Old battles must be revisited if only to set the republican record straight

WHILE I understand John Smith’s sentiments in wishing to ‘let the dust settle on old battles’ (Irish Examiner letters, August 26), I would like to remind him why this dust was raised in the first place.

After the civil war ended, most nationalists and republicans wished for nothing more than to put the events behind them and get on with their lives.

Sadly, this was not to be the case for many as the past continued to haunt them. Many so-called diehard republicans who found Ireland a cold house for those of their political outlook had to emigrate or suffer petty harassment.

Loyalists attached to the old British administration who felt there was no future for them in the new order of things either left or stayed, often in reduced circumstances. Few people, naturally enough, wanted to remember the civil war animosities or the shooting and killing. So the dust was allowed to settle little by little. Then, in 1998, Peter Hart made public his claims that ‘ethnic cleansing’ of Protestants had been a fact of the fight for independence, and that the republican movement was sectarian. Others with an axe to grind eagerly jumped on Hart’s claims, and hardly a week passed in the national newspapers when we weren’t being told that the War of Independence was a dirty sectarian fight aimed at Protestants.

This claim must have been a source of embarrassment to relatives or descendants of those named as victims, since it raised old ghosts long departed. Nonetheless, those who believed or knew these claims to be untrue had to respond. Had they been left unchallenged, it would have entered popular consciousness as the history of this country, an undeserved slur if ever there was one. John Smith adds that at a time when we are trying to extend the hand of friendship to unionists, nothing is to be gained by going over old ground. I beg to differ in this instance.

The false claims of sectarianism can only serve to widen the gulf between unionist and republican, giving unionists fresh ground for apprehension.

Surely he must see that it is to the benefit of this new rapprochement if such slurs against the republican movement are shown to be as groundless as they are. This can only be done through debate such as has been conducted in recent years in our newspapers.

Nick Folley

Ardcarrig

Carrigaline

Co Cork