Page 58 - GAHS Journal Volume 9

IT IS THE HOME RULE BILL THAT HAS DONE THAT

8
an eye to women’s mobilisation in Ulster , unionist women began
to organise on their own account. A Wicklow branch of the
Women’s Unionist Association was established which sent
representatives to meetings of the Women’s Central Committee
of the Irish Unionist Alliance in Dublin, and local groups were

formed at a number of locations. The inaugural meeting of the
Arklow branch, held in the Marlborough Hall, was chaired by the
Countess of Wicklow, and featured talks from a Miss Harrison,
who had ‘been delivering addresses in England in support of the
Union’, and from Captain Bryan Cooper, who urged members to
‘make the Arklow branch of the Women’s Unionist Committee a
strong and potent force in the battle against Home Rule.’
9
A Greystones branch was formed in February 1914 under the
chairmanship of Miss M Tottenham, described as ‘an active lady
Unionist worker in the county’, and addresses were delivered by
a Miss Ffolliott and Miss Conner as well as by local male unionist
10
dignitaries. Some ‘ladies resident in West Wicklow’ were also
among the attendance at a meeting of the South Kildare branch
of the Women’s Unionist Association, held in February 1912 at
11
Barretstown Castle. The chairperson, Lady Borrowes,
welcoming the large number in attendance, said that ‘it showed
that women took a great and real interest in the question of Home
12
Rule, and meant to do all in their power to oppose it’ , while Lord
Mayo, in his address (dismissed by one hostile observer as ‘the
usual claptrap’) extolled the benefits of the Union, urged
Unionists to enlist the support of English and Scots voters, and
cited the example of Ulster, ‘which had begun to fight, and meant

8 The Ulster Women’s Unionist Council was formed in January 1911. See
Diane Urquhart ed, The minutes of the Ulster Women’s Unionist Council and
Executive Committee, 1911-40 (2001).
9 Wicklow Newsletter, 30 March 1912.
10 Belfast Newsletter, 10 February 1914.
11 Wicklow People, 17 February 1912.
12 Dublin Daily Express, 8 February 1912.
54