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The 1966 Irish history syllabus for secondary schools was consistent with the focus of the 50th anniversary celebrations. It highlighted the role of advanced nationalists and downplayed and even deliberately obscured the role of individuals and groups who might possibly undermine the conservative hegemony of the Irish state. These included the organised labour movement and several women’s organisations, who were described essentially as auxiliaries to the independence struggle.Thankfully historiography has broadened in scope and there is general recognition now that the story of the Irish state is not simply one of emergence from the oppression of British rule. While there has been welcome attention paid to the women who were involved in various organisations during the revolutionary period, much less interest has been shown in the extent to which female solidarity cut across class lines and challenged social hierarchies, particularly in trade union circles. Many members of the Irish Women’s Franchise League, for instance, were also active in the 1913 Lockout and were also to play a critical role in the 1916 Rising and the War of Independence, with many of them on the anti-Treaty side in the Civil W Irish Citizen Army on parade at Liberty Hall, 1915 Far from simply supporting the separatist agenda, in the early years of the revolutionary period it is arguable that labour, particularly trade union forces had the most clearly laid out ideas for the shape of the state that would emerge from a successful revolution. James Connolly visualised a very clear strategy of attempting to unite all the most progressive forces in Ireland around their own revolutionary labour-based force, which was centred on the Irish Citizen Army, primarily in Dublin. As far as the organised labour movement was concerned, the revolutionary period can be divided into two phases: the first culminating in the Rising and its catastrophic casualties, as well as the symbolism of the destruction of Liberty Hall. The second phase saw a certain retrenchment behind industrial relations issues in the aftermath of the Rising, albeit with some notable exceptions. Despite the post-Rising caution of the Irish Trade Union Congress, between 1918 to 1922 there were no less than three national general strikes, called for political rather than industrial reasons.Consideration of the revolutionary period must also include the impact of the First World War. The Irish Trade Union Congress and Labour Party (ITUCLP) had an affiliated membership of 110,000 in 1914, mainly comprised of craft unions but including the general workers of the Irish Transport and General Workers’ Union (ITGWU). From its earliest stages, the Irish trade unions warned that the war would not be in the best interests of Irish workers. The National Executive of the ITUCLP frequently reminded Irish men and women of how the British Empire had treated them in the past.In the spring of 1918 the Irish trade unions played a prominent and crucial part in successfully opposing the introduction of conscription into Ireland. The ITUCLP made frequent representations to the British government in the course of the War of Independence, but they had lost the opportunity to lead their members politically when the Irish Labour Party opted not to contest the 1918 General Election, leaving the field free for nationalist forces that were frequently antagonistic to the best interests of the working class. Liberty Hall in the aftermath of the Easter Rising, 1916Dr. Mary Muldowney, Historian in Residence, Dublin City Library and Archive.Dublin City Council Historians in Residence are available to meet groups and schools, give talks, walks etc, run history book clubs and advise on historical research. 

On Friday 17 May 1918 the British government ordered the arrest and imprisonment of all leading members of Sinn Fein. They claimed they were involved in a plan to import arms from Germany. Among those arrested were Countess Markievicz, Eamon de Valera, Arthur Griffith and W.T. Cosgrave. They were quickly removed from Dublin and lodged in prisons across Wales and England. The arrests did dislocate Sinn Fein’s organisation but did not paralyse it; for example, Michael Collins was one of those who avoided capture.Following on from the conscription crisis in April 1918, the German Plot arrests provided another issue for the republican movement to rally around, particularly the injustice of the prisoners being held without charge.On the 27th of September 1918, Áine Ceannt presided over a protest meeting at the Mansion House. Addressing it in both Irish and English, Áine called for the government to release the prisoners at once. She was a founder member of Cumann na mBan, deeply involved in the Irish language movement and republican politics and was the widow of the executed 1916 leader Eamon Ceannt. The meeting was a remarkable cross-section of the nationalist movement and illustrated the continuing high profile of women in the politics of the time. Letters of support from the Bishop of Killaloe and Irish Parliamentary Party MP Timothy Healy were read out while William Smith O’Brien, Cathal O’Shannon, Hanna Sheehy Skeffington, Eoin MacNeill, Countess Josephine Plunkett, George Gavin Duffy, Muriel MacSwiney and Alderman Thomas Kelly were all in attendance.De Valera escaped from Richmond prison in February 1919 and the British government finally bowed to public pressure, releasing the remaining prisoners in March. By then, the war of independence had broken out and Ireland was gripped by the insurgency that the government had hoped to avoid by arresting the leaders in the first place. Bernard Kelly, Historian in Residence, Dublin City Library and Archive.Dublin City Council Historians in Residence are available to meet groups and schools, give talks, walks etc, run history book clubs and advise on historical research. 

We are delighted to announce that Cathy Scuffil, Historian in Residence with Dublin City Council (South Central area) has been awarded a silver medal by the Old Dublin Society for her paper on the South Circular Road on the eve of the First World War.  Professor Frank Barry from Trinity College Dublin presented the medal to Cathy on 21st June and praised her research which she undertook initially for an MA in Local History from Maynooth University.  Cathy brings her knowledge and love of history to groups and schools all over the Crumlin, Ballyfermot, Dolphin’s Barn, Walkinstown, Kimmage and Dublin 8 areas of the city. Some information about the Old Dublin Society medal:The Old Dublin Society was founded in 1934. Ten years later, the President at the time, Dr George Little, gave a silver medal for the best paper read by a member at one of the Society's meetings and published in 'The Dublin Historical Record'. This was known as 'The President's Medal' and this continued until Dr Little’s resignation in 1955. The Council then decided to continue awarding the medal, but calling it 'The Society's Medal'. Since 2016 articles submitted for publication by non-members of the Society are now eligible for the award as long as they feature original research on aspects of the history of the city and county of Dublin. The medal is now awarded for the best paper published in 'The Dublin Historical Record' in a calendar year, the winner being decided by majority vote of the Council.

Mellows bridge, situated towards the Heuston Station end of the quays, sits on the site of one of the oldest bridges in Dublin city. The original was built in 1688, was named Arran bridge and it collapsed in 1763. Its replacement, completed in 1768, was known as the Queen’s Bridge and has been renovated several times since. In the post-independence rush to rebrand structures with imperial connections, the Dublin Municipal Council renamed the bridge after Queen Maeve of Connacht in 1922. In 1942, the National Graves Association successfully petitioned to change the name to Mellows bridge, marking both the death of Barney Mellows in February 1942 and the 20th anniversary of the execution of his brother Liam. Born in Manchester in 1892, William Mellows was the son of a British army sergeant and his family moved to Ireland in the early 1900s. He attended the Hibernian Military School in Dublin but soon both Mellows brothers became heavily involved in the republican movement, starting with Na Fianna, before graduating to the Volunteers and the IRB. William soon abandoned his first name, choosing the more appropriately Gaelic Liam, and lead the Galway Volunteers during the 1916 Rising. After returning from the US in 1920, he chose the anti-Treaty side and was captured in the Four Courts in June 1922. While being held in Mountjoy Prison he was appointed Minister for Defence in de Valera’s shadow cabinet but was one of four prisoners executed in reprisal for the killing of TD Sean Hales in December 1922.   On 25 May 1942, following a procession from St Stephen’s Green, members of the National Graves Association and the Old Fianna Association assembled to hear a speech from Nora Connolly, daughter of James. Connolly pointedly remarked that Mellows’ vision of Irish independence was freedom from ‘foreign oppression and domestic exploitation’. A plaque was also unveiled on the bridge, dedicated to ‘Liet-General Liam Mellows’, reflecting his high status in the republican movement. Mellows bridge remains the oldest bridge over the Liffey and commemorates one of the most fascinating characters of the revolutionary period in Ireland.Bernard Kelly, Historian in Residence, Dublin City Library and Archive.Dublin City Council Historians in Residence are available to meet groups and schools, give talks, walks etc, run history book clubs and advise on historical research.

In the run-up to the referendum to repeal the 8th Amendment in May 2018, a mural appeared near the George Bernard Shaw pub in Portobello, Dublin. The mural by Aches graffiti artists depicted Savita Halappanavar who died in Galway University Hospital in October 2012 following a septic miscarriage. Dublin City Library and Archive photographed some of the messages that were left at the Memorial Wall so that a record of these transient notes might be preserved for future scholars and historians on what was a transformative event in Irish social history.

The following political cartoons come from the United Ireland and the Weekly Freeman and the National Press, Irish nationalist newspapers that commented on the last few decades of nineteenth-century Ireland. These cartoons illustrate Irish nationalist sentiments at the time by commenting on political events and figures, in particular the Home Rule Movement, the Land War, and the 1892 General Election.

Despite declaring neutrality when the conflict broke out in September 1939, Ireland came under aerial attack several times during the Second World War. Most of the incidents happened in 1940-41, while the Luftwaffe was attacking British cities and trying to degrade their air defences. In August 1940, three people were killed by German bombs in Campile, County Wexford, while more fell in Sandycove, County Dublin in December of the same year.

This flyer is an extract from a speech given by Fr. Michael O’Flanagan to 10,000 people at Ballyjamesduff, Co. Cavan on Sunday May 26, 1918. O’Flanagan mentions the arrest of De Valera, the suppression of Arthur Griffith’s newspaper, and the ‘poison-gas of lies’ spun by ‘the Little Welsh spider’ (Prime Minister David Lloyd George) against the Irish people in the ‘German Plot’.Over 70 members of Sinn Féin had been arrested that month as part of this alleged plot. They were accused of conspiring with the German Empire to stage an armed rebellion in Ireland. O'Flanagan's clerical status exempted him from the round-up and in the second half of 1918 he operated as acting leader of Sinn Féin's political activities. The censor refused to allow even one word of the speech to be published, but it was later printed and distributed by Sinn Féin from their office at 6 Harcourt Street. History Document of the MonthEvery month the Dublin City Council Historians in Residence will be highlighting a document from Dublin City Public Libraries and Archives Digital Repository.  An image of the selected document will be on display in branch libraries during the month.Historians in Residence are available to meet groups and schools, give talks, walks etc, run history book clubs and advise on historical research. 

It is fitting on International Nurses Day 2018 to remember one of the most notable figures in Irish nursing before and during the First World War. Katherine Elizabeth Middleton Curtis was born in London in 1860 and married to the noted Engineer and Merchant William Charles Middleton Curtis. Moving to Ireland, she became a member of the Blackrock Nursing Division of the St John Ambulance Brigade in Dublin and was a regular contributor to the Irish Times on nursing and medical matters. Always an innovator, Kate was involved in various public initiatives to raise public awareness of hygiene and health; she ran first aid courses for women from 1911 and was also involved in Kingstown ‘Health Week’, held in April 1913. Kate was one of the best-known members of St John Ambulance and noted in her diary on 20 October 1914 that she was also ‘the oldest ambulance lady in Ireland.’Kate was matron of the Convalescent Home for Soldiers and Sailors at Temple Hill House in Blackrock, taking up the post in October 1914. She remained in place until April 1915, when it was converted into an Auxiliary Hospital for Service personnel. Temple Hill was one of 70 such centres in Ireland during the war and it specialised in orthopaedic services for injured service personnel. Originally it had 20 beds but was later expanded to 36 and over 500 patients passed through the building during the war. Kate kept an autograph book of her time in Temple Hill which was signed by many of the soldiers she cared for.Kate Middleton Curtis died on 29 January 1918 of appendicitis, aged 58. Her legacy lived on after the war in the Kate Middleton Curtis Cup, awarded annually to winner of the St John Ambulance First Aid competition. Her personal papers were donated to the Royal Dublin Fusiliers Archive at Dublin City Library and Archive and can be consulted in the reading room in Pearse Street.The Kate Middleton Curtis collection can be view online at Digital Repository Ireland.Bernard Kelly, Historian in Residence, Dublin City Library and Archive.Dublin City Council Historians in Residence are available to meet groups and schools, give talks, walks etc, run history book clubs and advise on historical research. See Also: Listen back to Women of the Brigade: Pádraig Allen, St John Ambulance Ireland discusses some women of St John Ambulance who contributed to the war effort during the First World War.

From working in munitions factories, V.A.D. nursing, supporting the war effort through charitable works, and leading the anti-conscription movement, World War 1 led to a multitude of different experiences for Irish women. In this talk Pádraig Allen looks at some women of St John Ambulance who contributed to the war effort during the First World War.