John George Adair (1823–85) gained notoriety as a cruel landlord because of the Derryveagh evictions carried out on his estate in County Donegal in April 1861. The eviction of 244 people, including many women and children, is regarded as one of the worst excesses of Irish landlordism. Announcing his death, the Derry Journal asserted that … Read more
In 1772 John Rutty, in his ‘Essay towards a natural history of the county of Dublin . . .’, stated that granite ‘within these thirty years, is introduced and greatly used and esteemed in our buildings in the city of Dublin . . . insomuch as to have in some measure supplanted the use of … Read more
Earlier this year I wrote about Irish involvement in the First World War and how, although the numbers of Irish involved are still contested, official estimates currently stand at 210,000 mobilised and 49,300 dead. There is another war in which Irish soldiers fought and died in similar numbers but which is forgotten by official Ireland: … Read more
In 1843 Irish artist Joseph Patrick Haverty painted a scene from a ‘monster meeting’ at Clifden, Co. Galway. The meeting had been organised by the Loyal National Repeal Association and the painting consisted of a collection of mini-portraits of the leading members of the Association as they listened to Daniel O’Connell delivering a speech. Although … Read more
Published in Boston in the summer of 1845, Narrative of the life of Frederick Douglass, an American slave caused an immediate sensation. Denounced as a ‘catalogue of lies’ by newspapers in the slavery-supporting South, it was praised in the North as the ‘most thrilling work which the American press has ever issued—and the most important’. … Read more