JOHN SADLEIR and WILLIAM KEOGH - 19th Century Irish Turncoats .......
.......the pro-Catholic Church lobby-group , ' The Irish Brigade ' , and the 'Young Ireland Movement'-supported 'Tenant Right League' were against the British 'Ecclesiastical Titles Bill'.......
In 1852 , 'The Irish Brigade' and 'The Tenant Right League' joined forces to get the 'Ecclesiastical Titles Bill' revoked and , in July that year (1852) the new organisation came together as 'The Independent Irish Party' . This new Party declared that " legislative independence is the clear , eternal and inalienable right of this country , and that no settlement of the affairs of Ireland can be permanent until that right is recognised and established ....(we will) take the most prompt and effective measures for the protection of the lives and interests of the Irish people , and the attainment of their natural rights . "
John Sadleir and William Keogh , two of the more prominent MP's in 'The Independent Irish Party' (of which there were about forty , as the new 'IIP' was joined by Irish MP's in Westminster) , like all the other 'IIP' representatives , took a pledge not to accept any Office in a Westminster Administration or to co-operate with same until , amongst other things , the 'Ecclesiastical Titles Bill' was done away ; however , the British had seen developments like this in their other ' colony's ' and were preparing to manoeuvre things in their own favour .......
WHERE MOUNTAINY MEN HAVE SOWN :
war and peace in rebel Cork ,
in the turbulent years 1916-21.
By Micheal O'Suilleabhain : published 1965.
KNOCKSAHARING.......
"....... Ireland , early 20th Century ; Irishmen and women faced death each day , either from the enemy or from nature ; but the 'Poorhouse' was to be feared as well - families were split-up in these institutions : mothers pulled from their children , husbands from their wives , brothers from their sisters ......."
" And it happened in the 'Poorhouse' of Macroom , and Canon Peter O'Leary (An t-Ahair Peadar) has given the names of the family and the details of their sufferings in 'Mo Sgeal Fein' - he tells how Diarmaidin was separated from Sheila , his little sister , how he died and his body was thrown into the pit at Carraig a' Staire with other Famine victims ; how Sheila soon followed him there and how , a few days later , the father and mother struggled home to die .
He records how Padraig and Cait stopped at the Famine Pit at Carraig a' Staire : somewhere underneath were the bodies of their children , but their bright souls were in a better world "where tyrants 'taint not nature's bliss ." Having cried enough , the parents turned their faces towards their cabin in Doire Lia , six miles away to the north-west . Here they were found the following morning by a neighbour - both were dead . Cait's feet were clasped by Padraig to his breast inside his shirt ; it had been his last effort to somehow save her life...
Canon O'Leary almost lived to see the 'Poorhouse' laid low ; how the man who wrote 'Mo Sgeal Fein' would rejoice with us at its passing !
[END of 'KNOCKSAHARING.......'].
(Tomorrow - '1921-The Big Round-Up.)
ETHIOPIA - A Brief History .......
(First published in 'HOT PRESS' Magazine , 6th May 1988 , Volume 12 , No. 8 , page 28).
Re-produced here in 10 parts .
(6 of 10).
Only when British journalist Jonathan Dimbleby inflitrated the famine zone and smuggled his film of the horrific scenes back to London did Haile Selassie's government concede the immensity of the suffering ; it was the last throw of a corrupt and senile regime . The small young educated 'elite' in the universities and among the junior officers had already recognised the chasm between Haile Selassie and his showy international pretensions , and Ethiopia's true backwardness - the discontent erupted and the students struck and then marched on the Palace , bizarrely , after gathering at the only meeting the nervous authorities could'nt forbid - an American Peace Corps Fashion Show !
The Junior Officers took the leadership as 'the creeping coup' of 1974 displaced the Emperor . Finally , Haile Miriam-Mengisty emerged as leader of the revolutionary regime - a government which itself attracted much Western criticism during the 1984/'85 famine . This partially derived from the bloody events of the immediate post-revolutionary period ; many 'aristocrats' and Imperial Officials were executed . Within the military revolutionary 'elite' , opponents of Mengisty and his alies were also shot .......
(MORE LATER).
