Catholic Belfast and nationalist Ireland in the era of Joe Devlin, 1871–1934 A. C. Hepburn (Oxford University Press, £55) ISBN 9780199298846 To his admirers, ‘Wee’ Joe Devlin was a gifted orator, a powerful defender of Catholic rights and a champion of the working class, while detractors tend to see him as a ‘green Tory’, a … Read more
Turning points of the Irish revolution: the British government, intelligence and the cost of indifference, 1912–1921 Benjamin Grob-Fitzgibbon (Palgrave Macmillan, £42.50) ISBN 9781403980038 This is a well-structured book that provides the first sustained analysis of Colonial Office intelligence reports from 1913 to 1920. These indicate that Dublin Castle was better informed about the secret activities … Read more
The insider: the Belfast prison diaries of Eamonn Boyce, 1956–1962 Anna Bryson (ed.) (Lilliput Press, €40) ISBN 9781843511298 The history of the IRA ‘border campaign’ of 1956–62 is in its infancy. Very few titles have focused on the republican offensive that made Seán South and Fergal O’Hanlon household names of their generation. This writer’s From … Read more
Coolacrease. The true story of the Pearson executions—an incident in the Irish War of Independence Philip O’Connor (ed.) (Aubane Historical Society, €20) ISBN 9781903497487 On a superficial level this book is about an incident in County Offaly during the Irish War of Independence in which two brothers were executed by the IRA. Richard and Abraham … Read more
Sir John Soane’s Museum 13 Lincoln’s Inn Fields, London WC2A 3BP +44 (0)20 7405 2107, jbrock@soane.org.uk, www.soane.org Tues.– Sat. 10.00am–5pm by Tony Canavan Lincoln’s Inn Fields is one of those squares typical of this part of London, in which eighteenth- and nineteenth-century houses surround a green space. Number 13 does not particularly stand out among … Read more