Nick Maxwell Throughout history, literary and graphic images of Ireland have taken various female forms. Among many examples are the demure, pure and desirable maiden, complete with harp, who adorned seventeenth-century coins. There’s the eighteenth-century version, a plain looking but smiling Hibernia breast feeding pygmy-sized politicians; other times depicted as part freedom fighter part vestal virgin. There … Read more
There could be no more suitable venue for a seminar on the Act of Union than the Irish House of Lords chamber rendered redundant by the votes of its members in 1800. Preserved intact when the Bank of Ireland bought the parliament building in 1802 (and proceeded to gut the Commons), the Lords chamber is … Read more
The Thompson submachine gun or ‘Tommy gun’ as it became known, started life on the drawing board of retired US Army Lt. Col. Marcellus Thompson sometime during 1916. He was an enthusiastic gun designer with a lot of ideas of his own. He wanted to develop an automatic rifle from his personal specifications. His designs … Read more
MH: At what stage did you become interested in history? ML: I’ve always been interested in history. I had a very good secondary school teacher, Mary Varley. I liked the story of history and when I went to teacher training college, I studied it. I worked as a primary school teacher for about ten years … Read more
Family background George Gavan Duffy, the eldest of the four children of Sir Charles Gavan Duffy’s third marriage was born in October 1882 at his mother’s home in Cheshire. His father had left Australia and settled in Nice. Louise Hall, whom he married in 1881, was his second wife’s niece and forty years his junior; … Read more