Left Without A Handkerchief

On the afternoon of Wednesday, 10 January 1923, Lulu Bagwell wroteto her mother-in-law Harriet informing her the family house hadbeen destroyed in a blaze earlier that morning. Lulu and the childrenhad been obliged to stand shivering at gunpoint on the lawn watchingthe conflagration, the raiders responsible for the fire only leavingwhen it was too late to save Marlfield. Afterwards she discovered herhandbag and all the family's overcoats had been stolen. 'We hadn'teven a handkerchief,' she lamented, 'everything has gone.' The fate of Marlfield was not unique. It is estimated that between 250and 300 Irish country houses were burnt in the early 1920s during thecourse of the War of Independence and subsequent Civil War. Thereasons behind their destruction were various, but because of theirscale and prominence on the Irish landscape, setting fire to themwas judged by perpetrators to be good propaganda. Relatively littleinvestigation has been undertaken into this devastation - to bothproperty and lives. But how was it for the owners of these buildings? How did theyfeel when, in the course of just a few hours, they saw their worldsoverturned? Hitherto historians have concentrated on the actions andmotivation of those responsible for carrying out the burnings. LeftWithout a Handkerchief will tell the other side of the story, of historyseen from the perspective of the losers, left homeless and strugglingto cope, emotionally and financially. A key source for this story will be under-explored material held bythe national archives of both Ireland and Britain. Correspondenceback and forth, between claimants and the relevant authorities, revealthe extent of suffering experienced by those whose houses had beenburnt, often shock that the local community, of which they hadthought themselves part, displayed little concern in the aftermath oftheir devastation. These official documents will be supplemented byother material: letters, diaries, memoirs, some of it coming directlyfrom descendants of the house owners and not previously shared inpublic. Left Without a Handkerchief will fill a gap in the national narrative,featuring the stories of ten houses and their owners. From Galwayto Wexford, Mayo to Cork, it will give a voice to the dispossessed, tothe people who thought they had a place in Ireland until, usually inthe course of a single night, they were disabused of this belief. As thecentenary of the onset of house burnings arrives, now is the time totell their story.