The week the UVF learned to fight on a Newtownstewart estate

An event will be held tomorrow night to tell the story of a unique military event which took place in Newtownstewart more than 100 years ago.

From October 4 to October 10, 1913, around 300 members of the Co Tyrone regiment of the Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF) gathered at the Baronscourt Estate for a camp to learn all aspects of the battlefield.

The camp took place just a few months before the UVF’s famous gun-smuggling operation, which saw up to 25,000 brought into the North from Germany by ships which landed along the eastern coastline.

The importance of the so-called Baronscourt Camp of Instruction will be outlined at an event in the Somme Memorial Hall in Newtownstewart at 8pm tomorrow.

At the event, a booklet called ‘Keep your Powder Dry’ will be launched. It tells the story surrounding the camp, the Tyrone Ulster Volunteers and the motivation for, organisation of and significance of that week in 1913.

A spokesperson for the organisers of tomorrow evening’s event said the Baronscourt camp was ‘the first of its kind’.

“It gave Ulster Unionism a new vigour and confidence, and it changed the entire way the Irish establishment, civic society, and media approached the Ulster Volunteers. It signalled the Ireland that would come over the ten years ahead, if not the next century,” said the spokesperson.

“For that week it (Baronscourt) became the scene of a military camp. Over 300 members of the County Tyrone Regiment of the Ulster Volunteer Force entered into an intensive series of lectures and exercises covering all aspects of modern battlefield warfare from musketry to drill, tactics in defence and attack, all within a professional camp environment.

“Such was its importance Sir Edward Carson himself inspected the scene before the camp opened, while later the General Officer in Command of the Ulster Volunteers, Sir George Richardson, spent several days reviewimg the setting and exercises being undertaken.

“Whilst few know of that week in Baronscourt history beyond those with a specific interest in local or Home Rule era history, it is worthy of much more attention for several reasons.

“Baronscourt became a case study in the use of the media to sell a political message. Unionism embraced all aspects of the contemporary media world to demonstrate their earnestness in opposing Home Rule.

“Photographs appeared in the press across the world of the Ulster Volunteers at ‘war’. Their message of no compromise heard and seen not just across the British Isles, but across the Empire.

“More pertinently, and almost totally ignored, is the role the Camp played in wider Irish politics.

“Baronscourt did not just lay out the lengths Ulster Unionism was prepared to go too, it showed the resources they had available and their capabilities.

“An Irish nationalism that before was treating the Ulstermen as full of bluff and bluster, was now reassessing. It is no coincidence that within just a few weeks of the camp’s close, the first proposal to form an Irish Volunteer Force was heard, and its formation came soon after.”

The ‘Keep your Powder Dry’ project has been organised and facilitated by Derry and Raphoe Action, and supported by the Department of Foreign Affairs Reconciliation Fund.