Confidential report from Frederick H. Boland to Seán Nunan (Dublin)
(Confidential)¹

Since I came here, I have occasionally seen signs of IRA activity but it has usually been of a half-hearted and relatively innocuous character – nothing more than young fellows selling ‘An t-Eireannach Aontuithe’ and the ‘Ros Catha’ at rallies organised by the Anti-Partition League.

I hear, however, of a recent development which, to my mind, is somewhat more disquieting. On Sunday, 17th June, there was a meeting in Trafalgar Square organised by a group calling themselves the Roger Casement Branch of Sinn Féin. I gather that the people behind it were members of the ‘United Irishmen’ organisation here who broke away to form this new, and more vigorous and active, group. Very little publicity was given to the Trafalgar Square meeting on 17th June beforehand and the audience consisted merely of the people who go to Trafalgar Square regularly on Sunday afternoons to feed the pigeons together with about thirty-five or forty Irish people who seemed to be in sympathy with the speakers on the platform. There were four speakers on the platform, one of whom was identified as a man named Keogh,² a former President of a Branch of the Anti-Partition League. The speeches were of a most violent character. All of the political parties in Ireland were denounced in the most unmeasured terms and one speaker, whose name was given as Sean McDermott (not improbably a pseudonym) was introduced as a man who had ‘spent four years in de Valera’s jails’. The disquieting feature of the speeches was, however, that they were all frank recruiting appeals for the IRA. All the speeches concluded with an earnest exhortation to all young Irishmen to come forward ‘as volunteers in this last great fight’.

A duplicated hand-out was distributed during the meeting and I enclose a copy of this. It will give you an idea of the tenor of the speeches and the tone in which this new organisation’s propaganda is pitched. Of the four speakers, one had a pronounced Northern accent and another, a Dublin accent. They were all young men. A collection was taken up during the meeting.

There is no reason to regard this new activity as being in any way Communist-inspired. Keogh was known in the Anti-Partition League as a strong Anti-Communist.

Apart from this Trafalgar Square meeting, the Roger Casement Branch of Sinn Féin doesn’t seem to have attracted much notice here and most other Irish organisations in London seem unaware of its existence. The meeting on 17th June may be only a flash in the pan. Still, the thought that people are appealing to young Irishmen in this country in the inflammatory terms used by the speakers at this meeting is somewhat disquieting.

The foregoing information about the meeting on 17th June was given to me by an Irishman who was present at the meeting and who may be taken as utterly reliable.