Casement & Taboo History

Jack Lane questions Paul Hyde, author of the controversial Anatomy of a Lie. Jack Lane is founder-editor of The Aubane Historical Society

JL – What is the essential argument you make for forgery of the Black Diaries?

PH – Very simple. I can’t find any evidence to prove they are genuine or that Casement was homosexual.

JL – Many believed that the diaries were genuine originals with compromising interpolations made by British intelligence. Why do you not accept that argument?

PH – There is no verified evidence that any original diaries were found in 1916.

JL – Why do you think there is today such a wide consensus that the diaries are genuine? How did that happen?

PH – There’s no mystery explanation. The answer is six decades of persistent propaganda which has manufactured today’s consensus. The books by MacColl, Inglis, and Dudgeon and on up to the recent Philipps biography all promote authenticity. TV documentaries, press reporting, broadcasting, podcasts. Add to that the Casement Summer School which promotes authenticity at its events.  Apart from Anatomy of a lie there is no balance, no alternative voice providing evidence and detailed arguments against authenticity. In parallel there has been in these decades a revolution in attitudes to homosexuality which has assumed a humanitarian aura and that confounds the question of authenticity with issues of human rights. This confusion conceals the propaganda.

JL – You say the Casement Summer School supports authenticity. But surely they at least are impartial?

PH – I had an unpleasant experience in 2023 which convinced me they are not remotely impartial. Their committee intended to publish Dudgeon’s dishonest review of my book but they insisted on censoring my right-of-reply article because it exposed his lies and misrepresentations. I refused and they dropped the project. As a result the only expert on the committee, Angus Mitchell, resigned. They prefer Dudgeon’s duplicitous chicanery. Their website gives further evidence that the school is not an unbiased educational forum but its true agenda is to promote authenticity. To prove the point, they even launched the recent Broken Archangel biography which portrays Casement as a mentally-deranged pederast.

JL – A point that’s often made is if the diaries are forged, how can you explain the extent of the operation, three diaries and the ledger seems like far too much, and also risky?

PH – Yes, at first glance it looks like too much but the circumstances required a large scale endeavour. Casement was a moral hero comparable to Mandela and one or two compromising letters would not have been enough. Pigott’s was a one letter attempt and quickly proven false. Dreyfus was also a single letter proven false after a longer time. Casement’s fame was greater than Parnell’s or Dreyfus and extended over three continents. The Hitler diaries fiasco in 1982 shows that more forgery is more convincing; experts cannot believe a forger would risk forging on a large scale when the basic message can be delivered in a few pages. In this case a few letters would have evoked memories of the Parnell-Pigott scandal. Casement’s unexpected arrest forced them to modify the original plan and get the invented narratives typed up quickly before the trial. The typescripts were a necessary decoy and after the execution they needed manuscript diaries as a safety net. Such a quantity of handwriting resembling Casement’s would be difficult to doubt.

JL – What about the result of the forensic investigation in 2002 – the Giles Report which concluded the diaries were written by Casement?

PH – Take care with the word forensic. There was no forensic investigation in 2002 or at any other time. Forensic does not mean scientific, it refers to a court of law. A forensic investigation is intended for use in court and must meet very specific standards. The Giles Report was never intended for court use and therefore did not have to conform to court standards. It was simply a comparison of genuine handwriting with questioned handwriting, privately commissioned with a view to a predetermined conclusion of authenticity which is expressed in the instruction given to Giles. This was clearly a propaganda project from the beginning controlled by McCormack who never concealed his own bias for authenticity. When Ahern, prompted by Mansergh, first proposed an investigation to Blair in 1999, a worried McCormack wrote to Mansergh strongly warning against the political consequences of questioning the diaries. Giles kept her distance from the publicity jamboree in 2002 and gave no press interviews because her report in no way resembles a real forensic report.

JL – The various biographies state that Christensen, Casement’s manservant, actually betrayed him to the British Legation in Oslo. What do you make of that?

PH – It is a perfect example of the lies invented by Inglis in the late 1960s which later authors repeated. In fact, British Foreign Office files prove categorically that Christensen did not betray Casement. Despite the handwritten bribe issued to him by Findlay, Christensen never tried to obtain the £5,000 and two days later voluntarily gave the bribe document to a German official in Berlin and never saw it again.

JL – You wrote somewhere that the case for authenticity has a major weakness. Can you explain?

PH – There are so many weaknesses that taken together they reveal a fatal incoherence. For example, even in the recent biography the author contradicts both the official version of provenance (as defended by Dudgeon) and the police interrogation ‘transcript’. Philipps has Casement’s luggage opened in 1914/1915 while Dudgeon insists this happened in April 1916. Philipps can’t explain why nothing was said for almost eighteen months about incriminating diaries allegedly written by a hunted renegade traitor conspiring with the enemy against the Crown. Although both authors promote authenticity, they can’t agree on the most basic facts. Philipps joins strong proponents of authenticity who also believe the official date of April 1916 is false; Thomson, Montgomery Hyde, Professor McConville, Donald McLachlan, Sawyer. None of the six explain why there was official cover-up about the alleged diaries for fifteen months. Dudgeon is alone and there is no coherence in the authenticity camp.

Above all, there is simply no evidence whatsoever to show that Casement wrote the diaries or that he was homosexual. Add to that the seven conflicting versions of the provenance of the diaries given by British officials. Then consider the fact that no-one has ever identified a single person who was shown the manuscript diaries in 1916. The major weakness is that after over a century there is no proof that the diaries physically existed in 1916.

JL – Some months after publication your book was withdrawn from sale. What happened, what was behind it?

PH – The publisher received complaints from two academics about the book and one of these made him apprehensive about possible legal repercussions. He felt safer by reluctantly withdrawing it from the shops. The complaining academic had a reputation as a polemicist and had earlier been accused in a defamation dispute which he lost. I don’t know what the complaints said, I didn’t see them. No legal action was taken and nothing more was heard. The other academic eventually admitted he had not read the book. Behind it, however, was the fear in the media and in academia that the false but politically correct consensus is under serious threat from the evidence and arguments in Anatomy of a lie. Therefore, the complaints were a tribute to the strengths of the book. Indeed, no-one has coherently challenged the evidence or the inevitable conclusion of forgery.

JL – Surely after all this time Irish historians have researched the controversy – what do they say?

PH – Most of them say nothing but the few who do speak do so rarely and favour authenticity because they cannot distinguish between propaganda and historical truth. However, none of them have done any research and that disqualifies them from making any judgment. It was Diarmaid Ferriter a few years ago who confirmed to me that he does not know any Irish historian who has researched the diaries.  Michael Laffan also confessed “I make no claims to expertise in the question of the diaries.” Patrick Geoghegan knows nothing about the diaries but he enjoys broadcasting his astounding ignorance of the subject. One historian who confuses belief with knowledge is Grace O’Keeffe who in 2020 published on an official state website the following absurdity about the diaries; ‘…if they are forged it is perhaps because there was knowledge of his homosexuality.’ This disturbed reasoning seems to infer that if the evidence of homosexuality is false this was the result of knowing he was homosexual. Thus believing you know the truth produces false evidence. Close to accepting forgery, O’Keeffe cannot relinquish the main prize of homosexuality. No wonder Irish historians find the diaries are a toxic no-go-area and the dispute has become taboo.

JL – Your book Anatomy of a lie wasn’t reviewed in the Irish media, the papers or radio. Why do you think it has been ignored?

PH – I wanted to reveal the truth, the facts about the diaries but official Ireland does not want the truth revealed. Official Ireland prefers a dishonest version, one which makes Britain happy because that’s more important than historical truth. The only press outlet to support my book has been Village magazine thanks to the courage of editor Michael Smith. He’s taken seven or eight articles including a review by Conor Lenihan.  Not one newspaper in Ireland would breach the ‘omertà’ in the media. Even History Ireland which is owned by my publisher Wordwell refuses to review the book. The same for Books Ireland also belonging to Wordwell. Anatomy of a lie is not welcome in Ireland. Only the British lie is welcome – it’s the maximum of cynical duplicity.

JL – You say your book is not welcome in Ireland but how can you explain the amount of praise the book has achieved?  You have highly positive comment from scholars, politicians, readers, lawyers, including the world’s leading Casement expert, Angus Mitchell.

PH – It’s true there has been praise and it is greatly appreciated but there has also been strong opposition in the media and behind the scenes. This controversy is now so entangled with sexual politics that most people are profoundly confused and feel safer with the consensus of authenticity. Again most people cannot distinguish propaganda from historical fact. The people who have praised Anatomy of a lie are a minority whose eyes have been opened. The majority in Ireland does not welcome my book and will not read it.

JL – You say in your published articles that the diaries are homophobic documents. How can you explain that?

PH – Very few bother to read the diaries because they are so tedious, but if you do, you would see that the diarist is a thoroughly repugnant pederast, obsessed with the male sex organ, indiscriminately promiscuous, addicted to prostitutes, an immoral priapic sex addict. While Jeffrey Dudgeon does not find this portrait repugnant, most people will agree that it is totally unsympathetic to and unrepresentative of a majority of homosexuals. It is a homophobic representation today just as it was in 1916. Refusal to see the evident homophobia is to be incapable of understanding how they have been manipulated into abandoning all critical perspective on human behaviour for the delusion of a false liberal toleration.

JL – Does the homosexual dimension play any role in how people understand the controversy, how they interpret and react?

PH – Yes, it plays a major role in how people misunderstand the controversy. This dimension has an overwhelmingly powerful impact in conditioning response to the diaries dispute and to my books in particular. People are still highly nervous about expressing any doubt about the diaries because it might be construed as being mildly critical or just less than convinced about contemporary approval of homosexuality.

JL – You must be aware of the accusation that the motive for alleging forgery is simply homophobia – people say you cannot accept that an Irish patriot hero and pioneer humanitarian was also homosexual?

PH – Yes, of course I’ve heard the accusation. It’s an evasive decoy tactic which has been quite successful in focusing attention on irrelevant attitudes rather than on evidence and facts. I have no interest in Casement as patriot hero or as humanitarian. My sole interest is in the diaries as authentic or forged – nothing else. My research focuses on the verified evidence and not on obsessive speculations about alleged homosexuality. My motive is to expose the verified facts – the total absence of evidence for authenticity. But that homophobia tactic is attractive to people and successful because it allows them to believe they are tolerant liberals.

Both Dudgeon and Martin Mansergh confirm that to speak for forgery is seen as homophobic. That’s to say, Dudgeon the leading forgery denier and Mansergh who believes the diaries are forged, both confirm this real risk of homophobic allegation. It is an extraordinary state of affairs. If you say you believe the documents were forged giving your reasons and evidence, most people will repudiate you as being hostile to homosexuals although you’ve said nothing about them. You spoke only about documents being bogus. This acts as another level of omertà. Dare to challenge the official lie of authenticity and risk being abused as a reactionary fanatical homophobe, a sort of home-grown Taliban. This is a kind of hysteria. So this aspect is the single greatest obstacle to examining the evidence impartially, considering the arguments calmly. Fear, prejudice, plus ignorance still control the response. For over sixty years people have been drugged by authenticity propaganda, books, TV and radio, the press; my book is the first to present the abundant evidence for forgery, the first to penetrate the calculated confusion, misinformation and deceit.

But I must say there are now signs that something is changing, something I hadn’t foreseen. It is a fact that some homosexuals today view the creation of the diaries as clearly motivated by homophobia which makes the documents deeply suspect for them. They hold it highly improbable the author was homosexual because the diarist is portrayed negatively as an outsider, a predatory pederast pathologically and indiscriminately addicted to prostitutes, unstable and incapable of affection and ordinary discretion. This shift in perception is an encouraging sign because paradoxically it is capable of undermining the politically conformist and mindless consensus. When homosexuals reject the diaries as obvious forgeries, their voice will have enormous credibility and the delusion of authenticity will finally dissolve. I hope Anatomy of a lie will have played a significant part. I personally couldn’t care less about Casement’s so-called sexuality about which I know nothing save that he himself referred to his ‘celibacy’ in his private Amazon Journal.

JL – Somewhere you used the word ‘toxic’ to describe the dispute. What did you mean?

PH – What I’ve just explained about homophobia, this kind of hysteria has become quite intense. When I started research I didn’t know it was so vitriolic but in 2016 when I published my first articles I got a shock. Angus Mitchell returned from a Casement conference in California and told me his co-speaker had been distinguished professor Mary Daly, then president of the RIA. Angus told me she had announced to the conference that anyone challenging authenticity should be lynched. Since my third article had just appeared in Village that very week, I think her ‘hate speech’ was aimed at me. An incitement to murder because one has doubts about documents is definitely toxic. Lynching is still a live issue in the US today with many lynchings being officially recorded as suicides. The following year Daly was elected to the British Academy and later was awarded the RIA Gold Medal in the Humanities. With that kind of bigoted hostility from allegedly tolerant academics, it is not surprising that people are reluctant to say anything. President Higgins described the book as “very important scholarship …” but declined to say more. Present Minister for Justice, Jim O’ Callaghan said Anatomy was “excellent” and “a remarkable account … a work of scholarship and a valuable contribution…”; generous praise indeed but which has no effect on media omertà.  Angus Mitchell said ‘… the book draws to a close a century of obfuscation, secrecy, and acres of academic and speculative waffle.’ No other book on Casement has attracted such powerful comment by a world-recognized expert but his words fell on deaf ears. Readers should by now realize that this is a case of state agencies brainwashing the people in order to make the state acceptable to the UK.

JL – Today many people consider Casement a hero citing his outstanding humanitarian work, his courageous stand for Irish independence, his anti-imperialist and anti-war arguments and indeed, it has to be said, many see him as a martyr for homosexual liberty. How do you see Casement?

PH – It might surprise you but he is not a hero of mine. I have no heroes. His courage and compassion for the oppressed were admirable and I share his anti-imperialist position. As for homosexual liberty it was Jeffrey Dudgeon who pointed out that he did nothing at all for homosexuals. But it is true that today many people, including some homosexuals, have decided he was a kind of iconic martyr – it’s an incoherent claim predicated upon Casement’s human rights reputation. What I mean is those who make that homosexual martyr claim assume authenticity and want some of his humanitarian glory to support the cause of homosexual liberty. They imply a moral equation between homosexuality and the supreme value of human rights by insinuating that the social-legal position of homosexuals then or now can be compared to that of the racially oppressed and enslaved native peoples who risked genocide in the third world. I can’t take this manipulation seriously. If Casement is to be considered a martyr it can only be for Ireland’s independence.

JL – You say that the state’s policy on the diaries is that they are authentic. Why would that be state policy? How did that come about?

PH – That policy has its origins in the mid 1960s soon after the state funeral for Casement when the diaries were secretly offered to Dublin by the Wilson government. The poisoned chalice was politely declined and the matter was hushed up. Within a year Inglis was at work on his biography having first access to newly released documents which had been top-secret since 1916. In retrospect we can confirm that Inglis knew his task was to convince Ireland that the diaries were Casement’s work.  In 1973 his book was acclaimed on The Late Late Show and thereafter his project went from success to success with later authors replicating Inglis’ deceits, misinformation, altered documents and dates, false attributions, innuendo, omissions and selective framing.

With the eruption of violence in the Six Counties and the simultaneous accession of the UK and Ireland to the Common Market, the 1970s was a period of significant social change in Ireland, both generational change and change in values and attitudes influenced by rapid developments in UK popular culture often referred to as ‘the permissive society’. By the 1980s, two decades after that state funeral, many in Ireland had overcome some of the traditional distrust of Britain. In 1981 the Council of Europe made it a condition of EU membership that homosexual acts were no longer crimes. Within Ireland what had once been unthinkable about the diaries became a possibility for a new generation and then by stealth and propaganda a certainty for many. Official Ireland had little option but to acquiesce. Authenticity became tacit state policy by default rather than by Dail legislation.

JL – Your recent article in Village is severely critical of Jeffrey Dudgeon – you accuse him of lying, chicanery, of deliberate confusion and of bad faith and dishonesty. If you are right, how can you account for his considerable influence in the controversy?

PH – I overlooked Dudgeon for several years because I thought his idiosyncratic self-published book was so shabby and unconvincing that no-one would take it seriously. I was wrong. Despite its dishonesty and self-verifying chicanery, it has been influential and Dudgeon has gone unchallenged for over two decades regarded as if he was the spokesman for a protected species. To explain his undeniable influence I can only think he says things that uninformed people want to believe. Why they trust him is beyond me. But his apparent belief in authenticity is grounded in personal and political emotions – he wants the diaries to be genuine in order to safeguard his own political and personal worldview. I think he’s in bad faith and does not truly believe the diaries are genuine and to conceal this he constantly resorts to sophistry, lies, conjectures and uncontrolled speculation. He states things to be facts which he knows very well are false. His readers trust him. These are not mistakes or inaccuracies but are fully intentional deceits. Here’s but one example; in his ‘review’ of my book in the Irish Literary Supplement he claimed two persons were shown the manuscript diaries in 1916. In the following edition I cited the Home Office documents which prove his claim was false; the two witnesses saw only police typescripts. But that documented fact didn’t prevent Dudgeon from repeating the identical falsehood in his Village article last October. And again I had to denounce his dishonesty in the next edition.

I said he does not really know the diaries are genuine because he has stated ‘The controversy will never be resolved as it involves faith …’ This means he does not know if the diaries are authentic because for him it’s a matter of faith and not of fact. Ironically, we both searched for evidence of authenticity but we found none. Dudgeon concluded that the absence of evidence did not prevent belief in authenticity since faith by definition does not require evidence. I concluded that without evidence there were no grounds for belief in authenticity. The dispute will indeed be resolved when the dishonesty is exposed and eliminated.

My point here is that no-one should arrive at any conclusion about the diaries unless they have studied the Home Office files of the late 1950s and the Foreign Office documents of 1914-15 because these official records totally undermine authenticity. Dudgeon has done about thirty years research and knows these files but he has chosen to ignore what they say and mean. They clearly reveal that no-one was shown manuscript diaries in 1916 and that the dominant version first created by Inglis in 1973 is intentionally false. These files are mostly in the Kew archives and they are not published in any of the books for obvious reasons. But they are quoted in Anatomy of a lie.

The recent Village article is a second proof of forgery which exposes Dudgeon’s failure to produce the essential evidence for the physical existence of the manuscript diaries in 1916. Since publication in late March he has failed to exercise his right to defend himself against the charge of being a dishonest charlatan.  Dudgeon is a veteran campaigner and he knows his silence will be widely interpreted as the silence of assent, a tacit recognition that his authenticity project has failed miserably.

JL – If you had a final comment to sum up your reflections on the whole controversy what would it be?

PH – A last comment would have to be I am astonished that anyone could ever believe these diaries were authentic since there’s absolutely no evidence to support the idea. The following paradox occurs to me – there’s abundant witness testimony for UFO sightings all over the world but no rational person believes in UFOs. Why do those same rational people believe in the diaries without any evidence or witness testimony and when even their existence in 1916 cannot be proved?