William Martin Murphy - Anti-trade Unionist

Anti-trade Unionist

Worried that the trade unions would destroy his Dublin tram system, he led Dublin employers against the trade unions led by James Larkin, an opposition that culminated in the Dublin Lockout of 1913. This made him extremely unpopular with many, being depicted as a vulture or a vampire in the workers' press.

After the 1916 Easter Rising he bought ruined buildings in Abbey Street as sites for his newspaper offices, however it was his viewpoints (expressed through his Irish Independent) that made him even more unpopular, by calling for the executions of Sean MacDiarmada and James Connolly at a point when the Irish public began to feel sympathy for their cause. Murphy privately disavowed the editorial, claiming it had been written and published without his knowledge.