June (Meitheamh) 4^th

1487 - Thomas FitzGerald (Silken Thomas), Kildare's brother, accompanies Simnel's army of German mercenaries and some Irishmen to England on this date

1651 - Ireton, Oliver Cromwell's son-in-law, lays siege to Limerick city. By October, Limerick is in Ireton's hands. Ireton dies of the plague shortly afterwards

1731 - Allegedly, the date when the robbery of the Golden Lyon's cargo takes place at Ballyheige Co. Kerry. Owned by the Danish East India Company, the ship had become stranded near Ballyheige, Co. Kerry. Its valuable cargo is moved into a house and guarded by troops, but 'About twelve or one in the night a number of men broke into the house at Ballyheige where the money chests were kept, wounded three of the Danes and carried it off.' Eventually, about ten of the robbers are apprehended and charged, and approximately £7,524 2s is recovered

1798 - In Co. Wexford, Government troops march south out of Gorey. Rebels from Carrigrew move north, they attack and defeat Government forces at Tubberneering. Government forces withdraw north. Rebels occupy Gorey

1798 - Lord Edward Fitzgerald dies at Newgate prison from wounds sustained in the course of his arrest

1864 - Neilí Ni Bhriain, Irish Gaelic League activist, is born

1886 - Months of serious rioting begin in Belfast on this date

1909 - Charlotte Grace O'Brien, Irish social reformer dies. Charlotte Grace O'Brien, daughter of Young lrelander William Smith O'Brien, deserves to be remembered for her pioneering work in forcing shipping lines to improve conditions for emigrants.
http://www.limerick.ie/media/Media,3977,en.pdf

1909 - Robert Dudley Edwards, historian, is born in Dublin

1952 - Ciaran Fitzgerald, rugby player, is born in Galway

1957 - John Treacy, athlete, is born in Villierstown, Co. Waterford - Olympic silver medal winner.

1968 - Robert Kennedy won the California democratic Presidential Primary whose candidates included Eugene McCarthy.

1978 - Belfast flute player James Galway reaches no. 10 in the British charts with Annie’s Song

1980 - John Tunley, then chairman of the Irish Independence Party (IIP), was shot dead by 3 members of the UDA while on his way to a political meeting in Carnlough, County Antrim. [The IIP was a Nationalist party that had been established on 7 October 1977.]

1998 - A collection of 15 documents, one from George Yeats, the other 14 hand-written missives signed by WB Yeats is sold by fine art auctioneers Christie's for over £5,500; a second collection of 12 letters, including eight signed by WB Yeats, and one by Ezra Pound sells for £5,585

1998 - Amid strict security, His Royal Highness, the Duke of Kent makes a courtesy visit to Lifeboat Stations in Cork and Kerry in his role as President of the Royal National Lifeboat Institution (RNLI)

2001 - It is announced that a previously unknown and heavily re-worked draft of one of the closing chapters of James Joyce's epic novel, Ulysses, is set to fetch up to £1.2 million at auction in London next month.

Feast Day:

St. Edfrith (Eadfrith) of Lindisfarne, Monk & Bishop

Died 721. Edfrith's life is obscure prior to his becoming bishop in 698. He studied in Ireland and was well-trained as a scribe, an artist, and a calligrapher because it seems almost certain that he alone wrote and illuminated the Lindisfarne Gospels, which can now be seen in the British Library. His masterpiece was dedicated to Saint Cuthbert and would have taken at least two years to complete. He welcomed the new text of the Gospels and the new layout, both of which came to him from Italy via Wearmouth-Jarrow. He provided evangelist portraits as a creative artist in a field of Mediterranean expertise, but he also excelled in insular majuscule script and Irish geometric and zoomorphic decoration of extraordinary delicacy and accuracy. The fusion of all these elements in one work is a tribute to Edfrith's well-rounded education and the merging of Roman and Irish elements in Northumbria about 35 years after the Synod of Whitby.

The manuscript would have been enough to ensure Edfrith a place in art history; nevertheless, he was also a good bishop. Most of his memorable actions, however, are associated with Saint Cuthbert. The anonymous Life of Cuthbert was dedicated to Edfrith and he commissioned Saint Bede to write his prose Life of Cuthbert. He restored Cuthbert's oratory on the Inner Farne Island for the use of Saint Felgild. He may also have been the recipient of a letter from Saint Aldhelm.

Edfrith was connected with Cuthbert even in death: He was buried near his tomb. His relics, together with those of Saints Aidan, Eadbert, and Ethelwold, were taken with Cuthbert's in their wanderings through Northumbria from 875 to 995, when they reached Durham. When Cuthbert's relics were taken to the new cathedral, Edfrith's were translated, too. Today's feast is that of the translation (Farmer).

See the British Library's web site for the Lindisfarne Gospels:

A Brief Chronology of Hiberno-Saxon or Insular Manuscripts:

The Lindisfarne Gospels and the Book of Kells:
http://www1.minn.net/~wildrivr/eadfrith_studio/history.html

St. Breaca of Cornwall, Virgin

(also known as Breague, Branca, Banka)

5th-6th century. Saint Breaca was a disciple of Saint Patrick and Saint Brigid. Obviously not too much is known of Breaca: Some consider it a male name; others female. She is said to have migrated with several companions from Ireland into Cornwall (c. 460), where she landed at Reyver on the eastern bank of the river Hayle in the hundredth of Penrith. There she led a solitary life in great sanctity and was honoured with a church famous for pilgrimages and miracles. Montague claims martyrdom for the saint (Benedictines, Husenbeth, Montague).

St. Buriana of Cornwall, Virgin

6th century. Saint Buriana was another Irish woman who migrated to Cornwall, where Saint Buryan across from the Scilly Island perpetuates her name. King Athelstan built a college and church there to house her relics (Benedictines, Husenbeth).