President of Ireland, Michael D. Higgins, led the commemoration and national remembering of the events of Easter 1916 this past weekend, the centenary of the Easter rising of 1916. As part of a national programme of events, commemorations included a military parade past the G.P.O. on Dublin's O'Connell Street on Easter Sunday to a nation-wide synchronised sequence of events that took place in Galway, Cork, Meath and Wexford on Easter Monday,
Across the weekend a diverse programme of cultural commemoration in the form of lectures, talks, concerts, exhibitions and re-enactments entertained and engaged the public. At the beginning of all these events was a laying of a wreath at the Garden of Remembrance at Parnell Square by President Higgins.
The Garden of Remembrance was officially opened by then President of Ireland, Éamon De Valera, as part of the fiftieth anniversary commemorations of the 1916 Rising in 1966. As the events of 1916 are of such interest to study and understand, so too are the acts of commemoration and understanding how we remember these moments in Irish history at various times in the State's history. Within the archive of actor and revolutionary Arthur Shields at the Hardiman Library, NUI Galway, are original plans for the Garden of Remembrance. Arthur was an actor and stage manager at the Abbey Theatre and who was an active combatant in the Rising as it broke out just streets away from the Abbey Theatre. He was later arrested and interned at Frongoch Prison Camp in Wales.
In a further link between history and remembering, Shields has the unique distinction of being a rebel active in 1916, of playing the lead role of Jack Clitheroe in the 1926 original production of Sean O'Casey's "The Plough and the Stars" critiquing the Rising at the Abbey Theatre and also playing the role of Padraic Pearse in the 1936 film version of "The Plough and the Stars" directed by John Ford with a screenplay by Dudley Nicholas. The below images are all from the archive of Arthur Shields and offer a glimpse into commemorations of 1916 fifty years ago.
Original plans for the Garden of Remembrance
A book of commemorative stamps issued by An Post
A book of commemorative stamps issued by An Post
A photograph of Arthur Shields (centre) as a fallen rebel from the 1926 production of "The Plough and the Stars at the Abbey Theatre
Photograph of an Taoiseach of the time, Sean Lemass (also a rebel involved in 1916 as a 16-year old) with Christine Shields and Helena Moloney (bottom left) on the occasion of the unveiling of a plaque to commemorate members of the cast and staff of the theatre who participated in the 1916 Rising, 1966. Helena Molony was a central figure in events in 1916 and also afterwards as a leading feminist, trade unionist and socialist.
On the 11th February 1926, rioting greeted the Abbey Theatre performance of Sean O'Casey's "The Plough and the Stars" because of what was viewed as it's anti-Irish sentiment. Yeats tells the audience "You have disgraced yourselves again".
From the Arthur Shields Family Collection is a photograph from that production, featuring G Fallon, Arthur Shields, FJ McCormack and Shelah Richards(T13/B/246). In spite of the controversy surrounding aspects of the play, it played to full houses, and had many re-runs and revivals, as well as a film version in 1937.
In a reply to critics, printed in "The Irish Times" on 19 February 1926, O'Casey tackled some of the criticisms of the play, and went on to state.
The politicians - Free State and Republican - have the platform to express themselves, and Heavens knows they seem to take full advantage of it. The drama is my place for self-expression, and I claim the liberty in drama that they enjoy on the platform (and how they do enjoy it!), and am prepared to fight for it.
In a unique twist, Arthur Shields, an actor and stage manager at the Abbey Theatre, was also an active participant in the Easter Rising of 1916, would star in the 1926 production of "The Plough and the Stars" at the Abbey Theatre and also feature in the 1936 film version of "Plough and the Stars", directed by John Ford.
For more on productions of "The Plough and the Stars" check out the Shields Family Collection athttp://archives.library.nuigalway.ie/cgi-bin/FramedList.cgi?T13 and programmes from the various Abbey Theatre productions of 'The Plough and the Stars' as part of the abbey Theatre Digital Archive, available at the Hardiman Library.
One of the recent television highlights was the wonderful documentary, "Man on the Bridge" - the story of Arthur Fields, the street photographer in Dublin who was known simply as 'the man on the bridge'.
Over a career spanning five decades, Fields took hundreds of thousands of photographs on the streets on Dublin, but strikingly, no negatives survive. The 'Man on Bridge' project sets out to gather those images from people all over Ireland and abroad who may have a photograph of a parent or grandparent on their wall that was taken by Fields.
Within the Shields family archive here at the Hardiman Library, there is a photograph taken by an unknown (or at least unidentified) street photographer, of Arthur Shields, Lennox Robinson and Sean O'Casey. The three are walking down a city street; Shields is to the front and left with Robinson and O'Casey to the right respectively. Robinson is smoking a cigarette and O'Casey, seemingly in conversation with Robinson, is also holding a cigarette.
T13/B/338: Arthur Shields, Lennox Robinson, Sean O'Casey, Summer 1935
The reverse of the photo simply reads, "Summer 1935, Boss, Lennox Robinson, Sean O'Casey". 'Boss' was the nickname for Arthur Shields.
The question remains: Is this photograph taken in Dublin? if so, is Arthur Fields the photographer?
If so, it is surely one of the most literary and theatrical of Fields' images, with three Irish theatre greats in the image.
If anyone may be able to shed some light and information on this image it would be wonderful to hear.
An online exhibition from the Arthur Shields/Shields family archive, Hardiman Library, NUI Galway, is available here.
Here at the Archives of the Hardiman Library we are spoiled with the richness of our theatre collections. As the raw materials for study and research of theatre and performance in Ireland as well as Irish theatre abroad, these collections preserve and make accessible the stories, people, places, decisions and great works which have graced theatres all over Ireland and internationally.
The Hardiman Library is a hub for theatre research through collections such as the Druid Theatre, Thomas Kilroy archives, Lyric theatre Belfast Archive, Siobhan McKenna archive, Taibhdhearc na Gaillimhe and many others.
The Abbey Theatre Digital Archive is leading the way in technology and theatre archives as the largest theatre digitisation project in the world is underway on campus here at NUI Galway, preserving and making accessible the records of Ireland's National Theatre.
To celebrate World Theatre Day we have produced a short video using digitised material from our Shields Family Archive. Focused mainly on the Abbey theatre actor, director and stage manager, Arthur Shields, the collection is a wonderful insight into the life and career of Shields, who was a participant in the Easter Rising of 1916 in Dublin and had a long career on the Abbey stage, as well as overseeing the demanding Abbey tours to America in the 1930s. To view any of the images (and more) from the Shields archive you can view a stills exhibition here.
It is just one of our many theatre collections here at the Hardiman Library and we hope you enjoy the video and World Theatre Day!
Our theatre archive document of the month for April comes
from the Arthur Shields (1896-1970) archive and the Abbey Theatre tour of North
America, eighty years ago this year.
Arthur Shields
The papers of actor, director and revolutionary Arthur
Shields provide a truly personal, textual and visual insight into the life,
career of Arthur Shields, as he worked in theatre for the Abbey Theatre in
Dublin, in America on the Abbey Tours of the 1930s and his later film career
and that of his brother Barry Fitzgerald (William Shields, 1888-1961).
Shields was the son
of Adolphus Shields, labour organizer, writer for The Freeman’s Journal, and
friend of James Connolly and William O’Brien. His mother was of German
ancestry, and the parents were by upbringing Protestant—in practice, the family
were secular and socialist.
Shields had three wives, two of whom acted for the Abbey
Theatre: Basie McGee, who acted under the name 'Joan Sullavan,' and Una
'Aideen' O'Connor. His third wife Laurie Bailey Shields, an American
journalist, was instrumental in collecting additional material for the archive
after Arthur's death
The brothers Shields were close friends of Sean O’Casey, and
took instrumental roles in the first productions of his ‘Dublin trilogy.’
Arthur Shields was through the 1920s and 30s, the Abbey’s chief ‘handsome
lead’; his brother Barry Fitzgerald was the company’s most popular comic actor.
Arthur Shields frequently directed plays for the Abbey, and more particularly
for George Yeats's 'Dublin Drama Leagure'. In the 1930s, when the Abbey
undertook a succession of half-year tours of North America, it was Arthur
Shields who handled their management on the road.
These tours won the Abbey a fond welcome in towns and cities
across the continent. Broadway producers and Hollywood directors also expressed
their interest. John Ford, the great Irish American film director, met with the
company in Hollywood, and decided to use some members in The Informer(1935) and
all the main players in The Plough and the Stars (1936). Thereafter, Barry Fitzgerald
remained in the USA as a film star. Arthur Shields was cast in subsequent
movies by Ford. He also was invited to direct plays by Paul Vincent Carroll on
Broadway in the late 1930s. By the end of the decade, he and his partner Aideen
Shields had left the Abbey for the USA.
It is from these papers relating to the 1932-1933 tour of
North America that we focus on this month and highlight the Abbey Tour which
took place eighty years ago this year.
T13/A/82
Proposed and temporary itinerary for the 1932-1933 Abbey
tour of North America. Covers the period from 10 October 1932 to 10 May 1933. 2
identical copies present.
T13/A/90
Letter from W.B. Yeats, The Waldorf Astoria, New York
addressed to Arthur Shields. Yeats writes that he was of the strong opinion 'that
it would be better as far as possible to drop "Words upon the Window
Pane" out of our American repertory' because Yeats felt that American
audience didn't have sufficient knowledge of Swift's works. 30 October 1932.
An online exhibition of digitised material from the Shields
Archive is available here
The Shields archive catalogue can be accessed in full here
How the Abbey actor who later played Padraig Pearse in Hollywood himself took part in the Rebels' last stand in the 1916 Rising
Arthur Shields c.1920
With the centenary of the 1916 rising only three years away
the building on Dublin’s Moore street where the leaders of the Rising decided
to end the rebellion has been in the news recently amid plans to turn the
building into a museum. Amongst those
present on Hanlon’s fish shop on Moore street on the final day of the rising
was Abbey Theatre actor Arthur Shields.Shields’ daughter Christine donated his personal papers to the NUI
Galway archives service in 2003.
Arthur Shields and his brother Barry Fitzgerald (real name Will
Shields) both appeared in the first production of Sean O’Casey’s The Plough and the Stars.Shields also played Padraig Pearse in John Ford’s 1936
film adaptation of the drama.
The ruins of the Metropole Hotel and G.P.O. - from a booklet containing photographs of 'Twelve Interesting Views Showing the
Ruins of Sackville Street and Adjoining Streets After The Rising'. (Shields Family Papers, NUI Galway).
During the rising Arthur Shields was stationed in the
Metropole Hotel on O’Connell Street (now the location of Penny’s). The volunteer
garrison abandoned their position in the hotel on Friday 28th April,
first making there way into the GPO which was already on fire, then retreating
to Moore Street with the GPO garrison including Padraig Pearse and the other
leaders of the rising.While Shields himself
didn’t leave a detailed account of his role in the rising his brother in law Charles
Saurin who fought along side him made a detailed witness statement for the bureau of military history in
1949.The Shields Family papers includes
a copy of this statement, while the original was recently digitised and made
available on line ( see:http://www.bureauofmilitaryhistory.ie/reels/bmh/BMH.WS0288.pdf).
According to Saurin he and Shields along with the rest of
the volunteers made their way from house to house along Moore street trough holes
knocked in the dividing walls between the houses' basements.Saurin recalled that “there was
the question, as the last bricks and plaster of the hole went crashing out
under the blows of sledge-hammers and crowbars, as to whether we might not find
the enemy on the other side to hurtle grenades into our midst."
Arthur Shields, Lennox Robinson and Sean O'Casey c. 1935 (Shields Family Papers,NUI Galway)
Eventually Shields and Saurin found themselves in the loft
at the back of Hanlon’s fish shop (16 Moore Street) with five other men. Word reached them that they were to be given what
“used to be know as the place of honor in the coming battle” i.e. they were to
be first in the firing line.Saurin
describes the plan:
It seems that an attempt was to
be made to fight our way out of the Moore Street area and to get to the
Williams & Woods' Jam Factory in Great Britain Street from where we were to
try and link up with our own forces in the Four Courts.Apparently the seven of us in the loft at the
back of Hanlon's were on a given word to jump out through the open doorway down
on to the lane below, fire a volley and charge the barricade.This was supposed to be a diversion while the
main body in full force broke out into Moore Street and stormed a big barricade
at the top of the street, and no doubt carried all before it on the direction
of Williams & Woods while seven corpses lay in Moore Lane.
In the event the
break-out plan was abandoned and the decision was taken instead to surrender in order to avoid further bloodshed.When the time came to surrender the men were
advised to dispose of anything that might be regarded as loot:
Loot: Lorna Doone
I could not say that anyone carried, loot. Arthur Shields' commandeered
binoculars were of course, for military use. I had used binoculars in the Hotel
Metropole which were left behind by some guest there and I in turn had left
them on the evacuation.There had been
very fine gold and silver watches left on dressing tables in various rooms in
that hotel, as, to my mind, a watch was No. 1 in the list of traditional loot,
I had not touched them trough it would have been handy to have known the time
during the week.I was completely at a
loss in that respect, for while I had made use of a small clock (to my mind
quite distinct from a watch and therefore definitely not to be classed as loot)
it had stopped the first time an enemy shell had hit the hotel roof.... towards
4 or 5 o'clock when we were all called together and told to form up inside the
buildings, that we were going out. This is all the information we at the back
of Hanlons' received. However, as I went through the shop I suddenly recalled
that I had indeed some loot and I carefully hid within the pay desk a copy of Blackmore's
"Lorna Doone" which I had discovered in a room in the Metropole. I was
reluctant to part with it, though where and when I imagined I was going to read
it in the near future I did not know, but Arthur Shields said: "Leave it
there, I’ll buy you a copy afterwards". During the years that followed I
have occasionally reminded him that he has never since bought me "Lorna
Doone".
Clips from John Ford's 1936 adaption of The Plough and the Stars
After surrendering to the British forces Shields and Saurin
a long with other volunteers were marched to Richmond Barracks in Inchicore, on
the way they at the corner of Francis Street they passed “shrieking women from the back streets who called
us filthy names and hurled curses at us. ” Later on Thomas Street they saw “sympathy on the faces of people
looking out of the dwellings over the shops. British officers marching on our
flanks kept shouting to them: "Close those windows". While at Guinness’s
“shirt-sleeved officials were leaning
out of the windows looking at us with superior, contemptuous smiles.”
In the barracks “notables” amongst the volunteers were separated
out from the rest ; Shields apparently attracted attention because he wore
glasses:
Arthur Shields who wore glasses
and who, consequently, in the eyes of the 'G' men, may have looked an
intellectual and, therefore, important, was asked his name by the individual
who had picked out Willie Pearse, and also where he worked. The Abbey Theatre
should have been suspect as one of the birthplaces of twentieth century Irish
nationalism, but this did not seem to dawn on the 'G' man and Shields was left beside
me, after a final question as to whether be knew Philip Guiry, another Abbey
Player.
Barry Fitzgerald in Going My Way
While Willie Pearse was among those sentenced to death and
executed for their part in the rising Shields and Saurin were transported to Britain
and interned in Frongoch camp, Wales. Saurin later server as an officer in the Free State Army. While Shields went on to play lead roles in many Abbey productions during, also acting as the Abbey tour manager for a number of tours of North America. Eventually he and his brother Barry Fitzgerald settled in California where both acted in Hollywod films. Barry Fitzgerald one an Oscar in 1945 for his role alongside Bing Crosby in Going My Way.
An online exhibition of Material from the Shields family papers is available here: http://archives.library.nuigalway.ie/shields
Plans for 1916 Rebellion Museum - Moore Street Dublin - Narrated by John Connolly
This wonderful exhibition of photographs, documents, and publications
circulates around the also wonderful figure of Arthur Shields (1896-1970).
Shields was the son of Adolphus Shields, labor organizer, writer for The
Freeman’s Journal, and friend of James Connolly and William O’Brien. His
mother was of German ancestry, and the parents were by upbringing Protestant—in
practice, the family were secular and socialist.
Arthur Shields's oldest brother was Will Shields, best known by his
stage-name, ‘Barry Fitzgerald’ (1888-1961).
Shields had three wives, two of whom acted for the Abbey Theatre: Basie
McGee, who acted under the name 'Joan Sullavan,' and Una 'Aideen' O'Connor. His
third wife Laurie Bailey Shields, an American journalist, was instrumental in
collecting additional material for the archive after Arthur's death
His daughter by Aideen O’Connor was Christine Shields. Sara Allgood was her
godmother. It was Christine who kept this archive, and ultimately, with other
members of the Shields family, gave it—free of charge—to the National University
of Ireland in Galway.
When one looks at the spectacular pamphlet of photographs of Sackville
(O’Connell) Street before and after Easter 1916, it is helpful to know that
Arthur Shields, then just 19 years old, fought with the Citizen Army in the
General Post Office, and, having taken refuge in Henry Street, was one of the
last rebels to surrender. He was interned thereafter at Frongoch camp, Wales.
His military service—by other accounts, marked by bravery under fire—was
something about which he never bragged, or hardly, spoke.
The brothers Shields were close friends of Sean O’Casey, and took
instrumental roles in the first productions of his ‘Dublin trilogy.’ Arthur
Shields was through the 1920s and 30s, the Abbey’s chief ‘handsome lead’; his
brother Barry Fitzgerald was the company’s most popular comic actor. Arthur
Shields frequently directed plays for the Abbey, and more particularly for
George Yeats's 'Dublin Drama Leagure'. In the 1930s, when the Abbey undertook a
succession of half-year tours of North America, it was Arthur Shields who
handled their management on the road.
These tours won the Abbey a fond welcome in towns and cities across the
continent. Broadway producers and Hollywood directors also expressed their
interest. John Ford, the great Irish American film director, met with the
company in Hollywood, and decided to use some members in The
Informer(1935) and all the main players in The Plough and the Stars
(1936). Thereafter, Barry Fitzgerald remained in the USA as a film star. Arthur
Shields was cast in subsequent movies by Ford. He also was invited to direct
plays by Paul Vincent Carroll on Broadway in the late 1930s. By the end of the
decade, he and his partner Aideen Shields had left the Abbey for the USA.
The Shields brothers played in well over 100 movies before they returned
together to make The Quiet Man, directed by Ford, in County Galway in
1951.
After the death in Dublin of Barry Fitzgerald in 1961, Arthur
Shields—suffering from emphysema—spent more and more of his last decade with his
stamp collection and his library of Irish and world literature. Joyce and
Tolstoy were favorites, but his lodestar was Yeats. Precious volumes from that
library are also part of the Shields Family Papers.
Prof. Adrian Frazier, Director of the MA in Drama and Theatre
Studies, National University of Ireland Galway
Further Reading:
Frazier, A."Hollywood and the Abbey," Dublin Review (Summer 2004):
68-86.
Frazier, A. "Barry Fitzgerald: From Abbey Tours to Hollywood Films," in
Irish Theatre on Tour, ed. Nicholas Grene and Chris Morash (Carysfort
Press: Dublin, 2005), pp. 89-100.
Frazier, A. Hollywood Irish: John Ford, Abbey Actors and the Irish Revival
in Hollywood, Lilliput Press, Dublin 2011.
This day marks the birth of William Joseph Shields in 1888. A civil servant, his first interest was acting and he followed his brother Arthur into the Abbey, taking the stage name Barry Fitzgerald to avoid any problems with his employer. His best roles in the Abbey were in Sean O’Casey plays, and from the late 1920s he found himself in film roles. Deciding to become a professional actor, he toured with the Abbey in the States in the 1930s, going into the film business. His defining moment in film came in 1944 when he starred as Fr Fitzgibbon alongside Bing Crosby in Going my way (1944). Nowadays he is perhaps best remembered as the match-maker MicaleenOg in The Quiet Man by John Ford, shot here in Galway by John Ford in 1952, a film in which his brother Arthur also starred. He died in Dublin on 4th January 1961.
Today’s image, a letter dated 11 Dec 1959, is from Sean O'Casey, Flat 3, 40 Trumlands Road, St. Marychurch, Torquay, Devon addressed to Will (Barry Fitzgerald). O'Casey writes that he has heard that Fitzgerald was ill, he writes 'I hope you are up, or, if not up then sitting bolt upright in bed having another look at the world.'
Last Saturday marked the 50th anniversary of the death of Barry Fitzgerald, the well-known actor. Born William Joseph Shields in 1888, he followed his brother Arthur into the Abbey Theatre in 1915, taking the stage name Barry Fitzgerald so as not to draw the attention of his employers (the Department of Industry and Commerce). Although he did not become a full-time actor until 1929, he played a number of notable roles, including Fluther Good in the premiere of The Plough and the Stars. One of Sean O’Casey’s favourite actors at the time. In 1932 he toured America with the Abbey, and returned in 1936 when the director John Ford cast him in his film version of The Plough and the Stars. Numerous roles followed, including parts in Howard Hawks's Bringing up Baby (1938), and in four more Ford movies, including playing a Welshman in How Green was my Valley (1941). His defining role, however, came in 1944 when he starred as Fr Fitzgibbon alongside Bing Crosby in Going My Way (1944), winning an Oscar as Best Supporting Actor for the role. He is probably best remembered now for his role as the match-maker Michaeleen Og in The Quiet Man (1951), a film which also featured Arthur Shields.
Information on Barry’s acting career and family can be found in the Shields Family Papers held here at the James Hardiman Library. The full descriptive list of the collection is available at http://archives.library.nuigalway.ie/cgi-bin/FramedList.cgi?T13 and some of the items from the collection are available from our digitized collections http://archives.library.nuigalway.ie:8080/digi/exbos/T13/SlideShowThe collection includes many photographs of Barry, as well as correspondence by and about him. In a poignant letter to a fan written shortly after Fitzgerald's death in January 1961 Arthur Shields wrote of his brother 'Barry was a very shy little man and he was uncomfortable in crowds and really dreaded meeting new people, but he was not a recluse and did enjoy certain company, especially when the 'old chat' was good.' (see T13/311).
An avid theatregoer in her youth, Mary O’Malley collected some interesting memorabilia of the Dublin theatre scene during that time. Two items which have recently come to light are evidence of this. As you can see in these images, the archive contains two small playbills advertising new productions in the Abbey Theatre in 1929 and 1937.
The first of these is a playbill for Cartney and Kevney by George Shiels, produced on the 8th November 1929. The Abbey Theatre archives reveal that this play had an outstanding cast, featuring actors such as P.J. Carolan, Barry Fitzgerald, Arthur Shields, May Craig, Eileen Crowe and F.J. McCormick. The play was directed by Lennox Robinson. The archives note that ballets were also performed on the nights this play was performed, by Ninette de Valois and her pupils.
The second playbill advertises the opening night of Coggerers by Paul Vincent Carroll, being part of a double bill with the Synge’s Playboy of the Western World. This production featured Frank Carney, Patrick Considine, Josephine Fitzgerald and Eric Gorman. The director was Hugh Hunt, assisted by Arthur Shields.
Besides being wonderful examples of playbills of this era, these items have resonance in being stored in this particular institution, as NUI Galway Archives houses the Arthur Shields archive. This collection, which also contains much material on his brother Barry Fitzgerald, is available to researchers visiting the library. For those who would like to see more of this type of material, we have recently launched a wonderful online exhibition of images from the Shields collection, which can be viewed here.
