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IRA Army Council Declares War on England

Irish Republican Army (IRA) Army Council and Republican survivors of the Second Dáil declare war on England on January 15, 1939.

On January 12, 1939, the Army Council sends an ultimatum, signed by Patrick Fleming, to British Foreign Secretary Lord Halifax. The communiqué duly informs the British government of “The Government of the Irish Republic” intention to go to “war.” Excerpt from the ultimatum:

“I have the honour to inform you that the Government of the Irish Republic, having as its first duty towards its people the establishment and maintenance of peace and order here, demand the withdrawal of all British armed forces stationed in Ireland. The occupation of our territory by troops of another nation and the persistent subvention here of activities directly against the expressed national will and in the interests of a foreign power, prevent the expansion and development of our institution in consonance with our social needs and purposes, and must cease.”

“The Government of the Irish Republic believe that a period of four days is sufficient notice for your Government to signify its intentions in the matter of the military evacuation and for the issue of your Declaration of Abdication in respect of our country. Our Government reserves the right of appropriate action without further notice if upon the expiration of this period of grace, these conditions remain unfulfilled.”

~ General Headquarters, Dublin, January 12th, 1939, to His Excellency the Rt. Hon. Viscount Halifax, C.G.B.

On Sunday, January 15, with no reply from the British Government, a proclamation is posted in public places throughout Ireland announcing the IRA’s declaration of war on Britain. This proclamation is written by Joseph McGarrity, leader of Clan na Gael in the United States, and is signed by six members of the Army Council: Stephen Hayes, Patrick Fleming, Peadar O’Flaherty, George Oliver Plunkett, Larry Grogan and Seán Russell. The seventh Army Council member, Máirtín Ó Cadhain, refuses to sign as he believes the IRA is not ready to begin the campaign.

This proclamation also calls upon Irishmen both at home and “in Exile” to give their utmost support to compel the withdrawal of the British from the island of Ireland so that a free Irish Republic can be established. As the campaign begins in Britain the same proclamation appears posted around Irish communities in British cities. The proclamation references the December 17, 1938 statement by the group naming itself the “Executive Council of Dáil Éireann, Government of the Republic” and reads:

“On the twenty-third day of April in the year 1916 in the City of Dublin, seven men, who were representative in spirit and outlook and purpose of the Irish Nation that had never yielded to nor accepted the British conquest, set their humble and almost unknown names to the foregoing document that has passed into history, making the names of the seven signatories immortal. These signatures were sealed with the blood of the immortal seven, and of many others who followed them into one of the most gallant fights in the history of the world; and the Irish Nation rose from shame to honour, from humiliation to pride, from slavery to freedom….”

“Unfortunately, because men were foolish enough to treat with an armed enemy within their gates, the English won the peace. Weakness and treachery caused a resumption of the war and the old English tactics of ‘divide and conquer’ were exploited to the fullest extent. Partition was introduced, the country divided into two parts with two separate Parliaments subject to and controlled by the British Government. The armed forces of England still occupy six of our counties in the North and reserve the right ‘in time of war or strained relations’ to reoccupy the ports which they have just evacuated in the southern part of Ireland. Ireland is still tied, as she has been for centuries past, to take part in England’s wars. In the Six Counties, a large number of Republican soldiers are held prisoners by England. Further weakness on the part of some of our people, broken faith and make-believe, have postponed the enthronement of the living Republic, but the proclamation of Easter Week and the declaration of independence stand and must stand for ever. No man, no matter how far he has fallen away from his national faith, has dared to repudiate them. They constitute the rallying centre for the unbought manhood of Ireland in the fight that must be made to make them effective and to redeem the nation’s self-respect that was abandoned by a section of our people in 1923.”

“The time has come to make that fight. There is no need to redeclare the Republic of Ireland, now or in the future. There is no need to reaffirm the declaration of Irish independence. But the hour has come for the supreme effort to make both effective. So in the name of the unconquered dead and the faithful living, we pledge ourselves to that task. We call upon England to withdraw her armed forces, her civilian officials and institutions, and representatives of all kinds from every part of Ireland as an essential preliminary to arrangements for peace and friendship between the two countries; and we call upon the people of all Ireland, at home and in exile, to assist us in the effort we, are about to make, in God’s name, to compel that evacuation and to enthrone the Republic of Ireland.”

Significantly, there is an IRA bomb incident in or around a major British city almost every other day in the first nine months of 1939. During the campaign there are 300 explosions, 10 deaths and 96 injuries.

(From: “IRA Army Council Declare War on England and the Sabotage Campaign (S-Plan) Begins a Day Later,” Stair na hÉireann, https://stairnaheireann.net | Pictured: The aftermath of an IRA bike bomb in Coventry on August 25, 1939)


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Death of Simon Luttrell, 1st Earl of Carhampton

Simon Luttrell, 1st Earl of Carhampton, Anglo-Irish politician who sits in the House of Commons of Great Britain from 1754 to 1780, dies on January 14, 1787.

Luttrell is born in 1713, the second son of Henry Luttrell, of Luttrellstown Castle (whose family had held Luttrellstown Castle and the demesne and adjoining lands since the land had been granted to Sir Geoffrey de Luterel in about 1210 by King John of England) and his wife Elizabeth Jones. His father is a noted commander in the Jacobite Irish Army between 1689 and 1691. He later receives a pardon from the Williamite authorities and is accused by his former Jacobite comrades of having betrayed them. He is murdered when his sedan chair is attacked in Dublin on October 22, 1717.

Luttrell serves as a Member of Parliament in the House of Commons of Great Britain for four constituencies: Mitchell (1755–1761), Wigan (1761–1768), Weobley (1768–1774) and Stockbridge (1774–1780).

On October 13, 1768, Luttrell is created Baron Irnham of Luttrellstown in the Peerage of Ireland. As his title is an Irish peerage, he is able to keep his seat in the British House of Commons. He is elevated to the title of Viscount Carhampton on January 9, 1781, and is made Earl of Carhampton on June 23, 1785. He lives at Four Oaks Hall, Four Oaks, Sutton Coldfield, from 1751 to 1766.

On January 22, 1735, Luttrell marries Judith Maria Lawes, daughter of Sir Nicholas Lawes, Governor of Jamaica and Elizabeth Cotton (née Lawley), by whom he has eight children:

Luttrell’s rakish behaviour earns him the nickname “King of Hell,” with “Hell” being a district of Dublin notorious for its brothels. He reputedly starts the courtesan Mary Nesbitt in her career by seducing her.

Luttrell dies at Four Oaks, Warwick, England, on January 14, 1787. He is buried at Kingsbury, Warwick, England.


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Birth of Father Austin Flannery

Father Austin (Liam) Flannery OP, Dominican priest, editor, publisher and social justice campaigner is born Liam Flannery at Rearcross, County Tipperary, on January 10, 1925.

Flannery is the eldest of seven children produced by William K. Flannery and his wife Margaret (née Butler). He is educated at St. Flannan’s College in Ennis, County Clare, completing his secondary education at Dominican College Newbridge in Newbridge, County Kildare.

Flannery joins the Dominican Order in September 1944, leading to studies in theology at St. Mary’s Dominican Priory in Tallaght, Dublin, and then at Blackfriars Priory in Oxford, England. Joining the Dominicans he chooses the name Austin and is ordained a priest in 1950. He continues his studies at the Pontificium Athenaeum Internationale Angelicum in Rome. After his studies he teaches Latin at Newbridge College in Newbridge, County Kildare, and then theology at Glenstal Abbey in Murroe, County Limerick.

Flannery edits the Dominican bi-monthly journal entitled Doctrine and Life from 1958 to 1988, while at St. Saviour’s Priory, Dublin, where he also serves as prior from 1957 to 1960. He also edits the Religious Life Review. He publishes many English language documents on the Second Vatican Council.

Flannery’s campaigning to end apartheid in South Africa leads to involvement with Kader Asmal, and the founding the Irish Anti-Apartheid Movement, of which he serves as chairman and president. In the late 1960s his campaigning on behalf of the Dublin Housing Action Committee, due to its association with republicans and left-wing activists, leads him to being accused of being a communist. He is dismissed in the Dáil by the then Minister for Finance, Charles Haughey, as “a gullible cleric.”

Flannery dies of a heart attack at the age of 83 on October 21, 2008. He is buried in the Dominican plot at Glasnevin Cemetery in Glasnevin, Dublin.


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Lord Gosford Denounces Protestant Extremists in Armagh

The Governor of County Armagh, Arthur Acheson, 1st Earl of Gosford, gives his opinion of the violence in Armagh which results from the “battle” at a meeting of magistrates on December 28, 1795.

Acheson is born around 1744-45. He is the eldest son of Archibald Acheson, 1st Viscount Gosford, and his wife, the former Mary Richardson. His paternal grandfather is Sir Arthur Acheson, 5th Baronet, and his maternal grandfather is John Richardson of Rich Hill. His father succeeds to the baronetcy in 1748 upon the death of his father and is subsequently created Baron Gosford in 1776 and Viscount Gosford in 1785.

In 1774, Acheson marries Millicent Pole, daughter of Lieutenant-General Edward Pole, who is descended from the Poles of Radbourne Hall in Derbyshire, and Olivia (née Walsh) Pole, a daughter and heiress of John Walsh of Ballykilcavan. The have seven children, two of whom die at a young age.

Acheson is a Member of Parliament (MP) for Old Leighlin from 1783 until 1791. He serves as governor of County Armagh at the time of the Armagh disturbances of 1795 and on December 28 denounces the Protestant extremists:

“It is no secret that a persecution is now raging in this country… the only crime is… profession of the Roman Catholic faith. Lawless banditti (Orange Order) have constituted themselves judges… and the sentence they have denounced… is nothing less than a confiscation of all property, and an immediate banishment.”

Upon the death of his father in 1790, Acheson succeeds to the viscountcy. He is subsequently created Earl of Gosford in February 1806.

Acheson dies on January 14, 1807, at Bath, Somerset, England. His widow, Lady Gosford, dies on November 1, 1825.

(Pictured: “Arthur Acheson (c.1742–1807), 2nd Viscount, 1st Earl of Gosford,” oil on canvas by Gilbert Stuart)


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Birth of Political Economist John Elliott Cairnes

John Elliott Cairnes, Irish-born political economist, is born on December 26, 1823, at Castlebellingham, County Louth. He has been described as the “last of the classical economists.”

Cairnes is the son of William Elliott Cairnes (1787–1863) of Stameen, near Drogheda, and Marianne Woolsey, whose mother is the sister of Sir William Bellingham, 1st Baronet of Castlebellingham. William decides upon a business career, against the wishes of his mother, Catherine Moore of Moore Hall, Killinchy, and becomes a partner in the Woolsey Brewery at Castlebellingham. In 1825, he starts on his own account in Drogheda, making the Drogheda Brewery an unqualified success. He is remembered for his great business capacity and for the deep interest he takes in charity.

After leaving school, Cairnes spends some years in the counting house of his father at Drogheda. His tastes, however, lay altogether in the direction of study, and he is permitted to enter Trinity College Dublin, where he takes the degree of BA in 1848, and six years later that of MA. After passing through the curriculum of Arts, he engages in the study of Law and is called to the Irish bar. But he lacks a desire to pursue the legal profession, and over some ensuing years, he devotes himself to writing in various publications about social and economic questions and treatises that relate to Ireland. He focuses mostly on political economy, which he studies thoroughly.

While residing in Dublin, Cairnes makes the acquaintance of the Archbishop of Dublin Richard Whately, who conceives a very high respect for Cairnes’ character and abilities. In 1856, a vacancy occurs in the chair of political economy at Dublin, founded by Whately, and Cairnes receives the appointment. In accordance with the regulations of the foundation, the lectures of his first year’s course are published. The book appears in 1857 with the title Character and Logical Method of Political Economy. It follows up on and expands John Stuart Mill‘s treatment in the Essays on some Unsettled Questions in Political Economy and forms an admirable introduction to the study of economics as a science. In it the author’s peculiar powers of thought and expression are displayed to the best advantage. Logical exactness, precision of language, and firm grasp of the true nature of economic facts, are the qualities characteristic of this as of all his other works. If the book had done nothing more, it would still have conferred inestimable benefit on political economists by its clear exposition of the true nature and meaning of the ambiguous term law. To the view of the province and method of political economy expounded in this early work the author always remains true, and several of his later essays, such as those on Political Economy and Land, Political Economy and Laissez-Faire, are but reiterations of the same doctrine. His next contribution to economical science is a series of articles on the gold question, published partly in Fraser’s Magazine, in which the probable consequences of the increased supply of gold attendant on the Australian and Californian gold discoveries are analysed with great skill and ability. And a critical article on Michel Chevalier‘s work, On the Probable Fall in the Value of Gold, appears in the Edinburgh Review for July 1860.

In 1861, Cairnes is appointed to the professorship of jurisprudence and political economy in Queens College Galway, and in the following year he publishes his admirable work The Slave Power, one of the finest specimens of applied economic philosophy. The inherent disadvantages of the employment of slave labour are exposed with great fullness and ability, and the conclusions arrived at have taken their place among the recognised doctrines of political economy. The opinions expressed by Cairnes as to the probable issue of American Civil War are largely verified by the actual course of events, and the appearance of the book has a marked influence on the attitude taken by serious political thinkers in England towards the Confederate States of America.

During the remainder of his residence at Galway, Cairnes publishes nothing beyond some fragments and pamphlets, mainly upon Irish questions. The most valuable of these papers are the series devoted to the consideration of university education. His health, at no time very good, is still further weakened in 1865 by a fall from his horse. He is ever afterwards incapacitated from active exertion and is constantly liable to have his work interfered with by attacks of illness.

In 1866 Cairnes is appointed professor of political economy in University College, London. He is compelled to spend the session 1868–1869 in Italy, but on his return continues to lecture until 1872. During his last session he conducts a mixed class, ladies being admitted to his lectures. His health soon renders it impossible for him to discharge his public duties. He resigns his post in 1872 and retires with the honorary title of professor emeritus of political economy. In 1873 his own university confers on him the degree of LL.D.

Cairnes dies at the age of 51 at Blackheath, London, England, on July 8, 1875.


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Birth of Christina Noble, Children’s Rights Campaigner & Charity Worker

Christina Noble OBE, Irish children’s rights campaigner, charity worker and writer, is born on December 23, 1944, in Dublin. She is the founder of the Christina Noble Children’s Foundation in 1989.

Noble’s mother dies when she is ten years old. She is sent to an orphanage and dishonestly told that her three siblings were dead. She escapes and lives rough in Dublin, where she is gang raped. Her baby son is put up for adoption against her will. After discovering the state had lied about the death of her siblings, she locates her brother in England. She moves there to live with him after she turns eighteen. This is where she meets and marries her husband and has three children, Helenita, Nicolas and Androula. She is a victim of domestic violence.

In 1989, Noble visits Vietnam and begins to care for homeless children, after a recurring dream, during the Vietnam War. This leads her to create the Christina Noble Children’s Foundation in the same year. To date, she and the Foundation have helped over 700,000 children in Vietnam and Mongolia.

Noble appears as a castaway on the BBC Radio programme Desert Island Discs on June 15, 1997. She is the subject of This Is Your Life in 2002 when she is surprised by Michael Aspel at a fundraising fashion show and auction in Central London. Despite being from Ireland, she is made an Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE). She is a recipient of the 2014 Women of the Year Prudential Lifetime Achievement Award.

A film about her, Noble, is released on May 8, 2015. The director is Stephen Bradley.


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Birth of Noël Christopher Browne, Irish politician

Noël Christopher Browne, Irish politician who serves as Minister for Health from 1948 to 1951 and Leader of the National Progressive Democrats from 1958 to 1963, is born at Bath Street in Waterford, County Waterford, on December 20, 1915. He holds the distinction of being one of only seven TDs to be appointed to the cabinet on the start of their first term in the Dáil.

Browne grows up in the Bogside area of Derry. The Browne family also lives in Athlone and Ballinrobe for a period of time. His mother Mary Therese (née Cooney) is born in 1885 in Hollymount, County Mayo. His father Joseph Brown, a Royal Irish Constabulary (RIC) sergeant, later works as an inspector for the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children and, partly as a result of this work, all of the Browne family becomes infected with tuberculosis. Both parents die of the disease during the 1920s. His father is the first to die, leaving only £100 behind to support a wife and seven children. Fearing that if she and the children remain in Ireland they will be forced into a workhouse, Mary sells all their possessions and takes the family to London. Within two days of their arrival, Mary is dead, later buried in a pauper’s grave. Of her seven children, six contract tuberculosis. Noël is only one of two Browne children to survive into adulthood after those bouts with TB.

In 1929, Browne is admitted free of charge to St. Anthony’s, a preparatory school in Eastbourne, England. He then wins a scholarship to Beaumont College, the Jesuit public school near Old Windsor, Berkshire, where he befriends Neville Chance, a wealthy boy from Dublin. Neville’s father, the eminent surgeon Arthur Chance, subsequently pays Browne’s way through medical school at Trinity College Dublin.

In 1940, while still a student, Browne suffers a serious relapse of tuberculosis. His treatment at a sanatorium in Midhurst, Sussex is paid for by the Chance family. He recovers, passes his medical exams in 1942, and starts his career as a medical intern at Dr. Steevens’ Hospital in Dublin, where he works under Bethel Solomons. He subsequently works in numerous sanatoria throughout Ireland and England, witnessing the ravages of the disease. He soon concludes that politics is the only way in which he can make an attack on the scourge of tuberculosis.

The poverty and tragedy that had shaped Browne’s childhood deeply affects him. He considers both his survival and his level of education a complete fluke, a stroke of random chance that saved him when he was seemingly destined to die unknown and in poverty like the rest of his family. He finds this completely distasteful and is moved to enter politics as a means to ensure no one else would suffer the same fate that had befallen his family.

Browne joins the new Irish republican party Clann na Poblachta and is elected to Dáil Éireann for the Dublin South-East constituency at the 1948 Irish general election. To the surprise of many, party leader, Seán MacBride, chooses him to be one of the party’s two ministers in the new government. He becomes one of the few TDs appointed a Minister on their first day in Dáil Éireann, when he is appointed Minister for Health.

A ‘White Paper’ on proposed healthcare reforms had been prepared by the previous government, and results in the 1947 Health Act. In February 1948, Browne becomes Minister for Health and starts the reforms advocated by the Paper and introduced by the Act.

The health reforms coincide with the development of a new vaccine and of new drugs (e.g., BCG and penicillin) that help to treat a previously untreatable group of medical conditions. Browne introduces mass free screening for tuberculosis sufferers and launches a huge construction program to build new hospitals and sanitoria, financed by the income and accumulated investments from the Department of Health-controlled Hospital Sweeps funds. This, along with the introduction of Streptomycin, helps dramatically reduce the incidence of tuberculosis in Ireland.

As Minister for Health Browne comes into conflict with the bishops of the Catholic Church and the medical profession over the Mother and Child Scheme. This plan, also introduced by the 1947 Health Act, provides for free state-funded healthcare for all mothers and children aged under 16, with no means test, a move which is regarded as radical at the time in Ireland, but not in the rest of Europe. Virtually all doctors in private practice oppose the scheme, because it would undermine the “fee for service” model on which their income depended.

The Church hierarchy, which controls many hospitals, vigorously opposes the expansion of “socialised medicine” in the Irish republic. They claim that the Mother and Child Scheme interferes with parental rights, and fear that the provision of non-religious medical advice to mothers will lead to birth control contrary to Catholic teaching. They greatly dislike Browne, seeing him as a “Trinity Catholic,” one who has defied the Church’s ruling that the faithful should not attend Trinity College Dublin, which had been founded by Protestants and for many years did not allow Catholics to study there.

Under pressure from bishops, the coalition government backs away from the Mother and Child Scheme and forces Browne’s resignation as Minister for Health. Following his departure from government, he embarrasses his opponents by arranging for The Irish Times to publish Taoiseach John A. Costello‘s and MacBride’s correspondence with the Catholic hierarchy, which details their capitulation to the bishops.

The controversy over the Mother and Child Scheme leads to the fall of the coalition government in which Browne had served as a Minister. But Church opposition to socialised medicine continues under the subsequent Fianna Fáil-led government. The hierarchy does not accept a no-means-test mother-and-infant scheme even when Fianna Fáil reduces the age limit from sixteen years to six weeks, and the government again backs down.

After his resignation as Minister for Health, Browne leaves Clann na Poblachta, but is re-elected to the Dáil as an Independent TD from Dublin South-East in the subsequent election.

Browne joins Fianna Fáil in 1953 but loses his Dáil seat at the 1954 Irish general election. He fails to be selected as a candidate for the 1957 Irish general election and he resigns from the party. He is re-elected at that election for Dublin South-East as an Independent TD.

In 1958, Browne founds the National Progressive Democrats with Jack McQuillan. He holds onto his seat at the 1961 Irish general election, but in 1963, he and McQuillan join the Labour Party, disbanding the National Progressive Democrats. However, he loses his seat at the 1965 Irish general election.

Browne is re-elected as a Labour Party TD at the 1969 Irish general election, again for Dublin South-East. He does not seek a nomination by the Labour Party for the 1973 Irish general election but instead wins a seat in Seanad Éireann for Dublin University. He remains in the Seanad until the 1977 Irish general election, when he gains the Dublin Artane seat as an Independent Labour TD, having again failed to get the Party nomination.

In 1977 Browne is the first Irish parliamentarian to call for law reforms in regard to homosexuality, which is illegal at the time, and in 1979 is one of the few Irish politicians to attend the opening of the Hirschfeld Centre, Dublin’s first full-time LGBT community space.

Upon its formation, Browne joins the new Socialist Labour Party and is briefly its only TD, securing election for Dublin North-Central at the 1981 Irish general election. He retires from politics at the February 1982 Irish general election.

In 1990, a number of left-wing representatives within the Labour Party, led by Michael D. Higgins, approach Browne and suggest that he should be the party’s candidate in the presidential election due later that year. Though in failing health, Browne agrees. However, the offer horrifies party leader Dick Spring and his close associates for two reasons. Firstly, the leadership had secretly decided to run Mary Robinson, a barrister and former senator. Secondly, many around Spring are “appalled” at the idea of running Browne, believing he has “little or no respect for the party” and is “likely in any event to self-destruct as a candidate.” When Spring informs Browne by telephone that the party’s Administrative Council has chosen Robinson over him, Browne hangs up the telephone.

Browne spends the remaining seven years of his life constantly criticising Robinson who had gone on to win the election, thus becoming the seventh President of Ireland, and who is considered highly popular during her term. During the campaign he also indicates support for the rival Fine Gael candidate, Austin Currie.

After retiring from politics, Browne moves with his wife Phyllis to Baile na hAbhann, County Galway. He dies at the age of 81 in the Regional Hospital, Galway, on May 21, 1997. He is buried in a small graveyard near Baile na hAbhann.


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Birth of Sir William Napier, Soldier & Historian

Sir William Francis Patrick Napier, a soldier in the British Army and a military historian, is born on December 17, 1785, at Castletown, near Celbridge, County Kildare.

Napier is the third son of Colonel George Napier and his second wife, Lady Sarah Lennox, seventh daughter of Charles Lennox, 2nd Duke of Richmond, and previously wife of Sir Charles Thomas Bunbury, MP. His elder brothers are General Sir Charles James Napier (1782–1853), the conqueror of Sindh, and General Sir George Thomas Napier (1784–1855), governor of the Cape Colony. He is a first cousin of Charles James Fox and also of Lord Edward FitzGerald.

Educated locally, he enters the British Army as an ensign in the Royal Irish Regiment of Artillery on June 14, 1800. Transferring to the 62nd (Wiltshire) Regiment of Foot, he is promoted to lieutenant on April 18, 1801, but is placed on half pay at the Treaty of Amiens in March 1802. He is promoted to captain in June 1804, transferring to the 43rd (Monmouthshire) Regiment of Foot in August, and in 1806 is sent to Ireland on a recruiting tour, with instructions to recruit men from the militia to serve in the line regiments. In July 1807 he serves with his regiment under the command of General Arthur Wellesley during the successful Second Battle of Copenhagen and is present at the Battle of Køge.

In September 1808 Napier sails with his regiment to Spain, where he serves throughout the Peninsular campaign of Gen. Sir John Moore. He is present at many of the major actions of the later campaigns, including the Combat of the Côa in July 1810, where he is wounded, the Battle of Bussaco on September 27, 1810, and the actions at Pombal and Redinha. At the action at Casal Novo on March 14, 1811, he is severely wounded while leading forward six companies of the 52nd (Oxfordshire) Regiment of Foot in an effort to harass the rearguard of André Masséna‘s army. He later returns to the army, with his wound still open and a bullet lodged near his spine, and is appointed as brigade major to the Portuguese brigade. He takes part in the Battle of Fuentes de Oñoro on May 3-5, 1811, and is promoted to major at the end of the month.

Succumbing to fever, Napier returns to England. During a period of leave, he marries his cousin, Caroline Amelia Fox, daughter of General Henry Edward Fox and niece of Charles James Fox in February 1812. After his leave he returns to Portugal and takes command of the 43rd (Monmouthshire) Regiment of Foot as senior major present. He subsequently serves in the battles of Salamanca on July 22, 1812, Nivelle on November 10, 1813, and Nive on December 10-13, 1813, which is Marshal Jean-de-Diew Soult‘s last attempt to drive the allied army from France. Promoted to lieutenant-colonel in November 1813, he is present at the Battle of Orthez on February 27, 1814, but has to return to England due to wounds and illness. He is subsequently awarded the gold and silver Peninsular medal, with two and three clasps respectively. Arriving too late in France in 1815, he takes no part in the ‘Hundred days’ campaign and retires from the active list in 1819. He is made a Knight Commander of the Order of the Bath (KCB) in the same year.

Napier devotes the rest of his life to historical writing, initially contributing an article to the Edinburgh Review in 1821. In 1823, at the suggestion of Henry Bickersteth, 1st Baron Langdale, he begins writing his History of the War in the Peninsula and the South of France, 1807–1814 (6 vols., 1828–40). This epic work, which runs to several editions, makes use of material supplied by both the Duke of Wellington and the French marshals Soult and Suchet, while papers of Joseph Bonaparte, captured after the Battle of Vittoria, are also made available to him. In July 1830 he is promoted to full colonel. Promoted to major-general in November 1841, he is appointed Lieutenant Governor of Guernsey (1842–47). Appointed colonel of the 27th (Inniskilling) Regiment of Foot in February 1848, he is made a KCB in May 1848.

Napier later publishes several works centred on his brother, Gen. Sir Charles James Napier, after the latter resigns as commander-in-chief in India. These include History of Sir Charles James Napier’s Administration of Scinde (1851) and Life and Opinions of General Sir Charles James Napier (4 vols., 1857). As both of these works seek to vindicate his brother, they are generally seen to be biased in the extreme. Subsequently promoted to lieutenant-general on November 11, 1851, and general on October 17, 1859, he spends his later years troubled by ill health. He dies on February 12, 1860, at his London residence, Scinde House in Clapham, and is buried at West Norwood Cemetery.

There is a fine marble statue of Napier in St. Paul’s Cathedral, London. His letters are in the Bodleian Library, University of Oxford.

(From: “Napier, Sir William Francis Patrick” by David Murphy, Dictionary of Irish Biography, http://www.dib.ie, October 2009)


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Death of Thomas Butler, Viscount Thurles

Thomas Butler, Viscount Thurles, drowns on December 15, 1619, off the coast of The Skerries, Isle of Anglesey. He is the son and heir apparent of Walter Butler, 11th Earl of Ormond (1559–1633), whom he predeceases. He resides at Thurles Castle, Thurles, County Tipperary. He is the father of the Irish statesman and Royalist commander James Butler, 1st Duke of Ormond.

Butler is born the eldest son of Walter Butler and his wife Helen Butler. His father is the 11th Earl of Ormond. His mother is the eldest daughter of Edmund Butler, 2nd Viscount Mountgarret and his wife Grizel FitzPatrick. His father and mother are cousins. Their common great-grandfather is Piers Butler, 8th Earl of Ormond. Their family, the Butler dynasty, is Old English and descends from Theobald Walter, who had been appointed Chief Butler of Ireland by King Henry II of England in 1177.

Some time before 1610, Butler marries Elizabeth Poyntz against his father’s wishes. She is the daughter of Sir John Pointz (died 1633) of Iron Acton in Gloucestershire and his wife Elizabeth Sydenham. He and Elizabeth had seven children, three sons and four daughters:

In 1619 after the beginning of his father’s long imprisonment in the Fleet Prison, Butler is summoned to England to answer charges of treason, specifically, of having garrisoned Kilkenny. However, on December 15 the ship conveying him is wrecked off the coast of The Skerries, Isle of Anglesey and he drowns. Like his father, he is a prominent Catholic and it seems likely that his refusal to conform to the established Anglican religion had angered King James I and may have been the true motive for his summons.

Butler predeceases his father who dies in 1634. His eldest son James, the future 1st Duke of Ormond, succeeds him as heir apparent and bearer of the courtesy title Viscount Thurles until he succeeds his grandfather as the 12th Earl of Ormond.


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Murder of Nicholas Walsh, Church of Ireland Bishop of Ossory

Nicholas Walsh, (Irish: Nicolás Bhailis), Church of Ireland Bishop of Ossory and a pioneer of printing in Irish type, is murdered on December 14, 1585, by James Dullerde, against whom he had proceeded in his court for adultery.

Walsh is born in Waterford, County Waterford, in or before 1538. He is the son of Patrick Walsh, Bishop of Waterford and Lismore (d. 1578). The identity of his mother is unknown. She was Patrick’s concubine for many years and they apparently married only after 1558, meaning their son was born outside marriage. About 1551 Walsh leaves Ireland to study at the universities of Paris, Oxford, and Cambridge, eventually graduating BA at Cambridge in 1562 or 1563. He receives the MA from Cambridge in 1567. He is appointed chancellor of St. Patrick’s Cathedral, Dublin, in 1571.

As a fluent Irish speaker, Walsh is deeply committed to the propagation of the Protestant faith through the medium of the Irish language. In 1571 he helps to secure the publication in Dublin of a catechism written in Irish by John Kearney (Irish: Seán Ó Cearnaigh), whom he has known since his time at Cambridge. He then procures a government order for printing the Book of Common Prayer in Irish, and for the liturgy and a sermon to be communicated in Irish in a church in each large town. In practice this order has no effect. From about 1573 he and Kearney begin work on an Irish translation of the New Testament. This project is finally completed and published in 1602 or 1603. He also writes a collection of sermons in Latin.

In 1572 Walsh is offered the bishopric of Kilmacduagh in Connacht but declines as this diocese lay in a dangerous part of the country. In February 1578 he becomes Bishop of Ossory, upon which he resigns his chancellorship at St. Patrick’s Cathedral and presumably sets aside his translation of the New Testament. Through his family he has links with the area of his diocese, and he is assured of the protection of the dominant magnate, Thomas Butler, Earl of Ormond. However, Catholicism is very strong in Ossory, particularly in the diocesan capital of Kilkenny. His arrival at Kilkenny is ignored by the citizens, and he finds himself presiding over an empty St. Canice’s Cathedral during Sunday services. In November 1578 he writes for support to the Lord Justice of Ireland, Sir William Drury, who empowers Walsh to fine recusants. That month Drury comes to Kilkenny and heavily fines a number of prominent citizens of Kilkenny for recusancy. However, these punitive efforts have little long-term impact and only increased Walsh’s unpopularity.

Walsh is further hampered by a lack of revenues from his diocese, which leads him in April 1581 to seek additional benefices that he can hold in commendam. in July 1582 he seeks a licence to solicit charitable donations in England. He also initiates legal proceedings to recover church property. At a time when the Church of Ireland episcopate is characterised by venality, cynicism, and crypto-Catholicism, he stands head and shoulders above his colleagues owing to his dedication, ability, and evangelising zeal. At the installation of the Bishop of Meath in 1584 he criticises his fellow bishops for neglecting their spiritual duties for political concerns. He is married to an Englishwoman and has four children.

Walsh’s life comes to a violent end on December 14, 1585, when he is stabbed to death in his own house at Kilkenny by James Dullerde, whom he had cited for adultery in his consistory court. He is buried in a tomb in St. Canice’s Cathedral, Kilkenny. Dullerde is caught and beheaded by Domhnall Spanaigh Kavanagh MacMurrough and his brother Cahir Carroughe.

(From: “Walsh, Nicholas (Nicolás Bhailis)” by Anthony M. McCormack and Terry Clavin, Dictionary of Irish Biography, http://www.dib.ie, October 2009 | Pictured: Coat of arms of the Bishop of Ossory)