American Civil War Monuments and More in Ireland

04/09/2026

Check out a personal review of the 1994 Edition of this book. https://docs.google.com/document/d/1oXYoduzo2QgREHJNG6DEITJu9xRX5iCwptxhrFn15nE/view

01/09/2026

Ricard O Sullivan Burke joined the 15th New York Engineers (9 May 1861) on the outbreak of the civil war. He was his regiment’s colour-bearer at the first battle of Bull Run (21 July 1861), was promoted sergeant (August 1861), and fought at Yorktown (4 May 1862), the Seven Days battles (June–July 1862), and Fredricksburg (13 December 1862). Commissioned first lieutenant (1863), he was assigned to the chief engineer’s staff at Gen. Grant’s headquarters, fought in the spring campaign in Virginia in 1864, and commanded a fifteen-mile (24 km) stretch of trenches during the siege of Petersburg (June 1864–April 1865). In May 1865 he was commissioned captain and was promoted brevet-colonel before being discharged 13 June 1865, having gone through the war without a scratch. (Dictionary of Irish Biography)

31/08/2026

This memorial is dedicated to Ricard O’Sullivan Burke and his brother Morgan, and is located outside the walls of St Barthlomew’s Church, Castletown-Kinneigh, County Cork, Ireland. It was erected by Mary Lynch in August 2009. It is a Fenian rather than a Civil War monument. He joined the 15th New York Engineers in 1861 and by war's end had risen to the rank of Brevet Colonel.
For more info: https://americancivilwarmonumentsireland.ie/?page_id=960
Born of Ireland

28/08/2026

25/08/2026

Blocade Runner Captain Robert Charles Halpin: His final resting place is in the old Church of Ireland graveyard beside Wicklow Parish Church, on Church Hill in Wicklow Town. The graveyard overlooks Wicklow Harbour and the sea, which is particularly fitting given Halpin’s life at sea.
His grave is marked by a tall Celtic cross, making it relatively easy to identify within the historic burial ground, his final resting place overlooking Wicklow Harbour.
For more info including podcasts and Youtube clip: https://americancivilwarmonumentsireland.ie/?page_id=658

24/08/2026

Blocade Runner
Captain Robert Charles Halpin
Monument is in Fitzwilliam Square, Wicklow Town, Irl.
At the beginning of the Civil War, he was employed by the European Trading Company, which had been established to smuggle supplies to the Confederacy. Halpin became involved in blockade running, he brought in arms and food and took out cotton. In 1864 he took the Virgin into Mobile Bay, past the Union-controlled Fort Morgan. After the fall of Mobile he was arrested by the United States government and tried, but due to an apparent lack of evidence, nothing was proven and he was released. It also seems that Halpin had no great ideological sympathy for the Confederacy, and had become involved purely for financial gain.
For more info see https://americancivilwarmonumentsireland.ie/?page_id=658

05/08/2026

Private Maurice Coffey, Company D, 8th Wisconsin Infantry

https://maps.app.goo.gl/S7LiucjmTXHeZKUw9?g_st=am

The grave is located in the Coffey family plot, in St Brigid’s Church Graveyard, Kilrossanty, Co Waterford.

Maurice returned to Ireland after the ACW, and died in 1917 aged 81 years. He is buried in the family plot together with his father Philip and other ancestors and descendents.

He had enlisted in Company D, 18th Wisconsin Infantry on 27th September 1864 and was mustered out on 31st May 1865. In the 1870 Census, he is listed as living in Spring Brook, Wisconsin with his New York born wife Laura and four children.

For more info see: https://americancivilwarmonumentsireland.ie/?page_id=1857