One of the many treasures safeguarded in Laois Libraries’ Local Studies section is a memoir from Timahoe, a memoir which begins in 1913. The work is entitled Timahoe, as I remember 1914 and the memorialist is Jack Quigley, of Ballygormill, Timahoe. This is an undated typed document. The present article offers some extracts from the...Read More

In 1921 the Wolfhill Collieries company was planning an extensive expansion and seeking investment funds through offering shares to the public. Unfortunately, the company went into receivership in the summer of 1925. So this phase of coal-mining in Wolfhill ran between 1910, when efforts to re-start began, and 1925, with receivership and eventual liquidation.Read More

Kathleen Muldowney was one of five Labour candidates nominated for election to Maryborough Town Commission in the local urban and municipal elections of January 1920. Maryborough Town Commission was a layer of local government established in 1855 and was finally wound-up in 2014, by then re-named Portlaoise Town Council.Read More

On January 26th 1922 Maryborough Courthouse resounded to cries of “Up the Republic” from the gallery as a self-described “Republican soldier” was taken from the dock denouncing “the informers of Ballinakill” as he went. The prisoners were Peter Campion, John Campion and Alphonsus O’Hara. The charge was murder. Despite the defiant posturing this speech from...Read More

On 20th January 1921 Thomas Lawless, a 47 year old military veteran and father of seven, was shot dead by a group of 'Black and Tans' in his home on Lyster Lane. Lawless, who had fought for the British Empire abroad, became one of its' victims at home.Read More

Learn how a small newspaper article published a hundred years ago inspired and facilitated a deeper investigation into the revolutionary activities of a family member.Read More

On Sunday the 4th of June 1922 open-air rallies took place in Portlaoise and Rathdowney in support of Labour candidate for the Leix-Offaly constituency, William Davin. In this article we are going to look at Cissie Cahalan — one of the speakers at the rallies and at shop workers more generally. Cissie Cahalan was then...Read More

In the frontline of meeting the challenge of guerrilla insurgency was the Royal Irish Constabulary. The Dead of the Irish Revolution lists five Laois men among the fatal casualties from the ranks of the R.I.C. in the year 1921. They were John Doogue, Michael Quinn, Joseph Hughes, William Walsh and Thomas Dowling.Read More

On Wednesday the 12th of April 1922 there took place a meeting of, what some newspaper reports called, the “Protestant Unionists of Durrow and District”.[1] This assembly was in response to events in the north-east of Ireland and for this reason in this article we’ll have to delve into Belfast for a while before returning...Read More

Following 'The Treaty' the last major evacuation and hand-over was the surrender of Kellyville R.I.C. barracks in Portlaoise on Saturday the 18th of March 1922. In the words of historian Michael Rafter that was “seen by the people as being the end of British rule in the county.” This was the culmination of a series...Read More