Deep History, Deepening Collaborations

41 These years also witnessed the birth of Irish republican separatism, as the Society of United Irishmen reinvented itself as a revolutionary conspiracy dedicated to overthrowing British rule. 1798 witnessed a bloody uprising in which approximately 20,000 people were killed. The suppression of the rebellion provided the pretext for the government to introduce the Act of Union. This abolished the Irish Parliament and amalgamated Ireland into the new United Kingdom. Yet hopes that the Union would more closely integrate Ireland into Britain were dashed in 1803, with the recommencement of war with France, under the leadership of Napoleon. Renewed fears of another rebellion were confirmed in 1803, with Robert Emmet’s unsuccessful rising. Emmet’s subsequent execution effectively ended the United Irish movement, as well as hopes that the Union would provide a fresh start. For each volume from this sample of HO 100, we have selected between 10 and 20 items, providing descriptions and partial or full transcriptions. Now, for the first time, these enhanced descriptions of the volumes are available and fully searchable through the Virtual Record Treasury of Ireland, allowing far easier access to this rich source of social and political history. ‘Carrying the Union’, a satirical cartoon published in 1800, in the wake of the Act of Union’s passage. The cartoon depicts the Prime Minister, William Pitt, and John Fitzgibbon, the Irish Lord Chancellor, abducting ‘Erin’, the female personification of Ireland. They have tied her with a ribbon inscribed ‘Union Belt’, and are leaping across the Irish sea atop an English lion. They are being chased by a number of figures riding ‘Irish bulls’. These include St Patrick, wearing a mitre, and followed by several men, including Henry Grattan and John Foster, the Speaker of the Irish House of Commons.