A report on Ulster Volunteers, Home Rule Crisis, Irish War of Independence, Ulster, Partition of Ireland and Ulster loyalism

The Ulster Volunteers was a unionist, loyalist militia founded in 1912 to block domestic self-government ("Home Rule") for Ireland, which was then part of the United Kingdom.

The Ulster Volunteers were based in the northern province of Ulster.

Unionists in Ulster, determined to prevent any measure of home rule for Ireland, formed a paramilitary force, the Ulster Volunteers, which threatened to resist by force of arms the implementation of the Act and the authority of any Dublin Parliament.

HM Government's ability to face down unionist defiance was thrown into question by the "Curragh incident", when dozens of British Army officers tendered their resignations rather than secure arms against Ulster loyalist seizure, forcing a climb-down by the government.

The Home Rule Crisis was interrupted by the First World War.

The territory that became Northern Ireland, within the Irish province of Ulster, had a Protestant and Unionist majority who wanted to maintain ties to Britain.

After the war, the British Government decided to partition Ireland into two self-governing regions: Northern Ireland (which overall had a Protestant/unionist majority) and Southern Ireland.

Although Ireland had a Catholic majority who wanted self-government, the province of Ulster had a Protestant and unionist majority, largely due to the Plantation of Ulster.

However, by 1920 the Irish War of Independence was raging and the Irish Republican Army (IRA) was launching attacks on British forces in Ireland.

During the Home Rule Crisis (1912–14), loyalists founded the paramilitary Ulster Volunteers to prevent Ulster becoming part of a self-governing Ireland.

This led to the Home Rule Crisis (1912–14), when Ulster unionists/loyalists founded a paramilitary movement, the Ulster Volunteers, to prevent Ulster being ruled by an Irish government.

This was followed by the Irish War of Independence (1919–21) and partition of Ireland: most of Ireland became an independent state, while most of Ulster remained within the United Kingdom as the self-governing territory of Northern Ireland.

This led to the Irish War of Independence (1919–21), a guerrilla conflict between the Irish Republican Army (IRA) and British forces.

The conflict in north-east Ulster had a sectarian aspect (see Belfast Pogrom of 1920 and Bloody Sunday (1921)).

In the early 20th century, moves towards Irish self-rule were opposed by many Ulster Protestants, sparking the Home Rule Crisis.

While the Catholic minority there mostly backed Irish independence, the Protestant majority were mostly unionist/loyalist.

This, and the subsequent Irish War of Independence, led to the partition of Ireland.

In May 1921, Ireland was partitioned under British law by the Government of Ireland Act, which created Northern Ireland.

The demand for Home Rule was eventually granted by the British Government in 1912, immediately prompting a prolonged crisis within the United Kingdom as Ulster unionists formed an armed organisation – the Ulster Volunteers (UVF) – to resist this measure of devolution, at least in territory they could control.

Unionists continued to demand that Ulster be excluded, the solution of partition appealing to Craig; Carson, however, as a Dublin man, did not want partition, which would leave 250,000 Southern Unionists at the mercy of a huge nationalist majority.

The Anglo-Irish Treaty, which ended the Irish War of Independence, led to the creation of the self-governing Irish Free State in 1922.

The war provided Protestant loyalists with the iconic victories of the Siege of Derry, the Battle of the Boyne (1 July 1690) and the Battle of Aughrim (12 July 1691), all of which the Orange Order commemorate each year.

This movement also set up the Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF).