Irish History, Culture, Heritage, Language, Mythology
The ‘Londonderry’, a paddle-steamer which berthed at the quayside in Derry one Sunday in the winter of 1848 was only seven years old, big for a ship of her kind, weighing 222 tons. She was manned by a crew of 26 and often sailed between Sligo and Liverpool. On this winter trip, while hugging the […]
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A larger-than-life statue of three Irish figures sits on a round stone base, bordered by a walkway that incorporates the donor-bricks and flagstones. The walkway leads to a commemorative wall that narrates the history of the Great Hunger amid Irish immigration. The sidewalk beneath the wall incorporates an outline map depicting the coasts of America […]
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The potato is a tuberous vegetable that is native to the Andes of South America. Following the Spanish exploration and exploitation of the South American Indians, the potato was introduced to Europe where it had a profound, beneficial effect on diets of Europeans from Ireland well into Russia. It grew well all over Western Europe […]
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To this day, all over Ireland the landscape bears mute testimony to the events that occurred in the horrific period from 1845–1850. Starvation graveyards offer silent tribute to the millions of Irish men,women,and children buried in unmarked mass graves. Thriving villages were replaced by heaps of moss-covered stones. Although historians have not agreed on the […]
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‘An Opening of Eyes’ © Joe Canning 2018. All Rights Reserved. Sit a while and listen whilst a tale I tell ye all, Close thine eyes and picture well the scene. Let me take ye back to sad and distant times, To places like Mayo and Skibbereen. Gaze across a barren field, see […]
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Trevelyan is referred to in the modern Irish folk song The Fields of Athenry about ‘An Gorta Mór’. For his actions, he is commonly considered one of the most detested figures in Irish history, along with the likes of Cromwell. Image | Charles Trevelyan accompanied by a poem written by Joe Canning Friends of Ireland! Please […]
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The success of Oliver Cromwell’s Irish campaign during the autumn of 1649 caused further divisions in the Marquis of Ormond’s Royalist-Confederate coalition. With the defeat of British and Scottish forces in Ulster and the defection of most of Lord Inchiquin’s Protestant troops to the Parliamentarians, Ormond was obliged to rely increasingly upon Catholic support. Early […]
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‘The Land Of Lonely Women’ © Joe Canning 2018. All Rights Reserved. The harbour is silent now, ‘Tis only the seagulls that cry. Gone are the ghosts of yesteryear; Banished are the Botany bound manacled, Those that dared to feed their brood, That uprooted the master’s turnip, Gone are they to sore backs and sledgehammer. […]
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Pope Pius IX issued an encyclical letter to the universal church calling for financial relief and prayers for the hunger-stricken Irish. His appeal made a powerful impact on the Catholic world. Money poured into Dublin, the best-known See, from the church’s worldwide organisation. Especially notable were the relief efforts mounted by Catholics in America and […]
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The ‘Londonderry’, a paddle-steamer which berthed at the quayside in Derry one Sunday in the winter of 1848 was only seven years old, big for a ship of her kind, weighing 222 tons. She was manned by a crew of 26 and often sailed between Sligo and Liverpool. On this winter trip, while hugging the […]
Read More