Colbert is the fourth youngest of thirteen children of Michael Colbert, a farmer, and Honora McDermott. His family moves to the village of Athea when he is three years old. He is educated at the local national school. In 1901, his family is living in the townland of Templeathea West. A younger brother, James, and a cousin, Michael Colbert, later serve as Teachtaí Dála (TDs).
Colbert leaves Athea at the age of 16 and goes to live with his sister Catherine in Ranelagh, County Dublin. He continues his education at a Christian Brothers school in North Richmond Street. He is employed as a clerk in the offices of Kennedy’s Bakery in Dublin. In 1911, he is living with Catherine, two other siblings and two boarders at a house on Clifton Terrace, Rathmines. He is a deeply religious Catholic and refrains from smoking or drinking.
Colbert is sworn into the Irish Republican Brotherhood (IRB) by his cousin Art O’Donnell in Art’s home in 1908. He joins Fianna Éireann at its inaugural meeting in 1909 and rises to Chief Scout. The following year he becomes a drill instructor at St. Enda’s School, founded by Patrick Pearse. In 1912, he becomes head of an IRB circle within the Fianna started by Bulmer Hobson. During 1913 he is one of a number of Fianna who conduct military training at the Forester’s Hall in Rutland Square (now Parnell Square), and in November of that year he joins the Provisional Committee of the newly formed Irish Volunteers.
In the weeks leading up to the Rising, Colbert acts as bodyguard for Thomas Clarke. Before the Rising, because he lives out of the city, he stays with the Cooney family in the city centre. During Easter Week, he fights at Watkin’s Brewery, Jameson’s Distillery and Marrowbone Lane. Thomas MacDonagh surrenders to Brigadier GeneralWilliam Lowe at 3:15 p.m. on Sunday, April 30. MacDonagh then goes around the garrisons under his command to arrange for their surrender.
Colbert surrenders with the Marrowbone Lane Garrison along with the South Dublin Union Garrison, which had been led by Éamonn Ceannt. When the order to surrender is issued, he assumes the command of his unit to save the life of his superior officer, who is a married man.
They are marched to Richmond Barracks, where Colbert is later court-martialed. Transferred to Kilmainham Gaol, he is told on Sunday, May 7, that he is to be shot the following morning. He writes no fewer than ten letters during his time in prison. During this time in detention, he does not allow any visits from his family. Writing to his sister, he says a visit “would grieve us both too much.”
The night before his execution Colbert sends for Mrs. Ó Murchadha, who is also being held prisoner. He tells her he is “proud to die for such a cause. I will be passing away at the dawning of the day.” Holding his Bible, he tells her he is leaving it to his sister. He hands her three buttons from his volunteer uniform, telling her, “They left me nothing else.” He then asks her to say a Hail Mary for the souls of the departed when she hears the volleys of shots in the morning for Éamonn Ceannt, Michael Mallin and himself. The soldier who is guarding the prisoner begins crying according to Mrs. Ó Murchadha, and records him as saying, “If only we could die such deaths.”
The next morning, May 8, 1916, Colbert is shot by firing squad.
Colbert Railway Station in Limerick, Con Colbert Road in Dublin and the Fianna Fáilcumann in the University of Limerick are named in his honor. Colbert Street in his native Athea, County Limerick, is named after him, as is the local community hall. Colbert Avenue and Colbert Park Janesboro, Limerick, are also named after him.
On May 4, 1958, a plaque is erected over a bed in Barringtons Hospital, County Limerick. The plaque has since disappeared.
In May 2016, one hundred years after his execution, a full-scale limestone sculpture of Colbert is unveiled at the gable of his one-time house in Moanleana, County Limerick.
Peter Lacy, Irish-born soldier who later serves in the Imperial Russian Army, is born Pierce Edmond de Lacy into a noble Irish family on September 26, 1678, in Killeedy near Limerick, County Limerick. Considered one of the most successful Russian Imperial commanders before Pyotr Rumyantsev and Alexander Suvorov, in a military career that spans half a century, he claims to have participated in 31 campaigns, 18 battles, and 18 sieges.
Lacy’s first taste of land battle in Russia is the disastrous defeat at Narva, in which he commands a unit of musketeers, holding the rank of poruchik. During the Great Northern War he is seriously wounded on two occasions, also gaining the rank of colonel in 1706. In the same year, Peter the Great gives him command of the Polotskii regiment and three new regiments raising him to colonel status. The following year he leads his brigade at Poltava and in the ensuing battle he greatly distinguishes himself. In the 1708 battle of Rumna, he attacks and captures the headquarters of Charles XII of Sweden. He gains fame at this stage by advising the Czar that musketeers should wait until they were within a few yards of the enemy before opening fire. Prior to this, the Russians were known for uncoordinated fire. From this point begins his fame as a soldier. His next active service, still under Prince Anikita Repnin, is the siege of Riga. He is reputedly the first Russian officer to enter the capital of Livland and he is appointed the first Russian chatelain of Riga Castle in the aftermath.
In 1719, Major General Fyodor Apraksin‘s fleet lands Lacy with 5,000 infantry and 370 cavalry near Umeå in Sweden, where they proceed to devastate a dozen iron foundries and a number of mills. Two years later he leads a similar action against Sundsvall. Soon promoted to General, he enters the Military Collegium, as the Russian Ministry of Defense was then known, in 1723. Three years later, he succeeds Repnin in command of the Russian forces quartered in Livland, and in 1729 he is appointed Governor of Riga. These positions bring him in contact with the Duchess of Courland, who before long ascends the Russian throne as Empress Anna. During her reign, Lacy’s capacity for supreme command is never doubted.
Lacy is one of the first recipients of the Order of Saint Alexander Nevsky when it is established, furthermore, he is given command of all infantries in Saint Petersburg, Ingria and Novgorod. By 1728 he is ranked third of only six full generals in the Russian Army and the only foreigner. As a foreigner, his salary is 3,600 Roubles a year, 15% higher than Russian generals. Higher salaries for foreign-born generals are seen in other ranks too. His signature, even on documents in Cyrillic script, always appear in English and Latin script which suggests he never gains proficiency in the Russian language.
Having saved her from marriage to Saxe, Anna is very familiar with Lacy, and he becomes one of her most trusted generals. The War of the Polish Succession again calls him into the field. In 1733, he and Burkhard Christoph von Münnich expel the Polish king, Stanisław I, from Warsaw to Danzig, which is besieged by them in 1734. Thereupon the Irishman is commanded to march toward the Rhine and join his 13,500-strong contingent with the forces of Eugene of Savoy. To that end, his corps advances into Germany and, meeting the Austrians on August 16, returns to winter quarters in Moravia with exemplary discipline. In 1734, he commands Russian forces at the Siege of Danzig in which French and Polish forces are defeated. Lacy leads the Russians in two other decisive battles of the conflict, Wisiczin and Busawitza. In the latter battle, he is outnumbered ten to one but nevertheless prevails. For this victory, he is awarded Order of the White Eagle. After Busawitza Lacy is ordered to reinforce the Austrians at Mannheim. however, when he reaches Mannheim peace has been declared. He is received by Emperor Charles and Viennese society. On his return from Vienna, he is met by a courier from Saint Petersburg who delivers to him his patent honouring him as Field Marshal.
With the patent of Field Marshal is the news that Russia is at war with Turkey and Lacy is ordered at once to capture Azov Fortress. This he does despite being wounded in the fray. His rival, Burkhard Christoph von Münnich, had been campaigning in the Crimea with little success. Thus, after taking Azov, Lacy is ordered to capture Crimea. He bridges the Sea of Azov at a narrow point near Perekop. Within four days, aided by favourable winds and tides, his entire army crosses it and begins marching on Arabat. The Russians meet the Khan’s much larger Crimean army and rout them in two battles, on June 12 and 14. In 1738, his corps again land in Crimea and take the fortress of Chufut-Kale near the Khan’s capital, Bakhchisaray. For his success in Poland and Crimea he is awarded the Order of St. Andrew.
As soon as peace has been restored, Lacy is reinstated as the Governor of Livland, while Emperor Charles VI confers on him the title of an imperial count. His indifference to politics prevents his downfall following Anna’s death, when other foreign commanders, most notably von Münnich, fall into disgrace and are expelled from active service.
In December 1741, Elizabeth seizes power. Lacy is roused from bed in the early hours of the morning in a test of his loyalty. He is not aware if the men sent to him are from Elizabeth or Grand Duchess Anna. He is asked what party he is of, Anne or Elizabeth, and he answers, “Of the party of the reigning Empress.” A period of unrest follows, and he is called upon to restore order. Most of what is known as the German Faction falls out of favour at this stage. The restoration of order in Saint Petersburg is largely down to the prompt actions of Lacy.
When the Russo-Swedish War breaks out in 1741, the government of Anna Leopoldovna appoints Lacy Commander-in-Chief as the most experienced among Russian generals. He quickly strikes against Finland and wins his last brilliant victory at Lappeenranta in August 1741. His force, however, is poorly supplied and he is forced to withdraw to Saint Petersburg. The following year he rallies his forces and proceeds to capture Hamina, Porvoo and Hämeenlinna, by August encircling more than 17,000 Swedes near Helsinki and effectively bringing the hostilities to an end.
The war over, Lacy withdraws to Riga and resumes the command of the Russian forces stationed in Livland. He administers what is now northern Latvia and southern Estonia until his death on his private estate in Riga on April 30, 1751. His son, Franz Moritz von Lacy, enters the Austrian service in 1743 and becomes one of the most successful imperial commanders of the 18th century and also a Count of the Holy Roman Empire. His nephew, George Browne, is also a general in the Russian army.
Gwynn is appointed first lady registrar of Trinity College Dublin in February 1905. Women had only been admitted to the university the previous year. Despite coming from a family of academics, she had been unable to get a university education herself. She is 39 years old when appointed to her position in the university.
Students describe Gwynn as a pioneer. Her role as women’s registrar is described by one of her charges as “to control our movements to some extent and to protect the college and the students from criticism.”
In 1907, Gwynn is summoned before the Fry Commission on Dublin University to defend the position of women at Trinity. She is supported by the parents of the students. The result is that the commission endorses the principle of women’s admission to the university.
In 1922, the Dublin University Women Graduates’ Association is founded, under Gwynn’s presidency.
Gwynn never marries. As an eldest daughter she is required to assist in the management of her parents’ household and attend to them in their old age. From her mother’s brother, architect Robert Donough O’Brien, she inherits the house he had designed and built at Parteen-a-Lax in County Clare, close to Limerick. It is there that she retires at the end of her working life. Her hobby is tending its beautiful garden which lay next to the River Shannon.
Gwynn dies in County Clare in 1947.
Founded, by subscription, in 1948 in memory of Lucy Gwynn, the Lucy Gwynn Memorial Prize is awarded annually in the Michaelmas term to a Junior Sophister woman student for distinction in her course. The award is made by two women on the university staff nominated by the Board, and one of the female tutors. The value of the prize is €1,207.
Drew is the son of the Rev. Thomas Drew, son of a Limerick grocer, and Isabella Drew (née Dalton), daughter of a Dublin attorney. He is one of four sons and eight daughters of the couple, although most of the children die young. His sister, Catherine Drew, is a prominent Londonjournalist and an early champion of women’s rights.
Drew is trained under Sir Charles Lanyon before moving to work in Dublin, where he becomes principal assistant to William George Murray. In 1865, he becomes the diocesan architect of the united dioceses of Down, Connor and Dromore, and from that point forward Church architecture is his principal activity. He is consulting architect for both St. Patrick’s Cathedral and Christ Church Cathedral in Dublin.
Drew marries Adelaide Anne, sister of William George Murray, in 1871.
From 1885 to 1892, Richard Orpen works with Drew as a managing assistant. Drew’s most significant work in Belfast is St. Anne’s Cathedral, completed in 1899.
Harty is born on August 11, 1867, in Knocknagurteeny, Murroe, County Limerick, the son of Francis Harty and his wife, Johana (née Ryan). He is educated locally and at the Jesuits‘ Crescent College, Limerick. In 1884, he goes to St. Patrick’s College, Thurles, and two years later proceeds to Maynooth College, where he trains for the priesthood. After ordination at Clonliffe College, Dublin, on May 20, 1894, he returns to Maynooth. The following year he is appointed to the chair of philosophy and theology there. However, he defers this for a year while he attends lectures at the Ecclesiastical university in Rome, as one of two professors who has been granted the new privilege of leave of absence on full salary to study abroad.
Back at Maynooth Harty is a prominent member of staff. In 1906, he co-founds the Irish Theological Quarterly, of which he is for many years editor, and is also editor for a time of the Irish Ecclesiastical Record. His contributions to these and other periodicals are numerous and include an essay on the “Sacredness of fetal life” for the Irish Theological Quarterly in 1906. As a founder member of the Maynooth manuscripts publication committee, which runs from 1906 to 1915, he helps oversee the publication of the edition of the Black Book of Limerick (1907) by his colleague James MacCaffrey and of some impressive student publications, including Gadaidhe Géar na Geamh-oidche (1915), a volume of tales from the Fenian cycle from manuscripts in the library. He is appointed senior professor of moral theology but ceases teaching after he is consecrated Archbishop of Cashel on January 18, 1914.
Harty is early involved with the Gaelic Athletic Association – he had been a hurler in his youth – and is a strong supporter of the Irish Parliamentary Party (IPP). In late 1915 he furnishes John Redmond with a letter of support, and a few months later is denouncing the Easter Rising and congratulating the people of Cashel for abstaining from insurrection. Later that year he is involved in a French propaganda drive to boost the war effort in Ireland. As one of the four bishop delegates to the 1917 Irish Convention, he speaks against a Methodist delegate’s call for mixed education. Criticising the Protestant educational system in Belfast, he claims the Catholic church has a right to teach its own children, and effectively closes down the discussion. By April 1918 he has moved toward tacit acceptance of Sinn Féin and is at the forefront of the anti-conscription campaign. In a speech he calls conscription unjust and hypocritical and calls for “every man with a drop of Irish blood in his veins” to sign the protest against it.
On the establishment of the Free State, Harty preaches support for Cumann na nGaedheal, but by the 1930s is closer to Éamon de Valera, and is a strong advocate of protectionism, which he feels will ensure a self-sufficient Ireland of traditional values. In 1933, he applauds the tax set on imported daily papers, as he believes English papers are corrupting the young. At the golden jubilee of the GAA the following year he makes a speech in Cashel calling for Irish industries, Irish music, and Irish dances. As president of the congress committee, he is a key organiser of the massive Eucharistic Congress of 1932. His other great concerns are the foreign missions and the promotion of Catholic literature – he is president of the Catholic Truth Society of Ireland. His practical work for his diocese includes heading a deputation to the minister for agriculture in October 1932 to press Thurles’s claims for the new sugar beet factory. It opens there in December 1934.
Although tall, athletic, and fond of open air, Harty is for many years in poor health and from about 1933 petitions the Holy See for a coadjutor-archbishop. This finally comes about in 1942 when Bishop Jeremiah Kissane of Waterford comes to Cashel as his dean and coadjutor. Four years later Harty dies at his residence in Thurles on September 11, 1946, and is buried at the Cathedral of the Assumption, Thurles. He is survived by a brother and a sister. The GAA ground in his native Murroe is named after him.
(From: “Harty, John” by Bridget Hourican, Dictionary of Irish Biography, www. dib.ie, October 2009)
The Battle of Collooney, also called the Battle of Carricknagat, occurs on September 5, 1798, during the Irish Rebellion of 1798 when a combined force of French troops and Irish rebels defeat a force of British troops outside of Collooney near Sligo.
A long-anticipated French landing to assist the Irish rebellion takes place on August 22, when almost 1,100 troops under the command of General Jean Joseph Amable Humbert land at Kilcummin Strand (Cill Chuimín), Killala Bay, County Mayo. Although the force is small, the remote location ensures an unopposed landing away from the tens of thousands of British soldiers concentrated in the east in Leinster, engaged in mopping up operations against remaining pockets of rebels. The nearby town of Killala is quickly captured after a brief resistance by local yeomen and Ballina is also taken two days later, following the rout of a force of cavalry sent from the town to oppose their march. Irish volunteers begin to trickle into the French camp from all over Mayo following the news of the French landing.
The victory of General Humbert at Castlebar, despite gaining him about 5,000 Irish recruits, does not lead to a renewed outbreak of the rebellion as hoped. A British army of some 26,000 men is assembled under Field MarshalCharles Cornwallis, 1st Marquess Cornwallis, the newly appointed Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, and is steadily moving towards his forces. Abandoning Castlebar, Humbert moves towards Ulster via Sligo with the intention of igniting a rising there.
The combined Franco-Irish forces march northeast towards Sligo on their way to County Donegal in Ulster. When they get to the village of Collooney they are confronted by a unit of British troops from the garrison in Sligo, which is approximately five miles to the north of Collooney. A minor battle ensues at Carricknagat, a small townland to the immediate north of Collooney, hence the alternate name for the battle: the Battle of Carricknagat.
On September 5, 1798, the Franco-Irish troops push north through County Sligo but are halted by a cannon which the British forces have installed above Union Rock near Collooney.
A young Irish aide to General Humbert, LieutenantBartholomew Teeling, distinguishes himself during the encounter. Teeling clears the way for the advancing Irish-French army by single-handedly disabling a British gunnery post located high on Union Rock when he breaks from the French ranks and gallops toward the gunner’s position. Teeling is armed with a pistol and he shoots the cannon’s marksman and captures the cannon. After the loss of the cannon position, the French and Irish advance and the British retreat toward their barracks at Sligo, leaving 120 dead and 100 prisoners.
Colonel Charles Vereker, who commands the Limerick militia in the standoff, is awarded a peerage for his role in the battle.
In 1898, the centenary year of the battle, a statue of Teeling is erected in Carricknagat. Johnnie Woods of Aughamore, Sligo, County Sligo, a far-famed reliable scaffolder, erects the spire for this monument.
Talbot is born likely in 1630, probably in Dublin. He is one of sixteen children, the youngest of eight sons of William Talbot and his wife Alison Netterville. His father is a lawyer and the 1st Baronet Talbot of Carton, County Kildare. His mother is a daughter of John Netterville of Castletown, Kildare. The Talbots are descended from a Norman family that had settled in Leinster in the 12th century. They adhere to the Catholic faith, despite the founding of the Reformed Church of Ireland under Henry VIII. Little is recorded of Talbot’s upbringing. As an adult he grows to be unusually tall and strong by standards of the time.
Talbot marries Katherine Baynton in 1669, and they have two daughters, Katherine and Charlotte. Katherine dies in 1679. In 1681, he marries Frances Jennings, sister of Sarah Jennings, the future Sarah Churchill, Duchess of Marlborough.
Talbot’s early career is spent as a cavalryman in the Irish Confederate Wars. Following a period on the European continent, he joins the court of James, Duke of York, then in exile following the English Civil War, becoming a close and trusted associate. After the 1660 restoration of James’s older brother, Charles, to the thrones of England, Ireland and Scotland, he begins acting as agent or representative for Irish Catholics attempting to recover estates confiscated after the Cromwellian conquest, a role that defines the remainder of his career. James converts to Catholicism in the late 1660s, strengthening his association with Talbot.
When James takes the throne in 1685, Talbot’s influence increases. He oversees a major purge of Protestants from the Irish Army, which had previously barred most Catholics. James creates him Earl of Tyrconnell and later makes him Viceroy, or Lord Deputy of Ireland. He immediately begins building a Catholic establishment by admitting Catholics to many administrative, political and judicial posts.
Talbot’s efforts are interrupted by James’s 1688 deposition by his Protestant son-in-law William of Orange. He continues as a Jacobite supporter of James during the subsequent Williamite War in Ireland, but also considers a peace settlement with William that would preserve Catholic rights. Increasingly incapacitated by illness, he dies of a stroke on August 14, 1691, shortly before the Jacobite defeat. He is thought to have been buried in St. Mary’s Cathedral, Limerick. By depriving the Jacobites of their most experienced negotiator, his death possibly has a substantial impact on the terms of the Treaty of Limerick that ends the war.
Talbot’s widow, Frances, and his daughter, Charlotte, remain in France, where Charlotte marries her kinsman, Richard Talbot, son of William Talbot of Haggardstown. Their son is Richard Francis Talbot. Talbot’s other daughter, Katherine, becomes a nun. An illegitimate son, Mark Talbot, serves as an officer in France before his death in the Battle of Luzzara in 1702. Talbot’s estate in nearby Carton, renamed Talbotstown, is uncompleted at the time of his death. Tyrconnell Tower on the site is originally intended by him as a family mausoleum to replace the existing vault at Old Carton graveyard but is also left unfinished.
Talbot is controversial in his own lifetime. His own Chief Secretary, Thomas Sheridan, later describes him as a “cunning dissembling courtier […] turning with every wind to bring about his ambitious ends and purposes.” Many 19th and early 20th century historians repeat this view. Recent assessments have suggested a more complex individual whose career was defined by personal loyalty to his patron James and above all by an effort to improve the status of the Irish Catholic gentry, particularly the “Old English” community to which he belonged.
(Pictured: Watercolour portrait of Richard Talbot by John Bulfinch (d.1728) after painting by Sir Godfrey Kneller)
On June 17, as darkness falls, 12,000 troops move toward the fortifications of Monte Piccolo. At dawn the Walloon grenadiers of the Spanish regiments occupy the battery of Monte Piccolo, while other troops occupy the Artemisio Male, La Fajola and set fire to the Pratoni del Vivaro, the commander of the Monte Piccolo garrison, Jan. Pestaluzzi, is captured, probably drunk in a farmhouse of winemakers. The next day, Jean Thierry du Mont, comte de Gages, gives the order to withdraw and preserve only the Artemisio ridge line.
The surprise nighttime attack of Browne’s Austrians on Velletri on August 12 overruns the advanced Irish picquets commanded by Lt. Burke, who is killed, and capture much of King Charles III of Spain‘s royal entourage. But Burke’s men rally to make a fighting retreat, joined by members of the relief guard commanded by Capt. Slattery. The delaying tactics of the picquets allow the rest of the Brigade, along with a regiment of Walloons, to form a line to meet the Austrians. Still, the Irish are heavily outnumbered and suffer tremendous casualties as the Austrians push them. At Velletri’s gates they make a stand. Col. MacDonald of the Hibernia regiment and over 40 other Irish officers are killed, along with several hundred of the red-coated Irish soldiers. But they exhaust the Austrians, as well. With the rest of the Spanish army now rallied behind them, the remaining Irish and Walloons lead a bayonet charge that drives the Austrians from the field. So impressively did the Irish fight, the King of Spain awards each regiment a motto for their flags: “In Omneim Terram ex hivit sonos corum” (Their sound hath gone forth into all the earth). And to each regiment he also grants a sobriquet: To Irlanda, “El Famoso“; to Ultonia, “El Immortal“; and to Hibernia, “La Culumna Irlanda” (“The pillar of Ireland”).
McCourt comes to New York as a young man to live for a time with Frank, ten years his elder. He finds work wherever he can and eventually owns two restaurants in Manhattan. In 1975, he marries Lynn Rockman, with whom he has a daughter, Allison.
For twenty years, from 1993 until he retires in 2013, McCourt works for the Penn South Co-op in the Chelsea neighborhood of Manhattan, in charge of apartment restorations in the 2,800-unit residential complex.
Brendan Keany, general manager of Penn South, recalls meeting McCourt in the late 1980s at Allison’s, a restaurant named for his daughter. The restaurant on Eighth Avenue near Penn South closes after a time, but McCourt goes on to run Los Panchos on Columbus Avenue near 71st Street. However, as a man with a family, running bars and restaurants is not ideal, so he finds the job at Penn South, inspecting apartments and directing their restoration.
The author of short stories, newspaper essays, songs, and verse, McCourt, in 2008, publishes a memoir, A Long Stone’s Throw. Surveying the range of jobs he had taken on in a review of that memoir in Manhattan Express’ sister publication The Villager, the late Jerry Tallmer writes, “Working on a great glop-a-da-glop mainframe computer on Wall Street; issuing tickets for British and Irish Railways; a one-day job as bellhop in a Montreal hotel; a bank teller in Montreal; an encyclopedia salesman — for a month; working at the Army and Air Force Exchange Service on 14th Street as a buyer of luggage and musical instruments, knowing nothing about luggage and less about musical instruments; filing clerk; and, oh yes, teacher.”
Lynn McCourt recalls first meeting her future husband. “We were friends for a long time before we were married,” she says. “He was working as a bartender at the White Horse Tavern when I came in with a writer friend. He told me that he ‘saw the light behind’ me when I came in. He could twist words and turn something ordinary into something poignant. Just before he went to California around 1970, we spent a whole night walking and talking. He came back from California in 1974 and we got married in 1975.”
Then, recalling the devoted relationship McCourt has with Allison, Lynn continues, “Our daughter has special needs and has learning and speech problems. Alphie sang to her every night as a baby and eventually she sang back to him. They were inseparable. He’d have breakfast with her every morning. He was a great father — he, who hadn’t seen his own father very much. When we went to Ireland in 1980, he went north to find his father, and he did find him. I’m a Jewish girl from the Bronx who wanted to marry an Irishman with a brogue, and I did.”
Joe Hurley, of Joe Hurley’s Allstar Irish Rock Review, says McCourt, in his later years, had gotten into singing with the group, performing tunes from “The Great Irish Songbook,” like “The Auld Triangle.” He recalls, “He just performed with us at the Highline Ballroom in March. He loved being around young people. The place was full of young people and rock and roll, and then Alphie comes out — you could hear a pin drop. He would talk about how he had these incredible older brothers… fantastic storyteller. He never tooted his own horn.”
McCourt dies suddenly on July 2, 2016, at his home on the Upper West Side while taking an afternoon nap, just 27 days before his 76th birthday. His brother Michael dies the previous September, nine months earlier. He is survived by his brother Malachy.
Dowling is born on June 3, 1846, in Clonmel, County Tipperary, the only son of David Jeremiah Dowling, schoolmaster, and Margaret Dowling. His father dies when he is nine years old. He is educated in Clonmel, Waterford, and St. Munchin’s College in Corbally, Limerick, before entering the shipping office of his uncle William Downey in Waterford at the age of eighteen. He distinguishes himself in the Waterford Literary and Debating Society and contributes to local newspapers, including the Waterford Citizen and The Waterford Chronicle. In 1870, he joins the staff of The Nation and moves to Dublin. On the outbreak of the Franco–Prussian War, he edits for Alexander Martin Sullivan a war-sheet, The Daily Summary, and subsequently becomes editor and contributor successively to the humorous but short-lived Zozimus and Ireland’s Eye.
Dowling settles in London in 1874, joining the staff of the Illustrated Sporting and Dramatic News, and founds Yorick in 1876, a comic paper with cartoons by Harry Furniss which lasts six months. In 1879, he publishes the first and most successful of his many novels, The Mystery of Killard, a strange tale of a deaf-mute fisherman in County Clare, which is hailed as one of the most striking romances of the year. Though his later novels are intensely realistic, exciting, and clever, they never achieve the same high standard. According to Furniss, who thought Dowling would be a great author, he “drifted into the quicksand of Bohemianism…He sank a wreck, with a rich cargo of genius that was never delivered to the world.” Other writers later mention his unfulfilled promise. Among his other novels of Irish interest are Sweet Inisfail (1882) and Old Corcoran’s Money (1892). A dramatisation of Below Bridge (1895) is staged on April 6, 1896, at the Novelty Theatre, London.
Dowling contributes poetry, short stories, and essays to several magazines, including Belgravia, London Society, and Saturday Journal, and is a frequent contributor to Tinsley’s Magazine, writing its leading serials (1880–82), which are later published as the novels Under St. Paul’s (1881) and The Duke’s Sweetheart (1881). His collections of essays include On Babies and Ladders (1873), which some critics believe to be his best work, Ignorant Essays (1887), Indolent Essays (1889), full of wit and original thought, and descriptive essays London Town (1880). He also edits the Poems (1891) of John Francis O’Donnell. He writes both under his own name and under various pseudonyms, including Peter Mendaciorum, Marcus Fall and Emmanuel Kink. A selection of his letters is published as Some Old Letters (Oct. – Nov. 1919) and More Old Letters (Jan. – Feb. 1920).
According to his daughter, Dowling works erratically, often continuously for several days and nights. An invalid during his later years, he composes his works on a sofa, invariably wearing a cap and with a soup-plate full of pipes beside him, which he enjoys in turn. A mild, kind, and gentle personality, he is an effective raconteur and a witty conversationalist. His cousin, Edmund Downey, who publishes many of his works, is introduced to the publishing world by Dowling. He is an applicant to the British charity for authors, the Royal Literary Fund, and leaves his family ill provided for.
Dowling dies on July 28, 1898, at his home at 2 Foulser Road, Tooting, South London, and is buried in Mortlake Cemetery, London. He is married and has three children, although his wife’s name and the date of their marriage are not known.
(From: “Dowling, Richard” by Helen Andrews, Dictionary of Irish Biography, http://www.dib.ie, October 2009)
seamus dubhghaill 