1003 – Death of Abbot, Kilian of Cologne. Kilian was a native of Ireland. In 974, he and a group of Irish missionaries, led by Minnborinus of Cologne (died 986), arrived at Cologne where they established St. Martin’s Abbey in an island on the Rhine. Minnborinus ruled as first abbot; upon his death, Kilian succeeded him.

1739 – Birth of Arthur Wolfe, 1st Viscount Kilwarden and Lord Chief Justice in Forenaghts, Co Kildare.

1785 – Richard Crosbie became the first person to make a manned flight in Ireland. Crosbie was a native of Baltinglass Co Wicklow. His brother Sir Edward Crosbie of Carlow was executed in Carlow town for his part in the Rising of 1798. Using a hydrogen balloon Crosbie began his flight from Ranelagh Gardens, Dublin. He made the flight 14 months after the Montgolfier brothers made the world’s first ever manned flight in France.

1787 – Birth of Mary Aikenhead in Daunt’s Square off Grand Parade, Co Cork. She is the founder of the Irish Sisters of Charity and St. Vincent’s Hospital, Dublin.

1793 – Hugh Cane, MP for Tallow, dies from a fall down stairs.

1900 – Birth of badminton player, Frank Devlin, in Dublin. Devlin is the second most successful player ever in the All England Open Badminton Championships with 18 titles between 1925 and 1931, including three triple championships in 1926, 1927 and 1929. He also won four Irish Championships.

1916 – James Connolly vanished for a three-day meeting with the IRB military council where they agreed upon joint plans for an insurrection on Easter Sunday. At this point, Connolly was co-opted on to the Military Council of the IRB.

1923 – Republican fighters derail the railway line on the bridge near Ardfert, Co Kerry. The train crashes, killing its two drivers.

1946 – Death of politician, Pádraic Ó Máille. Born in Kilmilkin, Co Galway, he was a founder member of Sinn Féin and of the Gaelic League in Galway. He was a member of the Irish Volunteers from 1917 to 1921. He was elected as a Sinn Féin MP for Galway Connemara at the 1918 general election. He supported the Anglo-Irish Treaty and voted in favour of it. He was re-elected as a pro-Treaty Sinn Féin TD for Galway at the 1922 general election, and was elected as a Cumann na nGaedheal TD for Galway at the 1923 general election. In the subsequent Irish Civil War, he was targeted for assassination by anti-Treaty forces and was shot and badly wounded in Dublin in December 1922. His fellow TD, Sean Hales was killed in the incident.

1947 – Ireland was invaded by a “freakish” anticyclonic weather phenomenon that lasted for two months. The arctic siege brought freezing temperatures of -14 Centigrade (7F), a piercing east wind reaching 60-70 m.p.h., five major blizzards, and snowdrifts of 12 to 20 feet—some topping 50. Cars, buses, houses and entire villages were buried, roads were blocked, telephone and electricity lines felled and towns and farms isolated as food and fuel dwindled.

1949 – Birth of snooker player and world champion, Dennis Taylor, in Coalisland, Co Tyrone.

1961 – Birth of Eoghan Corry in Dublin. He is an Irish Journalist and author celebrated as the most travelled man in Ireland averaging over 30 countries a year. Since 2002 he has edited Ireland’s biggest circulation travel publication, Travel Extra. A former sportswriter and sports editor he has written books on sports history, and founding story-editor of the Gaelic Athletic Association Museum at Croke Park, Dublin.

1963 – Death of deaf dramatist, short story writer, and writer for radio, Teresa Deevy. Born in Waterford city, Deevy was elected to the Irish Academy of Letters in 1954.

1968 – Northern Ireland Prime Minister, Terence O’Neill, made a speech marking five years in office to members of the Irish Association. O’Neill called for “a new endeavour by organisations in Northern Ireland to cross denominational barriers and advance the cause of better community relations” (The Times; 20 January 1968).

1969 – Birth of association football manager and former professional footballer, Steve Staunton, in Dundalk, Co Louth. Staunton played as a defender and earned 102 caps for the Republic of Ireland national football team, captained his team to the knock-out stage of the 2002 FIFA World Cup and earned his place in the FIFA Century Club.

1973 – Death of stage, film, and television actor and singer, Max Adrian. Born in Enniskillen, Co Fermanagh, he was a founding member of both the Royal Shakespeare Company and the National Theatre. In addition to his success as a character actor in classical drama, he was known for his work as a singer and comic actor in revue and musicals, and in one-man shows about George Bernard Shaw and Gilbert and Sullivan, and in cinema and television films.

1975 – The IRA carried out two gun attacks on hotels in London. Shots were fired into the Carlton Tower Hotel and the Portman Hotel. Twelve people were injured in the attacks.

1977 – The IRA carried out a series of booby-trap bomb attacks on security force members.

1982 – The first meeting of Anglo-Irish Inter-government Council took place.

1983 – The Minister for Justice, Michael Noonan, reveals that the previous Fianna Fáil administration was involved in tapping the phones of Journalists Geraldine Kennedy and Bruce Arnold.

1988 – Dublin writer, Christopher Nolan, who cannot move or speak because of an accident at birth, wins the Whitbread Book of the Year.

1994 – At midnight the broadcasting ban under section 31 of the Broadcasting Act was lifted in the Republic of Ireland. This allowed Sinn Féin access to the Irish media. The British broadcasting ban ended on 16 September 1994.

1995 – The appeal in the House of Lords by Lee Clegg, a private in the Parachute Regiment, against his murder conviction was dismissed by the Law Lords. An earlier appeal on 30 March 1994 had also been turned down. However, Clegg was released from prison on 3 July 1995 having served two years of a life sentence for the murder of Karen Reilly (16) on 30 September 1990.

1998 – The Northern peace process are close to collapse after a 52-year-old Catholic taxi driver is killed in an attack which bears all the hallmarks of the UDA/UFF.

1998 – A delegation from Sinn Féin went to Downing Street, London to have talks with British Prime Minister, Tony Blair, about the ‘Propositions of Heads of Agreement’ document. Sinn Féin claimed that the document had emphasised a ‘partition solution’ to the problems of Northern Ireland at the expense of all-Ireland institutions. The Social Democratic and Labour Party (SDLP) rejected Sinn Féin’s assessment of the document.

1999 – The Belfast Telegraph published a report claiming that only 29 per cent of killings carried out by Republicans had been ‘solved’ compared to 50 per cent of Loyalist killings.

1999 – Andrew Hunter, a Conservative Member of Parliament (MP), said that he would use Parliamentary privilege to name those he believed were responsible for the Omagh Bombing. He also said he would name those involved in carrying out paramilitary ‘punishment’ attacks. Later the Chief Constable of the RUC, and others, persuaded him to postpone his statement on the grounds that it might prejudice any future trial.

2000 – More than 20,000 people gather on the streets of west Belfast in memory of IRA teenager, Tom Williams, who was hanged in 1942 for his part in the murder of an RUC man.

2000 – Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, Peter Mandelson, made a statement to the House of Commons on the Patten Report.

2003 – Disgraced celebrity chef Tim Allen moves to protect his multi-million euro family business, announcing he is ceasing all connection with the Ballymaloe Cookery School and hotel.

2019 – A car bomb exploded outside of a courthouse on Bishop St in Derry city at 8:10pm. Police said they were given 10 minutes warning, allowing little time to evacuate hundreds of people from a nearby hotel, the Freemasons’ hall, youth club and other sites. There were no casualties. The New IRA was the main line of inquiry, the assistant chief constable, Mark Hamilton, told a media briefing near the scene.

Image | Inis Oírr Lighthouse, Aran Islands, Co Galway | Giuseppe Milo photography

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