Sir, —In his response to my review of Tom Moore’s Memoirs of CaptainRock (HI 17.2, March/April 2009), Seamus Deane argues that I was ‘wrongto say that John MacHale’s “A Brief Reply to the Charge of WilliamMagee . . . (1822) . . .” first appeared in the Dublin Journal in1820’. As ‘should be obvious from … Read more
Sir, —Although delighted to see an article on Jerome Collins in the lastissue (HI 17.3, May/June 2009), permit me to make a few corrections andobservations. His second name was not Janus but James. In fact, hetravelled openly under the name James Collins when he went to Americain 1866: it wasn’t a case of having to … Read more
Sir,—John A. Murphy’s remarks on Tomás Ruadh Ó Suilleabháin are, to put it politely, rather remote from truth. Nowhere in Ó Suilleabháin’s 1828 poem does he express the wish that Protestants be subject to ‘ethnic cleansing’. The poet, after alluding to Wolfe Tone’s failed 1796 Bantry Bay expedition, expresses the desire that the peasantry be … Read more
Sir,—In view of its special attention to the Irish role in the American Civil War, there’s a curious omission in Kevin Haddick Flynn’s article (HI 20.5, Sept./Oct. 2012). It makes no mention of General Philip Sheridan, easily the most important Irish figure in the conflict, certainly a much bigger player than Thomas Francis Meagher, Michael … Read more
The month of July is named after Caius Julius Caesar—‘husband to every man’s wife, and wife to every woman’s husband’. But in Northern Ireland July is unquestionably the month of King Billy. The first half is taken up annually with the various events surrounding the commemoration of William’s victory in 1690 over his uncle and … Read more