World population in 1801
that
in 1801 when the first complete world census was carried out, the
world’s population was 1 billion. China had 295 million people,
India 131 million, Russia 33 million, France 27 million, Ottoman
Empire 21 million, Germany 14 million, Spain 11 million, Britain 10
million, Ireland and the USA 5 million
The
origin of the nickname “The Fighting 69th”
that none other than enemy commander
Robert E. Lee bestowed the nickname “The Fighting 69th” on the 69th
New York Regiment. Upon hearing that the 69th NY was moving into
position to face his troops across the battlefield at Fredericksburg
in December of 1862, Lee remarked, “Ah yes, that Fighting 69th.”
The Battle Cry of the
Irish Brigade, and historically of other Irish Regiments that have
served in armies around the world is the Gaelic “Faugh A Ballagh”,
“Clear the Way” (the Irish are coming). It is still the official
battle cry of the modern 69th.
Eleven Members of the
Irish Brigade were awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor. Three
of the Irish Brigades Commanding Officers fell in battle.
Source: AOH
Division 3, Pearl River, New York
The origin
of the name "croppy"
that the name
"croppy" derives from Ireland in the 1790's as a reference to people
with closely cropped hair, a fashion which was associated with the
anti-wig (and therefore, anti-aristocrat) French revolutionaries of
the period. Those with their hair cropped were automatically
suspected of sympathies with the pro-French underground
organization, the Society of United Irishmen, and were consequently
liable to seizure for interrogation by pro-British forces. Suspected
United Irish sympathizers were often subjected to torture by
flogging, picketing and half-hanging but the reactive contemporary
torture, pitchcapping, was specifically invented to
intimidate "croppys". There is evidence of United Irish
activists retaliating by cropping the hair of loyalists to
reduce the reliability of this method of identifying rebel
sympathizers.
Citizen ceremony for Irishmen killed in Korea
that twenty-eight Irishmen who were killed in the Korean War
were made posthumous citizens of the United States
at a special ceremony held in Washington, D.C. on
October 30, 2003
One by
one the names were called and in answer, sisters,
brothers, nephews, nieces and cousins stood up to
accept the specially framed certificates of
posthumous citizenship made for the occasion by the
U.S.
The
citizenship ceremony, which was held in the offices
of the US Senate on Capitol Hill was the culmination
of a lifelong campaign by Korea veteran and Kerry
native Mr John Leahy to see his dead comrades fully
embraced by their adopted country
Brehon Law
that prior to English rule, Ireland had its own indigenous
system of law dating from Celtic times, which
survived until the 17th century when it was finally
supplanted by the English common law. This native
system of law, known as the , developed from customs
which had been passed on orally from one generation
to the next. In the 7th century AD the laws were
written down for the first time. Brehon law was
administered by Brehons (or brithem). They
were the successors to Celtic druids and
while similar to judges; their role was closer to
that of an arbitrator. Their task was to preserve
and interpret the law rather than to expand it.
The Know Nothing
that the Know Nothing was a nativist American
secret political organization
of the 1840s and 1850s. The main object of the organization
was the proscription of foreigners, particularly
German and Irish Catholic immigrants,
by
the repeal of the naturalization laws, and the
exclusive choice of native Americans for office.
Membership was limited to Protestant males of British
lineage over the age of twenty-one. There were few
prominent leaders amongst the largely middle-class
membership.
Irish Catholics bore the brunt of their wrath as they
were regarded as hostile to
Anglo-Saxon Protestant values and controlled by the
Pope. Mainly active from 1854 to 1856 there efforts efforts met with little success.
The Sullivan Brothers
that on November 13, 1942 five Irish-American brothers, Albert,
Francis, George, Joseph and Madison (Sullivan)who served together on
the light cruiser, the USS Juneau, lost their lives when a Japanese
submarine torpedoed and sank their ship.
The tragedy received
extensive press coverage in the United States, resulting in a new
Navy policy prohibiting family members from serving together in the
same ship.
The story of the Sullivan Brothers was commemorated in the patriotic
film, The Fighting Sullivans.
The Navy
commemorated the Sullivans by naming a destroyer in their honor. The
USS The Sullivans served the Navy until final decommissioning in
1965. A second The Sullivans was launched in 1997 and is homeported
in Mayport, Florida
Brigadier General
Richard Montgomery
that
the first American general to die during the
Revolutionary War was Irish.
Dublin born and Trinity College educated Richard
Montgomery served in the British Army during the
French and Indian War. After completing his service
in the colonies and the Caribbean he returned to
England.
In
1773 he returned to the colonies to take up farming.
When the American
Revolutionary War broke out, Montgomery took up the
Patriot cause. He was elected to the New York
Provincial Congress in May 1775. Shortly
afterwards he was commissioned as a Brigadier
General in the Continental Army.
In
December of 1775 he was killed while leading the
attack on
Quebec City.
The U.S. has honored Montgomery in numerous ways.
The Navy has named several ships USS Montgomery
after the Irishman, Philadelphia has a statue of
Montgomery in Fairmount Park and several schools in
the country are named after the Revolutionary War
general
Ireland's blasphemy law
that
Ireland's new profoundly repressive blasphemous law
passed by the Irish parliament and signed into law
by the president, Mary McAleese, in July of
2009 criminalizes anyone who "publishes or
utters matter grossly abusive or insulting in
relation to matters held sacred by any religion,
thereby causing outrage among a substantial number
of the adherents of that religion, and he or she
intends by the publication or utterance of the
matter concerned to cause such outrage."
Therefore, anyone commenting on a cleric's
pedophilic tendencies or the practice in some
Islamic groupings to bury young girls alive for
looking at boys need to look over their shoulder to
make sure that they not within earshot of an
adherent who may report then to the police.
If
you are an unbeliever and consider all gods to be
fictional inventions of the creative human brain --
keep it to yourself unless you are willing to part
with €25,000.
Irish slave trade.
that
from 1625 thru 1659 between 50,000
and 100,000 Irish men, women and children were
shipped to Barbados Montserrat, Jamaica and
Antigua as slaves. Another 20,000 plus Irish
slaves were sold to English settlers in the American
colonies .
The Irish slave trade began when
James II of England sold 30,000
Irish prisoners as slaves to the New
World. His Proclamation of
1625 required Irish political
prisoners be sent overseas and sold
to English settlers in the West
Indies. By the mid 1600s, the Irish
were the main slaves sold to Antigua
and Montserrat. At that time, 70% of
the total population of Montserrat
were Irish slaves.
Ireland quickly became the biggest
source of human livestock for
English merchants. The majority of
the early slaves to the New World
were predominantly Irish.
Irish
emigration to the United States
that more than 7 million Irish
immigrants have come to America since the 1600s.
This mass migration transformed Irish society
and played a significant role in shaping American
politics, religion, culture, and economics during
the country's most formative years. More than 40
million people in the United States claim some
degree of Irish ancestry.
Ireland’s population
decreased dramatically throughout the nineteenth century. Census
figures show an Irish population of 8.2 million in 1841, 6.6 million
a decade later, and only 4.7 million in 1891.
It is estimated that
as many as 4.5 million Irish arrived in America between 1820 and
1930.
Between 1820 and
1860, the Irish constituted over one third of all immigrants to the
United States. In the 1840s, they comprised nearly half of all
immigrants to this nation.
Preamble to the Irish
constitution
that
the preamble to the Irish constitution
reads as follows:
In the Name of the Most Holy Trinity, from
Whom is all authority and to Whom, as our final end, all
actions both of men and States must be referred,
We, the people of Éire,
Humbly acknowledging all our obligations to
our Divine Lord, Jesus Christ, Who sustained our fathers
through centuries of trial,
Gratefully remembering their heroic and
unremitting struggle to regain the rightful independence of
our Nation,
And seeking to promote the common good, with
due observance of Prudence, Justice and Charity, so that the
dignity and freedom of the individual may be assured, true
social order attained, the unity of our country restored,
and concord established with other nations,
Do hereby adopt, enact, and give to
ourselves this Constitution.
Pickett's Charge
that
the official name for Pickett's Charge was 'The Longstreet
Assault'.
Pickett's
Charge was a disastrous infantry assault ordered by
Confederate General Robert E. Lee against Maj. Gen. George
G. Meade's Union positions on Cemetery Ridge, on July 3,
1863, the last day of the Battle of Gettysburg. Its futility
was predicted by the charge's commander, Lt. Gen. James
Longstreet, and it was arguably an avoidable mistake from
which the Southern war effort never fully recovered
psychologically. The farthest point reached by the attack
has been nicknamed the high-water mark of the Confederacy.
Approximately 12,500 men in nine infantry brigades advanced
over open fields for close to a mile under heavy Union
artillery and rifle fire. Although some Confederates were
able to breach the stone wall that shielded many of the
Union defenders, they could not maintain their hold and were
repulsed with over 50% casualties, ending the battle and
Lee's campaign into Pennsylvania.
Union
casualties were approx .1,500 dead and wounded
Segregated education in the British controlled six Irish counties
that
95%
of children in the British controlled six Irish counties
attend either
Catholic or
Protestant
managed schools.
In the
school year 2006/2007 the number of registered pupils in the
school system was approx.330,000. Of those 148,000 or 45%
attended Catholic-managed schools, and 165,000 or 50%
attended Protestant managed schools.
Integrated
education is not a priority for the politicians and
controlling elite in the occupied counties who view
segregation, particularly at an early age, as a means of
perpetuating the status quo, hence their power base and
privileged lifestyles.
This
situation is not the peculiar to either powerbase in the
sectarian enclave.
Irish-born
architect James Hoban designed the original White House
that
Irish-born
architect James Hoban designed the original
White House in Washington after winning a competition sponsored by
President George Washington and Secretary of State Thomas Jefferson
in 1792. When the White House was burned by the British during
the war of 1812, Hoban was contracted to oversee the
restoration of the building. He
also supervised the construction
of the U.S. Capitol and early offices for the Departments of the
Treasury, State and Navy & War.
Hoban who was born in a thatched cottage near Callan in County
Kilkenny, Ireland, rose from journeyman carpenter and wheelwright to
become the architect of Americas most famous residence.
Irish
emigration to the United States between 1820 and 1920
that
during the period 1820 to 1920 over 4,400,000 people emigrated
to the United States from Ireland . The only other countries with
comparable numbers were Germany and Italy with 5,500,000
and 4,190,000 respectively.
In
1840 Ireland was the most densely populated country in Europe,
however, by the early 1900's, due to British imposed depravation and
forced starvation, Ireland was the least densely populated European
country.
According
to the 1911 census the population of Ireland was
4,390,000. In 2008 the population, all 32 counties, was
approximately 6,100,000.
Irish-born
Major League baseball players.
that
41 Major League baseball players were born in Ireland. Eight of
these played for only one season.
The four longest
playing carriers were those of Patsy Donavon from Cork who played
for 18 seasons (1890 – 1907), Jack Doyle from Kerry who played for
17 seasons (1889 – 1905, Jimmy Archer from Dublin who played for 15
seasons (1904 -1918), and Tony Mullane from Cork who played for 14
seasons (1881 – 1894).
The last Irish born player was Joe Cleary from Cork who played for
one season (1945 ).
Free State
executions during Irish Civil War
that
(77) anti-Treaty Irish Republican
Army prisoners were summarily executed by the pro-Treaty regime
during the Civil War. Kevin Higgins, the regime's Minister for
Justice signed off on the executions
including that of the best man at his
wedding Rory O'Connor.
Higgins was regarded as a lightweight
even amongst his Free State cohorts including General Richard
Mulcahy who described him "as a person who did not understand what
was going on".
On July 10,1927,
O’Higgins was assassinated in revenge for his role in the
executions. No one was ever charged with his killing, perhaps an
acknowledgment of the low esteem in which he was held.
As a point of comparison --
after the American Civil War which lasted four years
with the loss of
620,000 lives, the victors executed only
one individual,
the psychopath responsible for the deaths of tens
of thousands of Union prisoners at the infamous
Andersonville Prison Camp in
Georgia.
Irish-born defenders who died at The Alamo
that
twelve (12) of
the 189 men who died at The Alamo in March, 1836, fighting for the freedom and
liberty of Texas, 12 were born in Ireland. Twenty (20) others
including Davy Crockett, William Travis and Jim Bowie
were of Irish descent.
The Alamo was a
pivotal point in the Texas Revolution. Following a thirteen-day
siege, Mexican troops under the President of Mexico, General Antonio
López de Santa Anna launched an assault, on what was then, the Alamo
Mission in San Antonio de Béxar (modern-day San Antonio, Texas). All
but two of the defenders were killed.
Irish born defenders who died were:
Samuel Burns, Stephen Denison, Andrew Duvalt, Robert Evans, Joseph Mark Hawkins,
William Daniel Jackson, James McGee, Robert McKinney, James Nowlin, Jackson J. Rusk, Burke Trammel and William B. Ward.
Irish-born Medal of
Honor Recipients
that
of the 3,459
Medals of Honor recipients, 258 listed Ireland as their place of
birth, by far the highest number of any of the other 33 countries
listed as the birthplaces of the recipients. Of the 258
listing counties as the place of birth, Cork has 19,
Dublin and Tipperary with having 11, Limerick 10 , Kerry 8,
Galway 7, Antrim and Tyrone 6 each, Kilkenny and Sligo each having
5.
Of the 19
individuals who received a
second Medal of Honor, 5 were born in Ireland. They are: Henry
Hogan from Clare, John Laverty from Tyrone, Dublin’s John Cooper,
whose name at birth was John Laver Mather, John King and Patrick
Mullen.
Three double
recipients were Irish-Americans: U.S. Marines Daniel Daly and John
Joseph Kelly, and the U.S. Navy’s John McCloy.
Margaret
Thatcher opposed German Reunification
that
Margaret Thatcher vehemently opposed the reunification of Germany.
Kremlin documents that have
recently come to light disclose that two months
before the fall of the Berlin Wall, British Prime
Minister Margaret Thatcher told Soviet leader
Mikhail Gorbachev that Britain opposed the reunification
of Germany and asked him to do what he could
to prevent it from happening.
Another example of moral
leadership and democratic values!
Irish children living in poverty
that
the number of
children living in poverty in Ireland remains
alarmingly high. The latest EU-SILC statistics
from the Central Statistics Office (CSO) show
that 1 in 16 children in Ireland were living in
consistent poverty in Ireland in 2008. That
means over 65,000 children went without basic
necessities – a warm meal, a winter coat,
heating at home – because their families were
too poor to provide these basics for them.
Another
185,000 children, or just over one in 5 of all
children, were at risk of poverty in 2008.
These children lived in households where the
family income was less than 60% of the national
median income per adult of €400 per week.
The
Forgotten Ten
that The
Forgotten Ten is
the term applied to ten members of the Irish Republican Army
executed by the British in Mountjoy Prison during the Irish
War of Independence. They were buried in unmarked graves
within the prison grounds.
The
names of the ten martyrs are Kevin Barry, Patrick Moran, Frank
Flood, Thomas Whelan, Thomas Traynor, Patrick Doyle, Thomas Bryan,
Bernard Ryan, Edmond Foley and Patrick Maher.
The
executions were carried out by the infamous English hangman Thomas
Pierepoint and his assistant John Ellis.
In 1944, de Valera
hired Pierrpoint's nephew, Albert, to hang Charlie Kerins, the IRA
Chief of Staff
Irish
immigrants who fought in the American Civil War
that 150,000
Irish-American immigrants served in the Union Army, most of them
from Boston, New York and Chicago.
Between 40,000 and 50,000 fought in the
Confederate Army.
Of all the Irish-American units involved in
the conflict, the best known was the Irish Brigade of the Union Army
of the Potomac, which distinguished itself at both Antietam and
Fredericksburg,
On the Confederate side one of the best
known regiments, with a large number of Irish,
was the 24th Georgia who faced the Union’s Irish
Brigade at Fredericksburg in 1863, where Union forces was soundly
defeated. The Union Irish may not have known they were
fighting other Irishmen, but the Confederate Irish knew and
mourned their countrymen’s deaths.
Grosse Isle - isle of
sorrow
that
a
large Celtic cross
monument of grey
Stanstead granite stands
high above the water on
the rocky promontory at
the western end of
Grosse Isle, an island
in the St. Lawrence
River east of Quebec.
The monument is
dedicated to the
countless thousands of
Irish emigrants who fled
Ireland to escape the
so-called "famine"
only to die from typhoid
after enduring inhumane
conditions aboard coffin
ships during their
passage across the
Atlantic.
The monument bears the
following inscription :
Children of the Gael
died in their thousands
on this island having
fled from the laws of
the foreign tyrants and
an artificial famine in
the years 1847-48. God's
loyal blessing upon
them. Let this monument
be a token to their name
and honour from the
Gaels of America. God
save Ireland".
