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CAPTAINS TWO. PATRICK O’CARROLL AND JAMES BLACKNEY IN THE PAPAL ARMY

Captains two. Patrick O’Carroll and James Blackney in the Papal Army

James Durney

In 1860 when Pope Pius IX issued an appeal to all Catholic countries to come to his assistance 1,400 Irishmen answered the call. Among them were at least two Kildaremen, Patrick O’Carroll and James Blackney. At only three or four weeks’ notice, without any preliminary training, young Irish men and boys, from all walks of life, left Ireland for Vienna where they were to be trained before proceeding to Italy. The British Government supported the cause of Italian nationalism and issued a proclamation reminding all persons concerned that, according to the Foreign Enlistment Act, any man entering a foreign service was guilty of a misdemeanor punishable by fine and imprisonment, as was anyone helping him to do so, and that any master of a ship conveying such persons was liable to a fine of £50. Towards the end of May and the beginning of June, various detachments found their way to Italy from ports in Ireland to England and then northern Europe. From there they travelled by rail to Vienna, Trieste and Rome. The minimum height requirement was five feet seven inches. Each recruit was given £3.15s. on leaving to cover his travel expenses. No kit was issued on departure, each man having to travel in his own clothing. The Papal States were conquered by Napoleon Bonaparte in 1796 and restored to the Pope by the Congress of Vienna in 1815. In 1848-9 there were abortive revolutions in Rome, Venice, Florence, Naples and Savoy, while in the south attempts were made to unite the country under one banner. After the Franco-Austrian war of 1859 the states of Parma, Modena and Tuscany joined the Union of Piedmont under the rule of Victor Emmanuel of the House of Savoy. Efforts were made during the early part of 1860 to induce Pius IX to surrender his claims to the Northern Provinces of Romagna, Umbria and the Marches, but without avail. When the province of Romagna voted itself into the newly formed State of Northern Italy, the Pope excommunicated all concerned, including Victor Emmanuel. Fearing an impending invasion of the papal frontiers the Pope appealed to the Catholics of Europe to come to his assistance. This appeal received support from the Irish hierarchy and resulted in the formation of ‘The Irish Battalion of St. Patrick’ for service in Italy. The Irish volunteers had been promised they would serve together as one unit, but in reality the shambolic organization of the Papal Army prevented this. They had also been told they would be compensated for making the financial sacrifice to travel to Italy. In Ancona matters came to a head and angry volunteers confronted their officers and expressed their anger at these false promises. In a brief melee two officers, Major Fitzgerald and Lieutenant Patrick O’Carroll, were slightly hurt. As a result, Maj. Fitzgerald, a veteran officer in the Austrian army, resigned his commission, while Lieut. O’Carroll was promoted to captain (Gazetted 7 August 1860). Patrick O’Carroll, was a native of Co. Kildare and had served in the 18th Royal Irish Regiment, of the British army. Maj. Fitzgerald and Lt. O’Carroll were probably not recognized as it was late when they arrived and were wearing civilian clothes. They were soon fit for duty again. The Irish recruits also caused some problems when they arrived in Macereta Barracks in northern Italy. There were six other nationalities represented there and on pay day fighting, due to the availability of cheap wine, broke out between the Irish and Belgians. The civil authorities petitioned for the removal of the unruly elements and 600 Irish troops were marched across the Apennine Mountains from Macereta to Rome. As they were not giving adequate water, rations or camp equipment the troops had to fend for themselves en route, for which they received more bad publicity. It was only with the arrival of their own commanding officer, Major Myles O’Reilly, of Louth, that living conditions for the men began to gradually improve due to his strenuous efforts and representations on their behalf. It was his intention to form a battalion of eight companies to be known as the ‘Irish Papal Brigade.’ Maj. O’Reilly began to train his recruits into a professional force, but because he was starting from scratch the Irish Battalion never really became a fully equipped, or adequately armed force. The commanding officer had to commission officers, to tell off companies, and to appoint NCOs. Although he did his best to extract written promises of commissions, it was not until August that they actually gazetted as officers. Eight company commanders were appointed in June – four at Ancona and four at Spoleto. Lt. James Blackney was appointed officer commanding No. 1 Company at Spoleto, though he was not gazetted captain until 31 August. James Blackney was the son of James Blackney, Esq, of Kilmullen. He was a former officer in the county militia and a grandson of Walter Blackney, MP for Co. Carlow (1831-2). G. F. H. Berkeley in The Irish Battalion in the Papal Army of 1860, (published in Dublin in 1929) gave Blackney’s address as Co. Kildare, while his fellow officer Michael T. Crean said he was from Co. Carlow. Kilmullen is in Lea, Co. Laois, which at the time would have been Queen’s County, but is near to Monasterevan, Co. Kildare. One veteran, Lt. Michael Theobald Crean, said that in the month of August under the able leadership of Maj. O’Reilly, the Irish got down to training in earnest. ‘Discipline increased and improved beyond measure. The Company Commanders, Kirwan, Coppinger, Boschan and Blackney, got down to it and it was drill – morning, noon, and night – with a will as they knew time was short.’ At the end of August the men were requested to take the Oath of Fidelity to the Holy Father and sign on for four years. About 200 refused and left to return to Ireland. They had become disillusioned by the poor pay, bad food and living conditions they had to endure. Equipment and uniforms for the remainder was of poor quality. On 29 August 1860 Capt. Blackney’s company of 145 men was moved from Spoleto to Perugia. Capt. Kirwan’s company also left with General de la Moricière, the head of the Papal Army, leaving only two under-equipped Irish companies in the fortress. The war began on 11 September when Piedmontese troops entered the Papal States. Two days later they attacked Perugia and entered the city through a gate opened by residents who were in opposition to the Papal Army. Capt. Blackney’s company was involved in some of the heaviest fighting of the day and lost three men killed and over a dozen wounded. Among the wounded was Capt. Blackney. The Irish volunteers were captured when most of the garrison simply downed arms and refused to fight. Gen. de la Moricière, a Breton,  lamented: ‘The Irish company and the majority of the 2nd Line Battalion [Italian] alone showed themselves determined to do their duty.’ With Perugia captured, the Piedmontese marched towards the port city of Ancona, on the Adiatric coast. Within days they had marched a force of 17,000 as far south as Spoleto, where Maj. Myles O’Reilly and 1,000 men – of whom 300 were Irish – awaited them. The Irish troops had been in Ancona since 5 July and had trained vigourously for two months, greatly assisted by the presence of experienced officers like Capt. Patrick O’Carroll, a veteran of the British army, Corkman Francis O’Mahony, a veteran of the Austrian army, and the French-born Count Francis Russell, an officer in the Papal army. The Irish volunteers were divided into four companies, one of which was commanded by Kildareman Patrick O’Carroll. He was described as an efficient officer by Gen. de la Moriciere. Spoleto, an old Umbrian walled city of 8,000 inhabitants, was attacked on the morning of 17 September by a superior force of veteran Piedmontese troops, and surrendered the next day after the loss of five Irish killed and twenty wounded and the rest taken prisoner. The attackers suffered sixteen dead and forty-eight wounded. The capture of Spoleto cut off Ancona from Rome. The remaining companies of the Irish Battalion were engaged at Castelfedaro – where over 100 were captured, along with twenty other casualties – and at the siege of Ancona, where they suffered a dozen casualties, with the remaining men also being captured. With the capture of Ancona the Piedmontese forces had gained total control of the Papal States, except for Rome and its environs. This effectively meant the end of the Papal Army and the Irish Battalion. The Ancona garrison was marched northwards for 200 miles to Genoa. On arrival in Genoa the officers were separated from their men, but were granted parole d’honour to visit the nearby town if they wished. The officers and men remained in Genoa for several weeks as POWs, where they were visited by British agents who offered free passage to Malta to any who would enlist in the British army. The papal treasury was depleted by the cost of the war, and the Pope was not in a position to maintain a standing army any longer. Most of his provinces were seceding to the new Italian state leaving the environs of Rome as the only territory under his control. The Irish Battalion was granted an honourable discharge from their commitments to the papacy, who, acknowledging the heroism which the Irish had discharged in their duty, also promised assistance with repatriation. In Ireland a national collection was organised to charter a vessel for the stranded exiles. On 20 October 1860 the Papal screw steamer Byzantine commenced transporting Irish survivors from Genoa to Marseilles. From there the 934 Irish veterans went to Paris and then to La Havre, from where the majority sailed to Ireland on 1 November. The first veterans arrived in Queenstown on 3 November to a tremendous welcome. After disembarking they were issued with food and clothing, and they marched to the railway station at Cork through cheering crowds. Special trains brought them to Dublin, where about 300 arrived at Kingsbridge Terminus at midnight, the greater number being dropped off at stations along the line. At Kingsbridge the men were greeted by a crowd of 10,000. The Irish Times referred to them as ‘the forlorn remnants of the Pope’s Brigade’ and reported that they were met by a ‘considerable mob of persons, composed of the lower orders’. The Times reported that the men ‘were dressed in every imaginable costume, some of them being attired in a mixture of Zouave and French coats, trousers and hats, and many of them in the ordinary dress of the laboring class. They presented altogether anything but a military appearance’. Cars were provided for the men who were brought to lodgings in the city. A further 100 arrived in Dublin at 7 a.m. The bulk of the men attended Mass in Marlborough Street chapel on Sunday morning, where Dr. Cullen presided. The Times reporting that they were followed by a mob of ‘the lower orders’. The idea of Irish Catholic soldiers fighting together in a cause of their choosing was not something the newspapers and the political classes were willing to accept, so every opportunity was used to castigate the Irish Battalion. The London Times even referred to them as ‘wretched creatures who were kidnapped by the recruiting agents of the Roman Pontiff’. In December twenty-seven wounded survivors reached Dublin and were cared for in St. Vincent’s Hospital. Irish casualties for the entire campaign were around seventy men. Despite the propaganda from the Italian and British press the performance of the Irish Battalion in battle was commendable, especially for men who had little military training. In due course sixty-four officers, NCOs and men of the Irish Papal Brigade were decorated for bravery. Ultimately, neither the Irish battalion nor the Papal army did anything to change the outcome of the war. By 1861 Italy was united and in 1870 Rome was declared the capital. The Papal government was lavish with decorations and the Battalion of St. Patrick did well, receiving more than any other Papal battalion. Capt. Blackney was awarded the Cavaliere (Knight) of the Ordine-Piano (Order of Pius). According to Michael T. Crean, who was wounded at Spoleto and was awarded the Knighthood of Pius IX, James Blackney on his return to Ireland ‘settled down to the life of a county gentleman’. Major O’Reilly returned to his home, Knock, Abbey, Co. Louth, and to his patriotic work. In 1862 he was elected MP for Longford. Another veteran, Carlow man Myles Keogh, emigrated to the United States, served in the Union army during the American Civil war and died fighting alongside George Armstrong Custer at the Battle of the Little Big Horn in 1876.

A GAME OF THRONES. LEINSTER V MUNSTER AT THE BATTLE OF CLONTARF

A game of thrones: Leinster versus Munster at the Battle of Clontarf

James Durney

This 23 April is the 1,000th anniversary of the Battle of Clontarf. For a long time it was generally thought that at Clontarf Brian Bórú chased the Vikings from Ireland. However, the events are not that simple and are much more complex. Both sides were locked in alliances with other thrones and kingdoms. While Leinster was allied with the Vikings, Bórú also had Viking allies. The main opponents of the High King were the brother and son of his estranged wife, Gormlaith, while Bórú’s daughter, Sláine, was also married to Viking king of Dublin, Sitric Silkbeard.

Máelmórda mac Murchada held the title ri Airthir Liphi – ‘king of the Eastern Liffey Plain’ – at the time of the Battle of Clontarf and was Brian Bórú’s principal Irish opponent in the fight. The Battle of Clontarf was not only the climax of Leinster’s rebellion against the Munster king Brian Bórú, but was also the culmination of the Uí Dúnlainge overkinship of the province after 300 years of rule.Máelmórda’s sister, Gormlaith, had married Brian Bórú, and both Irish and Norse sources paint her as a malign force, who became embittered with Bórú and helped to initiate the Battle of Clontarf by urging her brother Máelmórda to rebel against her husband.

Gormlaith was born in Naas around 955, the daughter of Murchadh mac Finn, Lord of Naas, King of Leinster. As head of the Uí Fháeláin, a powerful dynasty based at Naas, and one of the three branches of Uí Dúnlainge that alternated the overkingship of Leinster between them, Murchad had four sons – Faelán, Máelmórda, Muiredach and Máel Carmain – and one daughter, Gormlaith. The identity of her mother is unclear, but Celtic scholar Muireann Ní Bhrolcháin believes that she was a Norse servant or slave, probably taken by an Irish raiding party and perhaps forcibly baptised. This might explain her undying support, and also Máelmórda’s support, to her first-born, half-Viking son, Sitric. It would also explain the animosity towards Gormlaith in Irish and Norse literature. The medieval Icelandic Njáls saga described Gormlaith as ‘a most beautiful woman who showed the best qualities in all matters that were not in her power, but in all those that were, people said she showed herself of an evil disposition’. In Irish literature she is painted as an evil, vengeful queen and the instigator of the Battle of Clontarf.

It is believed that Gormlaith had been married three times to three famous kings, attesting Uí Fháeláin’s involvement at the highest level of dynastic politics during this period. These marriages were political contracts rather than love matches. Gormlaith first married the Norse king, Olaf Cúarán, with whom she bore a son, Sitric Silkbeard; she then married  Máel Sechnaill mac Domnaill, the king of Tara – with whom, it was thought, but not confirmed, she also bore a son, Conchobhar; she then Brian Bórú, with whom it is also thought she bore a son, Donnchad. All three marriages are remarked upon in a witty stanza preserved in the Annals of the Kingdom of Ireland:

Gormlaith took three leaps,

Which a woman shall never take [again],

A leap at Ath-cliath, a leap at Teamhair,

A leap at Caiseal of the goblets over all.

Gormlaith’s first husband was Olaf Cúarán – known as ‘Olaf of the Sandal,’ because he liked Irish footwear.  Olaf had come to Dublin in 952 when he lost his throne in Northumbria. At that time Ath-cliath, or Dublin, founded by Vikings as a permanent raiding-camp, was Ireland’s first genuine town with an economy based primarily on craft-working and trading, both locally and internationally. According to the Irish annalists Olaf was a Christian. Dublin Vikings had been converting to Christianity since 930 and the city Olaf ruled had timber churches where Christ was worshipped instead of the gods of the Norse and Danes. As part of a contractual alliance with the Leinster kingship Olaf married Gormlaith, probably in the late 960s, when she was in her mid-teens and he was possibly in his fifties. In this period girls were married early, probably as soon as they were capable of bearing children. Her father, Murchadh, may have arranged this marriage. Gormlaith bore Olaf a son, Sitric, and in all accounts, she appears to favour him above the others.

In 979 the Dublin Vikings were defeated by the Ardrí (High King) Máel Sechnaill, son of Domhnall Ua Néill a prince of the Southern Uí Néill, at Tara(Teamhair). The following year Máel Sechnaill(also known as Malachy the Great, or Malachy II), marched on Dublin and following a siege that lasted three days, captured the city, took much plunder and freed 2,000 Irish slaves. Máel Sechnaill made it plain that Dublin was now under his authority and that the Vikings would have to pay him tribute as the High King of Ireland. Olaf, the old Viking, could not stand for this. He abdicated and went off to the island of Iona in the Inner Hebrides on pilgrimage. Máel Sechnaill occupied Dublin, and installed Olaf’s son, Sitric, as its ruler in return for paying him considerable tribute. Olaf died at a monastery on Iona in 981, at which point Gormlaith returned to Ireland. (It is also possible that Gormlaith never left Dublin and stayed to protect her own and her son’s interests.) In a possible strategic move, Máel Sechnaill married Gormlaith, around 984, becoming Sitric’s stepfather. Sitric may have expressed a willingness to do the High King’s bidding, but he still considered himself an independent king. Whatever, the course Dublin continued to remain a Viking stronghold.

In 982 Brian Bórú, then secure as king of Munster, marched his armies out of the province for the first time and launched an assault on neighbouring Osraige. A Leinster alliance would have proved useful at this point and he found an ally in Máelmórda mac Murchada. His father, Murchad, overking of the province, was treacherously killed in 972 by Domhnall Claen, after they had eaten and drank together, at which point the kingship went to the second branch, Uí Muiredaig, and then in 978 to the third branch, Uí Dúnchada, after which the conventional expectation was that the next overking would be Máelmórda. But when the Uí Dúnchada incumbent died in 984 Máelmórda failed to secure it for his line. An alliance with the king of Munster might just hand the kingship back to Máelmórda.

Máel Sechnaill marched on Dublin again in 989 after he learned that the Leinster men had formed an alliance with his rival, Bórú, for the highkingship of Ireland. After a siege of twenty days Sitric capitulated and recognised his stepfather as overlord of Dublin, and promised to pay an ounce of gold for ‘every garden’ in the city, payment to be made annually on Christmas night. It is unknown if Gormlaith was in Dublin at the time of the siege, but it seems likely that she was then estranged from Máel Sechnaill. Some time later, Máel Sechnaillagain visited Dublin and to make Sitric’s humiliation complete carried off the ring of Tomar and the sword of Carlus, two heirlooms of the 9th century much valued by the Norsemen. The position was stalemated, but Sitric and his maternal uncle Máelmórda, along with Gormlaith, plotted against the high king.

When Brian Bórú brought his army into Leinster in 998 he secured the submission of its overking, Donnchad of Uí Dúnchada. (An overkingship consisted of a king’s power being recognized by another kingdom. This would usually be established by a military campaign. An overking had power over other lesser kings, like the king of Naas, etc.)However, Donnchad was taken captive by the Norse king of Dublin, Sitric, and Máelmórda, his rival for the Leinster overkingship. Donnchad was deposed for the time being, while Máelmórda took the title in his place. Máel Sechnaill was in no doubt that Gormlaith was part of the conspiracy and her repudiation, under the Brehon law, must have followed swiftly on the events in Kildare.

Both Máel Sechnaill and Brian Bórú decided to undertake a major military advance into Leinster. Their combined armies met the Leinstermen and Norsemen at the Battle of Glenn Máma (between Rathcoole and Kill) on 30 December 999. The battle was the greatest triumph of Bórú’s career to date and the slaughter on both sides was immense. Sitric’s brother, Haraldr, next in line to the Dublin throne, was among the dead. The day after the battle Máelmórda was captured, hiding in a yew tree and dragged from it by Bórú’s son Murchad. His life was spared, a mistake Bórú would live to regret.

Bórú and his new ally, Máel Sechnaill, stormed the dún, or fortress, of Dublin on New Year’s Day 1000. They burned the dún (present day site of Dublin Castle) carried off its gold, silver and captives and expelled its king, Sitric, who fled by ship to the east Ulster kingdom of Ulaid. Sitric negotiated a return to Dublin, only by making formal submission to Bórú and handing over his hostages, including Donnchad, king of Leinster. The Norseman was reinstated as king of Dublin, but Sitirc was now Bórú’s vassal and owed him military service in return. Bórú further cemented his alliance with Sitric by marrying off one of his daughters, Sláine, to the Norse king. Máelmórda, was kept in captivity until all the hostages of Leinster were freed at which point he was released.

To make his position, and his ambition, perfectly clear to Dublin, Leinster and Meath, Bórú took Gormlaith, mother of Sitric and repudiated wife of Máel Sechnaill, as his second wife. Bórú, nearing sixty, was still an active man and Gormlaith, in her mid-forties, was undoubtedly an attractive woman. The union was a sound political move. Gormlaith reputedly had one son for Bórú, Donnchad, who lived until 1064 and succeeded his father immediately after Clontarf. He died in Rome as an old man, but would have only been fifteen at the time of Clontarf, so was possibly the son of Brian’s wife, Dubhchobhlaigh. Under Brehon law it was permissible for a man to have more than one wife and it would appear that Bórú was married to two women at once. Dubhchobhlaigh would have been Bórú’s ‘lawful’ wife, while Gormlaith a secondary, perhaps temporary wife, fully recognised by law and everyone at the time.

Bórú had set his eyes on the Ardrí of Ireland and with an army drawn from Munster, Dublin, Leinster and Connacht marched on Tara. He made short work of Cathal of Connaught on the way and sent a messenger to Máel Sechnaill, asking for his abdication. Máel Sechnaill, aware of Bórú’s strength had appealed to the northern Uí Néill, but help was not forthcoming. The inability of the north to put aside personal jealousy and join in a united front against Bórú, or the Norse and Leinster incursions, led to Máel Sechnaill having no choice but to abdicate the highkingship in favour of the Munster king.

The new High King was declared ‘Briain Imperatoris Scotorum’ – Brian, Emperor of the Irish – Scots, or Scoti, being the name given to the Irish until the following century. In 1003 Bórú deposed Donnchad and hoping to keep the Leinstermen in check, installed Máelmórda as king of Leinster. Ireland endured a decade of peace, but in 1012 Bórú imposed a fresh tribute, or Bóramha, on Leinster. The Bóramha had long caused bitterness in kings and people and the Annals of Clonmacnoise record the annual tribute as being 150 cows, 150 hogs, 150 coverletts (to cover beds), 150 cauldrons, 150 couples (men and women) in servitude and 150 maids, including the king of Leinster’s own daughter.

Dubhchobhlaigh, Bórú’s wife had died in 1009, which left Gormlaith residing at Bórú’s court in Kincora. Medieval scholar Roger Chatterton Newman believes that the re-imposition of the Bóramha on Leinster could have been because Gormlaith, snubbed and isolated by her step-sons, might have left Kincora for her brother’s court and Brian, prompted perhaps by his favourite son, Murchadh, reimposed the hated tribute. Bórú knew that Leinster looked down on him as an interloper in the matter of kingship and he imposed a much heavier tribute on the rebellious province-kingdom. When the tribute was not forthcoming Murchadh was sent to plunder Leinster.

Bórú tried to mend the rift with Máelmórda, but Gormlaith was at the centre of a conspiracy, inciting her brother to rebellion, out of shame felt at the subordination of her province of Leinster to Bórú’s overlordship. Leinster withdrew its official submission to the High King and prepared for battle. Sitric of Dublin promised support to his uncle, who also sought aid from the Uí Néill in Aileach and other Irish princes. Máelmórda’s allies attacked Bórú’s loyal ally, Máel Sechnaill in Meath. The king of Tara retaliated leading an army into the Norse-controlled territory of north Co. Dublin and burning Sitric’s heartland from Fingal to the Hill of Howth, but a contingent of his army was overtaken south of Swords and defeated by Sitric and Máelmórda. The two kings continued their attacks on Máel Sechnaill’s kingdom of Meath, from which they brought back plunder and captives to Dublin. Sitric travelled overseas to gain more aid and support from Vikings outside Ireland, most notably Earl Sigurd of Orkney and Brodir of the Isle of Man. Sitric promised Sigurd his mother’s hand in marriage and overlordship of the eastern kingdoms on the death of Bórú. The conflict Gormlaith engineered now came to a climax at the Battle of Clontarf.

The two armies met at Clontarf on Good Friday, 23 April 1014. Bórú had an army of around 5,000, mainly Munster men, but also his allies from Tara and Meath, and Vikings from the south. Facing them was an army of around 3,000 Leinstermen, ‘foreign’ Norsemen and Dublin Norsemen. At the head of the Leinstermen was Máelmórda mac Murchada, king of Leinster. Sitric did not take part in the battle, remaining within the dún of Dublin to ensure it did not fall into Irish hands, as it had after the Battle of GlennMáma. He watched the course of the fight unfold from the wooden battlements of Dublin.  With him was his wife, Sláine, daughter of Brian Bórú, and possibly his mother Gormlaith, wife of Brian Bórú.

Clontarf was the bloodiest battle in Irish history up to that time. The battle saw the Norse and Leinster army annihilated. Every one of their leaders, Máelmórda, Sigurd, and Brodir were slain; Sitric’s brother, Dubgall was killed leading the Dublin contingent. Máelmórda fell on the battlefield, but it is unknown how. There also fell an Uí Muiredaig prince, Tuathal mac Augaire, who was a potential king of Leinster, and the son of Brogarbán mac Conchobair, from whom the Uí Conchobair Failgi (O’Connor Faly) descend. Although victorious Brian was killed by Brodir of Man, who was fleeing the battle. Brodir gathered a few warriors and burst through the thinned pen of shields guarding the seventy-three-year-old High King and killed him with a blow of his axe. He was instantly captured and subsequently suffered a very long, cruel, and grisly death.

The Irish paid dearly for their victory though, with the death of Brian Ború, his son Murchad, grandson Turlough, brother Cuduiligh, and nephew Conaing. In addition ten Munster kings and many other nobles also perished. Bórú’s army was too depleted to attack Dublin where Sitric was in a better position to repel any onslaught. Donnchad, as senior over his brother Tadhg, succeeded Brian and lead the survivors of Clontarf home to Kincora.

The Norsemen of Ireland were not seriously affected in their position by the Irish victory at Clontarf, but it did signal the end of paganism among them. The national distinction between the Irish and the Vikings, however, continued until after the Anglo-Norman arrival. In many instances the Norse sided with the Gaelic chieftains against the Normans.

From Máelmórda’s son Bran (d.1052) the Uí Dúnlainge dynasty adopted the surname Ua Brain (O’Byrne). He became king in 1016 after the deaths in quick succession of two other rulers of Leinster. Four years after Clontarf Sitric blinded, in Dublin, Bran – his cousin – and within a few decades the Uí Dúnlainge were permanently ousted from the overkingship of Leinster by the long-overshadowed Uí Chennselaig in the south of the province. The annals record that Gormlaith died in 1030, aged in her seventies. What happened Gormlaith after Clontarf is open to conjecture – she could have lived within the protected walls of her son’s kingdom, or returned to Naas and a quiet end within monastic walls, as other women of her mould had done. In the end, Gormlaith’s intrigues had led to the weakening and, eventually, destruction of the power of her own family in Leinster and that of her son in Dublin.

In 1028 after a much publicised pilgrimage to Rome Sitric Silkbeard gave a grant of gold and treasure and a site to build a church dedicated to the Holy Trinity, establishing what would become Christchurch Cathedral in Dublin. Sitric’s death is recorded as 1042, but his burial place is unknown. It may reasonably be assumed to have been in the Dublin colony in Gwynedd, Wales, where his descendents constituted the ruling dynasty. His daughter, Cailleach Fionáin, died in the same month, but it is unsure if she was the daughter of Sláine, who had watched the rout of the Leinstermen and the Norsemen by her kinsmen, the Munstermen, from the walls of Dublin.

PRIVATE JAMES DURNEY, ROYAL IRISH REGIMENT. A SOLDIER OF THE GREAT WAR

Private James Durney, Royal Irish Regiment: a soldier of the Great War

By James Durney

My great-grandfather James Durney served in what was called ‘The Great War for civilization,’ and had the scars and medals to prove it. He died in 1957, four years before I was born, so I knew basically nothing of his life. That is until I got ‘old’ enough to be interested. By this stage, my father, James Durney, had also passed on so I asked my uncle, Paddy Durney, about James the Great War soldier. He told me that James had been in the British army during WWI and had been wounded by a shell explosion while pushing an artillery piece across a bridge somewhere on the Western Front. All James could remember was an explosion and then waking up in a hospital where they took seven pieces of shrapnel from a head wound and inserted a metal plate in his skull. The shrapnel pieces were displayed in a glass on the mantelpiece in his house at Skeaugh, Callan, Co. Kilkenny.

All British servicemen received at least two medals – the British War Medal and Victory Medal – so I decided to have a look for James Durney on the UK National Archives website (www.nationalarchives.gov.uk) for the Medal Rolls Index Card which contains an entry for each person who received one or more medals. The card will usually show the name, regiment, rank, number and medals awarded. It may also show the ‘theatre of war first served in’ and the date of entry therein. The remarks column may note if a soldier was killed in action. The address is not usually recorded. There is a small sterling charge to get a copy of the index card, which is emailed to you.

I assumed James Durney was in the Royal Field Artillery or Royal Horse Artillery, because of the story of the artillery piece and the Medal Rolls are particularly useful if you do not know the service number, regiment, etc., of the person you are looking for. Durney, however, is a unique name so I found James Durney quite easily. There were several other Durneys on the rolls and the National Archives sent these along, six records in total, on an A4 page. I now had James Durney’s service number (5779) and unit (Royal Irish Regiment). However, no address was provided, so I was not totally sure this was my great-grandfather. In 2012 Niall Brannigan and John Kirwan published Kilkenny families in the Great War, compiling a nominal roll of Co. Kilkenny WWI veterans. There were five Durney entries in the book, including James Durney, service no. 5779, Royal Irish Regiment.

Herein lies the value of local histories as this book contained James Durney’s address, probable birth date, age, occupation, parents names and that he was reported wounded in September 1917. It also recorded that his two brothers Patrick and Matthew had also joined the British army. Their details were also provided. Both Patrick and Matthew had appeared on the medal card index I earlier received from the NA. I now had a lot of information and searched ancestry.co for James Durney’s personnel service record, but found nothing. Unfortunately, about sixty per cent of the WWI personnel records were burned during the London Blitz in WWII and James Durney’s record was more than likely one of them.

I located James Durney in the 1901 and 1911 census, but basically that was that. There did not seem to be much more to do. However, my father’s anniversary mass fell on 15 March 2014 and during the day, over a pint, of course, I asked my uncle Paddy about James Durney the Great War soldier. Did he know him, were there any other details? Paddy recalled that he and my father used to visit from Newbridge, Co. Kildare, to their grandfather James, in Skeaugh, Callan. He also said that both James and his brother, Mattie, had died on the same day, an hour apart – James in Callan and Mattie in England – and that there was a report in the newspapers. This revelation led me to search irishnewspaperarchives.com and lo and behold I found, in the Kilkenny People on 8 June 1957, a headline: ‘Brothers die on same day.’

This entry gave me some wonderful family information that you could only wish for: James Durney was seventy-two and a ‘respected member of an old and well-known Callan Family. Deceased was an ex-British soldier, who had served with the forces in France during the first world war. He is survived by a widow, a member of the Keogh family, Ahenure, and leaves five sons and three daughters…’ A list of chief mourners – names and addresses –  was given, which included his son and my grandfather, Patrick, Newbridge. The final resting place of James Durney, a soldier of the Great War, was recorded as the family burial ground, Newtown, Callan, Co. Kilkenny.