1580 – Second Desmond Rebellion: After a three-day siege, the English Army beheads over 600 Papal soldiers and civilians at Dún an Óir, Co Kerry.

1728 – Birth of writer, poet, and physician, Oliver Goldsmith, in Co Longford.

1783 – National Volunteer convention on parliamentary reform begins at the Rotunda in Dublin.

1795 – Edward King, Viscount Kingsborough, student and promoter of Mexican antiquities, is born in Cork.

1798 – Theobald Wolfe Tone is tried and convicted of treason.

1813 – Thomas Lloyd, son of John Lloyd, former MP for King’s County and Innistiogue, is killed at the head of his regiment at the passage of Nivelle in south-west France.

1832 – Charles Russell, 1st Baron Russell of Killowen; lawyer and Lord Chief Justice of England, is born in Newry, Co Down.

1841 – Death of Sister Catherine McAuley, founder of the order of the Sisters of Mercy.

1847 – The passenger ship Stephen Whitney is wrecked. The Stephen Whitney was a passenger carrying sailing ship which was wrecked on West Calf Island off the southern coast of Ireland on 10 November 1847 with the loss of 92 of the 110 passengers and crew aboard. The disaster results in the construction of the Fastnet Rock lighthouse. The 1034 ton ship left New York on 18 October for Liverpool carrying passengers and a cargo which included corn, raw cotton, cheese, resin, and 20 boxes of clocks. On 10 November in thick fog the captain, C.W. Popham, mistook the Crookhaven lighthouse for the one at the Old Head of Kinsale. At around 10 pm the ship struck the western tip of West Calf Island, completely breaking up within about ten minutes. Conditions in the area were distressing as it was the height of the Great Hunger. The loss of the ship triggered the decision to replace the Cape Clear Island lighthouse with one on Fastnet Rock. http://www.irishshipwrecks.com/shipwrecks.php?wreck_ref=273

1861 – In Dublin, thousands turn out to view the coffin of Terence Bellew MacManus, Young Irelander who died in poverty in San Francisco .

1879 – Birth of teacher, barrister, poet, writer, nationalist, political activist, revolutionary and one of the leaders of the 1916 Easter Rebellion, Pádraig Pearse, in Dublin.

1896 – Birth of pioneer aviator and athlete, Lady Mary Heath, née Sophie Catherine Pierce, in Newcastlewest, Co Limerick.

1902 – Birth of writer and public servant, Leon Ó Broin, in Dublin.

1916 – Birth of painter, Louis le Brocquy in Dublin. His work has received many accolades in a career that spans seventy years of creative practice. In 1956, he represented Ireland at the Venice Biennale, winning an International prize with ‘A Family’ (National Gallery of Ireland), subsequently included in the historic exhibition ‘Fifty Years of Modern Art Brussels’, World Fair 1958. The same year he married the Irish painter, Anne Madden, and left London to work in the French Midi.

1924 – Irish American mobster Dean O’Bannion gets killed. Mobster Dion (Dean) O’Banion was born to Irish Catholic parents in Maroa, Illinois. For a short period, he was a major kingpin in Prohibition Chicago, controlling most of the bootlegging and gambling in the northside of Chicago.

1945 – Famous Irish TV and stage actor and co-founder of The Druid Theatre, Mick Lally is born. Lally is best known for his portrayal of Miley who never stopped saying “Well, Holy God!” in the long running RTÉ series Glenroe. This wonderful clip features Lally and another great actor Joe Lynch who plays his dad (at about 55 seconds): http://youtu.be/h3cwdKPWDrQ

1965 – Birth of retired racing driver, Eddie Irvine in Newtownards, Co Down. He was the runner-up in 1999 Formula One World Drivers’ Championship, driving for Ferrari.

1966 – Fianna Fáil’s Jack Lynch replaces Seán Lemass as Taoiseach.

1975 – The ‘incident centre’ in Derry was blown up in a bomb attack carried out by the IRA. The IRA in the city was opposed to the truce.

1978 – Birth of Drew McConnell in Dublin. He is the bass guitarist and backing vocalist with Babyshambles, the band formed and fronted by frontman of the Libertines, Pete Doherty. He lived in Tenerife, Spain, for much of his childhood, and speaks Spanish fluently. Formerly in the band Elviss, McConnell participates in a number of side-projects, such as the Phoenix Drive and playing double bass and piano with Irish singer/songwriter, Fionn Regan, as well as writing and recording solo material.

1986 – Loyalists held a closed meeting at the Ulster Hall in Belfast. The main speakers at the meeting were Ian Paisley, Peter Robinson and Ivan Foster. During the meeting a new organisation, Ulster Resistance, was formed to “take direct action as and when required” to end the Anglo-Irish Agreement.

1990 – The IRA shot and killed two members of the RUC and two civilians in Co Armagh.

1992 – Unionists withdrew from the political talks (later known as the Brooke / Mayhew talks) and brought the process to an end. Their action was provoked by the restart of work by the Maryfield secretariat for the Anglo-Irish Intergovernmental Conference (AIIC). Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, Patrick Mayhew, said that informal party contacts would continue. The talks had lasted two years and had cost an estimated £5 million.

1994 – Frank Kerr (54), a Catholic civilian who was a Post Office worker in a sorting office, was shot dead during a robbery. The shooting happened in Clanrye Street, Newry, Co Down. On 20 November 1994 the IRA admitted that its members had been responsible though it claimed the killing had not been sanctioned by the Army Council of the IRA. Reacting to the killing the Irish government suspended the release of nine Republican prisoners due on 11 November 1994. The prisoners were later released on 22 December 1994.

1995 – Garda Síochána arrested two men after seizing explosives, estimated at 1,500 lbs (700kgs), about one mile from the Co Armagh border. Further bomb making equipment and ammunition were found at a farm near Castleblayney, Co Monaghan, in the following week.

1996 – The possibility of an election pact between Sinn Féin and the Social Democratic and Labour Party (SDLP) was discussed at the SDLP annual conference. It was decided that arrangements could only be entered into after an IRA ceasefire.

2000 – The Commission of Inquiry into the Dublin and Monaghan bombings wrote a letter to Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, Peter Mandelson, seeking assistance with matters related to the Inquiry. Further correspondence took place throughout 2001 but no information was supplied by the British government until 26 February 2002.

2002 – Ireland and Sunderland soccer star Niall Quinn announces his retirement from club football.

2015 – Death of jockey, Pat Eddery. Born in Newbridge, Co Kildare, he was a flat racing jockey and horse trainer. He rode three winners of the Epsom Derby, and was Champion Jockey on eleven occasions. He is co-holder of the record for most wins in the Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe. He rode the winners of 4,632 British flat races, a figure exceeded only by Sir Gordon Richards.

Image | Benbulben Mountain, Yeats Country, Co Sligo | Gareth Wray Photography

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