Captain Jack White, an unsung hero of the Irish Revolution, first published his autobiography Misfit in 1930. He was an extraordinarily complex man and difficult to fit into any convenient slot. He was born into a loyalist and middle-class family, the son of Field Marshal Sir George White, governor of Gibraltar. He was brought up … Read more
When John O’Donoghue, Minister for Arts, Sport and Tourism, recently announced the composition of the new Irish Film Board, he commented that ‘Film has a unique ability to convey to a wide audience the stories and atmosphere of any local community’. Although his recognition of the importance of film not just as a means of … Read more
Ireland and Auschwitz This period marks the sixtieth anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz and other Nazi extermination camps. Here it has been marked by a particularly Irish form of commemoration—the vandalisation of a public monument, in this case the decapitation of the statue of IRA leader Seán Russell in Dublin’s Fairview Park. In the … Read more
Sir, —Thank you for publishing the article by David Franklin about Eamon de Valera’s 1920 visit to Birmingham, Alabama, in the last issue (Winter 2004). He makes reference to the murder of Father James Edwin Coyle. A native of Drum, Athlone, Co. Roscommon, Father Coyle spent his priestly life in Alabama from 1896 to 1921. … Read more
The Observer and the Irish Independent reported (2 January 2005) that an anonymous group claimed responsibility for vandalising the statue of IRA leader Seán Russell in Fairview Park, Dublin. It said that as Europe prepares to commemorate the sixtieth anniversary of the liberation of the Nazi death camps, it could no longer tolerate a statue … Read more