United Irishman

The United Irishman title has been a very popular newspaper title in Ireland and a number of newspapers have been published under the title.

• The United Irishman was a weekly Irish nationalist newspaper founded by John Mitchel in February 1848,^[1] after he left The Nation newspaper, where he had been editor. The paper suppressed under the Treason Felony Act (1848) and Mitchel arrested and convicted on the 26th of May 1848 and sent to Van Diemen’s Land.^[2]

• The United Irishman was an Irish nationalist newspaper co-founded by Arthur Griffith and William Rooney.^[3] It was first published on the 4th of March 1899 and ran from 1899 to 1906. Contributors included Oliver St. John Gogarty, Padraig Pearse, Maud Gonne and Roger Casement. The writer James Joyce is quoted as saying about the United Irishman was the only newspaper of pretensions in Ireland.^[4] In 1906 the United Irishman collapsed under a libel suit and was refounded as Sinn Féin, which ran until 1914 when it was suppressed by the British government.

• The United Irishman/An tÉireannach Aontaithe, first published in May 1948, was the official monthly organ of Sinn Féin sold by its members. After the split in the Irish Republican Movement, the title continued as the organ of Official Sinn Féin, being published from the offices in 30 Gardner Place in Dublin, with the Provisional wing publishing An Phoblacht.^[5][6] The first editor was Seán G. O'Kelly based in an office in 38 South King Street in Dublin.^[7] The historian Éamonn MacThomáis edited the paper for a short while prior to the 1970 split in Sinn Féin. Other editors of the paper included Seán Cronin,^[8] Seán Ó Brádaigh (1958–1960), Ruairí Ó Brádaigh,^[9] Eoin Ó Murchú, Seamus Ó Tuathail, Denis Foley and Tony Meade (1967). Other contributors to the paper included Eamon McCann, Roy Johnston, Eamon Smullen, Eoghan Harris and Sean Garland.^[10][11][12] The United Irishman was replaced by Sinn Fein the Workers Party in 1980 by The Irish People and the Workers' Weekly.^[13]

• The United Irishman, published in north Belfast 2000 and produced by those involved in the Official Republican Movement which was a breakaway from The Workers Party in the late 1990s.^[14] It included articles by Colm Breathnach and Eamon McCann.

Editors

1948: Seamus G. O'Kelly^[15]

Seán Cronin

1958: Seán Ó Brádaigh

1960: Ruairí Ó Brádaigh

1960: Martin Shannon

1962: Denis Foley^[15]

1965: Tony Meade^[15]

1967: Seamus Ó Tuathail^[15]

1971: Eoin Ó Murchú^[16]

Des O'Hagan

References