For decades an inaccurate story has been told about the Irish Tricolour. This inaccurate story emerged in the 1990’s following a misidentification of a French flag, flown in Waterford on March 07th, 1848. The misidentification also overlooked Irish tricolours had been flown 18 years previous, emerging in 1830 and seeing popular use. Here is a short summary of that evolution.
A SYMBOL OF REPEAL
The first Irish Tricolours emerged in 1830, Ireland lifted on a goodwill tide following the granting of Catholic Emancipation. This allowed Catholics to sit in Parliament and effect legislation, a major advancement after a century of harsh Penal Laws that oppressed Catholics. Following its granting, the driving force behind it, Daniel O’Connell, was elevated to the status of the ‘Liberator’. He became the most influential voice in the land, making it matter when he began to promote a new idea – that the Irish Catholic, represented by the colour green, and Irish Protestant, represented by orange, should unite for the betterment of their country.
He began to call for this union from 1829 when he turned his attention from Catholic Emancipation to a new campaign, Repeal. This called for the establishment of an Irish Parliament in Dublin to run Irish affairs, a benefit lost with the Act of Union in 1801. The movement hoped to ‘Repeal’ the union, hence the title. O’Connell sought new symbols and new momentum for the effort. His words led to a new symbol in March 1830. He called for:
‘Orange and green to blend their colours henceforth, and let the general object be to render their country that place of plenty and happiness which God and nature intended’.
He repeated this language across the year before it took physical form in a cockade, or rosette, seen at a political event in Cork City in March 1830. The event was attended by his son, another speaker present commenting on the new device. It saw more use across the year in flag and rosette form before the first Tricolour emerged.
Emelia Hamilton, of Annadale Cottage, Fairview Dublin was the first to add white to the green and orange device.
She was inspired by the French Revolution of July 1830. Having likely read of the green-orange device in use, she added white to create the symbol. She gave the Tricolour its meaning with two lines from a poem, cementing the symbolism we recognise today:
‘Let orange and green, no longer be seen, bestained with the blood of our island’
Her cockade was presented at a meeting to salute the French. It got some press attention in the coming weeks, even being suggested as a national flag by a London newspaper. It faded from view but the symbol got a national launch in December 1830 when it was selected by the followers of Daniel O’Connell as the symbol of his Repeal movement. (Read more about Emelia Hamilton here)
O’Connell returned from taking his seat in Parliament to a well organised event at Howth Pier, at which Irish tricolour and green-orange devices were flying with abandon. These unfurling’s were published in every newspaper of the day, the symbol known to every person in Ireland. O’Connell would say;
It opens a new era for Ireland to behold the mixture of orange and green’
Newspapers like the Waterford Chronicle felt:
‘One might justly suppose that the return of Mr O’Connell was chosen as the period for the great reconciliation of Irishmen – The Orangeman and the Catholic renounced their inveterate dissensions, and the colours which have hitherto the emblems of the opposite factions were blended together’
The Tipperary Free Press opined the year would be ‘memorable by the union of the orange and green’.
The Irish Tricolour was seen frequently in flag, banner, ribbon and cockade form over the coming years. Its first recorded flight abroad was in America in 1831, the Friends of Ireland group in Charleston, South Carolina seeing a tricolour flag and scarf presented to the Chairman. It was an exact green, white and orange with the white in the middle, like the modern tricolour.
A first recorded flight over a building took place in 1832 when a green, oragne and white tricolour flew over Dunsoghly Towerhouse, Saint Margaret’s Dublin. This was after an anti-tithe meeting, the symbol being adopted by this campaign against Church taxes. It was also adopted by the Temperance, or tee-total movement of Father Matthew.
The symbol saw declining use as O’Connell’s Repeal campaign stuttered. When O’Connell passed in 1847, a new group adopted the green – orange device: The Irish Confederates. Often known as the Young Irelanders, they took up the reins of increased Irish autonomy, even adopting O’Connell’s green – orange symbol. They used the colours in their membership cards for 1848 and began to craft green-orange neckerchiefs, or cravats, early that year.
The group used the green-orange device but took to flying French tricolours after the French Revolution in February of 1848. They first flew in Cork, then Limerick, Cappoquin and Waterford, from late February to early March. Then an important return occurred – a patriot flew an Irish Tricolour in Enniscorthy March 7th, 1848, an event that was published in all nationalist newspapers. Within weeks the Irish Confederates adopted the white into their existing green-orange device, flying the Irish tricolour in Limerick on Saint Patricks Day and also in Manchester in rosette form.
Members of the group travelled to Paris in April 1848 seeking support for Irish independence but received none. They did return with a striking version of the Irish Tricolour which they presented at a meeting of the Trades in Dublin, April 15th. There, Thomas Meagher gave an excellent speech which played an important role in the Irish Tricolour’s future adoption as the national flag. He said:
‘The white in the centre signifies a lasting truce between the orange and the green: beneath its shadow I trust that the hands o the Irish protestant and the Irish catholic will not only be clasped, but clenched’
Since the 1990’s, Thomas Meagher has been credited with flying the first Irish Tricolour. This is demonstrably not the case. The symbol had been around for 18 years by this point. He is also credited with flying a Tricolour in Waterford on March 7th, 1848 but this is also inaccurate – the flag flown in Waterford was a French flag, clearly stated in several references at the time and even a century later.
The 1990’s misidentification was an assumption, one which can be shown to be inaccurate. We can, however, credit the Young Irelanders with an important adoption of the symbol that played a role in its later adoption as the flag of the 1916 Easter Rising. They were not the first, but they were important.
The group flew the symbol and were first to carry it in battle when William Smith O’Brien, Confederate leader, wore a tricolour sash at Ballingarry. After the rebellion it got important adoptions by secret societies like the Irish Republican Brotherhood and Clan na Gael, before it was used in the Easter Rising of 1916. It quickly assumed the position of premier symbol, becoming the flag of Ireland after 26 county independence in 1922.
It overtook the harp flag, partly because of an inaccurate origin story for that symbol. (Read more on that here)
Today the inaccurate story is broadcast far and wide, but the research for this first ever referenced work on the subject, ‘The Irish Tricolour’ had led to a new era of accuracy and understanding of Ireland’s Tricolour flag.
This new research shows the Irish Tricolour:
- First appeared as a green – orange device in March 1830.
- It was inspired by the calls of Daniel O’Connell, made possible by the achievement of Catholic Emancipation
- The first green, orange and white device was a cockade, or rosette, fused by Dubliner Emelia Eleanor Hamilton of Annadale Cottage. It was presented to a meeting in September 1830 and got notable press, even being proposed as a national flag.
- She was clear on its meaning, as a symbol of peace between the factions.
- The followers of Daniel O’Connell adopted the symbol for his Repeal campaign and it got a national launch at an event to welcome O’Connell home from taking his seat in Parliament, December 1830. Howth Pier, Dublin.
- It saw regular use in the 1830’s in flag, banner, rosette and ribbon form, used by the Repeal, anti-tithe and Temperance movements. The green-orange symbol of the same meaning also saw ongoing use.
- It flew in flag form in America in 1831 and over an Irish building, Dunsoghly Towerhouse, Dublin in 1832.
- After O’Connell’s death in 1847, the Irish Confederates adopted the green-orange device.
- The Confederates added white after an important return of an Irish tricolour in Enniscorthy, March 7th 1848, which reminded all of the Irish Tricolour and its utility.
- (A report of an Irish Tricolour in Waterford March 7th 1848 are inaccurate – this was the French flag)
- The group adopted the tricolour for their rebellion, presenting a striking tricolour to a meeting in Dublin on their return from France in April 1848.
- The rebellion failed, but the group gave the tricolour an important ‘rebel edge’, one to the liking of later Republicans.
- The symbol was occasionally used by the Irish public or groups between 1850 – 1915. Its most important adoption was in secret as it became the flag of secret societies.
- It was first adopted by Fenian groups in America, then the Irish Republican Brotherhood in Ireland, then Clan na Gael in America.
- It was used sparingly, stored for the Rising of Easter 1916. Its use at this event saw it quickly rise to become the uncontested symbol of an Irish Republic.
Read the brand new full history of the Irish Tricolour and Ireland’s other storied symbols in the book, available widely in bookstores and online here –
