Ireland In World War 1 Essay

As the War was going on Ireland was part of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, which they entered the War in August 1914 as one of the Entente Powers, along with France and the Russian Empire (“Global World Warrior”). As the War outbreak most of the Irish people, regardless of political affiliation, supported the war in much the same way as their British counterparts and both nationalist and unionist leaders initially backed the British War. Over 200,000 Irishman fought in the war, in several theatres and either 30,000 to 49,000 died. When World War I ended Sinn Fein won the Irish general election of 1918. As this all came about it was when Ireland was coming up for election again and Sinn Fein’s campaign ending up winning majority of the votes. However, by 1918, under its new leader Éamon de Valera, Sinn Fein had come to

Levels of poverty in many isolated rural areas were exceptional by western standards. In 1930, the total population in Ireland was just under three million. Majority of people were living in the countryside, or in country towns or villages. Most people in Ireland occupied small agricultural holdings. As the Great Depression was coming Irish famers had received a poor return for their 1929 crop. Also many other factors of the Great Depression where cattle and beef was slowly begin to decline, and wages for people working in shops began to get very low (“Global World Warrior”).Though Ireland was a largely agrarian economy, trading almost exclusively with the UK, at the time of the Great Depression. Beef and dairy products made up most of the exports, and Ireland fared well with other commodities. Though During the late 1930’s Fianna Fail began a dispute with Britain over payment of land annuities, called the Economic War. So the Irish refused to continue paying land annuities to Britain. Imposing that Britain put tariffs on Irish beef until this was resolved