A grandmother’s letters, passed down through two generations, offer a fascinating, and at times intimate, glimpse into the period following the 1916 Rising. Dermot McEvoy talks to Rosemary Mahoney “My maternal grandmother, Julia Frances Rohan (née Fraher), and her five sisters who emigrated to Boston from Ballylanders, County Limerick, were fervid Sinn Féiners. My grandmother … [Read more...] about Dear Julia: Personal Reflections on 1916 and its Aftermath
History Archives
The Rebel Path
Ernie O’Malley was a renowned figure in Ireland’s fight for independence. Here are his memories of 1916 as compiled by his son Cormac O’Malley. Born in 1897 in Castlebar, Co. Mayo, Ernie O’Malley’s (Malley) family moved to Dublin in 1906 where he went on to study medicine. During the Easter Rising O’Malley came to share the vision of the rebels, and left his medical studies … [Read more...] about The Rebel Path
Ernie O’Malley’s Mayo
County Mayo is largely a rural, wild, untouched landscape on the west coast of Ireland, but it has changed drastically over the years. The images in Cormac O’Malley and Juliet Christy Barron’s new photographic collection Western Ways capture an unrecognizable Mayo through the lens of Irish Republican Ernie O’Malley and Helen Hooker, Cormac’s parents. ℘℘℘ In 1938, Ernie … [Read more...] about Ernie O’Malley’s Mayo
Thomas Meagher: The Immortal Irishman
By Timothy Egan
In the following excerpt from Timothy Egan’s new book on Thomas Meagher, the legendary Irishman arrives in New York City having escaped from the Tasmanian prison colony where he had been banished for his part in the failed 1848 rebellion. He had seen half the world from a ship’s deck, and yet nothing prepared him for how many of the earth’s uprooted strivers had stuffed … [Read more...] about Thomas Meagher: The Immortal Irishman
Digging Up the Past
Robert Schmuhl takes us behind the scenes on a decade-long research project that culminated in his book Ireland’s Exiled Children: America and the Easter Rising. Facts are stubborn things,” John Adams famously remarked. Less known, though, is a clause he added to complete the thought – “and whatever may be our wishes, our inclinations, or the dictates of our passions, they … [Read more...] about Digging Up the Past