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1848 The 1848 Tricolour Celebration commemorates the first official unveiling of the Irish Tricolour flag by Thomas Francis Meagher at 33 the Mall in Waterford city. He was an Irish nationalist and leader of the Young Irelanders in the Rebellion of 1848.
In 1848, Meagher and William Smith O’Brien went to France to study political events there. French women supporting the Irish cause gave Meagher the new Flag of Ireland, a tricolour of green, white and orange.
He returned to Ireland with the flag. The flag was commemorated at the 1848 Flag Monument in the Irish parliament.
The difference between the 1848 flag and the present flag, is that the orange was placed next to the staff, and the red hand of Ulster adorned the white field.
Discover the history of the Irish Tricolour flag;
1848 Tricolour Celebration in Waterford
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1920 Eilís Dillon was born in Galway on this day in 1920. She was an author of children’s books and many of her stories have been translated into more than a dozen different languages to be sold around the world. In a career that produced more than 50 books, Dillon won various awards including the Bisto Book of the Year Award in 1991 for her tale, An Island of Ghosts. The Bisto Book of the Year Award went on to create the Eilís Dillon Award for a First Children’s Book in her honour.
Her uncle was Joseph Mary Plunkett who was a signatory of the 1916 Proclamation (below).
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1921 George Clancy was shot dead by Black and Tans on this day in 1921. Clancy was the Mayor of Limerick and a member of Sinn Féin.
He was close friends with James Joyce and Thomas Kettle and had been put in prison in the past for his part in the 1916 Easter Rising. Clancy is the basis for the character Michael Davin, in Joyce’s novel Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man.
Click here to read more about the Easter Rising
Click here to read more about James Joyce
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1922 Patrick Clancy was born on 7 March 1922. He was a member of The Clancys and Tommy Makem, who were the first Irish singers to achieve international fame during the folk revival of the 1960s. Bob Dylan was a fresh faced young man who looked up to The Clancy Brothers and kept pestering them for advice.
See The Clancys full story here with videos
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1967 Happy birthday to Kevin Manning, born in County Kildare on this day in 1967. Manning is a professional flat jockey in Ireland and Britain. He rides for his father-in-law Jim Bolger. Manning has won several prestigious races including both the Irish and English 1,000 Guineas and the 2,000 Guineas in England. However, the highlight of his career came when he won the Epsom Derby on board New Approach in 2008.
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1942 Happy birthday to Ralph Bryans, born in Belfast on this day in 1942. Bryans was a motorcycle rider and raced for Honda, with the pinnacle of his career being named the 1965 50cc World Championship.
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1999 More than 400 people formed a human chain around the Central Bank in Dublin on this day in 1999. The protest was in aid of the campaign to cancel Third World Debt, and similar protests were held in another 50 countries around the world.
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2006 The 1916 Proclamation of Independence was donated to the National Museum on this day in 2006. It was read aloud by Padraic Pearse at the General Post Office during the Easter Rising, when Irish nationalists tried to take control of Dublin and break free from British rule. The document can now be seen by tourists visiting Dublin.
Click here to read the history and background of the Easter Rising
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