Archive of the Month01 May 14

Gender debates at the General Synod in 1914

Archive of the Month – May 2014

Walsh’s personal book plate featuring the Walsh family arms and motto ‘Noli irritare leonem’ (Do not irritate the lions), RCB Library MS 297/1; Walsh’s signature on his copy of the Irish Church Bill ; and the official notice of Walsh’s sudden death on 24 February 1917, as published in the

The son of the Rt Hon John Edward Walsh (1816–1869) Master of the Rolls in Ireland, and the grandson of the Revd Dr Robert Walsh, vicar of Finglas parish in Dublin 1839–1852, Robert the younger took a keen interest in record–keeping and history from the beginning of his clerical career. He opened the first volume of press–cuttings entitled ‘The Irish Church Bill and Debates upon it’ on the 1 March 1869, extracting daily press items mainly from the Standard newspaper about the bill which ultimately was enacted as the Irish Church Act (32&33 Vic. c. 42 sect. 2) whereby the union between Church and State in Ireland that had existed since the Reformation was dissolved, and the Church of Ireland ceased to be established by law and have any state connection.

Walsh’s cuttings include all sides of the evolving pro– and anti–arguments as well as his annotations and dating of each item – all of which helps to build up a true picture of the reporting on this radical and controversial piece of legislation, after which the Church of Ireland had to completely re–organise itself and devise the synodical structures at central and diocesan levels we have inherited today. Walsh carefully cut out the relevant items, and gummed them onto loose pages which were eventually bound together as individual volumes, in chronological order. Usefully he then indexed each volume (with the exception of the final one which remains unbound because he died before its completion) which will assist researchers navigating for particular subjects of interest.

Left: Detail of the speech of William Gladstone MP, Prime Minister, moving the Irish Church Bill, as reported verbatim in

Thus the collection provides a significant body of commentary complimenting the collection of working papers of the General Convention (the forerunner of the General Synod) featured as a previous Archive of the Month ‘What happened at disestablishment’ available at this permanent link: http://ireland.anglican.org/about/133

The names of all the delegates (bishops, clerical and laity) who attended the initial Consulting Committee tasked with the re–structuring of the Church once the bill became law are included, diocese by diocese, again with Walsh’s explanatory comments. The summoning of, and detail of debate at each diocesan and provincial synod held thereafter is provided in detail, culminating in the lay conference of September 1869, and then the General Convention of February 1870, which was effectively the first ever general synod, and at which every diocese and parish of the church was represented by clerical and lay delegates much as still happens at the annual General Synod to this day.

After completing the first volume on the disestablishment process, Walsh maintained the disciplined practice of extracting cuttings on all manner of subjects to do with the Church of Ireland for the remainder of his life, in a series of 15 additional volumes, continuing its story up to 1917.

Title pages from the ‘Reorganisation of the Irish Church’ volumes 1 and 2, being a continuation of Walsh’s press cutting work on matters relating to the affairs of the Church of Ireland post–disestablishment, RCB Library MS 297/2 and /3.

The second and third volumes in the series he titled ‘Reorganisation of the Irish Church’ – covering the meetings held throughout Ireland to make all the preparations for the future of the Church through the momentous changes that occurred after disestablishment. As well as The Standard, many of the early press cuttings were extracted by Walsh from the Daily Express, but laterally he used The Irish Times extensively too.

Initially the General Convention of 1870 and subsequent seven early General Synods were held at a variety of large–capacity venues in Dublin – including the Ancient Concert Rooms in Great Brunswick Street, and the Molesworth Hall. However, a purpose–built hall was made available to the Church as the result of a most generous gift, in the context of the large–scale restoration of Christ Church Cathedral in Dublin, undertaken by the English architect, George Edmund Street, and generously funded by Henry Roe, whiskey distiller.

Roe gifted the Church a new Synod Hall for ‘General

The Synod of 1914 was held at the Synod Hall in Dublin, following the usual service in Christ Church Cathedral, and involved four days of proceedings from Tuesday 28 April to Friday 1 May. The reported headlines of the address of the President of the Synod, the Primate and Archbishop of Armagh, the Most Revd John Baptist Crozier, convey Ireland on the brink of change: ‘Ireland Torn Asunder – The Gathering Storm’.

The speech did indeed capture the archbishop’s ominous views of how changing times were threatening the Church of Ireland. Interestingly, when he spoke of the ‘ever darkening shadows’ and ‘clouds above our heads grow[ing] blacker’ it was not the growing likelihood of war on mainland Europe to which he was referring. Rather it was the situation at home, and the ‘cruel tragedy’, as he put it, ‘that there should be the real danger of drenching the fair fields and towns of Ulster with the blood of our countrymen to create “a united Ireland”’! Referring specifically to the third Home Rule proposals, he could not believe that the ‘sons and daughters of Ireland really desire’ such a measure, and viewed with ‘holy horror the growing prospect before us of intensified hatred and separation’.

He flagged the relatively healthy state of the Church’s finances as would be outlined in the report of the Representative Church Body; outlined that there would be debates on the proposed revisions of the Prayer Book and Hymnal with reports from their respective working committees; commented on the successful opening of the new Divinity Hostel since following provisions granted at the 1913 synod; and further flagged various pending amendments dealing with the diocesan representation at the synod and episcopal appointments. Towards the end of the speech he touched on what would prove to one of the more contentious issues of the 1914 synod – the representation (or lack of it) of women on vestries.

It was agreed at this point that the motion and debate would be postponed until the following day at 3.30pm when Mr Justice Madden [High Court Judge John Madden] who was ‘keenly interested’ in the issue would be available to participate.

When it came to the actual debate the following day, support for the petition had risen overnight to 1,140 signatures, including several clergy in support, one of whom was Gregg who in proposing the motion urged synod to put women on a ‘better legal footing’ by reflecting on changed times and that the role of women was, as he put it, ‘no longer as mild satellites for men as they might have been regarded 40 years ago …’. The Rt. Hon Justice Madden seconded the motion, drawing attention to the higher education of women, and urged synod to ‘loyally discharge the debt due to women’

Thereafter there were amusing but largely negative interventions revealing the difficulties of the more liberal–minded and progressive to move things forward. The Revd F.R. Montgomery Hitchcock DD warned synod that allowing women on vestries would open the floodgates to Roman Catholics and non–conformists. The bishop of Ossory, the Rt Revd John Henry Bernard warned ‘social disputes would increase further rather than diminish with women on the select vestries’, whilst his dismissive remarks about the risks of allowing them to be nominators (to chose clergy for a parish) received laughter.

It would  take a further six years before the Church of Ireland constitution was amended to allow women to be included on the register of vestrymen [sic]. Women were not permitted to serve as churchwardens and parochial nominators until the constitution was consolidated in 1947; whilst the terms ‘vestrymen’ and ‘synodsmen’ (as opposed to vestry and synod ‘member’) continued to be used to describe members of these representative bodies – irrespective of their gender – until 1960. Thanks to Archdeacon Walsh’s painstaking compilations of press cuttings we are enlightened on a whole range of issues about the nature of decision–making and modest pace of change within the central structures of the Church, 100 years ago. 

At the local parish level, research which has been shared with us by Mary Williams who has used vestry minutes and other sources in Kill (Kill o’ the Grange) parish in Dublin demonstrates how gender issues played out in particular places, with her specific focus on the contributions to parish life of the eminent statistician William S Gosset and his wife Marjorie Gosset. The full text of an article produced for the parish magazine is available at this link.

For further information please contact:
Dr Susan Hood
RCB Library
Braemor Park
Churchtown
Dublin 14
Tel: 01–4923979
Fax: 01–4924770
E–mail: susan.hood@rcbcoi.org