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370 matching titles

Through American and Irish Wars: The Life and Times of Thomas W. Sweeny 1820-1892 (Irish Abroad)

Jack Morgan

Dublin: Irish Academic Press, 2006. xii, 171 pages. Illustrated. Hardback

This well-illustrated biographical study is the first ever of Thomas W. Sweeny who, with his widowed mother, brother and sister, emigrated to Brooklyn, New York, in 1832 when Tom was twelve years old. Until the outbreak of the US war with Mexico, he was occupied with schooling and then work in the printing trade. Setting off for Mexico in 1847 as a Lieutenant in a New York volunteer regiment, however, would serve to define his life from then on. He lost an arm in the battle of Churubusco, but was permitted to serve as an officer in the regular army after the war. After service in California and the southwest desert, he was an outstanding officer in the Civil War during which he rose to the rank of General. All along, however, he had remained devoted to the cause of Irish nationalism, and at the close of the Civil War politicked among Irish nationalist circles (the Fenian Brotherhood) in the US for an American Irish invasion of Canada as the most direct and viable action to free Ireland. Sweeny's plan was adopted by the Fenians and, under his leadership, strikes into Canada were undertaken in 1866. The book considers at length the Fenian movement of the 1860s, its relationship to Irish nationalism in Ireland and the historical context in which Sweeny's Canadian invasion plan was formed and carried out. Also examined is the shaping of the historical record of the event. Highly literate, colourful, dashing and charming, Sweeny was a representative nineteenth century Irish American. He was also a devoted husband and father as is evident in his letters extensively cited in this illuminating biography.

USED. A very good copy in a very good dustjacket

Price: £ 16.00

Parallel Lives

Davina Jones

Belfast: Appletree Press, 2005. 206 pages. Illustrated. Hardback.

An affectionate look at two very different lives lived in tandem but intertwined by country house life on the Ards Peninsula in County Down. Castle Ward (now held by The National Trust) and Ballywhite House stood on opposite sides of Strangford Lough but their owners and those who lived on the estates found that their idyllic lives were changed for ever by the advent of the Second World War. This remarkable biography of Colonel William Brownlow, 'The Major', and Agnes White chronicles two very different lives. One was well known in Northern Ireland society, becoming Lord Lieutenant for County Down - a World War II veteran who campaigned for local issues and championed horse-racing and country sports. The other life was lived more quietly behind the scenes as a working mother and wife, chorister and talented amateur artist, but both were the faces of working lives well spent. All the more fascinating for being true..

USED. Slight top corner bumps, otherwise a good plus to very good copy

Price: £ 10.00

Buried in the Arctic Ice: One Irishman's Role in 19th Century Polar Exploration

Cyril Dunne

Dublin: Nonsuch Publishing, 2009. 296 pages. Illustrated. Paperback.

This is the story of the brave Arctic explorers who died in their attempts to seek the North-West Passage and North Pole during the years 1845-1877. Among them was Jim Hand from Bray, Co. Wicklow. Although low in rank, Jim was unique for two reasons. Firstly, in the year 1876, he and a small band of shipmates stood closer to the North Pole than any explorers had ever done. Secondly, his name is stamped in history for evermore, as Hand Bay, located on the most north-westerly point of Greenland was named in his memory. In Buried in the Arctic Ice, Cyril Dunne combines Jim Hand's personal journey with an intricately researched account of life in the Arctic, that is in turns terrifying and inspiring. A resident of Bray, Co. Wicklow, Cyril Dunne is the great grandnephew of Jim Hand.

USED. A very good copy

Price: £ 6.95

What's the best you can do? First-hand recollections of a second-hand bookseller.

ROWLINSON, Derek.

Downpatrick: Clive Scoular, 2009. 130 pages. Illustrated. Paperback.

If you happen to harbour a vague romantic notion of some day opening your own second-hand bookshop where the artistic intelligentsia would congregate to discuss highbrow matters and engage in witty badinage, then perhaps you would do well to read "What's the best you can do?" first. It may not necessarily put you off the idea altogether, but it will certainly provide you with a sharp reality check. The book is an autobiographical account of a second-hand bookshop owner in Northern Ireland during the 1980s and 90s and is a combination of straight prose mixed with numerous anecdotes of a mainly humorous, but sometimes rather poignantly sad nature. Although set against the backdrop of 'The Troubles', it shows how life generally went on pretty much as normal in those times, and that the experience of the second-hand bookseller is essentially universal, irrespective of circumstances or location. These recollections provide an insight into the world of used bookselling whilst simultaneously entertaining with descriptions of the often inexplicable behaviour of various characters who came through the door. The rude, the mean, and the downright stupid all make an appearance, and the eccentric is never too far away either. Bizarre situations, silly questions, and the author's reaction to them, seriously threaten to have you chuckle out loud at times. A 'must' for book lovers.

NEW. A fine copy.

Price: £ 4.99

Next 50 Matches

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Edward J. Byrne, 1872-1941: The Forgotten Archbishop of Dublin

Rory Gallagher: His Life and Times

This Scouting Life: A Memoir of a Simpler Time

Sir Richard Musgrave, 1746-1818: Ultra-Protestant Ideologue

Grattan: A Life

An Irishman: The Life of John O'Connor Power

Through American and Irish Wars: The Life and Times of Thomas W. Sweeny 1820-1892 (Irish Abroad)

Bishop in the Dock: The Sedition Trial of James Liston in New Zealand

Lady Gregory: An Irish Life

The King of Spring: The Life and Times of Peter O'Connor

Capital Women of Influence: Profiles of 13 Inspirational Irish Women

The Boys of St Columb's: From the 1947 Education Act to the 1968 Civil Rights Movement - Profiles of Eight Remarkable Men from Derry

Lives Less Ordinary: Dublin's Fitzwilliam Square, 1798-1922

Prodigals and Geniuses: The Writers and Artists of Dublin's Baggotonia

The Lives and Times of the Presidents of Ireland

A Time to Speak

Glory O! Glory O!: The Life of P J McCall

Cathal O'Byrne and the Northern Revival in Ireland, 1890-1960

Thomas A. Finlay, SJ, 1848-1940: Educationalist, editor, social reformer

Conor Cruise O'Brien: Violent Notions.

Visions and Revisions: Irish Writers in their Time - W. B. Yeats.

Sean MacEntee: A Political Life

Who is Roger Casement? A New Perspective

Parallel Lives

William Monsell of Tervoe, 1812-1894: Catholic Unionist, Anglo-Irishman

Philomena Garvey: Queen of the Irish Fairways

My Father, The General: Richard Mulcahy and the Military History of the Revolution

Memoirs of a Scribbler

Jack Lynch: A Biography

Francis Stuart: A Life

Sir Henry Docwra,1564-1631: Derry's Second Founder

Michael Collins Himself.

The Most Famous Irish People You've Never Heard of

The Fall of the House of Paisley

Buried in the Arctic Ice: One Irishman's Role in 19th Century Polar Exploration

Shackleton - The Boss: The Remarkable Adventures of a Heroic Antarctic Explorer

De Valera in America: The Rebel President's 1919 Campaign

Francis Stuart: Artist and Outcast

John Banville (Visions and Revisions, Irish Writers in Their Time).

Cromwell: An Honourable Enemy.

Bright, Brilliant Days: Douglas Gageby and The Irish Times.

Condemned: Letters from Death Row.

Dark Corners.

Days of Fear: The Diary of a 1920s Hunger Striker.

Queen's Thinkers: Essays on the Intellectual Heritage of a University.

Patrick Hillery: The Official Biography.

Jasper Wolfe of Skibbereen.

What's the best you can do? First-hand recollections of a second-hand bookseller.

Inside Man: Life as an Irish Prison Officer.

Ronnie Delany: Staying the Distance