Page 71 - GAHS Journal Volume 9

GREYSTONES ARCHAEOLOGICAL & HISTORICAL SOCIETY JOURNAL VOLUME 9

School, and was remembered by him as the archetypal
44
grassroots Ulster loyalist.
In a few other cases, it has been possible to ascertain that
members of the Wicklow signatories’ families also signed the
Declaration or Covenant: Isaac Hill, Lilian Hill’s father, signed at
Dromore, Co Down, as did Fanny Digby’s nieces, Lucette and
Olive Brush. Maurice and Eileen McCausland, son and
daughter-in-law of Laura McCausland, signed at the Market
Place, Limavady, and Thomas Steuart Jackson, Maud Steuart
Jackson’s father, added his name at Ballycastle. Oddly, perhaps,
Thomas Harrison appears to be the only one of eleven husbands
of Wicklow signatories who signed the Covenant, and this
despite the fact that three – the husbands of Hannah Geddis
Porter, Bessie McSeveney and Mary Peatt, all of Bray – were
born in Ulster.
45
The aftermath

As we know, the Home Rule Bill did progress through
Parliament, and its implementation was prevented only by the
outbreak of war in 1914. With southern unionism diverting its
energies to cope with this new crisis, it is not surprising to find a
number of the women who signed the Declaration involving
themselves in war work. Mrs and Miss McCausland, for example,
are reported as contributing to the Rathdrum Soldiers’ Christmas
Present Fund in 1915, while Mrs McCausland was a member of
a committee established in September 1916 by Wicklow County
Council ‘to look after the interests of soldiers and sailors and their
dependents.’ Meanwhile, Florence Lindsay is mentioned as one

44 Fitzpatrick, Descendancy, pp 70-71.
45 William Porter, carriage builder, Main Street, Bray, was born in Co
Armagh; James McSeveney’s birthplace is given as Co Antrim, and Edward
Peatt as Co Cavan.
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