User talk:Kusala1952

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[edit] William Hoey Kearney Redmond

This is a cut and paste of something I sent to the creator of this page. I thought it might be helpful to have it here as well.

I was considering creating a page on this man so congratulations on beating me to it!

I have read the Denman book as well.

I feel the page as it stands covers his military career well but would be strengthned by more emphasis on his politics. Although generally a constitutional politician he did sometimes swing in the direction of advocating physical force and the tension between the two is quite interesting. It is possble that he just got carried away with his own rhetoric - he wouldn't be the first politician to do that

Talking of rhetoric, I feel the page also would benefit from some assessment of his powers as an orator and especially his final speech to the House of Commons which the Denman book quotes and comments on at length. I assume there would not be copyright problems about reporting a speech to Parliament.

I have a feeling that the compilers of Hansard may have elected him as the greatest Parliamentary orator of the 20th century but I can't find evidence for that so may have just dreamt it.

The reaction to his death is worth exploring too. It is said that his was the most mourned British Empire war death. In spite of the polarised nature of Irish politics at the time, Willie Redmond seems to have had almost no enemies.

After being so much mourned he was rapidly forgotten. The 'official' version of Irish 20th century history seems to either ignore or demonise the constitutional nationalists. Ironically the strategy he advocated - standing in elections, talking to the unionists- has largely been adopted by the current Sinn Fein heirs of those who condemned him and his allies for doing so.

Some time in the 1990s Mary McAleese and others opened the Island of Ireland memorial park in Belgium which commemorates the attack in which Willie Redmond died but without seeming to specifically mention him on any of the memorials. A link to this might help.

Of course I could just go ahead and add all this on my own without consulting you but I thought it would be more agreeable to open a discussion.

I am new to contributing to Wikipedia and am enjoying the whole business.

Best wishes

Kusala1952

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