6 September 868 AD: The Battle of Cell ua nDaigri/ Killineer on this day. This clash of arms was fought just a few miles north of Drogheda, Co Louth. The opponents were the forces of the King of Tara, Aed Finnliath aka Áed mac Neíll of the northern Uí Néill, and his dynastic rivals the Uí Néill of Brega [east Meath] who had as allies the Vikings of Dubhlinn/Dublin and the men of Laigin [south Leinster]. King Aed had for support King Conchobor of Connacht who seems to have contributed the bulk of the warriors. They were probably dressed and fought like those above. That is in open formation where individual leadership and courage was the primary consideration on the battlefield.

The northern king appears to have brought south with him just a picked force of about one thousand men. Aed was faced with what was an alliance by the kings of greater Leinster against his hegemony – as they all feared dominance by a king as powerful and as skilful as he.

In the event he defeated his enemies in what was probably a hard fought battle. It looks like the men of the East were the ones who opened the battle but were held in check. As both sides had more or less equal numbers its probable that the contest was a long drawn out affair. It certainly was a bloody one as the King of Brega and his ally Diarmait mac Etarscéle, the King of Loch Gabor were amongst the fallen. Many of the Vikings were also put to sword. But King Aed lost from amongst his own one Fachtna mac Mael Dúin, (the man selected to succeed him in the North) when he launched his own counter assault upon his enemies.

King Aed was one of the most successful kings to rule in Ireland in the 9th Century. He drove the Vikings out of the North and checked their power in north Leinster. He was also adept at keeping Irish rivals from usurping him from his throne. He died a peaceful death at the Monastery of Dromiskin, some 30 miles north of where this great battle was fought, in the year 879.

Aed (the son of Niall) who was the king of Temair [Tara], and Conchobor (the son of Tadc) who was the king of Connacht, won a battle at Cell ua nDaigri on the 8th of the Ides [6th of September]against the Uí Néill of Brega and the Laigin, and a large force of foreigners, i.e. three hundred or more.

Flann son of Conaing had five thousand and Aed Finnliath had one thousand,

Flann son of Conaing, king of all Brega, and Diarmait son of Etarscéle, king of Loch Gabor, fell in this battle.

Very many of the heathens were slaughtered there and Fachtna (the son of Mael Dúin), heir designate of the North, fell in the counterattack of the battle.

Chronicon Scotorum 868 AD

5 September 1926. The Drumcollogher/ Drom Collachair Cinema Tragedy on this day. The village of Dromcollogher is nine miles south-west of the town of Charleville, Co Cork but situated just to the north of the Limerick/ Cork border in the County of Limerick. On the night in question 48 people lost their lives when a candle overturned and caused film to ignite during a showing of The Ten Commandments. A room in the centre of the town, which was being used as a temporary cinema in Dromcollogher, caught fire when the candle ignited a reel of film carelessly left nearby.

'This was on the upper floor of a building used for storing hardware and access to it was by an external timber ladder, fixed to the wall to form a stairs. The hall, which had been used for meetings and entertainments for a number of years, was a rectangular room with a separate small dressing room area in the right-hand rear corner. The show began about 9.15pm after Benediction had finished in the local church, at which many of the audience had been present.

Estimates of the attendance varied but it appears that at least 150 people crowded into the hall, many of them children. At around 10.00 pm as the second film was showing, one of the reels, which lay unprotected on a table near the door, went on fire when a candle on the table overturned and set it alight. The people immediately rushed to the single narrow door from which the ladder/stairs descended. Those seated nearest the exit escaped as the fire spread rapidly. Others fled to the rear of the hall where the two windows were located and crowded into the small dressing room area. Some got out through the window here but unfortunately it was blocked when a woman became trapped in it. Within minutes the floor of the hall collapsed and the victims were hurtled to the ground where they died from the combination of burns, asphyxiation and shock. Forty six people were dead within 15 minutes. Two survivors later died from their injuries.'
https://sites.google.com/site/dromcollogher/cinemadisaster

The fire spread rapidly resulting in the deaths of 46 people, which included a family of six, with two more dying later in hospital. The 46 original victims of the tragedy—often referred to locally as ‘the Dromcollogher Burning’—and are buried in a large grave in the grounds of the local church. The bodies of the victims were buried in a communal grave in the local churchyard. A large Celtic cross was erected as a memorial to the victims of this tragedy.

4 September 1828: The Annaghdown/Anach Cuain Boat Tragedy. Eleven men and eight women were drowned on the river Corrib aboard an old and decrepit boat the Caisleán Nua. The tragedy was the subject of a poem by Anthony O’Rafferty Anach Cuain. On September 4th, 1828 the boat left Annaghdown Pier bound for a fair at Galway City. On board were some sheep, which were for auction at the fair, and some thirty men and women who had intended to make a holiday out of the visit to Galway. Some two miles from the city on the river Corrib tragedy struck.

Its not quite certain what caused the boat to sink, but the story is told that one of the sheep on board got restless and poked his hoof through the floor of the boat. One of the men on board tried to stuff the hole with a piece of clothing but only succeeded in knocking a plank out of the boat which caused the water to pour in. Nineteen men and women on board drowned in the ensuing panic and scarcely a family in the village of Annaghdown remained unaffected by the tragedy.

The boat and passengers proceeded without obstruction until they arrived opposite Bushypark, within two miles of the town, when she suddenly went down and all on board perished except twelve persons who were fortunately rescued from their perilous situation by another boat. 

Galway Advertiser

6 September 1828

One man on board was named John Cosgrave who was a strong swimmer. He saved several people and went back to save the woman he was shortly to marry. Some desperate people clung to him in a desperate bid to save themselves but only succeeded in drowning him also.

The recovered bodies of those who drowned were brought ashore near Menlo/Mionnloch Castle, [above] itself the scene of a tragic fire in 1910. It is now a ruin.

3 September 1916: The Battles of Guillemont & then Ginchy began on this day. The 16 (Irish) Division of the British Army was deeply involved in both affairs and suffered tremendous casualties as a result.

These two villages were on the extreme right flank of the British Army on the Somme battlefield where they met those of their allies the French. Guillemont and Ginchy lay on spurs, which constricted the British right flank and commanded the ground to the south, in the French Sixth Army area. It was the task of the British 4th Army to clear these devastated villages of their German defenders and remove the threat their possession posed to the Allied Armies. It was tasked to advance up the gradual but perceptible slope that the German Army had so skilfully entrenched and fortified in their attempts to stop their enemies from advancing any further upon their lines.

Most of these villages had fortified blockhouses within them that were interconnected by deep tunnels. To simply overrun these places would not be enough. Usually each had to be taken out one by one with companies of grenadiers much in demand to winkle out or simply destroy the defenders.

An Irish Officer of the 2nd Leinsters who witnessed the attacks upon Guillemont in August described the scene:

“Shell-fire was hellish all afternoon. Box barrages were put down all round and the earth was going up like volcanoes completely smothering us. During a bombardment one developed a craze for two things: water and cigarettes. Few could ever eat under an intense bombardment especially on the Somme, when every now and then a shell would blow pieces of mortality, or complete bodies which had been putrefying in no man’s land and slap into one’s trench.”

 Stand To! - A Diary Of The Trenches 1915-1918 by Captain F. C. Hitchcock

Villages were natural fortifications that the engineers of any army sought to fortify when threatened by an enemy. By 1916 the Germans had this down a high degree of skill and any attempt to take one was always going to be a tough nut to crack. Wilfrid Miles noted in the History of the Great War (the British official history, 1938), that the defence of Guillemont in late August and early September was judged by some observers to be the best performance of the war by the German army on the Western Front.

The assault was repeatedly delayed by bad weather but it was agreed to go ahead on September 3rd with the 20th (Light) Division and the 16th (Irish) Division attempting what had been beyond previous attempts.

The men lay down in their shallow trenches from 4am waiting for the assault. The regimental pipers were busy from early morning. They played Brian Boru’s March, The White Cockade, The Wearin’ o’ the Green and A Nation Once Again.

The Irish battalions involved in the Battle of Guillemont were the 7th Leinsters, the 6th Connaught Rangers, the 8th Royal Munster Fusiliers and the 6th Royal Irish Regiment.

The commanding officer of the Connaught Rangers, Lieutenant Colonel John Lenox-Conyngham, was killed as soon as he stood on the parapet to wave his men on. Undaunted, they pressed ahead. Within minutes, the German’s front positions in the village were overrun.

With Guillemont now captured the next objective was the equally hard target of the village of Ginchy. The preparations for attack took a few days to organise but by the morning of the 9th September all was ready - or as ready as it would ever be. The 47 & 48 Brigades of the 16 Irish Division were tasked with taking a lead role in the attack.

The 47th  Brigade was understrength going into the assault with around a thousand men ready for battle - roughly about the strength of a single battalion. With four battalions to a brigade it was some task they were been given. To make matters worse due to a cock up they were sent ‘over the top’ just as the Germans launched a counter barrage and to add to their misery they ran right into a nest of German machine guns that cut down many of the survivors.

However the 48th brigade achieved great success. It attacked in two waves, the 1st battalion, Royal Munster Fusiliers, and 7th battalion, Royal Irish Rifles, led off , with the remaining two battalions following in support. It too was also severely under strength. The RIR also had the indignity of being heavily shelled by British Artillery as they attempted to hold their positions prior to attack. Then the 7th battalion, Royal Irish Fusiliers, the divisional reserve, was brought up to reinforce the lines and at 4.45pm both battalions attacked.

 Second Lieutenant Young of the 7th battalion, Royal Irish Fusiliers, remembered the scene:

The bombardment was now intense. Our shells bursting in the village of Ginchy made it belch forth smoke like a volcano… We couldn’t run. We advanced at a steady walking pace, stumbling here and there…(a shell) landed in the midst of a bunch of men about seventy yards away on my right. I have a most vivid recollection of seeing a tremendous burst of clay and earth go shooting up into the air—yes, and even parts of human bodies and that when the smoke cleared away there was nothing left. I shall never forget that horrifying spectacle as long as I live.

But terrible as the suffering and sacrifice had been by 5.25pm Ginchy itself was captured and positions secured beyond the village to guard against counter attack. Unfortunately the 48th brigade paid a high price for this success; half the attacking force were casualties.

The 16th (Irish) Division paid a terrible price for its efforts to secure these villages, now reduced to a smudge on the surface of the Earth. Of the nearly 11,000 officers and men who arrived there on September 1st, more than 4,300 were casualties. The number of dead amounted to 1,067.

Today the land of the Somme has long since  been re-landscaped to reflect how it looked before the Great War began. There are not that many monuments to commemorate the sacrifices of Irishmen who fell on the Western Front in the War but such is in the village of Guillemont that has one known as the ‘Ginchy Cross’. This monument is a replacement of the original one which is now secured in the War Memorial Gardens Islandbridge Dublin. I had the chance to stand it before it in the pouring rain on a summers day some years ago. Upon it is written the following words:

1914-1918 - In commemoration of the victories of Guillemont and Ginchy September 3rd and 9th 1916 in memory of those who fell therein and of all Irishmen who gave their lives in the great war. RIP.

Pictures: The 'Ginchy Cross' at Guillemont & German dead at Guillemont, Summer 1916.

3 September 1658: Oliver Cromwell ‘The Lord Protector’ died on this day at Whitehall in the City of London. He still remains one of the most hated figures in Irish History even though he spent less than a year of his life in this Country.

Hee was very restlesse most part of the night, speaking often to himself. And there being something to drink offered him, hee was desired to take the same, and endeavour to sleep, unto which hee answered:

‘It is not my design to drink or to sleep, but my design is to make what haste I can to bee gone’.Afterwards towards morning, using divers holy expressions, implying much inward consolation and peace, among the rest hee spake some exceeding self-debasing words, annihilating and judging himself. And truly it was observed, that a publick spirit to Gods cause did breath in him (as in his life-time) so now to the very last...

An account by his valet, Charles Harvey, of his final hours

He was born in 1599 but did not rise to prominence until the outbreak of the English Civil War in 1642 when he raised a troop of cavalry to fight for their Parliament against King Charles I.

Quickly proving his worth in his native area of east Anglia he played a significant role in the parliamentary victories at Marston Moor [1644] and Naseby [1645]. When civil war flared up again he commanded a force which first crushed a Royalist revolt in South Wales and then at the battle of Preston [1648] when he defeated a Scottish-royalist army of invasion. Cromwell consistently attributed his military success to ‘God's Will’ but there is no doubt that he had natural leadership talents that made him the best military Leader that England’s Parliament had - and indeed one of the most able soldiers of that Age.

Following the execution of King Charles in January 1649 an Expedition was assembled to take back Ireland from the Catholics. This was a task that Cromwell did indeed consider ‘Gods Will’ and as its Commander he was determined to see that those who had ‘rebelled’ against the rule of England’s Parliament were punished for what he believed were the huge atrocities and massacres committed against the Protestants of Ireland in the Rising of 1641.

On 15th August 1649 he came ashore at Ringsend near Dublin having left Milford Haven in Wales two days before. He brought with him an army of 4,000 horse and 8,000 foot. He quickly moved north to take the town of Drogheda where there was a strong force of Royalists. On 11 September with the help of his artillery train he breached the town’s walls and stormed the place. A massacre followed in which most of the garrison was put to the sword and it is believed many of the inhabitants too.

After the massacre, Cromwell sought to explain his actions in a letter to William Lenthall, speaker of the Parliament:

…I am persuaded that this is a righteous judgement of God upon these barbarous wretches, who have imbued their hands in so much innocent blood, and it will tend to prevent the effusion of blood for the future, which are satisfactory grounds to such actions, which otherwise cannot but work remourse and regret….

One month later on 11 October his Army was before the walls of the important port of Wexford and while still in negotiations with the garrison his troops gained entry through an agent inside. Another massacre followed and many priests and women were slaughtered.

These actions sent shock waves throughout Ireland and Cromwell’s reputation for ferocity was firmly established.

With Winter now closing in and his Army ravaged by disease and the cold Cromwell curtailed his operations. He too came down sick and he allowed his subordinates to do the running. It was not to be until the following Spring that he was again involved in a major siege - this time at Clonmel in County Tipperary.

On 9 May the Parliamentarians poured through a breach in the towns walls –and right into a trap. Cromwell had to withdraw with a loss of 2,500 men. The following day General O’Neill led his men out - and Cromwell led his battered men in. Surprisingly this time he kept them on a leash and no massacre followed. But a deeply chastened Cromwell had suffered the biggest defeat of his military career.

Less than a month later Cromwell returned to England, which was facing a threat of invasion from Scotland, which had declared for the exiled King Charles II. He never returned.

But Cromwell’s legacy did not end there. In the years that followed his lieutenants and subordinates issued forth from their strongholds across Ireland to wage a vicious campaign of war and slaughter on many of the populace.

Tens of thousands of people were shipped off as virtual slaves to the West Indies & many landowners were dispossessed of their ancient holdings. Religious Freedom was denied to the Catholics of Ireland & their civil and political liberties trampled on. To this day his name is reviled amongst the Irish.

2 September 1022 AD: The death of the King of Mide (Meath), Máel Sechnaill mac Domnaill, on this day. He died on an island in Lough Ennell in what is now County Westmeath. His passing marked the end of an era in Irish History. Since the Battle of Ocha in circa 483 AD the southern and northern O’Neill’s had shared back and forth the title of King of Temair (Tara) in Meath between them on a more or less continual basis. This made the holder of the title the most influential king in Ireland - if he had the wherewithal to make use of the status the title gave him.

For it was believed that in ancient times Ireland had been ruled from the Royal seat of Tara. The O’Neills believed that any man who held that hallowed ground was the heir to a lost Kingdom - and thus had precedence over the other kings of Ireland. However King Brian Boru of Munster in 1002 had pushed aside King Máel and had himself recognised as the superior king in his stead. The line of succession had been broken.

But with the death of King Brian at the Battle of Clontarf in 1014 it came about that Máel Sechnaill had regained his position. However he was by then an old man and Ireland had changed greatly since his predecessors had established their dual kingdoms all those centuries before. After him Mide(Meath) would no longer be the force it was in Irish Wars and Politics. It never regained what it had lost in terms of Power & Prestige in the ‘Game of Thrones’ that dominated Irish politics at that time.

Mael Sechnaill son of Domnall son of Donnchad, overlord of Ireland, pillar of the dignity and nobility of the western world, died in the 43rd year of his reign and the 73rd of his age on Sunday the fourth of the Nones 2nd of September, the second of the moon.

Annals of Ulster 1022 AD

Mael Sechnaill son of Domnall, son of Donnchad, overking of Ireland, the flood of honour of the western world, died in Cró-inis of Loch Aininne in the forty-third year of his reign on the 4th of the Nones 2nd of September, that is, on Sunday, the second day of the moon, the one thousandth and
twenty-second year after the Lord's Incarnation, and died penitent and at peace, with the successors of venerable saints Pátraic and Colum Cille and Ciarán present and assisting him.

Chronicon Scotorum

1 September 1701: The Irish Brigade in the service of France fought in the Battle of Chiari [above]*on this day. This clash of arms took place in Lombardy in northern Italy during the War of the Spanish Succession. The French Army was under the command of Marshal Villeroy who was opposed by Prince Eugene of Savoy in the service of the Austrian Empire. Villeroy decided to attack the town of Chiari as he felt it was his duty to fight for King Louis rather than just observe the enemy.
Villeroy ignored the warnings of his subordinate Marshal Catinat that Eugene was in a strong position, remarking his deputy that the King had not sent so many brave men there just to look at the enemy through their spy glasses!

The attack was however a fiasco as the French were cut down in droves. Amongst the regiments leading the attack was the Irish regiment of Galmoy (Its Colonel was Pierce Butler, 3rd Viscount Galmoy), which suffered heavily in the assault. Eventually the attempt was called off and the surviving troops were told to retire. The French losses were over 2,000 men killed or wounded while their enemies sustained a loss in the low hundreds. The most prominent Irish casualty was Dominick Sarsfield, 4th Lord Killmallock who was killed at the head of his men in the attack.

Some of the Irishmen who survived were badly wounded. Felix MacNamee, aged 35, a native of Armagh, had had his left arm taken off by a cannon ball and, put out of service, was admitted into the military hospital of Les Invalides in Paris, dying at Arras in 1726. The ensign of the Colonel’s company, Terence Sweeny, aged 33, was hit in the right thigh by cannon shot and across the body by a musket ball. He too, was admitted to Les Invalides and survived until 1750. Also hit by a cannon shot in the right leg was the reformed Lieutenant Thomas Meade, aged 31, a native of Kilmallock, who survived until 1736. John Conor, aged 31, a Kerryman and the sergeant of grenadiers, lost his right arm through a musket ball but lived until 1721.

　

* Battle of Chiari, by Jan van Huchtenburg