Heritage

at Play
Politics on the Playing Field:
Gaelic Games & Irish Nationalism through 1920

a brief history
by Zachary McCune
 T
he history of Irish Nationalism has been closely coupled with the revival and
playing of gaelic games. Historicized as an activity at least 2,000 years old in
Ireland, hurling has been the most recognizable of these games, and was con-
nected to the nationalist movement by Irish Republicans in the 19th Century to
bridge ancient Irish history and mythology with their contemporary independence move-
ment. At the founding of the Gaelic Athletic Association (GAA) in 1884, there were at least
two members of the Irish Republican Brotherhood (Fenians) who saw a political oppor-
tunity in the institutional revival of gaelic games. These men hoped to use the burgeoning
sports league as a way to create a political network of “teams” across the country of Ireland.
The degree of their success in politicizing the GAA has been a subject of long debate. But
regardless of its actual success, the percieved politicization of Gaelic Games made them a
target for British reprisals during the Anglo-Irish War of 1919 – 1921. During that interim,
gaelic games were frequently the subject of political debates, and on November 21, 1920 a
gaelic football game was the site of a British reprisal that killed 12 people including one of
the players.

early history
There is evidence that as early as the Statutes of Kilkenny in 1367, foreign powers
had connected indigenous Irish games with political instability. At that time, the English
King forbid the playing of hurling because it was considered an incitement to violence and
uprising among his Norman-Irish vassals [1]. In a letter from 1667, a British Lord com-
plained that “Irish Papist Rebels” had been meeting “under the pretence of a match at hurl-
ing” [2]. In a letter to the editor of The Freemen’s Journal dated August 23, 1769, a reader
contended ““At [hurling matches] all associations and midnight revels are hatched; and
positively hurling matches were the first beginnings of the deluded and unthinking people
called White Boys, who are now rising again in a neighbouring County, in open Defiance of
the laws...” [3]. Each of these documents draws a connection between hurling, a gaelic game,

[1] O Maolfabhail, Art. Caman: Two Thousand Years of Hurling in

Ireland. Dundalk, Dundalgan Press. 1973. 40.

2
[2] O Maolfabhail, 40.
[3] O Maolfabhail, 43.
and the organization of political insurrection. But, in a ambiguity that will visible through-
out the history of gaelic games, it is unclear whether the games are merely a “pretence” for
politics or are an impassioned activity that actually incites political fervor. The latter conclu-
sion is offered by both the Statutes of Kilkenny and the 1769 letter to the editor, which both
suggest that there is something political in the very play of hurling. The former “pretence”
argument suggests that hurling is important as a gathering function and excuse to assembly,
but that there is nothing political per se in the play of the game.
A third consideration in the politicality of gaelic games lies in the dual utility of
a hurley or hurling stick. Traditionally constructed from a single piece of ash wood, hur-
leys measure between 20 and 40 inches in length, and open from a thin handle into broad
paddle. Popular histories of gaelic games, such as Ian Prior’s illustrated children’s book The
History of Gaelic Games, often claim that or hurleys (or hurls) were abstracted from weap-
ons. The game of hurling in this history is considered an ancient substitute for open warfare
with the wooden hurleys were preferred to metal weapons because they bruised were bronze
and steel bled opponents [4] . Though these origins are largely based on legend, histori-
cal documents do point to examples of the hurley being (re)made into a weapon. In 1829,
for example, during a rebellion against Church of Ireland tithe-collecting in the southern
counties, a group of hurlers attacked a squad of Crown forces. Their only weapons were the
hurleys they carried.

It was then that an agile boy came lightfooted with a caman [Irish for hurley] in
his hand, and he mounted the ditch so that he was on a level with him, and he gave
his two hands to the caman and struck with the end of it the nearest horsemen below
the cap. [5]

The hurley and hurling thus gain a third political/rebellious dimension beyond the
arguments for the game as an incitement to violence and the game as a “pretence” for politi-
cal gathering. Once one sees the hurley as itself a weapon, hurling matches become oppor-

[4] Prior, Ian. The History of Gaelic Games. Belfast, Appletree Press.
1997. 17.

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[5] O Maolfabhail 45.
 tunities for military training and even military action. The game’s violence spills out from it,
threatening to re-make the political landscape as a hurling pitch on which the hurlers may
engage political enemies as though they were opposing team members. For British authori-
ties, hurling thus became not just a symbolic act of resistance, a game to foster nationalist
sentiment, or allow Irish citizens to meet against British authorities, but quite literally an
opportunity for military action. The ability of the hurley to operate as both a game tool and
a weapon, bound into its very history as a piece of sporting equipment, suggests the game’s
own duality as both sport and military exercise.

in cinematic memory
In just past two decades two high profile Irish films, Michael Collins (1996) and
The Wind That Shakes the Barley (2006), have offered cinematic proof that the military/
sport duality of hurling is a recognized popular historical coupling. The Wind That Shakes
the Barley, a winner of the coveted Palme d’Or at Cannes for its perceived historic/politic
potency, actually opens in the midst of a hurling match, with the violence of two brothers
at play foreshadowing the violence of the Anglo-Irish War and the eventual Irish Civil War.
After leaving the field, the hurlers walk home with their hurleys were they are accosted by
a unit of British Auxiliaries or “Black and Tans” . Never letting go of their wooden hurleys,
despite the threats of the Black and Tans, the Irish men suggest that their hurleys are more
than sporting equipment. Indeed the hurleys seem to represent the pride and republican in-
clinations of the Irish men, equipping them at all times with a weapon of protection as well
as a historic symbol of their beliefs. Later in the film, the same Irish men use hurleys in place
of rifles while going through military training. The reason for this substitution is that the
the Irish men do not have real weapons, but the visual represents that the hurley has always
been the Irish man’s first weapon. This cinematic choice, which also depicts the Irish as the
impoverished, heroic resistance against an imperially over-equipped enemy, perpetuates the
history of the hurley as a symbol of military power and resistance, and consequently suggests

4
the interchangeability between the playing of gaelic games and the practicing of warfare.
In Michael Collins, the hurley is again found as a convenient weapon of Irish re-
sistance. While Michael Collins (played by Liam Neeson) rallies a crowd of Irish men in
a non-specific Irish village, they all slowly reveal that they are carrying hurleys. When the
Royal Irish Constabulary arrives with billy clubs, the purpose of the hurleys is made clear:
these gentlemen have not freshly arrived off the hurling pitch, but have been expecting a
confrontation with the RIC, and have armed themselves with hurleys. In the chaos of the
subsequent battle/brawl, the hurley proves a cinematically convenient way of separating the
“good” guys from the bad guys. Where the round paddle of the hurley rises and falls, the
viewer knows s/he is watching an Irish attack. The hurley thus becomes visually synonmous
with the Irish resistance and in this moment, with civil justice. Into the hurley, a whole his-
tory, heritage, and hope for an autonomous Irish state is incorporated. The hurley becomes
an embodiment of Irish desire and Irish dedication to their cause. It should be noted, that in
both Michael Collins and The Wind Shakes the Barley the hurley cannot be returned to its
natural “place” in a game of hurling once Anglo-Irish tensions have reached a fever pitch. At
this critical juncture, the stick becomes a weapon only, as the time for play been consumed
by war. This is the inversion of the popular history of hurling, which hoped to prevent war
by playing gaelic games. But the British do not play hurling, and the Irish are not willing to
simply “play out” their frustrations.

a national movement
Twenty five years before the Anglo-Irish War, the Gaelic Athletic Association was
formed to institutionally revive the playing of gaelic games such as hurling, and to bring the
administration of Irish sports in general under a single Irish authority. Conceived of by Mi-
chael Cusack, an Irish nationalist and Celtic revivalist, the GAA was imagined of as a paral-
lel movement to Parnell’s land reform (which sought to “return” land to the Irish people
who worked it) and the Gaelic League (which hoped to revive the use of the Irish language

5
 and gaelic culture). Before formally founding the GAA, Cusack published a newspaper
called the Celtic Times, which he used to present manifesto-like rationalizations for form-
ing a such an organization.

No movement having for its object the social and political advancement of a nation
from the tyranny of imported and enforced customs and manners, can be regarded
as perfect, if it has not made adequate provision for the preservation and cultivation
of the national pastimes of the people. Voluntary neglect of such times is a sure sign of
National decay and approaching dissolution. [6]

With his “no movement…” sentence, Cusack clearly makes an appeal to the broader
currents of Irish Nationalism. He generalizes the goals of both the Land League and the
Gaelic League as against “the tyranny of imported and enforced customs and manners” sug-
gesting that attempting to fight this “tyranny” in just one domain (language, land law, etc.)
will not be enough to fully defeat the system that perpetuates these “customs and manners.”
This is to say that for Cusack, Irish independence would have to be achieved in every field of
culture, labor, and law, not in any one place that would thus free all of the others. Interest-
ingly, this passage never uses the term “British” or makes mention of the “King”, “England”,
or the “British Commonwealth”. Instead, Cusack speaks only of the “movement” and “the
people” suggesting that it is in within the power of the Irish themselves to make the socio-
political changes that will overthrow “tyranny.” So this passage calls on the Irish themselves
to “preserv[e] and cultivat[e] … the national pastimes of the people.” In doing so, the Irish
will reverse the “neglect,” “National decay” and “approaching dissolution,” which Cusack
leaves for the reader to imagine.
Cusack’s editorial continues by attacking the status quo of athletics in his contempo-
rary Ireland, which according to his analysis excluded large populations of the people in fa-
vor of the wealthy and the pro-British. Moreover, the current athletic authorities in Ireland
were attempting to popular “foreign” games, which were almost all British in origin. Cusack

[6] Michael Cusack, Celtic Times, quoted from Scally, John. The GAA:

6
An Oral History. Mainstream Publishing. Edinburgh and London. 2009.
16.
was incredibly critical of these games, calling them “garrison games” for what he viewed as
their Irish origins- military outposts around Ireland [7]. The term “garrison game” is incred-
ibly interesting, because it suggests a closeness between British sports like rugby, cricket,
and football, and the military ‘occupation’ of Ireland by British troops. As gaelic games are
connected in Irish history with political processes and military actions, so too does Cusack
believe that British games are indicative of British martial training and exercise. The danger
it would seem for Cusack is that in playing these “foreign” games, one takes on the traditions
of military power associated with them, joining British forces so to speak. If rugby, cricket,
and football are “garrison games” then playing them makes one a part of the British garrison.
Cusack’s hopes were that a gaelic athletic organization would figuratively (but per-
haps also literally) combat the popularity of British games by reviving oppressed Irish ones.
At the conclusion of his editorial, Cusack makes a connection between nationalism, the
revival of Irish athletics, and the strength of the Irish as a people (“race”).

The vast majority of the best athletes in Ireland are Nationalists. These gentlemen
should take the matter in hand at once, and draft laws for the guidance of promoters
of meetings in Ireland next year… It is only by such an arrangement that pure Irish
athletics will be revived and that the incomparable strength and physique of our race
will be preserved. [8]

“Athletes” and “athletics” in this passage are clearly more than just gifted players of
games and enjoyable activities. There is something powerfully political at stake in Cusack’s
claim that the “vast majority of the best athletes in Ireland are Nationalists.” First, this likely
a jab at the fact that known Nationalists were generally disqualified from pro-British compe-
titions, and therefore forced out of Irish athletics. Second, Cusack’s suggestion is that being
a Nationalist is often a sign/consequence/cause of being a good athlete. Intertwining suc-
cessful athletes with politics allows for the consideration that Irish Nationalism is as strong,

[7] Scally 16.

7
[8] Michael Cusack, Celtic Times, quoted from Scally 16.
[9] de Burca, Marcus. The GAA: A History. Gill & Macmillan Ltd. Dub-
lin, Ireland. 1980. Revised 1999. 10.
 victorious, and energetic as the athletes who subscribe to its missions and beliefs.
Cuscak also makes the claim in this passage that it is only through “pure Irish athlet-
ics” that the “incomparable strength and physique of our race will be preserved.” Which is to
suggest that the Irish people’s vitality, as both individuals and as a collective nation, is direct-
ly tied to its maintenance of “pure Irish athletics.” While these “athletics” are not enumerat-
ed or listed, one can gather that they are “gaelic games” by the fact that at the establishment
of the GAA, Cusack advocated for the codification of hurling and gaelic football as inher-
ently “Irish” pursuits. And by the fact that while writing this piece, Cusack was consciously
attempting to bring rural, then un-codified hurling into Dublin with the founding of the
Dublin Hurley Club in 1882 [9]. Against “garrison games,” Cusack’s “pure Irish athletics”
are suggested to be the pathway to a strong and united Irish race. This strength, called “in-
comparable” by Cusack, also reflects the need for strength in possible armed conflict against
those who “garrison games”, making gaelic games even at their first stirrings of institutional
revival, a matter of martial prowess.

the GAA & the IRB

Members of the Irish Republican Brotherhood, better known as the Fenians, did
not miss the relationships between sport and politics, and sport and military power that
Cusack’s editorials suggested. Writing frequently on the subject of Irish athletics and the
need for an Irish sports authority, Cusack managed to spread his message outside of his
home in Dublin through National newspapers like United Ireland and The Irishman [10].
Both of these papers had high circulation among Fenians, so when Cusack published an
announcement in several papers that he would be meeting at Thurles in the center of Ireland
on November 1, 1884 he cannot have been surprised that IRB leaders turned up [11]. The
attendance at this first now celebrated meeting was incredibly low. A report published in
the Cork Examiner put the number of attendees at just seven [12]. Nevertheless, the indi-
viduals in attendance were men of influence and power . Among them was Maurice Davin, a

[10] de Burca 13.

8
[11] de Burca 13 -14 .
[12] Scally 17.
[13] de Burca 7.
world-record holder in the hammer, who wrote the first official rules for gaelic football and
hurling. Also in attendance was John Bracken, a tradesman with extensive ties to the Fenian
movement. Bracken’s attendance was representative of the IRB’s broader interest in the goals
of the fledgling GAA.
Although it is the patronage of Archbishop Croke that the GAA decided to honor
with the naming of it’s largest park in Dublin, the IRB’s Michael Davitt was at least as
influential of a patron in the GAA’s formative years. Like many Fenians, Davitt came into
politics through the Land Reform movement of the late 19th century. It was there that the
political value of sports became clear. For Michael Davitt, along with celebrated IRB athlete
Pat Nally, “politics and sports were inseparable. For some years, Fenianism and the cause
of the small tenant-farmer had been closely allied in Connacht; hense [sic] Nally became a
bitter opponent of Landlordism, the class then patronising rural athletics” [13]. Cusack’s
editorials had made similar jabs at the landlordism of Irish athletics, so when Davitt learned
of Cusack’s movement, he pledged his support. Though he did not attend the first founda-
tional meeting, Bracken was sent along to represent the Fenians, and within a few months,
two further IRB members had joined the ranks of the organization’s leadership [14] . Si-
multaneously, the more conservative and Pro-British elements of the GAA’s leadership left.
Though Thomas St. George McCarthy of the Royal Irish Constabulary had been present
at the founding of the GAA, he was soon pressured to leave [15]. Michael Cusack too was
forced out of the organization, but not for political purposes. His stubborn personality and
inability to cooperate with the developing Athletic Association frustrated his co-workers
and angered Archbishop Croke. With Cusack’s resignation, the IRB took a central role in
the early formation of GAA Clubs and Athletic events. What had begun with a nationalist
leaning had now become firmly nationalistic.
To suggest that the GAA was founded by the IRB would be misleading. Moreover,
to suggest that the GAA was completely controlled by the IRB during its formative years
would likewise be untrue. Yet there can be no denying that the organization was directly
influenced and assisted by the Fenian movement in its early years. In a 1990 history of the

[14] Scally 19.

9
[15] Prior 33.
 GAA and Irish Nationalist Politics, historian W.F. Mandle systematically documents the
“infiltration and manipulation of the GAA by the Irish Republican Brotherhood” [16]. His
primary resources are contemporary police reports, which though no doubt exaggerated by
paid informers, nonetheless document the British policemen’s continuous interest in the
GAA as something other than an athletic league. According to Mandle’s research, the actual
gaelic games of the GAA were of entirely secondary interest to British political observers.
Instead, Crown forces remained interested in the GAA as an organizing body politic. Here,
we have a return of the “pretence” argument that Lord Orrey complained of in 1667. Then,
as in the late 19th and early 20th century, gaelic games were read as mere covers for political
organization.
Part of the British authorities fears of gaelic games and the GAA came from the
league’s rapid and widespread growth. The GAA was modeled on the parish organization
that Daniel O’Connell had taken advantage of in 1829, and had been used by the Roman
Catholic Church for centuries [17]. Consequently, the GAA spread “like prairie fire” to
quote Michael Cusack, and soon had a firm network of clubs around Ireland. GAA events
increased in popularity, bringing larger and larger groups of people together for its con-
tests. By 1918, the Times of London reported that over 30,000 people had attended the
All-Ireland hurling Final in Dublin that year, even without public transportation provided
[18]. Because of the IRB’s infiltration and involvement with the GAA, this growth was a
considerable worry for British authorities who could not be sure whom among the GAA
was a Fenian, and whom was merely nationalistic. GAA events off the sports field further
complicated this distinction, as a February 1, 1888 parade brought young GAA men “clad
in jerseys bearing their camans on their shoulders marched along under the banners of their
respective branches” [19]. The militarism of this display is impossible to ignore. With their
hurleys on their shoulders, clad in uniforms, and under the banners of their clubs, the GAA
men surely looked like a disciplined military, with their hurleys again cast as rifles/weapons.
The Freemen’s Journal calls this display “the finest section” of a parade given in honor of two
visiting politicians. But for British authorities, the impression was likely far more problem-

[16] Fitzpatrick, David. “Review: The Gaelic Athletic Association and Irish
Nationalist Politics, 1884-1924” The English Historical Review, Vol. 105,
No. 414 (Jan 1990). 240.

10 [17] Scally 17.

[18] The Times, Tuesday, Nov 04, 1919; pg. 48; Issue 42248; col B. “Gael-
ic Games. Hurling And Gaelic Football.” (FROM A CORRESPONDENT.)
[19] Freemen’s Journal, Feb 1, 1888; quoted by O Maolfabhail 52
atic. The GAA refused to just play their gaelic games. Like Cusack had imagined, the revital-
ized Irish men of gaelic games were now “incomparable” in martial discipline and proud to
show it.

the Croke Park Massacre

It is in light of the proto-militarism of the GAA, and the close coupling of gaelic
games and Irish nationalism that the Croke Park massacre of November 21, 1920 appears
more rational. Not that the actions of Royal Irish Constabulary and British Auxiliaries on
that original “Bloody Sunday” can ever be rationalized away, but from a British perspective
the close identification of politics, militarism, Fenianism and Irish Nationalism with gaelic
games makes gaelic games into a veritable target for British war reprisals. On that Sunday
in November, a gaelic football match was being contested between Dublin and Tipperary.
Earlier in the day, 14 British agents had been attacked and killed by IRA operatives on the
orders of Michael Collins. According to later published explanations, Royal Irish Constabu-
lary and British Auxiliary forces were sent to Croke Park, where the game was being played,
to shut it down, and search the attendees for weapons. The implication of this logic is that
IRA agents would be the kind of people who attend GAA events and thus British authori-
ties would be able to find those guilty of the day’s early ambush at this gathering. Instead,
spectators panicked at the arrival of the armed auxiliaries and in the confusion, the police
opened fire, not stopping for 90 seconds.
The Croke Park massacre can also be understood as the moment at which gaelic
games were finally taken on as participant/combatant/victim in the Anglo-Irish War. For
the dispersal of spectators at that November 21st game was not just an opportunity to seek
IRA agents, but also to intervene in an Irish cultural activity that was considered by the Brit-
ish authorities in Ireland as part and parcel of Irish resistance. This, after all, had been the
traditional understanding of the game by British authorities for almost six hundred years.
Moreover, the growing popularity of GAA events certainly suggested that gaelic games and

11
 the radicalism they had been connected to were re-entering vogue among the Irish citizenry.
So attacking/interrupting this gathering was certainly a symbolic gesture of British authori-
ties desire to intervene in the political radicalization of the Irish people.
Yet, for whatever reason, the politicality of the GAA and gaelic games more broadly
was not made clear to a general British audience outside of Ireland. In the November 4,
1919 Times of London, not one but two different articles were written about the Irish
and their love of sports. Both articles paid special attention to hurling and gaelic football,
acknowledging the massive groundswell of support among the Irish for the revival of their
“national pastimes” but without mention of the games as political activities [20] . In fact,
while the Times was willing to write on gaelic games as a positive cultural force outside of
“centuries of turmoil and political strife,” [21] it refused to cover the Croke Park killings just
one year later [22]. Part of the cause for this self-censorship may lie in the Times concern
for international attention to British action in Ireland. At the time of the Croke Park massa-
cre, international opinion felt that the British action was entirely unjust because the activity
in question was a public sporting event with women, children, and unarmed civilians [23].
Perhaps unable to succinctly convey the political history of gaelic games, the Times cover-
age tried to focus attention away from the sporting massacre towards the killing of its own
‘crown forces.’
Meanwhile, within Ireland, even Unionist and allegedly ‘neutral’ newspapers ac-
knowledged the Croke Park attacks as inherently political [24]. In fact, an Irish Indepen-
dent editorial pleaded with the British to recognize the problem in Ireland, evidenced by
the attacking of the GAA, as a political issue.

The real cause of all the terrible happenings to which we have alluded [violence of
the past year] is incapacity or deliberate refusal on the part of the British Govern
ment to perceive that the disease is political … [25]

The GAA, in its commissioning of its own history in 1980, asked author Marcus de Burca

[20] The Times, “Gaelic Games.”

[21] The Times, Tuesday, Nov 04, 1919; pg. 47; Issue 42248; col A. “Irish
Enthusiasm. Love Of Racing And Hunting., Football And Hurling.”

12 [22] Kenneally, Ian. The Paper Wall: Newspapers and Propaganda in

Ireland 1919-1921. The Collins Press, Cork. 2008. 158.
[23] Kenneally 158. [24] Ibid. 113.
[25] Irish Independent, November 23, 1920 quoted by Kenneally, 113.
to pay special attention to “its influence on the national movement of the pre-1922 Ireland”
suggesting that it from its perspective, albeit with the gift of hindsight, the GAA was indeed
a political actor in the Anglo-Irish War [26] . Although, it is somewhat ironic that given all
of the violence associated with gaelic games, and all of the military symbolism attached to
the hurley and the training of hurling players, the most significant achievement of the GAA
may well be the martyrdom of its players and fans on Bloody Sunday.

politics in play today

A true history of Irish nationalism and gaelic games would need to be far more exhaustive
than this cursory overview. For in addition to the eventual independence of the Irish Free
State, and the changes that this necessitated for the GAA and for gaelic games broadly, there
is certainly more depth to interrogate even within the small part of the story that has been
examined here. Interestingly, the GAA continues to manage a 32-county athletic league de-
spite the fact that these 32 counties are split between the Republic of Ireland (26 counties)
and Northern Ireland (6 counties). Imagining the “whole” Ireland hoped for Republicans,
the GAA thus represents the continuation of ideas for an integrated Ireland. Which is not
without it’s own problems or open political difficulties.
The relationship between gaelic games and Irish politics has also not completely
subsided. A May 6, 2010 Belfast Telegraph article documents a controversy in Northern
Ireland over a charity event that includes the logos of both the GAA and the PSNI (Police
Service of Northern Ireland) [27]. The GAA long banned members of British military and
Police services from entering GAA competition under “rule 21” and only abolished the ban
in 2001 [28]. But the political strife between the PSNI and Irish nationalists in Northern
Ireland has not subsided as easily. Caught between the GAA of Irish Nationalism and the
symbolic British authoritarianism of PSNI, formerly the Royal Ulster Constabulary, gaelic
games remain politicized even in the 21st century.

[26] de Burca Preface.

[27] McNeilly, Claire. Belfast Telegraph. May, 6 2010. “police widow
Kate Carroll in tears after GAA symbol row hits fundraiser.”
[28] RTE News. September, 24 2005. “GAA Sanctions rule 21 Aboli-
tion.”
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Heritage
at Play
is forthcoming a documentary
by Colleen Brogan
& Zachary McCune

cover photograph from The Wind That Shakes the

Barley (2006) a film by Ken Loach

document design
by Zachary McCune

contact zmccune@gmail.com