November 24

  • 1996 Mícheal Ó Hehir (76), sports commentator, journalist and ‘the voice of Gaelic games’, died.
  • 1940 James Craig, Lord Craigavon, prime minister of Northern Ireland since 1921 and the architect of the Orange state, died.
  • 1926 The first Fianna Fáil Árd Fheis was held.
  • 1922 Erskine Childers (52), anti-Treaty republican, arrested a fortnight earlier and found to be in possession of a revolver (a present from Michael Collins), was executed by a Free State Army firing squad while awaiting appeal.
  • 1859 Charles Darwin’s The origin of species by means of natural selection was published.
  • 1922 Erskine Childers (52), widely regarded as de Valera’s ‘right-hand man’, who was in custody for possession of a small-calibre pistol, a present from Michael Collins, was executed in Beggar’s Bush Barracks while awaiting the hearing of his appeal.
  • 1972 The RTÉ Authority was replaced by the government after broadcasting a radio interview with Provisional IRA chief-of-staff Seán MacStiofáin in breach of Section 31 of the Broadcasting Act. The radio reporter, Kevin O’Kelly, who conducted the interview was subsequently sentenced to three months’ imprisonment for contempt of the Special Criminal Court.