Post
by Sduddy » Thu Jun 29, 2023 12:11 pm
Well, I’ve been listening (several times) to the recording made by Paddy Waldron of the lecture given by Oliver Hawes, grandson of Joseph Hawes, in 2016, and I’ve made a good stab at listening to and transcribing the letter that Joseph wrote to his mother in 1922. It is held in the National Archives and is dated 18 May 1922. My question marks signify difficulty hearing, and dots (…) signify whole sentences that I failed to hear:
Dearest mother,
Just a line hoping to find you and all at home in the best of health, as this leaves me and my comrades at present, thank God. I suppose you are thinking I must be dead, dear Mother, when I had not written for such a long time but, as the saying goes, ‘better late than never’. I will not be able to write again until July, but it’s not my fault - you know that your son Joe would write every day if I was allowed to.
When is the election coming and what side will get in, the Free State or the Republic? Who is opposing De Valera for the County Clare? I myself think the Free State should be returned as we now have got the same freedom as Australia and Canada, and it would take hold from(?) 1914. This is more than I have ever expected or wished for. But Irishmen have fought and spilled their blood for this, so we need not thank any country for …today. That(?) country that Irish fought for…. and looks calmly on while that country is going through the furnace. Don’t think, Mother, for one moment, that I would not wish Ireland to be a Republic. I would walk smiling to the scaffold tomorrow if I thought Ireland had a chance to be a Republic. But I think we have no chance at present, so I hope peace is soon restored, as it looks very bad over here for Irishmen to be fighting among themselves. If we get anything it is by uniting together and we should get it. I’m glad to say some of my comrades were released in March. They were doing a sentence of 3 years. There were 8 of them and they are now in the Free State army. Michael Collins sent a solicitor named McDarragh(?) to see us in March and he told us that they had been trying to get us released and that he was also going to write to you. Let me know if he did so, or if anyone wrote to you. We would not much mind doing our prison sentence every day if we only knew that the Irish Government and the people of Ireland tried to get us released. I suppose we are only 4 private soldiers. We do not count. Athough there were 13 others besides myself sentenced to death for the cause of Eireann, while one of this number poured out his heart’s blood 7000 thousand miles away. His name was James Joseph Daly…. I still suppose they still say it’s nothing.
Well mother, I hope the O’Byrnes(?) in Scarriff wrote to you. They are friends of Walty Kennedy from Kiltartan(?). There were 4 of them in Sinn Fein doing 2 years. They knew me well from home. If they did, remember (?) Fitzpatrick and his Missus. I hope you told them what we were in prison for. Although we were not released we were here for a just cause. Also Pete and Maggie and Bertie(?) and Jim and Joe Linnane and all the boys. Tell them I send my very best love and wishes. Not forgetting [sister] Delia. How is she getting on? And the Misses Quins and … Bowman(?). I suppose he is a captain in the Irish Free State army now. Sister Lena, tell her I send my best love and wishes from my prison cell, and though my body is here my spirit is in Eireann. Lena can send a note in your letter when you write. And send me a good long letter. Let me have all the news. I now close with fondest love to you, Lena, Mattie, George and John, may God and his blessed Mother bless you all and keep you safe till I return once more to my native country, Eireann. Goodbye my dearest and fondest mother, from your loving son, Joe.
I think Joseph’s sister, Delia, was no longer living at home when that letter was written.
It is often assumed that Joseph Hawes was in the Connaught Rangers during WWI, but Oliver Hawes explains that he enlisted in the Munster Fusiliers on 6 Jan 1916 and was in the Mediterranean Expeditionary Force. He was wounded and spent some time in hospital in Cairo and sent two postcards home from there. He was discharged on 19 Feb 1919 and enlisted in the Connaught Rangers the very next day.
Sheila