By Owen O’Shea The Irish Press—which Éamon de Valera and others founded in 1931 ‘to give the truth in the news’—is rightly credited with providing Fianna Fáil with a significant publicity and propaganda boost. It offered a valuable platform for Fianna Fáil candidates and policies in a national press that was largely pro-Treaty and pro-Cumann … Read more
By Antóin O’Callaghan In Cork during the early years of the twentieth century the feast of Corpus Christi was normally celebrated within the confines of church buildings and adjacent grounds. At St Vincent’s in Sunday’s Well, the faithful walked in procession from the main altar to an outside courtyard and around a statue of St … Read more
By Joseph McKenna There is confusion over the Cairo Gang, the origin of the name and the men assassinated by Michael Collins’s ‘Squad’ on Bloody Sunday. We know of them today because of a photograph (above/below). The men shown are the intelligence section of F Company of the Auxiliary Division Royal Irish Constabulary (ADRIC), based … Read more
By Angus Mitchell Easter Week 1916: as gunfire echoed across Dublin, a small band of Irish Citizen Army volunteers received orders to cross from their position at the Royal College of Surgeons and search for materials to fortify barricades. They entered a building on the other side of York Street via the roof. Moving cautiously … Read more
James Joyce’s brother and long-time resident of Trieste found himself in the crosshairs of the authorities during both world wars. By Isadore Ryan In 1905 James Joyce was joined in Trieste by his younger brother, Stanislaus. For the next ten years Stanislaus played ‘Sancho Panchez … to James’ Don Quixote’, in the words of Richard … Read more