Events

• June - Ulster Unionists hold a huge convention in Belfast at which they solemnly swear that "We will not have Home Rule".^[1]
• 1 July - Edward Carson sworn in as Solicitor-General for Ireland.^[1]
• 9 July - In the General Election, Edward Carson, standing as a Liberal Unionist, is elected to one of two Trinity College, Dublin seats.^[1]
• 25 November - Douglas Hyde lectures to the Irish National Literary Society on The Necessity for de-anglicising the Irish People, a precursor to the founding of the Gaelic League.^[2]
• The Belfast Labour Party, the first Socialist Party in Ireland, is established in Belfast.
• Free primary schooling and compulsory education up to the age of 14 is introduced through the Irish Education Act.

Arts and literature

• The Irish National Literary Society is founded.
• Oscar Wilde stages Lady Windermere's Fan.

Sport

Football

• International

27 February Wales 1 - 1 Ireland (in Bangor)^[3]

5 March Ireland 0 - 2 England (in Belfast)^[3]

19 March Ireland 2 - 3 Scotland (in Belfast)^[3]

• Irish League

Winners: Linfield

• Irish Cup

Winners: Linfield 7 - 0 The Black Watch

• Derry Olympic becomes only the second non-Belfast team in the Irish Football League, but only lasted one season.
• The Leinster Football Association is founded as the game's popularity is no longer confined to Ulster.
• The Oval football ground in Belfast is opened as the home of Glentoran.

Golf

• The first Irish Golf Championship is held.

Births

• 2 February - Alan McKibbin, businessman and Ulster Unionist Party MP (d.1958).
• 5 March - Tom Hales, Irish Republican Army volunteer, fought in Anglo-Irish War and Irish Civil War (d.1966).
• 4 April - Tom Jameson, cricketer (d.1965).
• 6 May - Edward FitzGerald, 7th Duke of Leinster, peer and gambler (d.1976).
• 7 June - Kevin O'Higgins, Minister for Justice, assassinated by the Irish Republican Army (d.1927).
• 15 August - Derrick Hall, cricketer (d.1947).
• 20 September - Patricia Collinge, actress and writer (d.1974).
• 15 October - James Kempster, cricketer (d.1975).
• 20 October - Eoin O'Duffy, first leader of Fine Gael and the Blueshirts, leader of Irish volunteers on the Nationalist side of the Spanish Civil War (d.1944).
• 26 November - Mike McTigue, boxer, light heavyweight champion of the world from 1923-1925 (d.1966).
• 24 December - Claude Joseph Patrick Nunney, recipient of the Victoria Cross for gallantry in 1918 on the Drocourt-Queant Line, France (d.1918).

Full date unknown

• Eamon Bulfin, Irish republican (d.1968).
• Willie Hough, Limerick hurler (d.1976).
• Kitty Kiernan, fianc e of the assassinated Michael Collins (d.1945).
• P. J. Ruttledge, Sinn F in, then Fianna F il, TD and Cabinet Minister (d.1952).

Deaths

• 26 January - Bernard Diamond, soldier, recipient of the Victoria Cross for gallantry in 1857 at Bolandshahr, India (b.1827).
• 5 February - John Hogan, businessman and United States Representative from Missouri (b.1805).
• 29 February - John Lucas, soldier, recipient of the Victoria Cross for gallantry in 1861 in New Zealand (b.1827).
• 8 May - James Thomson, engineer and physicist (b.1822).
• 17 May - William Walsh, U.S. Congressman in Maryland (b.1828).
• 29 May - Richard Charles Mayne, British admiral, explorer and MP (b.1835).
• 31 May - John Kean, businessman and politician in Ontario (b.1820).
• August - John Doyle, soldier at the Charge of the Light Brigade (b. c1828).
• 29 October - William Harnett, painter (b.1848).
• 30 November - Fenton John Anthony Hort, theologian and writer (b.1828).

Full date unknown

• Robert Templeton, naturalist, artist and entomologist (b.1802).

References