Some say we should forget about wars. However, rather than glorify or celebrate them, we should remember every gory detail to try to prevent further conflicts, writes Ryle Dwyer

“The true history of a passionate period,” wrote PS O’Hegarty in The Victory of Sinn Féin in 1924, “cannot be written by any contemporary. We are all too near it.”

AFTER Macroom, the biggest numbers to mobilise in Cork on Easter Sunday gathered at Bweeng, between Blarney and Mallow.

A Cumann na mBan courier was involved in a daring but unsuccessful attempt to deliver a key message to the local Irish Volunteers command on Easter weekend, writes Niall Murray

IF THE August 1915 funeral of Jeremiah O’Donovan Rossa was a portent of the Irish Volunteers’ military strength, British authorities were given an even clearer picture just five weeks before the Easter Rising began.

When Eleanor Burke eventually asked her grandmother why she never spoke about her membership of Cumann na mBan in Kerry, Ellie Rice replied: “We learned not to speak or say anything because one idle word during that period could cause somebody’s death.”

Another glance at the activities 100 years ago this week of key figures in the upcoming Rising, as recorded by authorities at the time, or recalled later by the participants.

Pension details released by the military archives shows women played a wider role in the Rising than previously thought, says Sinead McCoole

R.F. Foster

A relative of Protestant victims of a notorious War of Independence-era triple execution linked to a bloody massacre has issued an emotional appeal for help tracing the bodies of the victims.

Ryle Dwyer looks at a frenzy of violence against British forces at the height of the War of Independence in Kerry, and reveals the grisly fate of two Black and Tans who went missing

As an author of several books on 1916, I’m seeking your readers’ help in researching my next effort.

The Men Will Talk to Me:Kerry Interviews by Ernie O’Malley

The Military Archives, in collaboration with the National Archives, are to be congratulated for their digitisation of a substantial proportion of the Bureau of Military History collection.

First-hand accounts of the Easter Rising and the War of Independence are among important historical documents being made widely available to the public for the first time in almost half a century.

Sean Moylan: Rebel Leader

TODAY the Whyte’s history and literature auction of memorabilia is being held in Dublin. Ian Whyte, the managing director of the auctioneering firm, mentioned that the material had been forgotten after the Civil War.

THE rest of the country may have been preoccupied with the Lisbon Treaty, but in Kerry the topic of conversation this week was the brainstorm that seized Paul Galvin when he threw a tantrum and slapped the notebook out of the hand of referee Paddy Russell.

There was confusion tonight over the fate of a potentially historic antique pistol reluctantly handed over to gardai during a gun amnesty.

IN his letter (Irish Examiner, May 6), Jack Lane drew attention to John Regan’s review of my book, Tom Barry: IRA Freedom Fighter (Mercier Press) where the reviewer stated that Peter Hart was “fortunate in finding survivors of the ambush alive and lucid nearly 70 years after the event… one of whom, he notes, visited the site with him”.

IN his letter (Irish Examiner, May 6), Jack Lane drew attention to John Regan’s review of my book, Tom Barry: IRA Freedom Fighter (Mercier Press) where the reviewer stated that Peter Hart was “fortunate in finding survivors of the ambush alive and lucid nearly 70 years after the event… one of whom, he notes, visited the site with him”.

I READ with interest the column by Peter Levy (Irish Examiner, County News, April 19) on republicanism and section 31 of the Broadcasting Act.

IF THE government’s choice of Charlie McCreevy to steer the Freedom of Information Amendment Bill through the Oireachtas was a breath-taking piece of contemptible arrogance, then Cheltenham Charlie’s subsequent performance in taking off for the races while the legislation was being debated in the Oireachtas just beggars belief.

Records documenting the Irish struggle for independence between 1913 and 1921 are due to be released later this evening.