Many communities across the country will be actively preparing for the centenary commemorations of events, which happened during the War of Independence. During this commemorative phase, long ago battles, raids and skirmishes will be recalled. Plaques and information signs erected telling the stories from 100 years ago, many of which we have featured on the blog since last October. However, commemoration is sele...
 As the month of June wore on the British military resorted to targeting a number of types of premises connected to the Republican movement including newspaper offices and printing shops. These included the offices of the Munster News, a Limerick based nationalist newspaper which was set on fire in the middle of the night. The editorial and commercial departments were entirely destroyed, while Miss Connellan, the...
June 1920 ends with violent reprisals from the British military all across Ireland. Once again the radical newspaper, Irish Bulletin, provides an account of raids and assaults which occurred throughout Ireland in the final week of June. In Limerick city the military fired a number of shots into business and residences after midnight in a night of terror across the country. At Kilcommon, county Tipperary the homes ...
 One of the features of Irish radical newspapers was the platform they provided for poets and writers. Harking back to episodes of Irish history or lamenting the present, poetry were used to instil pride, belief and hope for Ireland. Of course many of these poems and prose were nationalist in nature and reflected the interests of the newspaper in which they were published. Many were local scribes, but the newspap...
Cartoons were not a new feature of the Irish newspaper business one hundred years ago but certainly was transformed by the arrival of Ernest Forbes, to the staff of the Freeman’s Journal in 1920. Using the pseudonym ‘Shemus’, he was the first regular cartoonist on an Irish daily newspaper and his cartoons during the during the War of Independence and Civil War were widely published and distributed. Cartoons ...
The daring capture of Brigadier General Lucas in Fermoy county Cork during late June 1920 was captured in the pages of the Irish Bulletin. Described by the newspaper as the ‘Commanding Officer of the British Army of Occupation’ in the Fermoy area, the military carried out a frenzied search for him using armoured cars and even aeroplanes as large parts of Munster were scoured for evidence. It was estimated that...
The continued violence by all sides during the War of Independence and the lawlessness that prevailed generated considerable interest in the international press, with many sending correspondents to witness events at first hand. In Britain, there were varying reports about the cycle of violence and in June radical newspapers such as the Irish Bulletin published extracts from some. The excerpts gave an insight into popular op...
The ongoing riots in Derry City continued to generate interest throughout the month of June. Described by the Freeman’s Journal as being on the verge of destruction, tensions ran high after Catholics were attacked coming from Mass. Catholic houses were attacked in the Waterside and families were forced to leave their homes. In a night of terror on 19 June five men were killed. The fighting continued over...
Another radical newspaper in circulation in 1920 was Old Ireland a paper which provided commentary and debate on all of the leading issues of the day. In an edition published in June 1920 in the wake of the county council elections, the editor of Old Ireland declared that the result was ‘a defeat for Carson’ and victory for republicanism. Amongst the contributors to Old Ireland was Maud Gonne McBride who in 19...