Constance Markievicz (1868–1927)
Constance Markievicz was a painter, a revolutionary, a trade union supporter and a politician. She fought in the Easter Rising, became the first woman elected to the British House of Commons, and served as Minister for Labour in the first Dáil, the first woman to hold a cabinet post in Ireland.
Early life
She was born Constance Gore-Booth on 4 February 1868 in London, the eldest daughter of Sir Henry Gore-Booth, and grew up at Lissadell House, the family's estate in County Sligo. Her younger sister was the poet and suffragist Eva Gore-Booth. W. B. Yeats, a visitor to Lissadell, later wrote of the two sisters in a well-known poem.
She studied art at the Slade School in London and then in Paris, where she met the Polish painter Casimir Dunin-Markievicz. They married in 1900 and settled in Dublin in 1903, where they were part of the city's artistic and theatrical circles. Their daughter, Maeve, was raised largely by her grandmother at Lissadell.
Into politics
Around 1908 she became involved in nationalist politics, joining Sinn Féin and Inghinidhe na hÉireann and writing for its paper, Bean na hÉireann. In 1909 she co-founded Na Fianna Éireann, a nationalist youth organisation, with Bulmer Hobson. Many of its boys later served in the Irish Volunteers.
She was also drawn to the labour movement. During the 1913 Lockout she organised a soup kitchen at Liberty Hall for strikers' families, and she became an officer in the Irish Citizen Army, the workers' militia led by James Connolly.
The Easter Rising
During the Rising she served as second in command to Michael Mallin with the Citizen Army garrison at St Stephen's Green and the Royal College of Surgeons. After the surrender she was court-martialled and sentenced to death; the sentence was commuted to penal servitude for life on account of her sex. She was held in Mountjoy and then Aylesbury Prison in England, and was released in the general amnesty of June 1917. That year she was received into the Catholic Church and was elected president of Cumann na mBan.
Election in 1918
In May 1918 she was arrested again during the so-called "German Plot" arrests and held in Holloway Prison. While still a prisoner she was elected in the December 1918 general election as Sinn Féin candidate for the Dublin St Patrick's division, the first woman elected to the House of Commons. Like the other Sinn Féin members, she refused to take her seat at Westminster.
Her election came only months after the Representation of the People Act 1918 had given some women over 30 the parliamentary vote, the result of the long suffrage campaign.
Minister for Labour
When the first Dáil Éireann met, she was appointed Minister for Labour in April 1919, a post she held until January 1922. Much of her time in office was spent on the run or in prison, as the Dáil was suppressed during the War of Independence. She is often described as one of the first women in Europe to hold a ministerial post.
Her department was small, but it dealt with labour disputes and conciliation at a time of rising trade union activity, and it reflected the influence of the labour movement she had worked with since the Lockout.
The Treaty and after
Markievicz opposed the Anglo-Irish Treaty of 1921 and spoke against it in the Dáil debates. She took the anti-Treaty side in the Civil War, toured the United States to raise support in 1922, and was imprisoned again in 1923, when she joined a hunger strike. She lost her seat in the 1922 election but was re-elected for Dublin South in 1923, though as an abstentionist she did not sit in the Dáil.
In 1926 she joined Éamon de Valera in founding Fianna Fáil and was elected for the party in June 1927. She died a few weeks later, on 15 July 1927, in Sir Patrick Dun's Hospital, Dublin, and was buried in Glasnevin Cemetery. Large crowds lined the streets for her funeral.
Legacy
Markievicz has been remembered in very different ways: as a heroine of the Rising, as an aristocrat who chose the side of Dublin's poor, and, by critics, as a romantic who loved uniforms and drama. Recent biographies have drawn on her letters and prison writings to give a fuller picture of her political thinking, particularly on labour and on women's place in the new state. A bust of her stands in St Stephen's Green, Dublin, and Lissadell House in Sligo is associated with her and her sister.
Sources and further reading
- Dictionary of Irish Biography (Royal Irish Academy): "Markievicz, Constance Georgine".
- Houses of the Oireachtas: members' database and Dáil debates, including the Treaty debates of 1921–22.
- Lauren Arrington, Revolutionary Lives: Constance and Casimir Markievicz (Princeton University Press, 2016).
- Anne Haverty, Constance Markievicz: An Independent Life (Pandora, 1988).
- Military Service Pensions Collection (Military Archives).
Frequently asked questions
Was Constance Markievicz the first woman elected to Westminster?
Yes. She was elected in the December 1918 general election for Dublin St Patrick's, but as a Sinn Féin member she did not take her seat.
What role did Markievicz have in the 1916 Rising?
She was second in command to Michael Mallin with the Irish Citizen Army garrison at St Stephen's Green and the Royal College of Surgeons.
Was Markievicz a government minister?
Yes. She was Minister for Labour in the Dáil ministry from April 1919 to January 1922, the first woman to hold a cabinet post in Ireland.
When did Constance Markievicz die?
On 15 July 1927, in Dublin, a few weeks after being elected as a Fianna Fáil TD.