James McCalmont, M.P., the Hon. R.T. O'Neill, M.P., Mr. G. Wolff, M.P.,
Mr. J.B. Lonsdale, M.P., and Mr. William Moore, K.C., M.P. These
nominations were confirmed by a ballot of the members of the Council,
and twenty other members were elected forthwith to form the Standing
Committee. This first Executive Committee of the organisation which for
the next fifteen years directed the policy of Ulster Unionism included
several names that were from this time forward among the most prominent
in the movement. There were the two eminent Liberals, Mr. Thomas
Sinclair and Mr. Thomas Andrews, and Mr. John Young, all three of whom
were members of the Irish Privy Council; Colonel R.H. Wallace, C.B., Mr.
W.H.H. Lyons, and Sir James Stronge, leaders of the Orangemen; Colonel
Sharman-Crawford, Mr. E.M. Archdale, Mr. W.J. Allen, Mr. R.H. Reade, and
Sir William Ewart. Among several "Unionist candidates for Ulster
constituencies" who were at the same meeting co-opted to the Council, we
find the names of Captain James Craig and Mr. Denis Henry, K.C. The Duke
of Abercorn accepted the position of President of the Council, and Mr.
E.M. Archdale was elected chairman of the Standing Committee. Mr. T.H.
Gibson was appointed secretary. In October 1906 the latter resigned his
post owing to failing health, and, on the motion of Mr. William Moore,
M.P., Mr. Richard Dawson Bates, a solicitor practising in Belfast, was
"temporarily" appointed to fill the vacancy. This temporary appointment
was never formally made permanent, but no question in regard to the
secretaryship was ever raised, for Mr. Bates performed the duties year
after year to the complete satisfaction of everyone connected with the
organisation, and in a manner that earned the gratitude of all Ulster
Unionists. The funds at the disposal of the Council in 1906 only enabled
a salary of £100 a year to be paid to the secretary--a salary that was
purely nominal in the case of a professional gentleman of Mr. Bates's
standing; but the spirit in which he took up his duties was seen two
years later, when it was found that out of this salary he had himself