Witness Statements from War of Independence

TCDStudent1

I was reading through some witness statements on the military bureau site (http://www.bureauofmilitaryhistory.ie/bmhsearch/search.jsp).

I noticed that the statements taken in my area are all from people who subsequently opposed the treaty and voted for FF all their lives afterwards. Furthermore, when they list the people who participated in ambushes with them, it seems to be all Fianna Fail people, and no Fine Gael people.

So my questions are:

1) When were these statements collected?

2) Was there bias towards Fianna Fail participants (maybe because FF were in government at the time?) Or is it just the coincidental that in the statements I read, that FF participants were acknowledged while the others who participated were "forgotten"?

mickmackey1

Quite the opposite in my case; a relative of mine who wrote his account was a strong supporter of the Treaty and his subsequent career reflected this.

It actually says somewhere on the site (I forget where) that Treaty opponents were more reluctant to come forward with their recollections and were somewhat suspicious of the whole project.

maringo

My Grandfather's statement is dated 21 September 1951 - the statement is signed, dated and witnessed