Irish History, Culture, Heritage, Language, Mythology
1713 – Jonathan Swift becomes Dean of St Patrick’s Cathedral, Dublin. 1748 – Sir Robert King, MP for Boyle, Co Roscommon, is created Baron Kingsborough. Earl of Kingston is a title in the Peerage of Ireland. It was created in 1768 for Edward King, 1st Viscount Kingston. He had already succeeded his father as fifth […]
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The Battle of Ballynahinch was fought outside Ballynahinch, Co Down, between British forces led by Major-General George Nugent and the local United Irishmen led by Henry Munro. Munro was a Lisburn linen merchant and Presbyterian United Irishman who had no military experience but had taken over command of the Down organisation following the arrest of […]
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In the Liturgical calendar, today is the Feast day of St. Christian O’Morgair, brother of St. Malachy, and Bishop of Clogher. 1731 – The Revenue Commissioners report the robbery of the Golden Lyon’s cargo at Ballyheige. One of the robbers is caught and turns king’s evidence; the Danish Asiatic Company offers a reward of 10 […]
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Ireland plays England in its first ever match in the World Cup Finals. England took an early lead courtesy of master poacher Gary Lineker. Ireland, under the managership of “Big Jack” Charlton (who had won a World Cup medal with England 1966) fought back to equalise with a goal by Welsh-born Kevin Sheedy. Irish football […]
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1534 – Thomas Garrett (Lord Offaly and grandson of Garret Mór Fitzgerald, Earl of Kildare), rides through Dublin with a large band of followers. Known as ‘Silken Thomas’ because of the silk worn on his followers’ helmets, he has heard the false rumour spread by Henry VIII that his father, Garrett Óg has been executed […]
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Frank Ryan was born in Co Limerick, in 1902. After leaving university he became an active member of the Irish Republican Army and fought in the Irish Civil War. In 1929 Ryan was appointed editor of An Phoblacht, the IRA newspaper. He was imprisoned several times over the following years for publishing seditious articles and […]
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Belfast born, Patrick Joseph Magee is found guilty of planting the bomb at the Grand Hotel Brighton which killed five people, but missed its primary target, Margaret Thatcher. The bombing was testament to the ingenuity of the IRA and its bomb makers. The 30 lb bomb had been planted behind a bath in a room […]
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1642 – The first regularly constituted presbytery in Ireland constituted by Scottish army chaplains meets at Carrickfergus. 1798 – United Irishmen Rebellion: Rebels capture Maynooth in Leinster and Bangor in Ulster. 1834 – Alfred Webb, writer and traveller, is born in Dublin. 1842 – The first number of James MacKnight’s “Banner of Ulster”, the newspaper […]
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A force of United Irishmen from Wexford, estimated at 10,000 strong, launched an assault into Co Wicklow, on the British-held town of Arklow, in an attempt to spread the rebellion into Wicklow and to threaten the capital of Dublin. The rebel army that formed for attack on the afternoon of 9 June was a combined […]
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In the Liturgical calendar, today is the Feast day of St Columba (St Colmcille, ‘dove of the church’). He was an abbot and missionary credited with spreading Christianity in what is today Scotland at the start of the Hiberno-Scottish mission. He founded the important abbey on Iona, which became a dominant religious and political institution […]
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