#OnThisDay 1916 Sean Mac Diarmada, from Kiltyclogher, Leitrim was executed in Kilmainham Gaol for his role in the Easter Rising. Before his death he wrote “I feel happiness the like of which I have never experienced. I die that the Irish nation might live!”
#OnThisDay 1891 Maurice Meade was born in Limerick. He fought for the British Army in WW1, was captured by the Germans, joined Casement’s Brigade, volunteered to fight in the German Army in Egypt but that never took place. When the war ended he was arrested by the British but pardoned but when he went back to Ireland he was rearrested by the RIC. They had to wait for confirmation of his pardon so Meade was incarcerated for over a month until he stole the key from a sleeping constable and broke out of barracks.
Meade then joined the East Limerick IRA & was at most of their ambushes like Dromkeen and others. He executed two prisoners after an ambush.
After the War of Independence he served in the Free State Army.
#OnThisDay 1745 At the Battle of Fontenoy, the Irish Brigade of the French Army charged the English & allied army as the French line was about to collapse shouting Remember Limerick & the Saxon betrayal!! This attack clutched French victory from defeat.
When King George II heard of the loss he was quoted as saying (of the Irish);
“Cursed be the laws that deprive me of such subjects.”
#OnThisDay 1689 The French & English navies fought each other for the first time since 1545 at the Battle of Bantry Bay. The French managed to unload supplies for James’s Irish campaign & inflicted more damage but the battle is deemed inconclusive. The French did not capitalise on their tactical gains with strategic success.
#OnThisDay 1943 Nineteen men & boys aged between 13 and 34 were killed when a floating sea mine detonated on the shore of Ballymanus, near Kincasslagh beach, Donegal. The locals had tried to remove it from the rocks as the local coast watcher sought help form the Ordnance Corps when it exploded killing seventeen outright and two died in hospital a day or two later from their wounds.
Some of the victims below:
The Irish at War 