ON THIS DATE (30TH AUGUST) 182 YEARS AGO : A NEW NATIONALIST VOICE IS 'PRESSED' INTO ACTION.
The front page of the first copy of 'The Cork Examiner' newspaper (pictured), which was produced on Monday, 30th August 1841 - 182 years ago on this date.
'The paper was founded by John Francis Maguire under the title 'The Cork Examiner' in 1841 in support of the Catholic emancipation and tenant rights work of Daniel O'Connell...the first issue of the newspaper appeared on 30 August 1841. Maguire was a barrister and an MP who supported an independent parliament for Ireland. From its inception, 'The Cork Examiner' was an advocate of constitutional nationalism.
The newspaper was originally an evening paper which appeared three times weekly...the newspaper's printing presses printed the First National Loan for the Sinn Féin Finance Minister, Michael Collins, in 1919, leading to the British authorities briefly shutting down the paper.
Ironically, the I.R.A. damaged the newspaper's printing presses in 1920, which were again destroyed by the anti-Treaty I.R.A. in 1922...' (from here.)
The newspaper had also found itself in difficulty in 1919 when it was closed down by Westminster for two days, in reprisal for it having published a Sinn Féin advertisement asking for donations towards a £250,000 fund that the republican organisation was trying to raise to further its objectives.
It had similar trials and tribulations the following year, 1920, when Westminster failed to get the results it wanted in the 15th January 1920 Elections in Ireland, so Westminster went to 'Plan B' - they called in British Army General 'Sir' Nevil Macready and appointed him as the
'Commander-in-Chief' of the their forces in Ireland.
General 'Sir' Nevil 'Make Ready' Macready, one of many British bully-boys inflicted on the Irish.
Macready was known to be in favour of martial law and the imposition of a complete military dictatorship on the island and, in December 1920, he told his political masters in Westminster that his "military governors" in Ireland had been given 'permission' "to inflict punishments" on the local population following any IRA operation in that local area - "Punishments will only be carried out on the authority of the Infantry Brigadier who, before taking action, will satisfy himself that the people concerned were, owing to their proximity to the outrage or their known political tendencies, implicated in the outrage...the punishment will be carried out as a Military Operation and the reason why it is being done will be publicly proclaimed." ('1169' comment - this was, in effect, carte blanche to the British military to do as they liked in Ireland.) However, as a 'pr stunt', in the belief that he could portray himself as something other than the vicious bastard he was, Macready implemented a policy by which those to be 'punished' were given one hours notice to remove any valuable foodstuffs, hay or corn, but not furniture, from their homes, which
were then reduced to rubble by the use of explosives.
But, generous to a fault as Westminster was (and is...!) to us Irish, a slightly different variation of this punishment was applied to those who lived in terraced houses - the furniture was to be removed from the dwelling and burned in the street!
On the 3rd January 1921, in Middleton, Cork, the British reduced seven houses to rubble "in official reprisal" for an IRA ambush carried out in the area, on 29th December 1920, in which three RIC/Tan members were killed. 'The Cork Examiner' newspaper carried a report of that particular IRA operation -
'Attack on Police at Midleton.
Followed by Ambush.
Two constables dead.
Closing on to ten o'clock at night when the police patrol standing at a corner of the main street were attacked by a large number of men who fired on them from three directions. The firing was of rapid but short duration. The ten policemen were considerably outnumbered, and taken as they were, completely by surprise, they had little time to put up a defence. One of them, Mullen, was shot by one of the first few shots discharged. He was killed instantly. A telephone call was made to Cork, and some lorries of police and ambulances set out and had nearly got to Midleton by 11.30pm.
The procession of lorries and ambulances, it is stated, had their way further impeded about two miles from the town, by obstacles, such as heavy branches of trees, lying on the roadway. They were just within two miles of the town, at a point where boreens cut off the main road, when fire was opened on the last lorry.
A sharp encounter ensued. In all, three policemen died as a result of the shooting.'
It was also on that same date (ie 3rd January 1921) that 'The Cork Examiner' newspaper printed a statement from the British, in which they outlined their position and intentions regarding that IRA attack - that statement declared that the "authorities" were going to destroy some nearby houses "as the inhabitants were bound to have known of the ambush and attack, and they neglected to give any information either to the military or police authorities."
Seven houses were chosen and the families in them were given one hour to remove any money or valuables, but not furniture. The houses were then destroyed as, indeed, was Macready's reputation in this country (and that of his kind in Westminster) so much so that he had failed so miserably in encouraging locals to support* him, his troops and their ideals that he had no reason not to try and bully and intimidate the locals into supporting him and his fellow thugs.
True to form for all imperialists.
(*Macready asked influential trade union leader Tom Foran to assist him to "get a grip" in Ireland, to which Foran stated - "William O'Brien, kidnapped by your predecessor and deported, is the person best qualified to give the most authentic information respecting the Labour movement in Ireland...it is useless attempting to 'get a grip on the conditions in this country' until you let go your grip on the citizens of this country.." - Macready obviously ignored that good advice and attempted to do the opposite.)
Anyway - in 1996, in a move to increase readership, its title was changed from 'The Cork Examiner' to 'The Examiner' and, in 2000, it became 'The Irish Examiner' but is now, unfortunately, an echo chamber for Leinster House propaganda.
'KEOGHBOYS OF THE 1950's...'
From 'The United Irishman' newspaper, April 1955.
Mr George Coburn TD, the next speaker, stated that the importance of demonstrations such as the one in Ballycastle was that they were not provocative.
Mr PS Donegan TD did, however, to put it in vulgar parlance, "take the cake", and proceeded to point out without, of course, stating the specific incidents, how the direct attacks on the British military in this country resulted in a strengthened and more incited border patrol by the 'Special Constabulary' in the Six Counties, and in the recent shootings by that body.
"During the last six months the consequences of an incorrect approach to the eventual unity of a Christian Ireland have been amply displayed. Armed men have made incursions into this State within a State, and within a nation, in the mistaken belief that force can only be met by force and coercion by similar coercion.
Sadly, the obvious truth that like begets like was only too clearly displayed in recent incidents at the Border when one perfectly innocent young man lost his life and others, injured and uninjured, have stood the gravest danger of losing theirs..."
(MORE LATER.)
ON THIS DATE (30TH AUGUST) 101 YEARS AGO : IRA ATTACK STATERS IN BANTRY, COUNTY CORK.
On the 30th August 1922 - 101 years ago on this date - IRA Volunteers from the Cork No. 5 Brigade arrived in the town of Bantry, in County Cork, to take the Post Office building back from the Free State Army, who were in occupation of it.
The rebels succeeded in capturing several buildings located near their objective but, as they were consolidating their gains, four of their number were killed - Brigadier General Gibbs Ross, Captain Patrick Cooney, Quartermaster Donal McCarthy and Lieutenant Michael Crowley, and one Free State soldier, a Captain John Hourihane - who had previously been an IRA Volunteer in the Cork No. 5 Brigade - was also killed in the battle.
The loss of four of their Officers led to the IRA retreating.
BRIGADIER COMMANDANT GIBBS ROSS, GLANDART, BANTRY.
CAPTAIN PATRICK COONEY, BRIDGE ST, SKIBBEREEN.
LIEUTENANT DONAL MCCARTHY, CARRIGBAWN, DRINAGH.
LIEUTENANT MICHAEL CROWLEY, REENOGREENA, GLANDORE.
'LIFE’S GREATEST SACRIFICE : FOR LIBERTY, FREEDOM, AND HAPPINESS.'
On the 30th August, 1920, Westminster imposed a curfew (10.30pm to 5am) for the Belfast area that was to last, with variations in the times, until 1924!
On the 30th August, 1921, Eamon de Valera replied to a letter he had received from Llyod George on the 26th August, in which Mr de Valera "stressed" how important it was 'that Ireland's declaration of independence and Britain's refusal to accept it' was. The same man was later to accept a so-called 'Free State' within Ireland and accept Britain's refusal to withdraw, politically and militarily, from all of Ireland.
In 'disturbances' in Belfast on the 30th August 1921 (mostly in the New Lodge Road, North Queen Street and York Street areas), nine people were killed : Stephen Cash, William Kennedy, William Smith, Annie Watson (5 years young), Henry Robert Bowers, Samuel Ferguson, John Coogan, Thomas McMullan and Charles Harvey.
On the 30th August 1922, the Free State administration in Leinster House issued an 'order' that any of its members involved in the anti-Treaty campaign should be arrested and also declared that any of its members currently in prison (ie anti-Treaty politicians) would not be released for the purpose of attending meetings of the institution (as they could rekindle old political passions in some Free Staters, no doubt).
On the 30th August 1922, a British Intelligence Officer, Lieutenant Richard James Story, was found dead in Dublin -
'King’s Shropshire Light Infantry.
Lieutenant Story, a native of Wrington Somerset, was found at 11.35pm on Wednesday the 30th of August 1922 near Island Bridge Dublin, he had been shot in the head.
Initially it was suspected, and some witnesses testified, that Storey had shot himself but Storey’s revolver was produced in evidence and testimony given that the gun had not been fired for several weeks. A verdict of death due to laceration of the brain caused by a bullet fired by some person unknown was returned...' (more here.)
The 'story' is that that man, the army, agency, and political grouping that he represented shouldn't have been in Ireland, and they still shouldn't be here.
IRELAND ON THE COUCH...
A Psychiatrist Writes.
'Magill' commissioned Professor Patricia Casey to compile an assessment of Irish society at what may emerge as the end of a period of unprecedented growth and change.
This is her report.
From 'Magill Magazine' Annual, 2002.
We assert our right to get a drink when or where we want it, and our individual needs take precedence over minor inconveniences that may be imposed when more restrictive laws are considered.
Meanwhile, we proclaim a desire to tackle the alcohol problem by our constant reference to underage drinking, when all the evidence is that the problem is not confined to the under-18's but exists among the over-18's also. This double-think is a recurring attribute of much of modern Ireland.
Ireland, enveloped by rapid social change - particularly in areas of personal morality - has shifted from the absolute certainties and authoritarianism of the past to moral relativism, at least in the area of parenting.
The 1950's have been blamed for many of Ireland's ills, and there has been a rush to jettison any disciplinarian residue from that period. So the child-centredness of Dr Spock, the parenting guru, has been adopted with gusto.
The result for parents is not so much that they do not wish their children to be well-behaved and responsible as that they are uncertain of how they should instill values lest they be dubbed backwoods people.
This ambivalence leads to a reticence in addressing a range of behaviours and values that include alcohol and drugs, relationships, the influences of pop music, abortion etc but, by their reluctance, parents have disempowered themselves and created a vacuum.
Stepping into the breach has been the State, whether by design or default, with the addition of more and more courses of a personal development nature to the already overcrowded school curriculum. To religion has been added 'Civic, Political and Social Studies', 'Relationship and Sexuality Education' and a pilot scheme for boys called 'Exploring Masculinities'... (MORE LATER.)
'IN ANSWER TO CHURCH AND STATE AND IN DEFENCE OF IRISH REPUBLICANISM...'
Address to the Annual General Meeting of Comhairle Uladh (Ulster Executive) in Cootehill, County Cavan, on Sunday, November 22nd, 1987, by Ruairí Ó Brádaigh, Uachtarán, Sinn Féin Poblachtach.
Comhaírle Uladh AGM, November 22nd, 1987.
The obvious inference of all this is that the British Occupation Forces in Ireland are morally right while the 'natives' who resist them are morally wrong.
But the 'natives' in this case are Irish people exercising the prerogative - some would say the duty - of resisting foreign aggression in their own land, a right common to all peoples on the face of the earth. However, the Catholic Church never said officially that the 1916 Rising was justified - quite the contrary, in fact - or that the partition of Ireland and the continuation of British imperialist rule here in new forms was unjust.
Similarly, the orchestrated reaction to what happened in Enniskillen is in sharp contrast to the low-key attitude or total ignoring of other occasions of great loss of life in Ireland since 1969.
One of the first major tragedies was in December 1971 when McGurk's Bar in North Queen Street in Belfast was demolished by a loyalist bomb and 15 nationalist people - the youngest aged 8 years and the eldest aged 80 - were killed. It was ignored...(MORE LATER.)
Thanks for the visit, and for reading,
Sharon and the team.
ON THIS DATE (21ST APRIL) 146 YEARS AGO : IRISH HOME-RULER ELECTED TO WESTMINSTER.
Charles Stewart Parnell (pictured) was born on the 27th June, 1846, in Avondale, in County Wicklow, and became associated with the 'Irish Home Rule' organisation. He proved to be a thorn in the side of British injustice to the extent that he was once described in British political circles as "...combining in his person all the unlovable qualities of an Irish member with the absolute absence of their attractiveness...something really must be done about him...he is always at a white heat or rage and makes with savage earnestness fancifully ridiculous statements.."
On the 21st April, 1875 - 146 years ago on this date - the then 29-year-old C.S. Parnell was first elected to the British Parliament as MP for County Meath ; he kept his seat for that constituency for five years, and then moved to represent County Cork. He was generally 'well got' in political circles but was also looked at in a somewhat wary fashion by some of his own people as he was a Protestant 'Landlord' who 'owned' about 5,000 acres of land in County Wicklow and his parents were friends of and, indeed, in some cases, related to, the local Protestant 'gentry'.
He supported the 'Boycott' campaign and, in one of his many speeches, stated - "Now what are you to do with a tenant who bids for a farm from which his neighbour has been evicted? Now I think I heard somebody say 'Shoot him!', but I wish to point out a very much better way, a more Christian and more charitable way...when a man takes a farm from which another had been evicted you must shun him on the roadside when you meet him, you must shun him in the streets of the town, you must shun him in the shop, you must shun him in the fairgreen and in the marketplace, and even in the place of worship, by leaving him alone, by putting him in a moral Coventry, by isolating him from the rest of his country as if he were the leper of old, you must show your detestation of the crime he has committed..".
However, in his early 40's, he was brought down by a 'crime' he himself committed - he took-up with a married woman, Katherine O'Shea (whom he subsequently married, in a registry office, as their church had refused to participate) ; divorce proceedings were heard over two days in 1890, Parnell was not represented and Katherine did not contest the evidence. Indeed, her husband, Captain William O'Shea, was by all accounts a waster, a gambler, a drinker, and a figure of £20,000 was mentioned by him in regards to making the whole sorry mess disappear.
But the damage was done : Parnell's political career was all but over and, at only 45 years of age, he died in Katherine's arms, in Hove, in England, from pneumonia, on the 6th of October, 1891.
'CORK MUNICIPAL ELECTIONS.'
From 'The United Irishman' newspaper, June, 1955.
At a meeting of Comhairle Ceanntair Corcaighe the following candidates who had been selected by Sinn Féin Conventions in the different areas were ratified ;
Cork Corporation - Liam Early and Seán O Murchú.Cork County Council - Owen Harold.Mallow UDC - Owen Harold.Skibbereen UDC - William O'Brien, Seán MacSwiney and CC O'Sullivan.Passage Town Commissioners - J. O'Regan.
Liam Early is a member of the Ard Comhairle of Sinn Féin, and Seán O'Murchú is Secretary of the 'Irish Engineering and Electrical Trade Union' and Secretary of the Cork Council of Irish Unions.
Owen Harold, a veteran of the Republican Movement, is Chairman (sic) of Mallow Urban District Council, and J. O'Regan is an outgoing member of Passage West Town Commissioners. The candidates for Skibbereen were instrumental in the formation of the O'Donovan Rossa Cumann of Sinn Féin and have brought about a wonderful revival of republican spirit in that town of the Phoenix Clubs... (MORE LATER.)
ON THIS DATE (21ST APRIL) 105 YEARS AGO : THE AUD, CON KEATING, CHARLIE MONAHAN AND DONAL SHEEHAN.
The Aud (pictured) set sail from the Baltic port of Lubeck on the 9th of April, 1916, carrying 20,000 German rifles, one-million rounds of ammunition, ten machine guns and some explosives, for use by Irish republican forces in the Easter Rising.
The British were waiting for a German gun-running ship and, on Friday, 21st April 1916, they boarded the Aud in Tralee Bay but Captain Karl Spindler managed to convince the British raiders that they were actually on board a Norwegian ship, which, he told them, was anchored for repairs.
Nevertheless, the British insisted that one of their warships should 'accompany' the Aud to Cobh (then known as 'Queenstown') Harbour and, as they approached their destination, on Saturday, 22nd April, Spindler and his men scuttled their own ship, were 'arrested' by the British as POW's and, within days, were transferred to prison of war camps in England.
Roger Casement, who was following behind the Aud in a submarine, landed safely, but was later captured in Kerry and transported to London where he was charged with 'high treason' ; he was found guilty and sentenced to death by hanging, and the sentence was carried out in Pentonville Prison, London, on the 3rd August, 1916.
Irish republicans, meanwhile, had made arrangements to transport the German equipment to Cahirciveen, in County Kerry ; three republican Volunteers - Con Keating, from Kerry, Charlie Monahan, Belfast, and Limerick-born Donal Sheehan were sent from the Dublin Command to liaise with Roger Casement and Karl Spinder but, on Good Friday, the 21st April, 1916 - 105 years ago on this date - on their way there, all three men (the first casualties of the 1916 Easter Rising) drowned when their car plunged off the pier at Ballykissane.
'Too long a sacrifice
Can make a stone of the heart.
O when may it suffice?
That is Heaven's part, our part
To murmur name upon name,
As a mother names her child
When sleep at last has come
On limbs that had run wild...'
NO RIGHT OF APPEAL...
Why the media consensus on a broad range of issues is increasingly disturbing. By John Drennan.
From 'Magill' Annual, 2002.
We were soon back in business ; some mildly critical articles about the Flood Tribunal inspired Halloween-style levels of horror in Mr Dunphy, who surrounded himself with consoling cliques of 'Tribunalistas' who informed a remarkably calm nation that dark forces were stalking the land, conspiring to collapse Justice Flood's incubus. Happily, the absence of any response meant the 'debate' soon fizzled out and the media consensus returned to its normal uncritical adulation.
This was followed by another brief diversion as the discovery of some minor documentation on the Arms Trial saw the media again uniting to inform Dessie O'Malley that he had "serious questions to answer". The same journalists were equally unified in their pragmatic silence when it was revealed that O'Malley didn't have any "serious questions to answer" after all *. It's called 'vindication', but it happens awfully quietly here.
Indeed in most instances the silence was more eloquent that the clamour. The unity over the travails of the haemophiliacs was particularly touching ; bad news - bad for the advertising figures, that is - so it's best to get that sort of stuff off the front page. Similarly, when it came to the murder of Marty O'Hagan...well, he was only a tabloid hack, and what more do you expect up there in the badlands...? ('1169' comment * : Des O'Malley, and his colleagues in Leinster House, all have 'serious questions to answer', as they preside over a corrupt political system, operated from that institution, which financially benefits them at the expense of State citizens.) (MORE LATER.)
ON THIS DATE (21ST APRIL) 98 YEARS AGO : IRA CAPTAIN ABDUCTED AND KILLED IN DUBLIN.
20th April, 1923 : Frank Aiken is elected IRA Chief of Staff.
22nd April, 1923 : Free State troops surround Frank Aiken, Paidrag Quinn and Seán Quinn, the leaders of the Anti-Treaty forces in the Dundalk area, in a safe house in Castlebellingham. A firefight breaks out in which the two Quinns are wounded - Seán mortally - and subsequently captured. In the confusion, Frank Aiken manages to slip away...
Between the IRA election of Frank Aiken and the Castlebellingham incident (ie on the 21st April 1923 - 98 years ago on this date) 28-year-old IRA Captain Martin Hogan (pictured), from Dromineer in County Tipperary, was abducted from a Dublin street by the Staters, and shot to death. He was the fourth eldest son of Mr. Seamus Hogan, and was a member of the 1st. Tipperary Brigade, IRA. Seeking employment, he moved to Dublin and while there he joined the 1st Battalion of the Dublin City Brigade IRA.
He was out with his girlfriend in Dublin City Centre, at Eccles Place, Dorset Street, when they were surrounded by a group of about ten men from CID Headquarters, Oriel House. They bundled Captain Hogan away, leaving his girlfriend in a distraught state on the side of the road. When she regained her composure, she went looking for him, thinking that he had been kept in for an 'overnight stay' in a prison. The prison governor suggested she make her way to Oriel House and make inquiries there, which she did, only to be sneeringly told to "try the morgue".
His broken body was found the following morning, in an overgrown ditch on Grace Park Road in Drumcondra, Dublin ; he had been tortured before being shot, eleven times. No one was ever held responsible for his death. He is buried in the family grave in Killodiernan Graveyard, Puckane, County Tipperary.
(There are conflicting reports on where exactly Captain Mártan Ó hÓgáin was done to death by Free Staters : some reports have it that he was killed in action in Poulacapple, Tipperary, whilst others state that he was killed on the Gracepark Road in Whitehall, Dublin. It was common practice then for the Staters to 'lift' republicans off the street, torture and interrogate them before killing them and dumping their bodies in an area hundreds of miles away from where they were born and/or from the scene of the crime.)
ON THIS DATE (21ST APRIL) 27 YEARS AGO : PAUL HILL ('GUILDFORD FOUR') WINS HIS APPEAL.
On the 21st April, 1994 - 27 years ago on this date - Paul Hill (pictured) won his appeal against a conviction for an IRA shooting in the Occupied Six Counties.
'The story began in late 1974, following IRA bombs at pubs in Guildford in Surrey and Woolwich in London, which killed seven people and injured a hundred more. The British police picked-up two young Belfastmen, Gerry Conlon and Paul Hill, and interrogated them ; Conlon is said to have confessed to bombings, adding that Annie Maguire, his aunt, showed him and others how to make bombs in the kitchen of her London home. Paul Hill is said to have confirmed this.
The police raided the Maguire house, arrested the occupants and searched the place : nothing was found in the search and none of the people would admit to knowing anything about bombs. But forensic tests on the fingernails of six of the people, and on a pair of kitchen gloves used by Annie Maguire, were said to have yielded traces of nitroglycerine. On this 'evidence', the seven defendants were found guilty of handling explosives.
Patrick and Annie Maguire were sentenced to fourteen years, the judge remarking that he wished he could jail them for life. Annie's brother, Seán Smyth, also got fourteen years. Annie's sixteen year old son Vincent got five years, and her thirteen year old son Patrick got four years. Her brother-in-law, Guiseppe Conlon, and a family friend, Patrick O'Neill, both got twelve years. Closer examination of the facts surrounding the Guildford and Woolwich bombings raised enough doubts to lead even Sir John Biggs-Davidson, a 'Pillar of the Establishment' who does not lightly criticise the courts, to conclude that a miscarraige of justice took place.
Gerry Conlon and Paul Hill, who allegedly confessed to the Guildford and Woolwich bombings and implicated Conlon's Auntie Annie, were later jailed for sentences which stand in the 'Guinness Book Of Records' as the longest ever handed down in Britain - natural life and thirty-five years, respectively.
Yet doubt was cast on this conviction too when, in January 1977, four admitted IRA men - on trial for other bombings and killings - said they had bombed Guildford and Woolwich too. This was clearly un-welcome news to the authorities, for when the IRA men were tried they were simply not charged with the Guildford and Woolwich killings...' (The above is a shortened and edited version of a piece we posted here in 2005, and gives an indication of how British 'justice' impacted on Paul Hill, among many others. More about the 'Guildford Four' can be read here.)
It was while he was being questioned about the Guildford bombing that Paul Hill 'confessed' to the 1974 killing of Brian Shaw, a British Army soldier. The conviction stood for five years after he was released for the Guildford bombing, only for it to be quashed ("...unsafe and unsatisfactory..") by 'Sir' Brian Hutton, the then Six County 'Lord Chief Justice', on the 21st of April, 1994 - 27 years ago on this date.
"Upon my release I took some comfort from the thought that at least my misfortune would lessen the possibility of it happening to others. Alas it would appear that nothing has been gleaned from the many miscarriages of justice, especially those with political overtones. We now live in an age in which you can disappear into a black hole, be held without charge indefinitely and subject to torture, whilst Ivy League educated politicians play verbal gymnastics with the meaning of the word..." - Paul Hill. And how right he is.
'COMMENTS...'
From 'The United Irishman' newspaper, March, 1955.
Prisoners' Support ;
A unanimous decision of the GAA Convention sent a motion to Congress asking that the proceeds of the Railway Cup Finals on Saint Patrick's Day be devoted to the Irish Republican Army Prisoners' Dependents' Fund.
Pocket-Money for the Governor ;
"The financial position of the Six-County Governor has been steadily growing worse and he is now badly out of pocket", Major Lloyd George (the son of the man who created partition) told the British House of Commons recently, so the House stepped-up Wakehurst's pocket-money to £14,000 per annum. How much of it is danger money?
Churchill Cumann ;
No! It's not the name of a Conservative Club in London - it's the official title of a Fianna Fáil Cumann in Kerry. No wise-cracks allowed, but a recent notice in 'The Kerryman' newspaper was headed - 'Fianna Fáil (The Republican Party), Churchill Cumann.' Actually, Churchill is the name of a locality in Kerry! (MORE LATER.)
Thanks for reading,
Sharon.
We hope you'll check-in with us on Wednesday, 28th April 2021, when we'll be detailing the disgraceful events in a certain Irish county in Easter Week in 1916, when the local leadership of the 'Irish Volunteers' handed their members weapons over to the British military in the area in an attempt - 'successful', as it turned out - to 'keep the peace' in that county. Those 'Irish Volunteer' leaders were granted 'passports' by the British to travel throughout that county, and further afield, to call on other 'Irish Volunteer' branches not to take any military action during the Rising. Unbelievable, but it happened ; a very disturbing incident in our history.
See you on the 28th April 2021.
