FIGHTING IN IRELAND.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LVII, Issue 17622, 8 November 1920, Page 7

FIGHTING IN IRELAND.

SEVERAL SMALL CONFLICTS. ARMY CAPTAIN KILLED. REPRISALS BY TROOPS. By Telegraph— Association—Copyright. (Received 12.15 a.m.) A. and N.Z. LONDON, Nov. 6. A number of armed civilians at Ardfert, County Kerry, attacked a party of police and military proceeding from Tralee to disperse an assembly of armed civilians at Causeway. Their fire was returned and the aggressors dispersed. One report states that six civilians were killed. Others state that many were wounded and twenty arrested. A girl named O'Conor was killed. Of the civilians arrested, one was in possession of a German pistol loaded with German ammunition. The Crown forces suffered no casualties. The assembly at Causeway was dispersed after a short conflict. Captain Hamilton, a military officer, ■was shot dead near Nenagh, Tipperary. Reprisals followed, two houses and the local creamery being burned and shop windows riddled by bullets. Two men who were arrested, and tried to escape, were shot dead. An unconfirmed report states that 17 police were killed in BaLlinalee, Longford, when a reprisal raid was repulsed by the residents. In an affray at Edgeworthstown, County Longford, between Crown forces and Irish volunteers, two* of the former were' killed and a number wounded. Reprisals followed. In Longford several houses were burned. Sinn Feiners attacked a coastguard station near Skibbereen. Cork, killed a marine, and dangerously wounded two others.

The authorities raided Mahon's printing works, in Dublin, dismantled the machinery, and stopped the publication of Young Ireland, also the Home Journal. It is reported that the Curfew in Dublin is about to be enforced at 10 o'clock, instead of midnight. AN IRISH NAVY. MR. ASQUITH EXPLAINS. Australian and N.Z. Cable Association. (Reed. 11.30 p.m ) LONDON, Nov. 6. Mr. H. H. Asquith. speaking at Cardiff, complained of wilful perversion of his proposal to allow Ireland to have her own navy under a scheme of Dominion Home Rule. He never suggested that Ireland should equip herself with flotillas of submarines and destroyers, which would be a constant menace to Britain. It was improbable that Irish statesmen would squander any of Ireland's meagre resources on a navy. If ill-advisedly they did so the navy must be subject to similar restrictions to those which applied to the navies of the Dominions, and must be transferred bodily to the Admiralty's control in wartime.

IRISH RAILWAYS. 3000 EMPLOYEES DISMISSED. Australian and N.Z. Cable Association. (Reed. 7.30 p.m.) LONDON, Nov! 6. The Midland and Great Western Railway of Ireland has dismissed 3000 em. ployees owing to their refusal to handlemunitions and to a strike of boilermakers. AUSTRALIA'S ATTITUDE. INTERVENTION REJECTED. A. and N.Z. MELBOURNE. Nov. 6. In the House of Representatives, Mr. H. Mahon moved the adjournment to discuss the advisableness of intervention with regard to British treatment of Ireland, which, he alleged, had resulted in the death of Mr. McSweeney. Australia's share in the war had shown her desire to preserve the small nations, of which Ireland was one. He characterised the British Government as a foreign Government so far as Ireland was concerned, and asserted that Mr. McSweeney had died for his principles. A member interjected: " Suicide," and Mr. Mahon excitedly characterised this as a lie. Mr. W. M. Hughes, replying, said he was not out to defend English rule in Ireland, but he declined to support a plea that justified crimes and outrages. He deplored the state of affairs in Ireland, bu£ it was beyond the power of the Australian Government or the British Government to settle this dispute, which was one of racial hatred. If there were those who thought they could recreate in Australia the state of things existing in Ireland, let them try it—they would find the temper ; of Australians different. If Britain, as Mr. Mahon claimed, was a foreign country, then not) one of the Federal members was entitled to sit in this Parliament,'because he was not naturalised. The closure was applied, and the motion negatived.