Abstract

This article deals with French propaganda efforts in Ireland during the First World War, a theme hitherto unexplored. In 1914, Ireland was in the grip of war fever like other European countries. In the early months of the conflict, thousands of Irishmen enlisted in the British army. Soon, however, the number of recruits dropped dramatically as various British recruitment organisations blundered and as British propaganda was rather useless. The French government deemed that tens of thousands of Irishmen could be recruited, and Irish recruitment was all the more important since the human cost of the battles of Verdun and the Somme was ghastly. The French knew the British were in a most awkward situation in Ireland, especially after the Easter Rising of April 1916. They decided to begin their own propaganda campaigns in the country with the approval of the British authorities. First, the French focused their attention on political leaders, then on the Catholic Church. The article analyses the approach taken by the French and shows that the Entente Cordiale of 1904 and the Law of the Separation between the Churches and the State of 1905, among others, were serious obstacles to effective propaganda.