A fascinating family connection with a failed rebellion. By Fergus Whelan At 11pm on 5 March 1867, an undercover policeman watched as small groups of armed Fenians mustered at Palmerston Park, Dublin. Eventually nearly 600 men had gathered. They were under the leadership of Captain Patrick Lennon, an experienced soldier and a deserter from the … Read more
By Fiona Fitzsimons The first efforts to provide education for deaf children and young people in Ireland were voluntary. In 1816 Dr Charles Orpen established the Claremont Institute for the Deaf and Dumb in Glasnevin. The Claremont was under the patronage of the Church of Ireland but accepted Catholic children as students. In the 1830s, … Read more
The real history of Irish slavery on Barbados highlights how much worse slavery was for Africans in the Americas, reminding us that the curse of Cromwell has haunted more than just Irish history. By John Donoghue History and nationalism have long been locked in a troubled relationship. While nationalists base their appeals on history, their … Read more
A newly discovered manuscript throws a vivid, uncensored and revealing light on an Ulster Presbyterian community and an otherwise obscure eighteenth-century cultural world. By Andrew Carpenter Although several women living in the southern provinces of eighteenth-century Ireland published poetry in English, remarkably little of the verse written by women from Ulster during this period has … Read more
The first balloon crossing of the Irish Sea in July 1817. By Mark Davies ‘I am just come from the clouds; I should now wish to visit the deep.’ This was the bravado request of twenty-year-old Windham Sadler, only hours after becoming the first man ever to make an aerial crossing of the Irish Sea, … Read more