Bushe, Connell and an eighteenth-century Irish population controversy. By David Parker Gervase Parker Bushe was a taxman. It was his job to ensure that you paid your dues to the Board of Revenue, and that, even if you were ‘on the parish’ and entitled to tax-free status, you—or rather your dwelling, the basis of the … Read more
In recent years technology has placed another essential tool within reach of genealogists—DNA testing kits. By Fiona Fitzsimons A person’s ancestry is written in his or her DNA. The evidence can be used to trace deep ancestral origins, especially when researchers have run out of historical documents from which to work. Family historians use three … Read more
In Fenagh, Co. Leitrim, celebrations were held last summer to commemorate a vellum manuscript written there in 1516. By Brendan Scott In 1516 a well-known scribe from Roscommon, Muirgheas Ó Maoilchonaire, was hired by Tadhg O’Roddy, the coarb of Fenagh, to revise and update an earlier version of a manuscript that had supposedly been written … Read more
On the 50th anniversary of a war that was headline news in Ireland. By Kevin O’Sullivan Biafra’s heyday was short-lived. On 30 May 1967 Lt Col. Odumegwu Ojukwu announced the secession of Nigeria’s Eastern Region (of which he was leader) and the creation of an independent republic. Within months his forces were drawn into a … Read more
By Tony Canavan The Know-Nothings Recent events in the United States raise echoes of the Know-Nothing Party, also known as the American Party, which was prominent in the late 1840s and early 1850s. The Know-Nothings strongly opposed immigration and Catholicism. Irish immigrants fleeing the Great Famine were particular targets of their vitriol. The Know-Nothings feared … Read more