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The History Sale 2015
www.adams.ie655
‘THE WORST CRISIS IN THE HISTORY OF THE PAPER’
ARTHUR GRIFFITH AND ‘SINN FEIN’
An important autograph letter signed from Arthur Griffith, editor and proprietor of
the ‘Sinn Fein’ paper, to the Irish-Argentinian businessman Padraic MacManus
(addressed as ‘A Chara’), 2 pp, on ‘Sinn Fein’ notepaper, dated June 13 1912,
asking for funds to help clear the newspaper’s debts.
Griffith says the proposal of a Home Rule Bill has given a new lease of power to
Parliamentarianism, and the Sinn Fein paper has had to ‘mark time until it passes
through or is rejected. I believe it will pass through. During the last eighteen
months the paper has been sustained by great sacrifices and for another twelve
months it cannot hope to get into smooth water.
‘If S.F. can be carried over this crucial year I feel pretty safe about the future,
both of it and the movement. If it be forced to drop publication now it will be
very difficult to resuscitate the national movement when Home Rule comes in to
operation.
‘The weekly loss on the paper is small, and might be met by us, but there is a
legacy of debt from the days of the “Daily” which threatens to crush it, for the
paper at present cannot pay its necessary expenses and the debts of a former
date which press on it.
Griffith estimates that two hundred pounds would save the paper, tiding it over
the interval before the passage or rejection of the H.R. Bill. ‘In either event Ir[ish]
politics would enter on a new era, and our opportunity would come.
‘I have a house which was purchased a few months ago for €300. With the
improvements I have made, I dare say it would sell at any time for €350 or more.
There is no debt on it save one of €30. If you would lend me €200 on the security
of the house, I believe I could pull the paper successfully through. I could not
attempt to repay the money for at least three years ..
‘I am sorry that the first letter I write to you after your return should be of this
nature, but I am face to face with the worst crisis in the history of the paper’.
The letter is torn and repaired at folds, without loss, otherwise in good condition.
It is not clear whether MacManus put up the money, but in any case the paper did
not close, and continued publication until it was suppressed by Dublin Castle in
December 1914, whereupon Griffith replaced it with another title.
The debts mentioned by Griffith related to an earlier period when he tried to bring
out a daily paper. The house which he offered as security, was in fact bought for
Griffith on his marriage in 1910, by a committee of friends and supporters.
Arthur Griffith [1871-1922] was the founder of the Sinn Fein party and of various
newspapers associated with it. His political writings laid much of the basis for
the independence movement. He joined the Irish Volunteers, but did not take part
in the 1916 Rising, though he offered to do so, and was arrested and imprisoned
afterwards. He was acting President of the First Dail during De Valera’s absence
abroad. He led the Treaty delegation in 1921, and his decision to sign was
decisive. He became President of Dail Eireann and a member of the first Free State
government. He died of a cerebral haemorrhage in August 1922, probably due to
overwork, a few weeks before the death of Michael Collins. Letters from him are
scarce.
€1,000 - €1,500
Lot 655