Seán Milroy Explained

Term Start:27 April 1938
Term End:7 September 1938
Constituency:Labour Panel
Term Start2:12 December 1928
Term End2:29 May 1936
Office3:Teachta Dála
Term Start3:May 1921
Term End3:30 October 1924
Constituency3:Both Cavan and Fermanagh and Tyrone`
Birth Name:John Ignatius Milroy
Birth Date:1877
Birth Place:Cumberland, England
Death Place:Dublin, Ireland
Branch:Irish Republican Army
Unit:Irish Volunteers
Battles:Easter Rising

Seán Milroy (1877 – 30 November 1946) was an Irish revolutionary and politician, who took part in the 1916 Easter Rising and served in the Second Dáil during the War of Independence and afterwards in the Seanad of the Irish Free State.[1]

Biography

Milroy was born in Maryport, Cumberland, England to Scottish parents. He moved to Cork as a young adult.[2] He was a journalist by profession.

He was a close personal friend of Arthur Griffith and an early member of Sinn Féin, serving on its national executive from 1909 to 1912.[1] He joined the Irish Volunteers, and in 1915 he was arrested and imprisoned for three months for a speech in which he urged Irishmen not to fight in World War I.[3] He fought in the Easter Rising in 1916, and was imprisoned in England.[1]

On 3 April 1918, Milroy contested a by-election for Sinn Féin in Tyrone East unsuccessfully. At the 1918 United Kingdom general election he stood in Tyrone North-East, but an electoral pact brokered by Cardinal Michael Logue allocated the seat to the Irish Parliamentary Party and it was not contested by Sinn Féin.[4] He was elected a Sinn Féin Teachta Dála (TD) at the 1921 elections for both the Cavan constituency and for the Fermanagh and Tyrone constituency.[5] He supported the Anglo-Irish Treaty and voted in favour of it. He strongly supported the controversial executions of Rory O'Connor, Liam Mellows, Dick Barrett and Joe McKelvey who were executed without trial or court martial, after serving five months in prison, the day after the assassination of a pro-treaty TD.[6]

He became a member of Cumann na nGaedheal but left the party and resigned from his seat on 30 October 1924 along with seven other TDs in opposition to the Government's actions to the so-called Irish Army Mutiny. He contested the June 1927 general election unsuccessfully.[7]

In later years, he made up with his former colleagues and was elected to Seanad Éireann, serving for both Cumann na nGaedheal and later for Fine Gael from 1928 until the Free State Seanad was abolished in 1936. He was re-elected to the new Seanad in 1938, following the 1937 general election but failed to be re-elected following the 1938 general election.

Sources

Notes and References

  1. Web site: Milroy, John Ignatius ('Seán'). Dictionary of Irish Biography. Coleman. Marie. October 2009. 10 December 2021.
  2. http://www.kilmainhamgaolautographbooks.ie/people/sean-milroy/ Sean Milroy
  3. Book: Kelly. M. J.. The Fenian Ideal and Irish Nationalism, 1882-1916. 2006. Boydell & Brewer. 1843832046. 249. 3 April 2016.
  4. Dublin Evening Telegraph. 4 December 1918. Milroy defied the pact as a breakaway candidate but received only 56 votes.
  5. Web site: Seán Milroy. Oireachtas Members Database. 11 April 2009.
  6. Web site: Dáil Éireann debate - Friday, 8 Dec 1922. Oireachtas Debate Database. 26 July 2024.
  7. Web site: Seán Milroy. ElectionsIreland.org. 11 April 2009.