{"id":129133,"date":"2025-10-18T00:25:07","date_gmt":"2025-10-18T00:25:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/129133\/"},"modified":"2025-10-18T00:25:07","modified_gmt":"2025-10-18T00:25:07","slug":"a-brave-dissection-of-terror","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/129133\/","title":{"rendered":"A brave dissection of terror"},"content":{"rendered":"

Linden MacIntyre\u2019s decision to write a biography of Sir Hugh Tudor was brave and rewarding.<\/p>\n

Brave because Tudor was, either naturally or professionally \u2014 or both \u2014 unknowable.\u00a0<\/p>\n

He was an enigma wrapped in an uncertain psychosis, unaccustomed to expressing emotions other than the forcefulness that marked a successful early military career.\u00a0<\/p>\n

He was 10 times mentioned in dispatches in the First World War \u2014 so when he arrived in Ireland to lead the Black and Tans, his reputation went before him.\u00a0<\/p>\n

That he was asked to do this by his friend Winston Churchill added to the impression of a hard-nosed enforcer sent to a troublesome colony to quieten the restless, ungrateful natives.<\/p>\n

MacIntyre\u2019s project was rewarding because it dissects the motivations, conflicting loyalties, doubts, weaknesses, and principles of a military man.<\/p>\n

It also shines a light into that dark corner where a military commander acts on secretive, tacit instructions from politicians, in this instance Churchill and Lloyd Geroge.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n They, always in a deniable way, encouraged Tudor to assure the Black and Tans that they could treat their opponents as they wished and not face sanction.\u00a0\n <\/p>\n

Tudor did this enthusiastically, once infamously in Listowel. While encouraging Black-and-Tan mayhem, he routinely assured his concerned peers in Dublin Castle that he was committed to high standards.\u00a0<\/p>\n

He plainly was not and because of that he had to seek refuge beyond the reach of Irish avengers after two years leading the Tans\u2019 terror campaign.<\/p>\n

Ironically, he did that first in Palestine where he led the police force trying to placate the Arab population while controlling nascent Jewish nationalism.<\/p>\n

The author is a Canadian whose interest in Tudor was sparked by the soldier\u2019s retirement and second career as a fish dealer in Newfoundland.\u00a0<\/p>\n

This may account for his far from neutral vocabulary, where he describes men widely revered in this country as murderers, thieves, or terrorists.\u00a0<\/p>\n

He is, however, at least as critical of the Black and Tans.\u00a0<\/p>\n

That colouring is reflected in his declaration that Newfoundland was Britain\u2019s oldest colony, a dubious honour that burdened this country for too long.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

If MacIntyre\u2019s language is a tad judgemental, his exposure of the bigotry, racism, and contempt for all things Irish that animated much of Britain\u2019s officer class and Conservative politicians is unwavering.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The three main characters \u2014 Tudor, Churchill, and George \u2014 all expressed appalling anti-Irish racism when they believed they were speaking in closed circles.<\/p>\n

It seems too that a kind of cold justice has been delivered in that Tudor rests in a forgotten, hard-to-find grave in St John\u2019s since his death in 1965.<\/p>\n

All of the set pieces of our War of Independence are described here \u2014 Kilmichael, Crossbarry, Clonmult, and the assassination of Field Marshall Henry Wilson.\u00a0<\/p>\n

They will be familiar to anyone with a passing interest in those times but MacIntyre\u2019s perspective brings a challenging quality to An Accidental Villain \u2014 a questionable title as Tudor\u2019s racism, ruthlessness, and duplicity suggests there was nothing accidental about his terror career in Ireland.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Linden MacIntyre\u2019s decision to write a biography of Sir Hugh Tudor was brave and rewarding. Brave because Tudor…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":129134,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[266],"tags":[34216,359,18,117,19,17],"class_list":{"0":"post-129133","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-books","8":"tag-books-non-fiction","9":"tag-books","10":"tag-eire","11":"tag-entertainment","12":"tag-ie","13":"tag-ireland"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/129133","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=129133"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/129133\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/129134"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=129133"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=129133"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=129133"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}