Edward Lear

THERE WAS AN OLD MAN CALLED EDWARD By Turtle Bunbury As he plunged his quill into the inkpot, Edward Lear exhaled contentedly. It might have taken him the best part of fifty years to complete the trip, but the best-selling English nonsense poet had finally made it to...
Brabazon Disney – A Mostly Clerical Family

Brabazon Disney – A Mostly Clerical Family

Looking at the life of an Irish clerical family whose best known members include John Disney, sometime Mayor of Galway, and Catherine Disney (1800-1853), a sort of paramour of the mathematician and astronomer Sir William Rowan Hamilton.   *****   Origin of...
Connolly of Dundalk, County Louth

Connolly of Dundalk, County Louth

Looking at a Dundalk family and their work at places such as the iron works of Middlesborough in England and, back in Dundalk, the Great Northern Brewery in Dundalk, Carroll’s Cigarettes and the family grocery at 15 Chapel Lane. Complete access to all articles on this...
John ‘Old Turnip’ McClintock (1769-1855) of Drumcar, County Louth

John ‘Old Turnip’ McClintock (1769-1855) of Drumcar, County Louth

A prominent player in Irish politics during the last years of the Parliament in Dublin, aided by his kinship with John Foster, the last Speaker of the Irish House of Commons and his opposition to the Act of Union, the Brexit of its day. Following the tragic death of...
Rev. Alick McClintock (1775-1836) & the Tithe War

Rev. Alick McClintock (1775-1836) & the Tithe War

Alick – or Alexander – McClintock was the second son of  'Bumper Jack' M'Clintock, of Drumcar, M.P., and his wife Patience (née Foster). In 1831, while serving as Rector of Newtownbarry (now Bunclody) in County Wexford, he became deeply embroiled in the Tithe Wars...