October 2017

WW1 Event : Open Workshop with Piet Chielens and Annick Vandenbilcke, In Flanders Fields Museum
Irish Linen Centre & Lisburn Museum
28th October 2017 starting at 11.00am

Irish Linen Centre (LISBURN)

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For those who have never been able to visit In Flanders Fields Museum or the graves of loved ones fallen in Flanders, this is an opportunity to learn more about what was happening at the time. This session will be of personal or professional significance to anyone with an interest in First World War history, a rare opportunity to quiz two inspirational experts on details of Flanders’ battles, to ask where more information can be found and to learn more about the important work of In Flanders Fields Museum.

Lisburn Museum The 2017 programme continues to reflect significant events for Irish soldiers serving in the Great War as well as marking the quincentenary of the Reformation. Of particular note, is the open session on Saturday 28 October, an extra opportunity to quiz staff from the In Flanders Fields Museum on battle history in Belgium. The full programme can be viewed at https://www.lisburnmuseum.com/2017/09/free-autumn-talks-programme-2017/ All events are free but tickets are required. These may be booked in advance through Lisburn Museum Reception, ilc.reception@lisburncastlereagh.gov.uk Tel. 028 92663377

Why the First World War Failed to End
Friday 27th October 2017 from 7.00pm
Ulster Museum

Without the Great War, much of Europe’s history in the twentieth century cannot be adequately explained. The rise of fascism and bolshevism, or the escalation of an even more violent conflict between 1939 and 1945 are unthinkable without the Great War. One hundred years after the end of the Great War, the legacies of that conflict still haunt us today, be it in Ireland or – even more strikingly – in the Middle East and in the current conflict between Russia and the Middle East. Here, the Great War raised questions that remain unanswered even today.

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2017-08-30 WHY THE FIRST WORLD WAR FAILED TO END

Why the First World War Failed to End
Friday 27 October 2017
7.00pm – 8.30pm
Ulster Museum Belfast

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Without the First World War, much of Europe’s history in the twentieth century cannot be adequately explained. The rise of fascism and bolshevism, or the escalation of an even more violent conflict between 1939 and 1945 are unthinkable without the First World War. One hundred years after the end of the First World War, the legacies of that conflict still haunt us today, be it in Ireland or - even more strikingly - in the Middle East and in the current conflict between Russia and the Middle East. Here, the First World War raised questions that remain unanswered even today. Dr. Marie Coleman - Senior Lecturer in Irish History at Queen’s University Belfast Robert Gerwarth - Professor of Modern History at UCD and Director of the Centre for War Studies Margaret O’ Callaghan MA (NUI) PhD (Cambridge) - Historian and Political Analyst at the School of History, Anthropology, Philosophy and Politics at Queen’s University, Belfast Hosted by Ronan McGreevy from The Irish Times.

Please click here for full poppies programme or go to the website be clicking here.

27/10/2017 # Why the First World War Failed to End

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WW1 Event : Talk: The Irish Contribution to the Great War in Belgium, Piet Chielens, In Flanders Fields Museum
Irish Linen Centre & Lisburn Museum
27th October 2017 starting at 7.00pm

Irish Linen Centre (LISBURN)

2017-10-ALL - Irish Linen Centre

Piet’s talk gives an overview of the part played by Irish regiments from the first month of the war. His focus is on the roles taken by the 16th (Irish) and 36th (Ulster) divisions in 1917 and of the Ulster Division in 1918, from the German Spring Offensive to the Final Advance in Flanders. Piet is joined by his colleague Annick Vandenbilcke.

Survival in a Devastated Battlefield Landscape
Thursday 26 October 2017
1.00pm – 2.00pm
Ulster Museum Belfast

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Shortly after the First World War finally ended, the bright red corn poppy was adopted as the international emblem of war service ‘Remembrance’. Poppies bloomed across some of the worst battlefields of Flanders and their brilliant red colour made them symbolic of the blood spilled in prolonged trench warfare. Local botanist, Dr Ralph Forbes talks about the biology of the poppy, its relatives and other colourful cornfield weeds, examining how they reproduce and thrive in disturbed ground. The talk will end with information from the Centre for Environmental Data and Recording (CEDaR) on how you can identify and record plant life near yo

Please click here for full poppies programme or go to the website be clicking here.

26/10/2017 # The Poppy - Survival in a Devastated Battlefield Landscape

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In Praise of Forgetting
Thursday 26th October 2017 from 6.00pm
Canada Room, Queen's University

The conventional wisdom about historical memory is summed up in George Santayana’s celebrated phrase, ‘Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.’ Today, the consensus that it is moral to remember, immoral to forget, is nearly absolute. And yet is this right?

David Rieff, an independent writer who has reported on bloody conflicts in Africa, the Balkans, and Central Asia, insists that things are not so simple. He poses hard questions about whether remembrance ever truly has, or indeed ever could, ‘inoculate’ the present against repeating the crimes of the past. He argues that rubbing raw historical wounds—whether self-inflicted or imposed by outside forces—neither remedies injustice nor confers reconciliation. If he is right, then historical memory is not a moral imperative but rather a moral option—sometimes called for, sometimes not. Collective remembrance can be toxic. Sometimes, Rieff concludes, it may be more moral to forget.

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WW1 Event : The Irish Convention of 1917-1918: The Last Hope of Averting Partition?
Council Chamber, Belfast City Hall
Thursday 26 October 2017 6.30pm

belfast city council logo

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At present we are remembering a decade of key historical moments that shaped the history of Northern Ireland and Ireland a century ago. The period from 1912 - 1922 witnessed some dramatic changes. Now, one hundred years on, we are taking time to explore some of the significant events in more detail.

This season we will look at the Irish Convention, which was an initiative by the Prime Minister David Lloyd George who launched it saying that ‘Ireland should try her hand at hammering out an instrument of government for her own people.’

We will also look at the changing politics of the time, exploring the role of women in politics, following the extension of the vote with the Representation of the People Act in February 1918. The extension of the vote under this act made the General Election of 1918 historic in more ways than one and we will explore this election in detail.

In 1917, we also witnessed the Russian Revolutions and how this impacted on World War I, which was still ongoing throughout this period. We will explore this, and the connection with Belfast.

All of these events are free to attend, however, registration is essential and spaces are limited. If you would like to attend any of these events and have any particular access requirements please contact our Good Relations Unit on 028 9027 0663 or email goodrelations@elfastcity.gov.uk

http://www.belfastcity.gov.uk/events/Event-82836.aspx

The October Revolution in Russia: The Impact of Communism in Ireland
Heritage Cafe at PRONI
25th October 2017 from 9.30 am to 3.00 pm

Public Record Office of Northern Ireland

To coincide with the 100th anniversary of the October Revolution, PRONI is pleased to invite you to a conference exploring the Impact of Communism in Ireland, to be held at the Public Record Office of Northern Ireland (PRONI) on 25 October 2017 at 10.00am.

https://www.nidirect.gov.uk/articles/october-revolution-russia-impact-communism-ireland

From February to October: Competing Visions of Revolution by Professor Ian Thatcher
Bolshevism as foreign policy: Irish Labour and the October revolution by Professor Emmett O'Connor
Women & the Russian Revolution by Professor Mary Davis
PRONI Sources by Stephen Scarth The Russian Revolution and its Legacy: A Trade Union Perspective by Sean Byers
Lessons of 1917 and the role of the Communist Party of Ireland by Joe Bowers
The impact of the October Revolution in Ireland: the Limerick Soviet of 1919 by Dr Conor Kostick

WW1 Event : Talk: Luther and his Legacy by Reverend Dr Martyn Cowan
Irish Linen Centre & Lisburn Museum
24th October 2017 starting at 7.00pm

Irish Linen Centre (LISBURN)

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Martyn is a lecturer in Historical Theology, Union Theological College, Belfast. His talk looks at the repercussions of the Wittenberg event of 31 October 1517. Loved by some, loathed by others, this talk provides an accessible introduction to the real Luther, who is without doubt one of the most important figures in religious history. Martyn will trace events that brought about Luther's own personal reformation and explain how the ideas that sprang from it led to transformational events in Western history that have shaped not only our religious context but the wider culture in which we live today.

WW1 Event : Talk: Reformed Always to be Reformed, the Reformations then and now by Professor Johnston McMaster
Irish Linen Centre & Lisburn Museum
23rd October 2017 starting at 7.00pm

Irish Linen Centre (LISBURN)

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Johnston is a Senior Research Writer with the Ethical and Shared Remembering Project. He discusses his recent publication which outlined the Reformation as a long lasting revolution in European history. Johnston discusses what ‘reformed theolog’ might look like in relation to other globalised religions.

Boys of the Island
A Musical Journey through the Battlefields
Sunday 22 October
1.00pm – 2.00pm
Ulster Museum Belfast

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This special concert will highlight the stories of soldiers from the island of Ireland who fought and died during the First World War using film, imagery, music and narrative. Their stories will weave their way throughout the concert creating a musical journey of remembrance and reconciliation. Richard Laird and Tracey McRory will be joined by renowned and champion musicians Darren Milligan and Tom Byrne to take you on a musical journey through the battlefields of the Great War, featuring ‘The Messines Suite’, which reflects both musical cultures on the island of Ireland. The final piece within the suite called ‘The Long Road’ expresses the synergy between both these divisions leading up to the capture of the village of Wytschaete on 7th June, 1917. This piece was commissioned specially to commemorate the Battle of Messines and performed with The Royal Navy Orchestra at The Island of Ireland Peace Tower, Belgium on the 7th June 2017.

Please click here for full poppies programme or go to the website be clicking here.

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Council for British Archaeology and Living Legacies First World War Workshop
Saturday 21st October 2017 from 10.00 - 17:30
St James' Priory 1 Whitson Street

Join the Council for British Archaeology’s Home Front Legacy team working with Living Legacies for a community workshop at St James Priory, Bristol and learn how to research, record and get funding for your own First World War project.

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21/10/2017 # WW1 Council for British Archaeology

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The Western Front Association was formed in 1980 to maintain interest in the period 1914-1918, to perpetuate the memory, courage and comradeship of those on all sides who served their countries in France and Flanders and their own countries during the Great War. It does not seek to glorify war and is non-political

Take a look at the 2017 Western Front events page:

Please click here to view all events in full

Or check out Twitter or Facebook

Heritage Angel Awards Northern Ireland
Thursday 19th October 2017
Ulster Museum from 7.00pm

What we know of war is always mediated knowledge and feeling. We need lenses to filter out some of its blinding, terrifying light.

Winter reveals the ways in which different creative arts have framed our meditations on war, from painting and sculpture to photography, film and poetry, and ultimately to silence, as a language of memory in its own right. He shows how these highly mediated images of war, in turn, circulate through language to constitute our ‘cultural memory’ of war.

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War Beyond Words
Professor Jay Winter, Yale University
Thursday 19 October 2017
7.00pm – 8.30pm Tickets £5 per person
Ulster Museum Belfast

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What we know of war is always mediated knowledge and feeling. We need lenses to filter out some of its blinding, terrifying light. Winter reveals the ways in which different creative arts have framed our meditations on war, from painting and sculpture to photography, film and poetry, and ultimately to silence, as a language of memory in its own right. He shows how these highly mediated images of war, in turn, circulate through language to constitute our ‘cultural memory’ of war. Jay Winter is Charles J. Stille Professor of History Emeritus at Yale University, Connecticut. He won an Emmy award as co-producer of the BBC/PBS television series The Great War and the Shaping of the Twentieth Century (1996), and is a founder of the Historial de la Grande Guerre, an international museum of the Great War inaugurated in 1992. He is a renowned author and his latest book War Beyond Words: Languages of Remembrance from the Great War to the Present was recently published by Cambridge University Press.

Please click here for full poppies programme or go to the website be clicking here.

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Transitional Justice and
The Politics of Inscription
Wednesday 18th October 2017

8-12 Bishop Sr. Within,
Derry~Londonderry
from 11.00am

In his new book, Jospeh Robinson argues that we must work towards a new politics of public memory in Northern Ireland, one that resists the control of powerful memory brokers and facilitates a vibrant, democratic debate over the ways in whcih a traumatic past can or should be remembered.

Joseph Robinson was a visiting researcher with The Junction from 2013-2016. He is currently an Irish Research Council Fellow at Maynooth University.

Please click here for more information or vist the site here.

2017-10-18 # Transitional Justice and the
Politics of Inscription

Joe Boyle’s Adventures in the Russian Revolution
Wednesday 11th October 2017 from 1.00pm - 2:00pm
Lecture Theatre at the Ulster Museum

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This is the centenary of the Russian Revolution, when the Tsar was overthrown by Kerensky in February 1917 and Kerensky was overthrown in turn by Lenin in October. The world was turned upside down, and a key player in these events - a man who, unlikely as that might seem, helped both Kerensky and Lenin - was Lieutenant-Colonel Joe Boyle. Joe Boyle’s parents emigrated from Armagh to Canada, but Joe himself returned to Ulster once his war was over. He arrived in Russia with the Canadian Army as a railway specialist, and, as Kerensky prepared for his ill-fated June offensive, Boyle struggled to make Russia’s trains run on time. Then, once the Bolsheviks had seized power, Boyle joined a small group of Allied officers whose mission was to ensure that military action continued on the eastern front, even after Lenin had signed a separate peace treaty with Germany. In an increasingly chaotic international situation, Boyle found himself, in early spring 1918, trying to keep both Russia and Romania in the war by resolving the bitter dispute between those two countries over the future of what today is Moldova. To this end, he personally took command of Romania’s state gold reserve, and ended up flying a biplane backwards and forwards between Russia and Romania as he negotiated the text of the Treaty of Odessa. All this drama proved futile, however. Despite Boyle’s efforts both Romania and Russia agreed peace.

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WW1 Event :Talk: The Reformation in Ireland by Dr Henry Jefferies
Irish Linen Centre & Lisburn Museum
11th October 2017 starting at 7.00pm

Irish Linen Centre (LISBURN)

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As a Reformation scholar and author, Henry uses his talk to explore the responses in Ireland to the Reformation in the sixteenth century. He explores how the Reformation in Ireland was promoted by English royal policies, setting the Reformation in a wider British context, to offer an explanation as to why the Reformation failed in Ireland though it succeeded dramatically in England and Scotland.

WW1 Event : Talk: The Battle of Messines, Why it Still Matters Today by Philip Orr
Irish Linen Centre & Lisburn Museum
10th October 2017 starting at 7.00pm

Irish Linen Centre (LISBURN)

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Local historian, playwright and author Philip Orr explores the mixed military fortunes which Irish troops experienced whilst fighting together on the Western Front. Philip also examines how both in the wider world at war and here at home, massive political and economic changes were underway that would shape the twentieth century.

WW1 Event : Film: A Man for All Seasons (1966) Cert 12A
Irish Linen Centre & Lisburn Museum
9th October 2017 starting at 7.00pm

Irish Linen Centre (LISBURN)

2017-10-ALL - Irish Linen Centre

With a screenplay by Robert Bolt based on his 1960 play, this biographical film stars Paul Scofield who won a Best Actor Oscar for his portrayal of Sir Thomas More, Lord Chancellor of England under Henry VIII. Exploring Sir Thomas More’s experiences, the film examines issues surrounding religious and social change and matters of individual conscience at the time of the Reformation. The film reflects a rapidly changing time when Henry VIII was awarded both accolades of Defender of the Faith by Rome (1521) and Supreme Head of the Church of England (1534). A Man for All Seasons launches Lisburn Museum’s talks commemorating the 2017 quincentenary of the Reformation.

Council for British Archaeology and Living Legacies First World War Workshop
Friday 6th October 2017 from 10.00 - 17:30
Imperial War Museum Duxford Cambridgeshire

Join the Council for British Archaeology’s Home Front Legacy team working with Living Legacies for a community workshop at Imperial War Museum Duxford and learn how to research, record and get funding for your own First World War project.

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WW1 Event : Talk: Back over Old Ground by Michael Jackson
Irish Linen Centre & Lisburn Museum
3rd October 2017 starting at 7.00pm

Irish Linen Centre (LISBURN)

2017-10-ALL - Irish Linen Centre

World War One researcher Michael Jackson discusses the cases of soldiers executed during the Great War. British soldiers were executed under the 1881 Army Act and 1911 Indian Army Act, for what were considered ‘battlefield offences’. Examples of these are cowardice or desertion which we now know may be influenced by the stress of battle. Michael looks at twenty-first century attitudes to a seldom discussed episode in history. He reviews the revisionism behind the 2006 Armed Forces Act which pardoned British soldiers executed for such battlefield offences. Using case studies, he poses the question, Was it modern thinking which powered the debate or the unfairness of the High Command in the Great War? Michael aims to create a lively discussion.