Friends Of Irish Freedom Inc.

06/01/2026

06/01/2026

06/01/2026

GREAT STUFF FROM THE PAST....
McNiff School was top class!!!!

06/01/2026

The people of Wexford declared an Irish Republic on May 30 1798.

227 years ago today, something truly remarkable happened in County Wexford. For the first time in Irish history, a free Irish Republic was declared on Irish soil. It had all happened so fast as just seven days earlier, a parish priest from Boolavogue named Father John Murphy had led a small band of desperate men against a Crown patrol.

What followed was one of the most extraordinary weeks in Irish history. Battle by battle, town by town — Oulart Hill, Enniscorthy, Three Rocks — the rebels swept all before them. Armed mostly with pikes and sheer determination, they drove one of the most powerful armies in the world out of an entire Irish county. On 30 May, they marched into Wexford town to find it empty. The Crown garrison had fled. The people of Wexford then did something incredible. They set up their own government — a Council of the People — and began to run the county themselves. A Protestant landowner named Bagenal Harvey was made Commander-in-Chief. A retired soldier named Matthew Keogh was made Governor. Catholic and Protestant, standing together, running a free Irish Republic.

At its heart was a simple belief, that Ireland belonged to the Irish, and that every man and woman had a right to their land and their freedom. The Republic lasted just 26 days before Crown forces crushed it. Its leaders were hunted down and executed. But for 26 glorious days, the people of Wexford had done what no Irish county had ever done before — they had taken their freedom, governed themselves, and shown the world what Ireland could be. Never forgotten. 🇮🇪

06/01/2026

06/01/2026

Remembering The Battle Of Bunclody

The battle of Bunclody or Newtownbarry, as it was then called, was a battle in the Irish Rebellion of 1798, which took place on June 1st 1798, when a force of some 5,000 rebels led by Catholic priest Fr. Mogue Kearns attacked the garrison at Bunclody as part of the Wexford rebels' campaign against border garrisons.

The garrison was forewarned of the approaching rebels and had prepared defensive outposts facing the rebel line of advance.

The rebel army occupied high ground to the west and stationed an artillery piece, captured in their victory over the military at the battle of Three Rocks, facing the approaches to the town.

As the bulk of the rebel army formed for the attack, their gunners opened accurate fire on the exposed lines of soldiers who retreated into the cover of the town.

Seizing the moment, the rebels quickly moved in, forcing the garrison to flee across the bridge into County Carlow, but crucially, failed to occupy this approach to the town.

The rebels now had an almost bloodless victory, and a number of them began to celebrate, roaming the town in search of Crown forces.

Trapped units of yeomen, some of whom had barricaded themselves into their own houses, opened fire on the unsuspecting rebels milling in the streets outside.

Meanwhile, the garrison had paused in their retreat and, upon hearing the sound of gunfire from the town, turned about and launched a surprise attack back across the bridge, which caught the rebels, distracted by the unexpected pockets of resistance, completely by surprise.

In the rout that followed, 400 of the rebels were killed and their army scattered for the loss of approximately the same number of the crown forces.

06/01/2026

Republican Group, Kilkenny, 1917

A noteworthy group of prominent republicans in this image taken in Kilkenny in 1917. The caption underneath identifies the subjects from left to right across both rows. It reads as follows:

‘Back row left to right — Dan McCarthy. Darrell Figgis. Most Rev Dr Brown. Ald Tom Kelly — Fleming, E DeValera, Sean Milroy.
Front Row — Lawrence Ginnell. Countess Markievicz. Wm Cosgrave. Mrs Ginnell.
Taken 1917’.

The group includes Constance Markievicz, a revolutionary nationalist, suffragette, and the first woman elected to the United Kingdom House of Commons (though she did not take her seat). Daniel McCarthy was a prominent Dublin-born republican organizer and sports administrator, serving as the President of the Gaelic Athletic Association from 1921 to 1924. Laurence Ginnell was a Westmeath-born lawyer, author, and politician, famously known as the ‘most jailed MP in British history’ due to his frequent political arrests. His wife, Alice Ginnell, was a dedicated Cumann na mBan activist and organizer who served as an election agent for her husband during the historic 1918 general election. William T. Cosgrave later served as the first President of the Executive Council of the Irish Free State. Éamon de Valera, who had recently been released from prison following the 1916 Rising, went on to become Taoiseach and President of Ireland. Darrell Figgis was a writer, intellectual, and nationalist who helped draft the 1922 Constitution of the Irish Free State.

Seán Milroy was a republican journalist and Sinn Féin organizer who was imprisoned multiple times, supported the Anglo-Irish Treaty, and later served as a TD and Senator for the Irish Free State. Alderman Tom Kelly was a dedicated Dublin municipal politician who served as an anti-Treaty Sinn Féin TD, survived political internment, and later became a prominent Fianna Fáil Senator. The Most Reverend Dr. Robert Browne was a Catholic prelate who served as the President of St Patrick’s College, Maynooth before a long, influential tenure as the Bishop of Cloyne from 1894 until his death in 1935.

The image forms part of a bound photographic volume compiled by the editors of ‘The Capuchin Annual’ (Identifier: https://catholicarchives.ie/index.php/constance-markievicz-eamon-de-valera-and-republican-group-in-kilkenny)