1919 in Ireland - Events

Events

• 21 January - Dáil Éireann meets for the very first time in the Round Room of the Mansion House, Dublin. It comprises Sinn Féin members elected in the 1918 general election who, in accordance with their manifesto, have not taken their seats in the Parliament of the United Kingdom but chosen to declare an independent Irish Republic. In the first shots of the Anglo-Irish War, two Royal Irish Constabulary (RIC) men are killed in an ambush at Soloheadbeg in Tipperary.
• 3 February - Éamon de Valera, the leader of Sinn Féin, and two other prisoners escape from Lincoln Prison in England in a break personally arranged by Michael Collins and Harry Boland.
• 1 April - Fifty-two members of Sinn Féin attend the second meeting of Dáil Éireann. Seán T. O'Kelly is elected Ceann Comhairle and Éamon de Valera is elected President of Dáil Éireann.
• 2 April - Constance Markievicz is appointed Minister for Labour, becoming the first Irish female Cabinet Minister (the only one for sixty years) and the first in Western Europe.
• 15–19 April - "Limerick Soviet": a general strike called by the Limerick Trades and Labour Council, as a protest against the declaration of a "Special Military Area" under the Defence of the Realm Act covering of most of the city of Limerick and its surroundings.
• 18 April - 1,000 delegates from all over Ireland attend the Sinn Féin Ard-Fheis in Dublin. Éamon de Valera is elected President of the organisation.
• 19 April - Sinn Féin proposes an Executive Council of the Irish National Alliance to challenge the right of any foreign parliament to make laws for Ireland.
• 13 May - Irish Republican Army volunteers, Dan Breen and Seán Treacy are injured while rescuing Seán Hogan from custody in County Limerick.
• 17 May - The first Republican law court is set up, at Ballinrobe, County Mayo.
• 14 June - Captain Alcock and Lieutenant Brown arrive in Clifden, County Galway following their 1,900 mile transatlantic flight.
• 18 June - Dáil establishes the National Arbitration Courts.
• 30 July - First assassination of a Royal Irish Constabulary officer carried out by The Squad (Irish Republican Army unit), newly-formed under the orders of Michael Collins, when Detective Sergeant Pat "the Dog" Smyth of G division is shot near Drumcondra, Dublin.
• 8 September - "The sack of Fermoy": drunken British forces rampage through Fermoy following an inquest on the previous death of a British soldier which fails to find for murder.
• 12 September - Dáil Éireann is declared illegal by the British authorities. There are raids on Sinn Féin centres and Ernest Blythe is arrested.
• 4 November - The British Cabinet's Irish Committee settles on a policy of creating two Home Rule parliaments - one in Dublin and one in Belfast - with a Council of Ireland to provide a framework for possible unity.