1884-1967 [freq. err. Moloney]; b.  8 Cole’s Lane, off Henry Street in Dublin, fg. of a grocer; lost her mother [Catherine, née McGrath] in childhood and had unhappy relationship with her stepmother; actress and trade-unionist; joined Inginidhe na hEireann in 1903 on hearing a speech by Maud Gonne with whom she worked closely on Bean na héireann; strenously opposed ‘loyal flunkyism’ of Dublin society centred on the Viceregal Lodge; encouraged James Connolly, then in America, to return to Ireland; co-fnd. with Maud Gonne McBride, and ed., Bean na hEireann, 1908, devoted to separatism and women’s causes; hosted the formation of Fianna Eireann at her home [34 Lwr. Camden St.], Aug. 1909; romantically associated with Bulmer Hobson who apparently jilted her; she threw a stone at effigies of George V and his queen in a Grafton St. shop-window during the royal visit, and was charged with high treason, 1910 - although she actually missed her target; released in 1911;

she opposed the Treaty, 1921 and engaged on the Republican side in the 1921-23; played her last role Lennox Robinson’s Crabbed Youth and Age (Nov. 1922); visited USSR in 1930; supported the Vocational Education Act of 1930 as a ‘University of the Poor’; argued for wide provision of social justice, citing Papal Encyclicals, contrary to the corporatist tendency of the Commission on Vocational Organisation; elected President of the Irish Trade Union Congress [ITUC], 1937-38 and prevented by ill-health from giving presidential address; member of executive of Saor Eire, and League Against Imperialism; retired from politics, Oct. 1941 [vars. 1945 and 1946] - speeded by bouts of alcoholism and depression; lived with the psychiatrist Evelyn O’Brien at North Circular Rd. and later at Sutton; d. 28 Jan., 1967 [var. 29], following a stroke; bur. Republican Plot, Glasnnevin; she was godmother of Thomas MacDonagh’s dg. Barbara [Pearse was godfather]; for Maud Gonne she was ‘Emer, my old friend and comrade’ - in which connection she is appears in early sections of Francis Stuart’s Black List, Section H (1971); her part in the Lock-Out Strike of 1913 was celebrated in “Soup”, a performance outside the Abbey Theatre, in Sept. 2013. DIB

The necessity for Irish Trades Unionists to apply their energies to form an Irish Federation of Labour independent of the English Amalgamated Societies, and also an Independent Labour Party to further their interests independent of politics, is daily becoming more evident, and it is a surprizing fact that it should have been so long neglected. In these Labour Notes we have brought the matter forward repeatedly, and it was stated that when the interests of the Irish Society clashed with the English Society that the English Labour Party would have to support the English Trade Unions to the detriment of the Irish local societies. Later events have fully justified us in our repeated warnings.
 In Mr James Larkin’s case, we have surely a striking example of the vicious methods to which an English society will descend in order to crush a newly formed Irish society, and perhaps a revision of the history of the case will prove of interest to the readers of Bean na hÉireann.
 James Larkin was originally an organiser of the National Union of Dock Labourers (an English society) and in that capacity he was sent over to organise the Irish Dockers and form branches of the Dockers’ Union.
 He was successful in organising Dublin and Belfast, and finally he was sent down to Cork. In the meantime the members of the Dublin branch had a dispute with their employers, which finally led to a lock-out, and the unfortunate men were thrown out onto the streets. When they applied for help from the English society the Dockers’ Union refused to give any money to the Dublin workers on strike, and ordered Larkin to proceed to Aberdeen and leave the Irish workers in the lurch. This Jim Larkin most manfully refused to do, thereby throwing up a lucrative position and putting himself on the same level as the men on strike. The connection between the Dockers’ Union and Jim Larkin immediately ceased.
 Larkin then devoted his energies and wonderful powers of organising to forming a purely Irish society, which was called the Irish Transport Workers’ Union, which embraced all classes of unskilled workers, and which had its headquarters in Dublin and was governed by an executive body.
 In the meanwhile the Cork men who had originally started to organise their forces, with the intention of amalgamating with the English, hearing of the scandalous treatment of the Dublin workers, decided at a committee meeting to amalgamate with the Transport Union; as they were not amalgamated to the Dockers’ Union, so they decided to support the Irish Society by joining forces with it. This was afterwards ratified by a general meeting, and they duly sent forward their affiliation fees to the Irish Transport Workers. In this we would imagine that they were quite entitled to join any organisation, either English or Irish, as up to that time they were not affiliated to any organisation.
 But the English Society thought differently, and was indignant at so much Irish money escaping from its money-grasping claws. Immediately musty Acts of Parliament were unearthed to discover under what headings the English Society could take action so as to make an Irishman send his money to England instead of investing it at home for the benefit of himself and his fellow workers. In a new Act under Edward VII they discovered a clause which makes it illegal for any committee or general meeting to vote money to any use, different to its original purpose, before first acquainting each individual subscriber of the proposed change of location of funds.
 On this one technical point they relied, although they supplemented it with twenty more items in the indictment. It is quite evident that the Crown must have been influenced to prosecute in the case, and every means were used to secure a conviction, and there can be no doubt that the money belonging to the English Society must have been freely circulated to bring several working men in Cork to come to Dublin to swear away the liberty of the man who had devoted his time and energy in the cause of labour.
 Never before has such a cruel and vindictive sentence been passed for such a small technical offence, and it is to be hoped that the Irish workers generally will recognise the fact that English laws have no sympathy with Irish labour, and it is also worth noting that no questions have been asked in the English House of Parliament, either by the English labour men, or by our own so-called Nationalist members who are always fond of boasting that they are the only friends of the Irish working classes, especially when approaching election times.

—Given at Searc’s Web Guide - online; accessed 16.12.2011.