Peter Costello
Emperor Haile Selassie I of Ethiopia Archives | State Papers
Echoes of the past from the archives
The files dealing with aliens contain in brief the life stories of thousands of people, some of Irish descent, who landed in Ireland either in transit, or wishing to stay, or even to become citizens. They reflect all the turmoil of the first half of the 20th Century. Among them are strange tales, none stranger than that from 1925 of the ‘The Prince of Abyssinia’.
This person, “of doubtful nationality”, came to the attention of the police and beyond them the Department of Foreign Affairs towards the end of May 1925. As he refused to produce a passport or to register as an alien he was something of a headache to the administration.
According to the Garda in Cork, he arrived in the port on April 19 on a boat from Liverpool. He failed to report as required to the Garda and was chased up by them for interview. He had no passport or identity card. He declared his intention of staying in Cork “for some time”. The police contacted the Department to inquire whether “anything was known” about him in Dublin.
The Department knew nothing about him, but thought he might be “the same person who was refused admission to land in America some months before”, observing that the likelihood was that “he is either a lunatic or an imposter”. Dublin remarked: “There would seem to be no reason why he should not comply with the Aliens Regulations, even if he was a prince travelling incognito.”
At this date, the Empire of Ethiopia was ruled by the Empress Zauditu, a daughter of Menelik II. The question of who exactly might call themselves a ‘prince’ (ras in the local language) was at this date a confusing matter, even for Ethiopians.
Proceedings
The Department said if he didn’t produce a passport, proceedings should be taken against him. He appeared in court in July 1925. He was described in the local paper as “a coloured man giving the name of Prince Shevington de Abyssinia”. It seemed he had previously been in Spain, studying artillery with a private tutor.
He now claimed to be “a British subject”. He had never been in Abyssinia and knew nothing of the country, beyond the fact that “a King named Menelik was reigning there”. [Actually, Menelik II had died in 1916.]
He said he had been born in Jamaica, that he was a man of some wealth, with banana and fruit plantations there, but that “the bananas must have gone west”, as he was very short of money.
He had been in the American Army, and then in the Spanish Foreign Legion, he said and had later lived in London for two months, but could not recall the name of the hotel he stayed in.
The prosecution claimed it was not for the Aliens Registrar to prove anything about him. He had to produce his papers to comply with the regulations: “If he were ever proclaimed King of Abyssinia, he would have some paper to that effect.” He had produced an interview with a Spanish paper. He had no discharge papers from any army.
There was much more said in court than we have room for here, but the prosecution suggested that he had never been out of these islands. He was fined £5, or in default sentence to six weeks in gaol. The magistrate recommended he be deported. He was give a week to pay. He failed to pay, and was lodged in Cork Male prison.
Deportation
While this was going on it was established that his name was Cyril Linton Mitchell and that he was indeed a British subject. No proceedings for deportation would therefore be taken. There was no need for him to register as an alien in future.
According to the Secretary of State for Dominions in London, the prince had presented a memorial to George V – this six-page document, dated July 2, 1924, in the file – and was now recognised to be a British subject. This was on August 18, 1924. Acting for the king, the Governor-General on the advice of his Irish Minster of Justice, commuted the sentence and Mitchell was released from prison on August 18, 1924.
The British Minister told Dublin that the Governor of Jamaica had provided confirmation that as Mitchell was born in the island he was a British subject. Records now in the possession of the authorities corroborated “the main outline of his career as described in the memorial”. This must have been a great surprise for the Cork police.
Mitchell had been issued with a passport from the Liverpool Office just as he had claimed. He was then staying with a Mr Collins on Boreenmanna Road, Cork.
“The gentleman might now be accepted as a British subject”, but further inquiries by London in Addis Abba had entailed he had no right to style himself Prince of Abyssinia. On that note the files closes and the prince himself disappears into oblivion.
In this case we have not just a lunatic or imposter, but an important historical development. It would not be until after 1930 when Ras Tafari became the Emperor Haile Selassie (though he had been the effective ruler since 1916) that the Rastafarian movement in Jamaica would begin. However, back in the 1880s, in Africa, the West Indies, and the US, black religious movements came into existence, generally called Ethiopianism. It was especially powerful among the Bantu nations of South Africa.
Mitchell’s claims to be an Ethiopian prince derived from these movements, which are of increasing importance in Africa, where Africanisation rather than conservative adherence to European colonial norms will undoubtedly be the future.
However there was a political aspect to this too. Ethiopia was the only independent state left in Africa by 1916. (Liberia was a US colony in effect, Libya was under Italian rule, and Egypt under British influence.) This status inspired many Africans and black people elsewhere to begin to organise movements not just for a ‘black Jesus’, but also for African independence that took some 30 years or so to develop.
The prince can be seen in this larger context, not as a fraud but an omen of the decolonisation that has come to dominate the world in recent times.
If the aliens files reveal efforts to control the immigration of Eastern Europeans, largely Jews, it should also be recalled that there were also visa controls as well. For instance, Belgians and Spanish did not require visas to come to Ireland, but persons from what an official document calls “Belgian colonies” and “Spanish Colonies” did. Here was an operative colour bar.
The racism of the Irish Free State and the Irish republic are likely to be an area of increasing academic research that will reveal a shameful story in some parts, an encouraging one in others.
[File 2014/85/2013]