The destruction of a convoy of RIC Auxiliaries by an IRA flying column at Kilmichael, West Cork, in November 1920 was one of the most notable events in the War of Independence. In recent years claim and counter-claim about the Kilmichael ambush have generated a very heated debate among scholars, and inspired a large number … Read more
The Scottish owner of the Tullamore D.E.W. brand, William Grant & Sons, opened the first new Irish distillery on a greenfield site in over 100 years on 17 September 2014 at a cost of ?35 million. Tullamore D.E.W. is now the second biggest Irish whiskey brand after Jameson and employs 90 people at its locations … Read more
One of history’s great mysteries came closer to being solved with the discovery of a shipwreck in the Canadian Arctic. John Franklin’s 1845 expedition to find the North-West Passage ended in disaster, with his two ships, Erebus and Terror, sinking and all 128 crewmen dying. Exactly what happened and what became of the ships was … Read more
Sir Patrick Dun’s Hospital was opened on Artichoke Road, later renamed Grand Canal Street, in 1808. It was built partially using funds bequeathed by Sir Patrick to the Royal College of Physicians of Ireland (RCPI) and it was used as a teaching hospital, training medical students and junior doctors from Trinity College, Dublin, until it … Read more
Let’s hear it for John Bruton, whose recent pronouncements (negative) on the 1916 Rising and (positive) on the enactment (subsequently suspended) of Home Rule on 18 September 1914 have stimulated a lively and long-overdue public debate on the nature of the Irish Revolution, its relationship to the First World War and the origins of the … Read more