James Hickey

Who was James Hickey?

James Hickey was an Irish Labour Party politician who joined the short-lived breakaway National Labour Party.

Hickey first stood for the Dáil at the 1937 general election for the Cork Borough constituency, but narrowly missed being elected. He was more successful at the 1938 genera; election, unseating Richard Anthony, a former Labour TD who left the Party in the 1920s and sat as an independent.

Hickey made international headlines in February 1939, when, as Lord Mayor of Cork, he refused to give a civic reception to the captain and crew of the German warship SMS Schlesien which was on a 'courtesy visit' to Cork Harbour flying the Nazi flag. The Schlesien was a 13,000 tonne World War I battleship. Hickey's reasoning for the refusal to entertain the German crew was stated to be a slight by the German media on the occasion of the death of Pope Pius XI some time earlier. Hickey said, "the insult given to the Catholic world on the death of the Pope, when the responsible German Press termed our Holy Father a political adventurer”.