Redmond And Pearse

Sir, - So John Redmond was utterly right and Patrick Pearse was utterly wrong (An Irishman's Diary, December 4th). I wonder

Sir, - So John Redmond was utterly right and Patrick Pearse was utterly wrong (An Irishman's Diary, December 4th). I wonder. Apparently it has not occurred to Kevin Myers that his hero Redmond was responsible for the deaths of more Irishmen in this century than any other politician.

Mr Myers, who deplores the blood sacrifice so earnestly sought by Pearse, fails to see that Redmond's call for Irishmen to fight against peoples with whom we had no quarrel whatsoever had truly horrific consequences for this country. And your scribe might care to consider the morality of Irishmen killing Germans, Austrians and Hungarians in that barbarous conflict of 1914-18.

Perhaps Mr Myers would care to let us have his thoughts on the points listed above. If necessary I should be happy to elaborate on them for him. - Yours, etc.,

John Clarke, Glendaniel, Tullamore, Co Offaly.