Beschreibung:

LOUIS LE ROUX ARCHIVE The following lots are from the personal archive of Louis Napoleon Le Roux (1890-1944), with provenance through family descent. Louis Le Roux was a Breton nationalist, co-founder of the Breton National Party in 1911 with Camille Le Mercier d'Erm, and was a writer and journalist for a number of Breton nationalist publications . In political terms he was a liberal socialist, a pacifist and a Breton separatist, and like other Breton nationalists he was interested in the example of Sinn Fein in Ireland. At the outbreak of the First World War in 1914, he went to Switzerland to avoid French conscription. From there he visited Ireland, and later moved to England where he translated works by the British labour politician Ramsay MacDonald (later Prime Minister) into French. While in England he became a member of the Celtic League and the Gaelic League. He began work on a biography of Padraic Pearse in French,( L'Irlande Militante: La Vie De Patrick Pearse avec une introduction historique et 15 photographies) originally intended as an example for Breton youth it was originally published in Britanny in 1932 and was the first biography of Pearse; through his research he made contact with the historian Desmond Ryan who assisted him in translating this biography into English and with other Republicans including Frank Ryan (no relation), editor of the IRA journal An Phoblacht (In October 11, 1930, An Phoblacht had published his article ''The revival of Brittany'').Frank Ryan became his literary agent in Ireland and assisted him in striking a deal with Talbot Press in Dublin to publish the English translation in the same year as the French edition. Louis moved to Ireland and began work on other books including a biography of the IRB veteran Tom Clarke. Through Republican contacts he secured employment in the Irish Sweeps, where it seems he was involved in clandestine distribution of Sweeps tickets in the United States through an IRB network. He married an Irishwoman, Marion Murphy from Clonmel, whose father was editor of the Clonmel 'Nationalist' newspaper, and he obtained Irish citizenship. His biography of Tom Clarke was published in 1936; (''Tom Clarke and the Irish Freedom Movement'') ,he also compiled a biography of the Limerick Fenian John Daly, uncle of Tom Clarke's widow Kathleen, which remains unpublished (see the original typscript listed below). He left Ireland in 1939 and died in London in 1944 during the blitz, when a building collapsed and he was struck on the head. The archive includes many letters and typescripts from persons whom he contacted in connection with his books, especially the Tom Clarke biography, including long and detailed comments on his initial drafts. Since statements of fact in his books are often not sourced, these letters are of particular interest and importance in indicating his sources and their views on many controversial matters. Markings on various documents indicate Le Roux's use of them (e.g. sections ticked or crossed through when taken account of), and sometimes his agreement or disagreement. Except insofar as Le Roux made use of some of their content, these documents are unpublished and have not been seen by other historians. Patrick McCartan (IRB, 1878-1966) An important file of 47 pp of notes (mostly manuscript) commenting on an initial draft of the Tom Clarke biography, with a carbon of a typed letter from Le Roux inviting McCartan's comments, 25.1.1936, and two ALS from McCartan dated 4 February and 12 March 1936, the second saying 'even Devoy's admirers here say he is not to be relied on when discussing an opponent. As I told you, according to him I am or was a dope fiend & President De Valera is a bastard.' A most interesting file including much about the Fenian dynamite campaign, Sullivan, Le Caron and other English spies, the state of the IRB on Tom Clarke's return to Ireland, the protest againat Queen Victoria's visit, Arthur Griffith ('Griffith was never opposed t