from hip-piece to knee, from that point falling loose, save that when necessary
they are held in place by tapes sewn beneath the pleats. For golf, and in fact any of the
present day energetic sports patronised by ladies, these are quite the most comfortable
skirts which can possibly be worn. When cutting a foundation for a gown, great care is
required to make it fit closely on the hips and to follow the figure to the knee, for thence
they flow our sharply and as I said, made with modified trains. The smart dressmakers
have given up cutting skirts with godit flounces, and fashion them in sharply cut gores. It
is still quite easy to use up old silk or satin gowns for foundations, as all they require is to
fit them well round the waist and hips, and then lengthen by means of a circular
flounce. Where great economy must needs be practised batiste can be used for lining silk
or foulard gowns, and if the colour is well matched and the skirt finished off inside with
a kilted flounce of glace silk, the effect is often excellent. Sun-rayed skirts are still consid-
ered the smartest wear and many of these will be worn by well-dressed women at the
near approaching Dublin Horse Show. In order to avoid a bulky appearance on the hips,
these skirts are often set into a plain hip piece. Many of the big firms are disposing at ex-
tremely low prices of sun-rayed skirts in voile, crepe, muslin and grenadines, with suffi-
cient material for the bodice. (The Irish times, 22.08.1903, p.6)

For the autumn there is no doubt that kasha, of which there are at least 150 varieties,
will be the most fashionable material used in the making of costumes. It is found in
every conceivably pretty shade, and can be bought both plainly and with many patterns
interwoven. It can also be got in plaids, in brilliant tones of red and yellow, blue and yel-
low, grey and black, and blue and green. Such plaids would doubtless scare the eye of a
brawny Scot, but all the same. When made up by a clever dressmaker, combined with
plain material can really be most effective.
Even more attractive, because less conspicuous, is the kasha cloth with stripes and
checks, and these, when used as trimmings for dresses, costumes and cloaks, look exceed-
ingly well. Woollen corduroys, the ribs being narrow or wide, will find many wearers, as
both materials wear well, and when trimmed with bands of fur and fur collar have a rich
effect. Plain materials are all made with handsome borders and novelty is found by the
clever manipulation of these borders. ...Even stockings show the tendency towards pat-
terns and bright colours; but it is safe to say that in the best turned out women will avoid
over-elaboration in their foot gear, knowing, as they do, how apt it is to make their feet
and ankles thick and clumsy.
Red, having been seen so much throughout the summer, will give place to blue, which,
in many charming shades, will be as popular as in the days of old, when every well-
dressed woman had to number a navy-blue gown among her dresses.
page 14
Scarves are still provided with the costumes, but as the season advances fur will take
their place, for all women realise that there is nothing quite so becoming as fur near the
face. (The Irish Times, 09.08.1924, p.14)

Appendix B
“Murty’s Letter”, The Irish Times, 1901

My Dear Denis, It’s my own private opinion that we don’t give the ladies a fair chance at
this big Horse Show of ours in Dublin. Some people may maintain that ‘tis the horses
bringing the crowds to Ball’s Bridge form all parts of the world, including our own four
Provinces, but, as a close observer, I disagree in toto… Horses, and especially Irish
horses, are good enough things in their way but what would the Horse Show be if there
wasn’t lovely Women in the Show Yard and in the Jumping Enclosure, arrayed in her
best, and adding to the exhibition that touch of grace and refinement without which the
whole thing would be only a kind of half-glorified horse fair. What the drop of crème is
to a cup of tea; what the lump or two of sugar is to a glass of punch, so is the ladies to
the Horse Show, sweetening the decoction and removing all rawness of flavour. The
Royal Dublin Society should be mighty obliged to the ladies, for it’s them that has truly
made Ball’s Bridge such a centre of attraction as it is for the civilised world at large in
the last week of August. They come in the crowds, and they come - in spite of what the
wind and weather, always uncertain, may do - they come arrayed in their finest costumes
and brightest colours, and with all that’s persuasive and attractive in their appearance
from the man’s point of view. …Isn’t it a quare thing then, to see all the judging business
of the Show in the hands of them men? They don’t seem to give the women a look in at
all, in any judicial or other capacity and you’ll never see a lady on horseback in the
Show, though there’s Irish girls and Irish matrons who could give a good account of
themselves in the jumping ground. Now, If the Dublin Horse Show was an American
Institution, on American ground, so far as I can judge from what I hear of the position
of American Women, the fair sex would have a fair share in the management of some of
the sections anyway, in return for their valuable patronage, and their hearty interest in
the whole business, but in Ireland we don’t encourage them to come to the front, at all.
Maybe the reason is because, as Irishmen, we are so bashful in the presence of the other
sex. Or is it because we fancy that the ladies look better on the Grand Stand, or prome-
nading about, discoursing to the men?

But enough of this philosophising, the question is, what clothes will I put on, for as soon
as I’ve this bit of a letter scribbled to you, I’m off to Ball’s Bridge to meet their Excellen-
cies and all the other fashionables. In past years the auld light blue silk waistcoat with
the flowered woodbine pattern on it was my “Piece de Résistance” as my college friend
wanst christened it; but with all these new Pan-Keltic notions, and the revived taste for
the auld ancient kilts, not to mention the passion for putting on riding breeches and
leather leggings that seizes on so many innocent pedestrians in Horse Show week, I’m in
a regular quandary. There’s no such thing, as far as I can figure it out, as reconciling the
costume of Brian Boru with that of the modern paddock. You can’t mix the classic kilt
and shoulder scarf with a covert coat and riding breeches. What I’m thinking of doing is
to make a compromise as it wear, and array my figure in a Scotch mackintosh, which,
while suggesting thoughts of the Gaelic will help to keep off the rain. I regard it as a
great victory when a man can mingle what’s truly national and patriotic with what’s
truly sensible and utilitarian.
(‘Murty’ – Irish Times, 31.08.1901, p.10)

page 15
Appendix C
The Burning of the Great Irish Houses

Meanwhile, the country houses lit a chain of bonfires through the nights of late summer
and autumn and winter and early spring. People who were wise, got their best treasures
away to England. But that was not always possible, or they left it too late. And when the
burning party came, often kind and helpful and sympathetic: “We can give you fifteen
minutes and we’ll help you. Will you hurry now!” it was impossible to remember what
one most wanted to save. And often it was the valueless things that were stacked on the
lawn to be examined when the cold day broke on the blackened walls and ashes, while
the Romneys and the Chippendale furniture and Waterford glass, or old Irish silver, had
perished!
Like the previous raiders, these spoke often with familiar voices and they knew their way
about the house, and, if there was a bomb to be laid, where to lay it. If they did not
know the house, perhaps somebody inside had told them. People whose families had
lived in the country for three or four hundred years realised suddenly that they were still
strangers and that the mystery of it was not to be revealed to them - the secret lying as
deep as the hidden valleys in the Irish hills, the barrier they had tried to break down
standing as strong and immovable as those hills, brooding over an age-long wrong. It
was those who had tried to atone for the wrong and to break down the barrier who did
most of the paying. That question of what should be saved. An Irish gentleman, if he
were worthy of the name, thought first of the people in his house, then of his dogs and
the horses in he stables, and the cattle in the yard if the fire should spread through the
hay and corn. Ten minutes. A quarter of an hour. The pictures must go if the horses
were to be saved.
Because Lord Mayo was a senator, they came to burn Palmerstown, wearing, several of
them, since it was a cold night, the woollen jerseys that Lady Mayo had just given them.
There was time to save either her pearls in her bedroom or her fowl in coops under the
dining-room window, where they would, inevitably, be roasted alive. I think her pearls
were not insured. She hesitated only a second. Saved the fowl, and the pearls went.
They came, one of those nights, to Castletown, which holds as many wonderful things
as a Museum and a Picture Gallery. They brought fifty gallons of petrol to burn the
house, with its wonderful hall and the staircase that I remembered- where I had had that
vision of the ladies of another time going up to bed with their candlesticks - its Van
Dycks and Hogarths, and the portrait by Sir Joshua of Squire Tom Connolly, husband
of Lady Louisa, who was a sister to the Duchess of Leinster and aunt of Lord Edward
Fitzgerald; the vases with the Eagle on them given to a member of the family by
Napoleon, and the countless other treasures. All these, and the great historical memories
of Castletown, were to be laid on the smoking pyre of the New Ireland. Just before the
petrol was thrown, a motorcycle came up the long avenue in a great hurry. And a
breathless young man, with some mysterious authority, rode into the middle of the
group of burners, to say that on no account was the house to be touched, that it had
been built with Irish money by William Connolly, who was Speaker of the Irish House
of Commons two hundred years or so earlier. So the petrol was loaded up again and
probably used elsewhere. But Castletown was saved and still stands. (Fingall, 1937,
p.414)

I put on a fur coat, because the night was turning chilly, and we went downstairs again,
made up the fire in the study, and sat down to await our visitors.
(Fingall, 1937, p.437)

page 16
Appendix D
The Boycott of the RDS

By a resolution, which took effect, yesterday the Markets Committee [of the Dublin
Corporation] has decided to withdraw the use of the markets from all members of the
Society and from all persons who have any dealings with it. The object of this boycott is
to force the Society to reform the personnel of its various committees, which is described
as being "overwhelmingly non-Catholic and anti-national." Of course, the charges of
bigotry and "anti-nationalism" are not true - as was proved conclusively by the society's
decisions at its last general meeting. If then, then the Royal Dublin Society is governed
by a body of "bigots and "die-hards", it is not likely to yield to the sort of pressure which
the Committee seeks to put upon it. When it finds that it cannot hold its annual shows
without unpleasantness and loss it may cease to hold them at all. How does the Markets
Committee propose to replace them? When it has killed the Royal Dublin Society how
will it compensate the country for a loss, which must impoverish every factor in the na-
tional prosperity? ...It is exceptionally foolish and mischievous at the present time when
the evil genius of destruction is at large in Ireland… When the full bill for the last twelve
months of civil strife is presented to the Irish people its dimensions will be appalling. In-
dustries have been ruined; enormous sums have been awarded as compensation for ma-
licious injuries; hundreds of people whose labours swelled the national income have left
the country; every day some fine house, which was, and might have been again, a centre
of local employment goes up in flames. Argument about the authorship or motives of
these calamities cannot effect the result, which is that Ireland is being devastated and
that, whether she finds piece in the end as a Kingdom, a Dominion, or a Republic,
many years of hard work will not repair the ravages of the last few months. In such cir-
cumstances, surely it is the duty of all good Irishmen, whatever they may call them-
selves, to conserve at least those institutions which lie outside the domain of politics and
have given abundant proof of their value to the whole nation. The Royal Dublin Soci-
ety is such an institution. (The Irish Times, 21.06.1921, p.4)

Appendix E
The Resentment of the RDS

The British reformers [Liberal party] and their Irish nationalist allies disliked the upper-
class Anglo-Irish Royal Dublin Society. They regarded it as an exclusive private agency,
hostile to Catholics, yet disbursing state grants. They were also critical of its cumber-
some and inefficient organization.
A report was commissioned which made both criticisms of the society and recommen-
dations for improvements, yet affirmed that the Society be considered as 'the great cul-
tural association' for the spreading of knowledge of practical science, agriculture and
the arts. Most of the recommendations of the Report were adopted promptly by the So-
ciety. (Turpin, 1989, p.248)

page 1
Appendix F
The Census Returns of the Household of a private (Protestant) household.

page 1
Appendix F
The Census Returns of the Household of the Lord Lieutenant.

page 1
Appendix F
The Census Returns of the Household of the Lord Lieutenant.

page 1
Appendix F
The Census Returns of the Household of the Lord Lieutenant.

page 1
Appendix G
The RDS, from the Irish Times, Tuesday, August 20th, 1901, p.3

page 1
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