Inghinidhe na hÉireann/Daughters of Ireland Clan na nGaedheal/Girl Scouts of Ireland

Inghinidhe na hÉireann/Daughters of Ireland was founded by Maud Gonne MacBride in 1900. Ironically, in view of later events, the organisational meeting took place at Easter 1900.The organisation was solely for women and adopted St Brigid as patron. Its agenda was political, social and feminist: it opposed the Irish Parliamentary Party and Home Rule, opting … Read more

The story of Irish museums 1790–2000: culture, identity and education

Marie Bourke is to be congratulated for writing a comprehensible and detailed account of museums in Ireland, as it is a complicated story. For most of the period under discussion Ireland was not an independent country, so it could not rely on a royal patron to found institutions, as was the case in many European … Read more

The IRA, 1956–69: rethinking the Republic

The historiography of Irish republicanism has greatly improved in recent years thanks to authors such as Brian Hanley, Richard English and Martyn Frampton. This book, Matt Treacy’s first, adds significantly to this growing body of work, charting the internal debates and developments within the IRA and Sinn Féin from the collapse of the ill-fated border … Read more

Fighting like the devil for the sake of God

Fighting like the devil for the sake of God is an arresting title for a book that purports to examine the origins of violence in Northern Ireland by pinpointing the moment in time and the unique set of circumstances in the nineteenth century that have fathered the core violence experienced in the recent Troubles. When … Read more

The empire of credit: the financial revolution in the British Atlantic world, 1688–1815

The title of this book is ambitious: to extend study of the ‘financial revolution’ of the English-speaking world on both sides of the Atlantic. The costs of war created in 1694 the Bank of England, with the right to issue paper money in return for a loan of £1.4 million to the government. Thereafter Britain … Read more