Hidden history or hidden agenda?

DR Pat Muldowney’s letter (October 29) on RTÉ’s Hidden History programme (October 23) was valuable at the time and has become of even greater importance subsequently.

Dr Muldowney provided clear contemporary evidence that the two young members of the Pearson family, killed by the IRA at Coolacrease, Co Offaly, on June 30, 1921, had been killed for military, rather than, sectarian reasons. He then explained that his contribution to the RTÉ programme, on that matter, had been excised and that the producers had persisted in portraying the killing of the Pearsons as a sectarian act.

Since the publication of the letter, RTÉ, in the person of Niamh Sammon, director of the programme, and Eoghan Harris, an influential voice on the programme, defended the depiction of the Pearson killings as sectarian on the Joe Duffy Liveline show (November 5).