This year will mark the 200th anniversary of one of Ireland’s most notorious murders: the brutal killing of a beautiful fifteen-year-old peasant girl called Ellie Hanley, who became known asthe Colleen Bawn. By Robert Whelan Elopement and sham marriage Ellie Hanley lived in Ballicahane, just outside the city of Limerick. Her great beauty attracted the … Read more
By Fiona Fitzsimons The Public Health (Ireland) Act, 1878, gave power to local authorities to establish mortuaries, and authorised any justice to order the removal of dead bodies to a mortuary. Where death was sudden, violent or unexplained, the body could be brought to a morgue for post-mortem examination before burial. Depending on the result, … Read more
In the peaceful setting of St Michael’s churchyard in Abergele in north Wales, just off the busy A55 road, there is a memorial to the 33 victims of a horrific railway accident who were buried in a mass grave there in August 1868. It was the worst rail disaster up to then, and the graphic … Read more
Victorian and modern prison regimes on Spike Island, Co. Cork. By Barra Ó Donnabháin Spike Island is dominated by a Napoleonic-era fortress that was used as a prison from 1847 to 1883, and again from 1985 to 2004. The Spike Island Archaeological Project was established in 2012 to examine the material remains of the Victorian … Read more
EPIC, the Irish Emigration Museum, collaborates with the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade to showcase the global Irish diaspora. By Angela Byrne In 2018–19 EPIC is working together with the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT) to celebrate global Irish emigration through the centuries, and to enhance connections with the Irish diaspora today, … Read more