On Thursday last, the 3rd April, I flew to Belfast 
where I had a series of conversations with Mr.Andrews, the Prime 
Minister, and with other leading citizens. On Friday morning I
proceeded to Dublin, where on Friday and Saturday I had lengthy 
discussions with Mr. De Valera and with several of his senior 
colleagues. In each place my attitude was one of enquiry, because 
I felt that to achieve any useful result I must aim at getting a 
real understanding of the various points of view. It would be 
impossible for me to give any detailed account of conversations 
which covered a total of many hours, and most of which in any 
event wore of a confidential character, and I therefore propose 
to set out in thins memorandum certain conclusions at which I 
arrived as a result of my talks. I emphasize that these conclusions 
are based upon inference rather than upon explicitly statements, 
but I believe that they are accurate.
 
          There is a very strong, and indeed bitter, feeling in Ul-
ster about Eire. Though the whole of my own instinctive bias is in 
favour of Ulster, I was occasionally a little disturbed to find my-
self wondering whether the Ulster attitude is entirely a reasoned 
one. Just as there are some Protestants whose Protestantism is an 
expression of hostility rather than of faith, so there are undoubtedly 
Ulstermen whose loyalty to Great Britain seems chiefly founded upon 
a dislike of the South. These remarks do not of course, apply to the 
majority of those who determine Ulster's policy, but at the same time 
the fact must be recorded that recruiting in Ulster is indifferent 
and that some comment is beginning to arise from the fact that the 
existing recruiting is greatly stimulated by a stream which flows 
from Eire into Ulster, a stream which has now  got up to a volume 
of something like 650 men per month. There is amoung resposible 
leaders a strong feeling that conscription should have been extended 
to Ulster and that the refusal so to extend it was dictated by a 
tenderness for the feelings of the Roman Catholic minority in Ulster 
which they felt was unwarranted. This view, widely held, has no doubt 
affected recruiting. Another thing which is having its effect is 
abnormally high unemployment, the figure being put at something like
45,000. Unemployment can easily have a depressing effect upon 
recruiting if the view becomes current that the man who enlists will 
after the war find his occupation gone. The Ulster unemployment is 
no doubt primarily due to the slackening of business at the linen 
mills, but there is a feeling that it could be substantially taken 
up if more use were made by the British Government of the munitions 
manufacturing potential of Ulster. Another related factor which I
thought had something to do with the recruiting position is the fear 
that the recruit's civil job will be taken by somebody coming into 
Ulster from the South. It is not my business to discuss the policy 
of the British Government on these matters, but it can be argued 
that many of these factors