130-507: Alice Letitia Milligan [ pseud. Iris Olkyrn] (4 September 1865 – 13 April 1953) was an Irish writer and activist in Ireland 's Celtic Revival ; an advocate for the political and cultural participation of women; and a Protestant-unionist convert to the cause of Irish independence. She was at the height of her renown at the turn of the 20th century when in Belfast , with Anna Johnston , she produced
260-713: A three-year guerrilla war , which ended in a truce in July 1921 (although violence continued until June 1922, mostly in Northern Ireland). In December 1921, the Anglo-Irish Treaty was concluded between the British government and representatives of the Second Dáil . It gave Ireland complete independence in its home affairs and practical independence for foreign policy, but an opt-out clause allowed Northern Ireland to remain within
390-795: A " nonconformist conscience " created a huge scandal, as adultery was prohibited by the Ten Commandments . Out of her family connection to the Liberal Party, Katharine acted as liaison between Parnell and Gladstone during negotiations prior to the introduction of the First Irish Home Rule Bill in April 1886. Parnell moved to her home in Eltham , close to the London-Kent border, that summer. Captain O'Shea filed for divorce in 1889; his reasons are
520-588: A Home Rule bill through parliament, it looked certain that one would finally pass in 1914. To prevent this from happening, the Ulster Volunteers were formed in 1913 under the leadership of Edward Carson . Their formation was followed in 1914 by the establishment of the Irish Volunteers , whose aim was to ensure that the Home Rule Bill was passed. The Act was passed but with the "temporary" exclusion of
650-483: A Parnellite." Writing as "Iris Olkyrn", Milligan's first novel, published the year before Parnell's death in October 1891, A Royal Democrat , had been a neo- Jacobite tale of a future Prince of Wales who, born to an Irish mother, leads "his" people in the struggle for land rights and a restored Irish Parliament . Assuming of the defeat of the existing Irish Home Rule movement , and attempting too many reconciliations, it
780-701: A biography of Parnell in 1914 as "Katharine O'Shea (Mrs. Charles Stewart Parnell)". Though to her friends she was known as 'Katie', Parnell's enemies and the press called her "Kitty O'Shea". At that time 'kitty', as well as being a common short form of Catherine/Katherine/Katharine, was also a slang term for a prostitute . She lived the rest of her life in relative obscurity and is buried in Littlehampton , West Sussex , England. Her daughter by Parnell, Claire O'Shea (1883–1909), married Bertram Sydney Osmund Maunsell, and their only son, Assheton Clare Bowyer-Lane Maunsell (1909–34), died of enteric fever while serving with
910-556: A century, with the migrations of the Celts being one of the more enduring themes of archaeological and linguistic studies. The most recent genetic research strongly associates the spread of Indo-European languages (including Celtic) through Western Europe with a people bringing a composite Beaker culture , with its arrival in Britain and Ireland dated to around the middle of the third millennium BC. According to John T. Koch and others, Ireland in
1040-476: A matter for speculation. He may have had political motives. Alternatively, it was claimed that he had been hoping for an inheritance from Katharine's rich aunt whom he had expected to die earlier, but when she died in 1889, aged 97, her money was left in trust to cousins. After the divorce the court awarded custody of Katharine O'Shea and Parnell's two surviving daughters to her ex-husband. Katharine's November divorce proceedings from Captain O'Shea, in which Parnell
1170-530: A new language and culture introduced directly by migration and genetic replacement). The earliest written records of Ireland come from classical Greco-Roman geographers. Ptolemy in his Almagest refers to Ireland as Mikra Brettania ("Little Britain"), in contrast to the larger island, which he called Megale Brettania ("Great Britain"). In his map of Ireland in his later work, Geography , Ptolemy refers to Ireland as Iouernia and to Great Britain as Albion . These 'new' names were likely to have been
1300-746: A part of the United Kingdom. Northern Ireland saw much civil unrest from the late 1960s until the 1990s . This subsided following the Good Friday Agreement in 1998. In 1973, both the Republic of Ireland and the United Kingdom, with Northern Ireland as part of it, joined the European Economic Community . Following a referendum vote in 2016, the United Kingdom, Northern Ireland included, left the European Union (EU) in 2020. Northern Ireland
1430-529: A plaque mounted on Omagh Library, 1 Spillar's Place, Omagh, Co Tyrone. Ireland in Europe (dark grey) Ireland ( / ˈ aɪər l ə n d / IRE -lənd ; Irish : Éire [ˈeːɾʲə] ; Ulster-Scots : Airlann [ˈɑːrlən] ) is an island in the North Atlantic Ocean , in north-western Europe . It is separated from Great Britain to its east by
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#17331052988321560-450: A platform to James Connolly : "Socialism and Nationalism", his argument that without a creed capable of challenging the rule of the capitalist, landlord and financier, the nationalism of "Irish Language movements, Literary Societies or Commemoration Committees" would achieve little. Connolly was allowed further submissions, and Milligan published appreciative letters from readers. Yet while expressing "full sympathy with Mr Connolly's views on
1690-559: A political reality until the Viking Age and even then was not a consistent one. Ireland did have a culturally unifying rule of law: the early written judicial system, the Brehon Laws , administered by a professional class of jurists known as the brehons . The Chronicle of Ireland records that in 431, Bishop Palladius arrived in Ireland on a mission from Pope Celestine I to minister to
1820-493: A republican rebellion inspired and led by the Society of United Irishmen , with the aim of creating an independent Ireland. Despite assistance from France the rebellion was put down by British and Irish government and yeomanry forces. The rebellion lasted from the 24th of May to the 12th of October that year and saw the establishment of the short lived Irish Republic (1798) in the province on Connacht . It saw numerous battles across
1950-757: A strife as ours; but this method of bomb throwing and blowing up buildings, without aim or reason other than the mere desire for vengeance is imbecile and wrong. This was not the light in which she saw the 1916 Easter Rising . Following close upon the death of her parents and her sister Charlotte (whom she had been nursing in London), the insurrection in Dublin, and the executions and loss of Connolly, Tomas MacDonagh and others she had known, affected her deeply. In London she visited Casement in detention. They had been together in Larne in April 1914 after unionists had run German guns through
2080-731: A teacher and 1888 secured a position as a Latin instructor at the MacKikkip's Ladies Collegiate School in Derry . It is here that she first became interested in Irish , the once majority language that as a child she had heard spoken only by farm hands. In 1891 she took a further position in Dublin . Unable, until the formation in 1893 of the Gaelic League , to find any school or group to teach Irish, she took lessons privately, while reading Irish literature and history in
2210-538: Is accepted that such movements are notoriously difficult to identify. Historical linguists are skeptical that this method alone could account for the absorption of Celtic language, with some saying that an assumed processual view of Celtic linguistic formation is 'an especially hazardous exercise'. Genetic lineage investigation into the area of Celtic migration to Ireland has led to findings that showed no significant differences in mitochondrial DNA between Ireland and large areas of continental Europe, in contrast to parts of
2340-605: Is extant in Ireland as a voluntary donation. In turn, Henry assumed the title of Lord of Ireland which Henry conferred on his younger son, John Lackland , in 1185. This defined the Anglo-Norman administration in Ireland as the Lordship of Ireland . When Henry's successor died unexpectedly in 1199, John inherited the crown of England and retained the Lordship of Ireland. Over the century that followed, Norman feudal law gradually replaced
2470-643: Is free of extremes in temperature. Much of Ireland was woodland until the end of the Middle Ages . Today, woodland makes up about 10% of the island, compared with a European average of over 33%, with most of it being non-native conifer plantations. The Irish climate is influenced by the Atlantic Ocean and thus very moderate, and winters are milder than expected for such a northerly area, although summers are cooler than those in continental Europe. Rainfall and cloud cover are abundant. Gaelic Ireland had emerged by
2600-586: Is from Ferriter's Cove , County Kerry , where a flint knife, cattle bones and a sheep's tooth were carbon-dated to c. 4,350 BC. Field systems were developed in different parts of Ireland, including at the Céide Fields , that has been preserved beneath a blanket of peat in present-day Tyrawley . An extensive field system , arguably the oldest in the world, consisted of small divisions separated by dry-stone walls . The fields were farmed for several centuries between 3,500 BC and 3,000 BC. Wheat and barley were
2730-561: Is unclear. However, a number of finds of Roman coins have been made, for example at the Iron Age settlement of Freestone Hill near Gowran and Newgrange . Ireland continued as a patchwork of rival kingdoms; however, beginning in the 7th century, a concept of national kingship gradually became articulated through the concept of a High King of Ireland . Medieval Irish literature portrays an almost unbroken sequence of high kings stretching back thousands of years, but some modern historians believe
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#17331052988322860-676: The Lebor Gabála Érenn , a medieval Christian pseudo-history of Ireland, along with the presence of Celtic culture, language and artefacts found in Ireland such as Celtic bronze spears, shields, torcs and other finely crafted Celtic associated possessions. The theory holds that there were four separate Celtic invasions of Ireland. The Priteni were said to be the first, followed by the Belgae from northern Gaul and Britain. Later, Laighin tribes from Armorica (present-day Brittany) were said to have invaded Ireland and Britain more or less simultaneously. Lastly,
2990-608: The Act of Settlement 1701 . Daniel O'Connell led a subsequent campaign, for the repeal of the Act of Union, which failed. Later in the century, Charles Stewart Parnell and others campaigned for autonomy within the Union, or " Home Rule ". Unionists, especially those located in Ulster, were strongly opposed to Home Rule, which they thought would be dominated by Catholic interests. After several attempts to pass
3120-624: The Duke of Wellington . Steering the Catholic Relief Bill through Parliament, aided by future prime minister Robert Peel , Wellington prevailed upon a reluctant George IV to sign the Bill and proclaim it into law. George's father had opposed the plan of the earlier Prime Minister, Pitt the Younger , to introduce such a bill following the Union of 1801, fearing Catholic Emancipation to be in conflict with
3250-573: The Fenian chief, veteran of the 1867 Rising , "favoured the authoress by appearing [on stage] amongst the band of warriors [Fianna] feasting at the banquet board". The reviewer of the Dublin edition of the Daily Express concluded that "if the aim of the Irish Literary Theatre is to create a national drama", it was "obvious" that Miss Milligan's method was "the proper road" to follow. Yeats, who
3380-420: The Fenian dynamite campaign of the 1880s, she rejected. In the October 1896 issue of Shan Van Vocht , she had condemned the use of dynamite methods: Those who would stoop to suggest, or organise, or carry out anything of the sort, degrade the name of their country, and in the eyes of the whole world render her less worthy of Nationhood. [...] Stern and terrible deeds are often done and may justly be done in such
3510-511: The IRB persuaded Milligan and Johnston that after forty issues it was time to pass the project on. Shan Van Vocht's subscription list was passed to Arthur Griffith and his new weekly, the United Irishman , organ of Cumann na nGaedheal the forerunner of Sinn Féin . Milligan's "romantic visions were of marching soldiers and green flags flying". What others regarded as revolutionary violence,
3640-539: The Irish parliament passed the Statutes of Kilkenny in 1367. These were a set of laws designed to prevent the assimilation of the Normans into Irish society by requiring English subjects in Ireland to speak English, follow English customs and abide by English law. By the end of the 15th century, central English authority in Ireland had all but disappeared, and a renewed Irish culture and language, albeit with Norman influences,
3770-583: The Milesians ( Gaels ) were said to have reached Ireland from either northern Iberia or southern Gaul. It was claimed that a second wave named the Euerni, belonging to the Belgae people of northern Gaul, began arriving about the sixth century BC. They were said to have given their name to the island. The theory was advanced in part because of the lack of archaeological evidence for large-scale Celtic immigration, though it
3900-654: The National Library . Milligan's command of Irish was never fluent, and on that basis Patrick Pearse was to object when, in 1904, the Gaelic League hired her as a travelling lecturer. With the help of costumed tableaux vivants evoking Irish historical or literary subjects (a skill she first acquired when commissioned to assist with the Irish exhibit at the 1893 Chicago World Fair ), Milligan proved herself by establishing new branches throughout Ireland and raising funds along
4030-748: The North Channel , the Irish Sea , and St George's Channel . Ireland is the second-largest island of the British Isles , the third-largest in Europe, and the twentieth-largest in the world. Geopolitically, the island is divided between the Republic of Ireland (officially named Ireland ), a sovereign state covering five-sixths of the island, and Northern Ireland , which is part of the United Kingdom . As of 2022,
Alice Milligan - Misplaced Pages Continue
4160-526: The Oisin legend , it was a Greek stage invocation of the twilight of pre-Christian Ireland. The play's lack of action and use of music (provided by her sister Charlotte) created moments of "picturesque stillness" on stage suggestive of the tableaux vivant which Milligan mounted on tour for the Gaelic League. At one such moment, John O'Leary , provided "an extraordinary uniting of past and present, legendary and historical.". The Freeman's Journal reported that
4290-468: The Protestant Ascendancy . The " Great Frost " struck Ireland and the rest of Europe between December 1739 and September 1741, after a decade of relatively mild winters. The winters destroyed stored crops of potatoes and other staples, and the poor summers severely damaged harvests. This resulted in the famine of 1740 . An estimated 250,000 people (about one in eight of the population) died from
4420-582: The Shan Van Vocht , a daring little paper". The formula was similar to that which had launched the Gavan Duffy's Young Ireland paper in the 1840s. Like The Nation , The Shan Van Vocht offered a mixture of poetry, serialised fiction, Irish history, political analysis and announcements. The second issue (Belfast, February 1896) contained the following: "America ... Oh mighty foster land" (poem); "The Captain’s Daughter" (a serial written by Milligan under
4550-580: The Sheares " (United Irishmen); "Our National Language"; " James Clarence Mangan "; "Reviews – The life of Owen Roe O'Neill (the rebel Ulster chieftain), The Life and Writings of Fintan Lalor " (prophet of the Land War ); "Our Notebook’" (diary and announcements); "The Moonlighters Hound" (poem); "For the Old Land" (review of different agencies advancing the national cause). The very first issue, January 1896, had given
4680-735: The Wars of the Three Kingdoms and the Williamite War . Irish losses during the Wars of the Three Kingdoms (which, in Ireland, included the Irish Confederacy and the Cromwellian conquest of Ireland ) are estimated to include 20,000 battlefield casualties. 200,000 civilians are estimated to have died as a result of a combination of war-related famine, displacement, guerrilla activity and pestilence throughout
4810-404: The civil war that followed, she also sided with Éamon de Valera in rejecting the 1921 Anglo-Irish Treaty , refusing dominion status and Partition in lieu of the republic. While her parents were tolerant of her views, Milligan's childhood community excluded her. At the same time she found that in nationalist circles her Protestant background could count against her. What won over many over
4940-506: The population of the entire island is just over 7 million, with 5.1 million in the Republic of Ireland and 1.9 million in Northern Ireland, ranking it the second-most populous island in Europe after Great Britain. The geography of Ireland comprises relatively low-lying mountains surrounding a central plain, with several navigable rivers extending inland. Its lush vegetation is a product of its mild but changeable climate which
5070-638: The 17th century left a deep sectarian division in Ireland. Religious allegiance now determined the perception in law of loyalty to the Irish King and Parliament. After the passing of the Test Act 1672 , and the victory of the forces of the dual monarchy of William and Mary over the Jacobites , Roman Catholics and nonconforming Protestant Dissenters were barred from sitting as members in the Irish Parliament. Under
5200-491: The 1st century AD. The island was Christianised from the 5th century onwards. During this period Ireland was divided into many petty kingships under provincial kingships (Cúige "fifth" of the traditional provinces) vying for dominance and the title of High King of Ireland . In the late 8th century to early 11th century AD Viking raids and settlement took place culminating in the Battle of Clontarf on 23 April 1014 which resulted in
5330-583: The 9th century, waves of Viking raiders plundered Irish monasteries and towns. These raids added to a pattern of raiding and endemic warfare that was already deep-seated in Ireland. The Vikings were involved in establishing most of the major coastal settlements in Ireland: Dublin , Limerick , Cork , Wexford , Waterford , as well as other smaller settlements. On 1 May 1169, an expedition of Cambro-Norman knights, with an army of about 600 men, landed at Bannow Strand in present-day County Wexford . It
Alice Milligan - Misplaced Pages Continue
5460-605: The British Army in India. Katharine’s other daughter by Parnell, Katharine O'Shea (1884–1947), married Arthur Moule of the East Lancashire Regiment ; she died in an asylum. Henry Harrison , who had acted as Parnell's bodyguard and aide-de-camp, devoted himself after Parnell's death to the service of his widow, Katharine. From her he heard a different version of the events surrounding the divorce from that which had appeared in
5590-692: The English church at the time, the Catholic Church , was published in 1216 and the Parliament of Ireland was founded in 1297. From the mid-14th century, after the Black Death , Norman settlements in Ireland went into a period of decline. The Norman rulers and the Gaelic Irish elites intermarried and the areas under Norman rule became Gaelicised . In some parts, a hybrid Hiberno-Norman culture emerged. In response,
5720-522: The English labour" no less debilitating than the courtship of English Liberals had proved for the Irish Parliamentary Party . "Freedom's boon" had to be won at home. Milligan's ideal remained United Irishmen's appeal to nation above both creed and class. It suffused the journal's literary features and, not least, her own particular genre of "across-the-divide" romances. Her serialised "The Little Green Slippers" "melds patriotic and erotic desire". A young society woman in Protestant Belfast, forced in wake of
5850-455: The English language, and sports such as association football , rugby , horse racing , golf , and boxing . The names Ireland and Éire derive from Old Irish Ériu , a goddess in Irish mythology first recorded in the ninth century. The etymology of Ériu is disputed but may derive from the Proto-Indo-European root * h2uer , referring to flowing water. During the last glacial period , and until about 16,000 BC, much of Ireland
5980-406: The Gaelic Brehon Law across large areas, so that by the late 13th century the Norman-Irish had established a feudal system throughout much of Ireland. Norman settlements were characterised by the establishment of baronies, manors, towns and the seeds of the modern county system. A version of Magna Carta (the Great Charter of Ireland ), substituting Dublin for London and the Irish Church for,
6110-515: The ILT's successor, the Abbey Theatre had rejected) is based on her unpublished 1893 novel, "The Cromwellians". Characteristically for Milligan it combines the theme of Irish dispossession with a transgressive relationship: between a Cromwellian soldier and the daughter of the Irish family on which he has been quartered. Milligan was unapologetic about the continuous nationalist thread in her writing. In 1893 she had written that Irish art could not exist "in some quiet paradise apart" but only "within
6240-456: The Irish "already believing in Christ". The same chronicle records that Saint Patrick , Ireland's best known patron saint , arrived the following year. There is continued debate over the missions of Palladius and Patrick, but the consensus is that they both took place and that the older druid tradition collapsed in the face of the new religion. Irish Christian scholars excelled in the study of Latin and Greek learning and Christian theology. In
6370-469: The Irish Volunteers' name and opposed Ireland's involvement in the war. The Easter Rising of 1916 was carried out by the latter group together with a smaller socialist militia, the Irish Citizen Army . The British response, executing fifteen leaders of the Rising over a period of ten days and imprisoning or interning more than a thousand people, turned the mood of the country in favour of the rebels. Support for Irish republicanism increased further due to
6500-527: The Late Bronze Age was part of a maritime trading-network culture called the Atlantic Bronze Age that also included Britain, western France and Iberia, and that this is where Celtic languages developed. This contrasts with the traditional view that their origin lies in mainland Europe with the Hallstatt culture . The long-standing traditional view is that the Celtic language, Ogham script and culture were brought to Ireland by waves of invading or migrating Celts from mainland Europe. This theory draws on
6630-467: The McCracken's execution to attend a British Red-Coat ball, secures the devotion of own her beloved rebel, a country Catholic on the run, by scandalously wearing green slippers and black (mourning) crepe. The Donegal writer Seumas MacManus wrote that The Shan Van Vocht "revived Irish nationalism when it was perishing." Leading literary revivalist Padraic Colum credited "a freshness that came from its femininity" (Milligan and Johnston were joined as
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#17331052988326760-442: The National University of Ireland granted her an honorary doctorate. Alice Milligan died in Trichur, County Tyrone, on 13 April 1953, aged 87. She had ended her life in poverty. Her Unionist relatives, she explained to Bigger, were disinclined to give her a helping hand "as they find that my political activities are constrained by financial embarrassment". Visiting her in the late 1940s, the Irish writer and broadcaster Benedict Kiely
6890-411: The North, to the national cause. Together with Johnston and Bulmer (and her son Bulmer Hobson , later also of the IRB), Milligan was drawn into the orbit of Francis Joseph Bigger . Bigger was a wealthy Presbyterian solicitor; like her father an avid antiquarian (he co-edited the journal of the Irish Folklore Society with Milligan's sister Charlotte ); and a celebrated host. To his house, Ard Righ , on
7020-469: The Sea King . and The Dynamite Drummer (an American tourist comments on the grim determination of Ulster Protestants in opposing Home Rule "not to rule themselves"). With the outbreak of war, William volunteered and when discharged by the British Army suffered from what might today be recognised as Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Late in 1921 he received notice that, as a former British officer, he had 24 hours to quit Dublin or be shot. Who sanctioned
7150-497: The United Irishmen in July 1938. That year she was the only woman signatory of a pamphlet issued by the Northern Council for Unity protesting Partition . During the Second World War, after the death of her sister-in-law, Milligan went to live on a farm in County Antrim with her lifelong friend, Eleanor Boyd. Relieved of the burden of caring for sick family members she again wrote poems for the Nationalist press, including The Irish Press edited by her friend, M.J. MacManus. In 1941,
7280-468: The United Kingdom, was not neutral during the Second World War, and Belfast suffered four bombing raids in 1941. Conscription was not extended to Northern Ireland, and roughly an equal number volunteered from Northern Ireland as volunteered from the Republic of Ireland. Katharine O%27Shea Katharine Parnell (née Wood ; 30 January 1846 – 5 February 1921), known before her second marriage as Katharine O'Shea and popularly as Kitty O'Shea ,
7410-434: The United Kingdom, which it immediately exercised. Additionally, Members of the Free State Parliament were required to swear an oath of allegiance to the Constitution of the Irish Free State and make a statement of faithfulness to the king. Disagreements over these provisions led to a split in the nationalist movement and a subsequent Irish Civil War between the new government of the Irish Free State and those opposed to
7540-465: The Y-chromosome pattern. When taking both into account, a study concluded that modern Celtic speakers in Ireland could be thought of as European "Atlantic Celts" showing a shared ancestry throughout the Atlantic zone from northern Iberia to western Scandinavia rather than substantially central European. In 2012, research showed that the occurrence of genetic markers for the earliest farmers was almost eliminated by Beaker-culture immigrants: they carried what
7670-453: The alleged Papal Bull Laudabiliter , issued by an Englishman, Adrian IV , in 1155. The document apparently encouraged Henry to take control in Ireland in order to oversee the financial and administrative reorganisation of the Irish Church and its integration into the Roman Church system. Some restructuring had already begun at the ecclesiastical level following the Synod of Kells in 1152. There has been significant controversy regarding
7800-423: The authenticity of Laudabiliter , and there is no general agreement as to whether the bull was genuine or a forgery. Further, it had no standing in the Irish legal system. In 1172, Pope Alexander III further encouraged Henry to advance the integration of the Irish Church with Rome. Henry was authorised to impose a tithe of one penny per hearth as an annual contribution. This church levy, called Peter's Pence ,
7930-440: The authorities, counterintelligence was a fundamental line of defence. With a regular army of only slightly over seven thousand men at the start of the war, and with limited supplies of modern weapons, the state would have had great difficulty in defending itself from invasion from either side in the conflict. Large-scale emigration marked most of the post-WWII period (particularly during the 1950s and 1980s), but beginning in 1987
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#17331052988328060-445: The authority of bishops and priests. Second, the mishandling of the paedophile scandals humiliated the Church, whose bishops seemed less concerned with the victims and more concerned with covering up for errant priests. Third, prosperity brought hedonism and materialism that undercut the ideals of saintly poverty. The financial crisis that began in 2008 dramatically ended this period of boom. GDP fell by 3% in 2008 and by 7.1% in 2009,
8190-504: The beleaguered leader of Irish nationalism at a public meeting "beaten and ashamed" by the furore created by his being named in a divorce case (his affair with Kitty O'Shea ). In the poem "At Maynooth " she scathingly contrasts the private life of George V , in 1911 rapturously received at the Catholic seminary by Cardinal Logue , to that of the man once hailed as Ireland's "uncrowned King". Fascinated by Parnell and his non-denominational nationalism, Milligan followed his appearances across
8320-460: The book her father offered that "patriotism … far from being an irrational sentiment is entirely rational and desirable from a utilitarian point of view. It is as much so from a Christian standpoint. By living in our own land and doing our best to benefit it, we can best carry out the command 'Do unto others as you would that they should do to you'". After a year studying in English history and literature at King's College, London , Milligan trained as
8450-439: The city was at the end of the nineteenth century". Meanwhile, attitudes on the nationalist side persuaded Milligan to launch (through the IWA) a separate Women's Centenary Union. As a woman she found that she was being barred from Centenary meetings, and that these were being appropriated by local politicians to solicit Catholic votes. On April 6, 1897, she beseeched readers of The Shan Van Vocht : "Is it too much to ask [...] that
8580-437: The city, sketching him as she went. This, she conceded, represented a sea-change in her political consciousness. Until then she described herself (despite her father's relative liberalism) as still very much a product of a "Tory and Protestant" upbringing, blinded to the literature and history of her native land by her formal education. In May 1891 she noted in her diary: "While in the tram going up O’Connell Street I turned into
8710-514: The descendants of the "Protestant leaders and peasants" who, according to Milligan, had sealed Tone's union of creeds on "the battle field and scaffold", effectively restricted any commemorative display to Catholic districts. A processive outing (organised with help of Lyttle) to the grave of Betsy Gray , heroine of the Battle of Ballynahinch , ended in a fracas and the destruction by unionists of her memorial stone. Milligan's emphasis upon Belfast's republican past "served to highlight just how different
8840-556: The development of the linen industry, Ireland was largely passed over by the Industrial Revolution , partly because it lacked coal and iron resources and partly because of the impact of the sudden union with the structurally superior economy of England, which saw Ireland as a source of agricultural produce and capital. The Great Famine of 1845–1851 devastated Ireland, as in those years Ireland's population fell by one-third. More than one million people died from starvation and disease, with an additional million people emigrating during
8970-634: The earliest evidence of human activity in Ireland was dated at 12,500 years ago, demonstrated by a butchered bear bone found in a cave in County Clare . Since 2021, the earliest evidence of human activity in Ireland is dated to 33,000 years ago. By about 8,000 BC, more sustained occupation of the island has been shown, with evidence for Mesolithic communities around the island. Some time before 4,000 BC, Neolithic settlers introduced cereal cultivars , domesticated animals such as cattle and sheep, built large timber buildings, and stone monuments. The earliest evidence for farming in Ireland or Great Britain
9100-401: The economy improved, and the 1990s saw the beginning of substantial economic growth. This period of growth became known as the Celtic Tiger . The Republic's real GDP grew by an average of 9.6% per annum between 1995 and 1999, in which year the Republic joined the euro . In 2000, it was the sixth-richest country in the world in terms of GDP per capita. Historian R. F. Foster argues the cause
9230-460: The emerging Penal Laws , Irish Roman Catholics and Dissenters were increasingly deprived of various civil rights, even the ownership of hereditary property. Additional regressive punitive legislation followed in 1703, 1709 and 1728. This completed a comprehensive systemic effort to materially disadvantage Roman Catholics and Protestant Dissenters while enriching a new ruling class of Anglican conformists. The new Anglo-Irish ruling class became known as
9360-480: The ending of Viking power in Ireland. Following the 12th century Anglo-Norman invasion , England claimed sovereignty. However, English rule did not extend over the whole island until the 16th–17th century Tudor conquest , which led to colonisation by settlers from Britain . In the 1690s, a system of Protestant English rule was designed to materially disadvantage the Catholic majority and Protestant dissenters , and
9490-407: The ensuing pestilence and disease. The Irish government halted export of corn and kept the army in quarters but did little more. Local gentry and charitable organisations provided relief but could do little to prevent the ensuing mortality. In the aftermath of the famine, an increase in industrial production and a surge in trade brought a succession of construction booms. The population soared in
9620-438: The family to Belfast where Milligan was able to attend Methodist College, Belfast , an early pioneer of secondary mixed-sex education . Her first poems were published in the school magazine Eos. Her father, a liberal unionist and well-known antiquarian, organized talks and lectures for the local workingmen's institute and drew his daughter into discussion of history, international affairs and literature. Alice also acknowledged
9750-477: The famine, mostly to the United States and Canada. In the century that followed, an economic depression caused by the famine resulted in a further million people emigrating. By the end of the decade, half of all immigration to the United States was from Ireland. The period of civil unrest that followed until the end of the 19th century is referred to as the Land War . Mass emigration became deeply entrenched and
9880-613: The first attempt in 1799. According to contemporary documents and historical analysis, this was achieved through a considerable degree of bribery, with funding provided by the British Secret Service Office, and the awarding of peerages, places and honours to secure votes. Thus, the parliament in Ireland was abolished and replaced by a united parliament at Westminster in London, though resistance remained, as evidenced by Robert Emmet 's failed Irish Rebellion of 1803 . Aside from
10010-471: The general progress of the expedition. He wanted to re-exert royal authority over the invasion which was expanding beyond his control. Henry successfully re-imposed his authority over Strongbow and the Cambro-Norman warlords and persuaded many of the Irish kings to accept him as their overlord, an arrangement confirmed in the 1175 Treaty of Windsor . The invasion was legitimised by reference to provisions of
10140-623: The geneticist David Reich , who says: "British and Irish skeletons from the Bronze Age that followed the Beaker period had at most 10 per cent ancestry from the first farmers of these islands, with other 90 per cent from people like those associated with the Bell Beaker culture in the Netherlands." He suggests that it was Beaker users who introduced an Indo-European language, represented here by Celtic (i.e.
10270-641: The influence of a family servant, Jane, who conveyed the spirit of her previous mistress Mary Ann McCracken (1770–1866). McCracken was the devoted sister of Henry Joy McCracken , the United Irish leader executed in the wake of the 1798 Rebellion and, to the end of her days in Belfast , an advocate for women and for the poor. As a by-product of their participation together in the Belfast Naturalists' Field Club , Milligan and her father wrote an ethnographic travelogue of Ireland, Glimpses of Erin (1888). In
10400-507: The island with an estimated 30,000 dead. As a direct result of the 1798 rebellion in its aftermath in 1800, the British and Irish parliaments both passed Acts of Union that, with effect from 1 January 1801, merged the Kingdom of Ireland and the Kingdom of Great Britain to create a United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland . The passage of the Act in the Irish Parliament was ultimately achieved with substantial majorities, having failed on
10530-463: The labour and social questions", Milligan opposed the formation of his Irish Socialist Republican Party and refused their invitation to lecture. Milligan's editorials "sidestepped" Connolly's proposal to link socialism and nationalism. Instead she took issue with the suggestion that the new party would seek election to Westminster. If successful, she believed that the ISRP would be led into "an alliance with
10660-549: The latter part of this century and the architectural legacy of Georgian Ireland was built. In 1782, Poynings' Law was repealed, giving Ireland legislative independence from Great Britain for the first time since 1495. The British government, however, still retained the right to nominate the government of Ireland without the consent of the Irish parliament. In 1798, members of the Protestant Dissenter tradition (mainly Presbyterian ) made common cause with Roman Catholics in
10790-403: The leading contributors by Alice Furlong , Katherine Tynan , Margaret Pender and Nora Hopper ) and a nationalism that was northern and never "parliamentarian". Despite the acclaim, the journal's attempt to unify nationalists across region, class, sex and religion proved untenable: no faction or party was prepared to provide enough financial support to sustain it. In April 1899, Mark Ryan of
10920-476: The local names for the islands at the time. The earlier names, in contrast , were likely to have been coined before direct contact with local peoples was made. The Romans referred to Ireland by this name too in its Latinised form, Hibernia , or Scotia . Ptolemy records sixteen nations inhabiting every part of Ireland in 100 AD. The relationship between the Roman Empire and the kingdoms of ancient Ireland
11050-468: The magazine and the formation of reading circles. Agents were found in Dublin, Derry, Glasgow and New York. Within a year subscriptions were also coming in from the Irish diaspora in South Africa, Canada, Argentina and Australia. Maud Gonne , who described Milligan as "small, aggressive and full of observant curiosity", said that she and her friends were "full of almost envious admiration of some numbers of
11180-601: The many carved stone crosses that still dot the island today. A mission founded in 563 on Iona by the Irish monk Saint Columba began a tradition of Irish missionary work that spread Celtic Christianity and learning to Scotland , England and the Frankish Empire on continental Europe after the fall of Rome. These missions continued until the late Middle Ages , establishing monasteries and centres of learning, producing scholars such as Sedulius Scottus and Johannes Eriugena and exerting much influence in Europe. From
11310-800: The monastic culture that followed the Christianisation of Ireland, Latin and Greek learning was preserved in Ireland during the Early Middle Ages in contrast to elsewhere in Western Europe, where the Dark Ages followed the Fall of the Western Roman Empire . The arts of manuscript illumination , metalworking and sculpture flourished and produced treasures such as the Book of Kells , ornate jewellery and
11440-710: The name Iris Olkyrn); "The Lonely One" (poem); "The Rise and Fall of the Fenian Movement of ‘67" (serialised history); "Manus O’Mallaghan and the Fairies" (folklore); "Irish Football Victory"; "On Inisheer’" (poem); "Willie Kane of the “Northern Star”, How He Escaped the Scaffold" (United Irishman); "Irishmen in the Transvaal" (volunteers with the Boers against the British); "The Burial-Place of
11570-541: The noisy field of political warfare". Invoking the memory of Young Ireland, Milligan criticised those in the Literary Revival who "proceeded on purely literary lines" and "lacked the national spirit that had fired the country in [18]48". On the eve of the Great War Milligan was living in Dublin with her younger brother William and his family. They collaborated on two works of fiction, an Irish-Norse saga Sons of
11700-422: The northern shore of Belfast Lough, Bigger attracted the poets and writers of the "Northern Revival" (among them Seumus McManus, Helen Waddell , Herbert Hughes , and Margaret Pender ) as well other prominent culturati . It was at Ard Righ that Milligan first met, among the regular visitors, James Connolly , Roger Casement and W. B. Yeats . Walking with her on Cave Hill above Ard Righ ("holy" to Milligan as
11830-582: The ongoing war in Europe, as well as the Conscription Crisis of 1918 . The pro-independence republican party, Sinn Féin , received overwhelming endorsement in the general election of 1918 , and in 1919 proclaimed an Irish Republic , setting up its own parliament ( Dáil Éireann ) and government. Simultaneously the Volunteers, which became known as the Irish Republican Army (IRA), launched
11960-648: The paper of another commemorative circle, the Henry Joy McCracken Literary Society, the Northern Patriot , but in December 1895 they were dismissed possibly because in three of their four issues they had supported amnesty for Fenian prisoners. In a short period, the two-penny monthly achieved a wide circulation. As touring lecturers for the Irish Women's Association, Milligan and Johnston promoted
12090-624: The political and literary monthly The Shan Van Vocht (1896–1899), and when in Dublin the Irish Literary Theatre 's performed "The Last Feast of the Fianna” (1900), Milligan's interpretation of Celtic legend as national drama. Milligan was one of nine surviving children born to Charlotte Burns, a linen shop assistant, and Seaton Milligan, a commercial drapery salesman in a village outside Omagh , County Tyrone , in 1866. In 1879, promoted by his company to an executive position, her father moved
12220-400: The population continued to decline until the mid-20th century. Immediately prior to the famine the population was recorded as 8.2 million by the 1841 census . The population has never returned to this level since. The population continued to fall until 1961; County Leitrim was the final Irish county to record a population increase post-famine, in 2006. The 19th and early 20th centuries saw
12350-517: The port, a feat Casement told her nationalists would have to match. On August 3, 1916, she was holding vigil outside Pentonville Prison and heard the applause that signalled his execution. Back in Dublin, she contributed plays and poems to a fund-raising campaign for Irish political prisoners. Milligan supported Sinn Féin in the 1918 general election , campaigning for the trade unionist and East Rising veteran Winifred Carney in Belfast. While aghast at
12480-472: The potential defence of Northern Ireland. Despite their country's neutrality, approximately 50,000 volunteers from independent Ireland joined the British forces during the war, four being awarded Victoria Crosses . The German intelligence was also active in Ireland. Its operations ended in September 1941 when police made arrests based on surveillance carried out on the key diplomatic legations in Dublin. To
12610-559: The press, and this was to form the basis of his two books defending Parnell published in 1931 and 1938. They had a major impact on Irish historiography, leading to a more favourable view of Parnell's role in the O’Shea affair. In the film Parnell (1937), O'Shea was played by Myrna Loy . Phyllis Calvert played her in Parnell for Play of the Week (1959). In the television miniseries Parnell and
12740-436: The principal crops. The Bronze Age began around 2,500 BC, with technology changing people's everyday lives during this period through innovations such as the wheel, harnessing oxen , weaving textiles , brewing alcohol and metalworking , which produced new weapons and tools, along with fine gold decoration and jewellery, such as brooches and torcs . How and when the island became Celtic has been debated for close to
12870-406: The relationship. He challenged Parnell to a duel in 1881 and initially forbade his estranged wife to see him, although she said that he encouraged her in the relationship. However, he kept publicly quiet for several years. Although their relationship was a subject of gossip in London political circles from 1881, later public knowledge of the affair in an England governed by " Victorian morality " with
13000-465: The republican order was not established. Leaving her business, an Irish bookshop in Dawson Street, and all her possessions, Milligan fled with her brother first to Belfast and then to England. Milligan and her brother returned to Tyrone in what was now Unionist-controlled Northern Ireland in the 1931. She lived with William, who had secured a minor civil-service position, his wife and paralysed son in
13130-590: The rise of modern Irish nationalism , primarily among the Roman Catholic population. The pre-eminent Irish political figure after the Union was Daniel O'Connell . He was elected as Member of Parliament for Ennis in a surprise result and despite being unable to take his seat as a Roman Catholic . O'Connell spearheaded a vigorous campaign that was taken up by the Prime Minister, the Irish-born soldier and statesman,
13260-485: The scheme was constructed in the 8th century to justify the status of powerful political groupings by projecting the origins of their rule into the remote past. All of the Irish kingdoms had their own kings but were nominally subject to the high king. The high king was drawn from the ranks of the provincial kings and ruled also the royal kingdom of Meath , with a ceremonial capital at the Hill of Tara . The concept did not become
13390-490: The site where Wolfe Tone and McCracken pledged themselves to Irish independence), Yeats disappointed Milligan. He failed “to warm to the least mention of '98". Milligan's passion for "'98" was shared by Bigger (he had a room in Ard Arigh dedicated to the rebellion). Together they sought to organise a Belfast commemoration of the 1798 centenary. Milligan produced a six-penny Life of Theobald Wolfe Tone (Belfast, 1898). However,
13520-465: The six counties of Ulster, which later became Northern Ireland. Before it could be implemented, however, the Act was suspended for the duration of the First World War . The Irish Volunteers split into two groups. The majority, approximately 175,000 in number, under John Redmond , took the name National Volunteers and supported Irish involvement in the war. A minority, approximately 13,000, retained
13650-523: The treaty, led by Éamon de Valera . The civil war officially ended in May 1923 when de Valera issued a cease-fire order. During its first decade, the newly formed Irish Free State was governed by the victors of the civil war. When de Valera achieved power, he took advantage of the Statute of Westminster and political circumstances to build upon inroads to greater sovereignty made by the previous government. The oath
13780-448: The village of Drumragh outside Omagh. Her nephew, of whom she was very fond, died in 1934 aged only 26. William died three years later. Hindered by the regular interception of mail, and obliged to report daily to a police barracks, Milligan described herself to Áine Ceannt as an "interned prisoner". She spoke of the "hostile" "un-Irish" atmosphere of the North at Wexford 's commemoration of
13910-454: The war. A further 50,000 were sent into indentured servitude in the West Indies . Physician-general William Petty estimated that 504,000 Catholic Irish and 112,000 Protestant settlers died, and 100,000 people were transported, as a result of the war. If a prewar population of 1.5 million is assumed, this would mean that the population was reduced by almost half. The religious struggles of
14040-528: The way. In the north, in Ulster , she focused on the more difficult task of recruiting Protestants, working with, among other activists, League president Douglas Hyde , Ada McNeill, Roger Casement , Stephen Gwynn , and Seamus McManus. In Dublin Milligan was witness both to the first stirrings of the Irish cultural renaissance and to the last act in the political career of Charles Stewart Parnell . In June 1891 she saw
14170-516: The women of Ireland, who are not asked to have any opinion whatever as to who shall have the right to speak for Ireland in the British Parliament, should form the Union which an historic occasion demands". The Shan Van Vocht (The "Poor Old Woman" in Irish, the metaphor for Ireland in a rebellion-era ballad) was produced by Milligan and Johnston in the offices of Robert Johnston's timber yard (and often edited at Ard Righ ). They had been editing
14300-693: The women" and to sustain the city's national and literary "prestige". Branches were also established in Moneyreagh (where the Presbyterian minister, Richard Lyttle, convened the Gaelic League), and in Portadown . In 1895 Milligan started writing a regular column for the Irish Weekly Independent entitled "Notes from the North" to remind a Dublin readership of these and other contributions of women, and of
14430-535: The worst year since records began (although earnings by foreign-owned businesses continued to grow). The state has since experienced deep recession, with unemployment, which doubled during 2009, remaining above 14% in 2012. Northern Ireland resulted from the division of the United Kingdom by the Government of Ireland Act 1920 , and until 1972 was a self-governing jurisdiction within the United Kingdom with its own parliament and prime minister. Northern Ireland, as part of
14560-473: Was a combination of a new sense of initiative and the entry of American corporations. He concludes the chief factors were low taxation, pro-business regulatory policies, and a young, tech-savvy workforce. For many multinationals, the decision to do business in Ireland was made easier still by generous incentives from the Industrial Development Authority . In addition European Union membership
14690-506: Was abolished and in 1937 a new constitution was adopted. This completed a process of gradual separation from the British Empire that governments had pursued since independence. However, it was not until 1949 that the state was declared, officially, to be the Republic of Ireland . The state was neutral during World War II , but offered clandestine assistance to the Allies , particularly in
14820-524: Was again dominant. English Crown control remained relatively unshaken in an amorphous foothold around Dublin known as The Pale , and under the provisions of Poynings' Law of 1494, Irish Parliamentary legislation was subject to the approval of the English Privy Council . The title of King of Ireland was re-created in 1542 by Henry VIII , the then King of England , of the Tudor dynasty . English rule
14950-570: Was also the niece of both Western Wood MP (1804–1863) and Lord Hatherley , Gladstone 's first Liberal Lord Chancellor . In 1867, Katharine married Captain William O'Shea , a Catholic Nationalist MP for County Clare from whom she separated around 1875. Katharine first met Parnell in 1880 and began an affair with him. Three of Katharine's children were fathered by Parnell; the first, Claude Sophie, died early in 1882. The others were Claire (born 1883) and Katharine (born 1884). Captain O'Shea knew about
15080-550: Was an English woman of aristocratic background whose adulterous relationship with Irish nationalist Charles Stewart Parnell led to a widely publicised divorce in 1890 and his political downfall. Katharine was born in Braintree, Essex , on 30 January 1846, the daughter of Emma Caroline Wood and Sir John Page Wood, 2nd Baronet (1796–1866), and granddaughter of Sir Matthew Wood , a former Lord Mayor of London . She had an elder brother who became Field Marshal Sir Evelyn Wood and
15210-542: Was extended during the 18th century. With the Acts of Union in 1801, Ireland became a part of the United Kingdom . A war of independence in the early 20th century was followed by the partition of the island , leading to the creation of the Irish Free State , which became increasingly sovereign over the following decades until it declared a republic in 1948 ( Republic of Ireland Act, 1948) and Northern Ireland, which remained
15340-592: Was granted a limited special status and allowed to operate within the EU single market for goods without being in the European Union. Irish culture has had a significant influence on other cultures, especially in the field of literature . Alongside mainstream Western culture , a strong indigenous culture exists, as expressed through Gaelic games , Irish music , Irish language , and Irish dance . The island's culture shares many features with that of Great Britain, including
15470-475: Was helpful, giving the country lucrative access to markets that it had previously reached only through the United Kingdom, and pumping huge subsidies and investment capital into the Irish economy. Modernisation brought secularisation in its wake. The traditionally high levels of religiosity have sharply declined. Foster points to three factors: First, Irish feminism, largely imported from America with liberal stances on contraception, abortion and divorce, undermined
15600-491: Was her undeniable role in the cultural revival. Milligan's contemporary and fellow poet, Susan Langstaff Mitchell , wrote of her in 1919: In almost every one of the national and intellectual activities in Ireland now known to everyone – the Gaelic Revival, the dramatic movement, the literary renaissance – this indefatigable Irish girl was there at the start of them. She was lecturing for the Gaelic League all over Ireland, she
15730-550: Was led by Richard de Clare , known as 'Strongbow' owing to his prowess as an archer. The invasion, which coincided with a period of renewed Norman expansion, was at the invitation of Dermot Mac Murrough , King of Leinster . In 1166, Mac Murrough had fled to Anjou , France, following a war involving Tighearnán Ua Ruairc , of Breifne , and sought the assistance of the Angevin King Henry II , in recapturing his kingdom. In 1171, Henry arrived in Ireland in order to review
15860-485: Was less convinced. Not least because of the comparison with Davis's heavy-laden patriotic verse, he advised her to stick to drama. From 1898, in short succession Milligan wrote eleven plays staged by Maud Gonne 's Inghinidhe na hÉireann (Daughters of Ireland), the Gaelic League and Irish Literary Theatre . In February 1901, the ILT performed “The Last Feast of the Fianna” in Dublin's Gaiety Theatre . Depicting an episode in
15990-553: Was named as co-respondent , led to Parnell being deserted by a majority of his Irish Parliamentary Party and to his downfall as its leader in December 1890. Catholic Ireland felt a sense of shock when Katharine broke the vows of her previous marriage by marrying Parnell on 25 June 1891. With both his political life and his health essentially ruined, Parnell died in her arms of pneumonia at the age of 45 on 6 October 1891 in Hove , less than four months after their marriage. Katharine published
16120-563: Was not well received in the nationalist press. In 1893 Milligan returned to Belfast. She lived with Anna Johnston (later to write under the name, Ethna Carbery ), the daughter of Robert Johnston, a leading member of the Irish Republican Brotherhood . Together with their next-door neighbour, the English-born suffragist Mary Ann Bulmer, they founded the Irish Women's Association (IWA) in Belfast both to spread "national ideas among
16250-429: Was periodically covered in ice. The relative sea level was less than 50m lower resulting in an ice bridge (but not a land bridge ) forming between Ireland and Great Britain. By 14,000 BC this ice bridge existed only between Northern Ireland and Scotland and by 12,000 BC Ireland was completely separated from Great Britain. Later, around 6,100 BC, Great Britain became separated from continental Europe. Until recently,
16380-625: Was reinforced and expanded in Ireland during the latter part of the 16th century, leading to the Tudor conquest of Ireland . A near-complete conquest was achieved by the turn of the 17th century, following the Nine Years' War and the Flight of the Earls . This control was consolidated during the wars and conflicts of the 17th century, including the English and Scottish colonisation in the Plantations of Ireland ,
16510-545: Was saddened "to think that to be poor, lonely and smoke-dried should be the lot of a poet at the end of it all". In 1914, acknowledging Milligan as "a northern Protestant woman who had denounced the unionist Anglo-centric doctrine of her upbringing", Tomas MacDonagh described hers as "a cultural practice that gave voice to those (like herself) who were so often confined to the footnotes of colonial history". During 2010/2011 Ulster History Circle mounted plaques for famous Ulster figures. Charlotte Milligan Fox and Alice Milligan have
16640-520: Was then a new Y-chromosome R1b marker, believed to have originated in Iberia about 2,500 BC. The prevalence amongst modern Irish men of this mutation is a remarkable 84%, the highest in the world, and closely matched in other populations along the Atlantic fringes down to Spain. A similar genetic replacement happened with lineages in mitochondrial DNA. This conclusion is supported by recent research carried out by
16770-532: Was working with George Moore on a comparable project ( Diarmuid and Grania ), did allow that the play "touched the heart as some greater drama on some foreign theme would not". But Augusta Gregory , with whom Yeats had established the ILT, was entirely dismissive. She found the language of the long soliloquies "intolerable" and the overall effect "tawdry". In 1905 the Cork National Players performed Milligan's “The Daughter of Donagh”. The melodrama (which
16900-596: Was writing plays and staging them [...] and she was [repeating the judgement of editor and critic, George Russell]. the most successful producer of plays before the Abbey Theatre started on its triumphant way. Comparing her to the Young Irelander Thomas Davis , in the Irish Review in September 1914 Tomas MacDonagh described Milligan as "the most Irish of living poets and therefore the best". W.B. Yeats
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