Nick Maxwell English/Scottish Sir Henry Sidney, lord deputy during Shane O’Neill’s time and during the attempted plantations in the 1570s. Sir Thomas Smith, English civil servant and polymath who organised the failed plantation of north Down in 1572. Walter Devereux, first earl of Essex, who instigated the failed plantation of south Antrim in 1573. Sir Thomas Norris … Read more
‘These men deck themselves out in big hairy coats, over their heads in the same way as the women wear their cloaks in Brabant. This coat only goes a half-quarter beyond the belt, and over this is a long linen apron. Thus shorn, bearded, armed and barefoot—as I said—imagine how strange this costume is to … Read more
The PSNI reference to Dolours Price opened another strand of history reaching from the dark days of the early 1970s to the present. Sisters Dolours and Marian Price famously endured a hunger strike of over 200 days in England, from November 1973 to June 1974, prolonged by force-feeding. They and fellow republicans Gerry Kelly and … Read more
Angela Macnamara was born in Dublin in 1931 to upper middle-class parents. Her desire to be a journalist and her life as a married mother of four children combined to see her publish a range of articles on the challenges of child-rearing. Macnamara published articles in magazines as diverse as the Irish Messenger and the … Read more
After five years of ’98 commemorations, actively militant opposition to the Boer War and the imminent passage of what was to become known as the Wyndham Land Act, unionists faced the prospect of two more potentially inflammatory commemorations: the centennial of Robert Emmet’s rebellion (23 July) and of his execution (20 September). In the eyes … Read more