4to (193 x 255 mm), 93 pp., and folio (253 x 373 mm), 176 pp. 3 volumes bound in two. 73 issues (apparently complete): Vol. I, Nos. 1-27 (with two issues of No. 27). Vol. II, Nos. 1-25 (with first and second editions of Nos. 4, 9 & 19).Vol. III, Nos. 1-16 (with an unnumbered edition dated ‘October’ between Nos. 13 and 14). Early issues 2 pages (single sheet printed both sides); later issues 4 pages. Contemporary blue half cloth. Boards rubbed and scuffed. Some leaves browned, some spotting and staining, a few marginal tears and worn edges, but overall in very good condition for documents of the period.

The journal aimed to kindle the enthusiasm of the Irish people for the new independent Ireland through proclamations and exhortations, reports of National Army (pro-treaty) victories, and atrocities committed by the anti-treaty "Irregulars." Michael Collins, the leader of the pro-treaty forces, is described as "Ireland's Hero [...] the man who fought the Black and Tan Terror. He is now fighting the native terrorist." Collins' death on August 22 at the hands of anti-treaty forces is mourned, as is that shortly before of Arthur Griffith, president of the Dáil. The author Erskine Childers, an opponent of the Anglo-Irish Treaty, is vilified, depicted in British uniform, and described as a man who "shoulders a great deal of the responsibility for the present tragic events in Ireland."

After centuries of British dominance, Parliament finally passed a Home Rule bill for Ireland in 1914, whose enactment was, however, shelved due to the First World War. The resentment stoked by this led to the Easter Rising of 1916 and the Irish War ofIndependence in 1921. The Anglo-Irish Treaty, negotiated by the Irish Republican Army leader Michael Collins among others, created an Irish Free State in 1922. The treaty, however, fell short of the hopes of many Republicans, who resented that Ulster was left in British hands, while Ireland itself remained part of the British Empire, with deputies to the Dáil required to take the Oath of Allegiance to the Crown. The ensuing conflict resulted in a victory for the pro-treaty forces, and the birth of the anti-treaty IRA as a paramilitary organisation. The tensions of this conflict still resonate in Irish politics today.

Extremely rare, even as individual volumes: no libraries have anything approaching acomplete set. A rare and unique insight into the birth of an independent Ireland.

Provenance: From a French private collection.