Primary Sources of Anti-English Activities in California, 1916-1936: The John Byrne Collection

Abstract

The modern Irish republican-nationalist tradition was born on the shores of California with the Fenian funeral of Terence Bellew McManus in San Francisco in 1861. A direct line can be traced from that extended event to the creation of the embryo of the independent nation sixty years later. During that interval, California's Irish-Americans figured prominently in numerous antiEnglish campaigns through their membership in various nationalist organizations. These activities gathered force during the First World War when many Irishmen saw England's woe as their chance for complete independence. In this country, to the extent that this opinion was coherently organized it usually took the shape of financial support for the republican ideas and policies of Eamon De Valera. The record of these activities in California on behalf of De Valera was preserved by John Byrne ( 1866-1962) , a participant of relatively humble station, a warehouse worker, who resided in Los Angeles from the turn of the century. In the 1960s the materials were entrusted to the late professor Dr. Mary Condon who deposited them as the John Byrne Collection ( ten boxes, ca. 800 documents) at the San Jose State University Li-