The Aubane Historical Society (AHS) is a

historical society A historical society (sometimes also preservation society) is an organization dedicated to preserving, collecting, researching, and interpreting historical information or items. Originally, these societies were created as a way to help future gen ...

amateur historian A historian is a person who studies and writes about the past and is regarded as an authority on it. Historians are concerned with the continuous, methodical narrative and research of past events as relating to the human race; as well as the st ...

s based in Millstreet, County Cork in Ireland, focusing on local history and the Irish revolutionary period.

Brendan Clifford Brendan Clifford (born 1936) is an Irish historian and political activist. Early life and education He was born in the Sliabh Luachra area of Munster, Republic of Ireland. Career As a young man, Clifford emigrated to the United Kingdom an ...

and Jack Lane, members of both the AHS and British and Irish Communist Organisation (BICO), grew up in the Aubane area of north Cork. The AHS has published numerous pamphlets on local history matters, often in relation to the Home Rule politician William O'Brien, the novelist Canon Patrick Sheehan, and the local poet Ned Buckley. According to Jack Lane, the AHS was originally intended to be a local history organisation, but later expanded into the role of opposing the "revisionist" movement in

Irish history The first evidence of human presence in Ireland dates to around 33,000 years ago, with further findings dating the presence of homo sapiens to around 10,500 to 7,000 BC. The receding of the ice after the Younger Dryas cold phase of the Quaterna ...

. The Society has been highly critical of Peter Hart, whom it accuses of falsifying interview material, with denunciations of Roy Foster, Brian Hanley,

Paul Bew Paul Anthony Elliott Bew, Baron Bew (born 22 January 1950), is a British historian from Northern Ireland and a life peer. He has worked at Queen's University Belfast since 1979, and is currently Professor of Irish Politics, a position he has h ...

, and Henry Patterson. The AHS regularly attacks Hubert Butler (whom it accuses of being a quasi-racist defender of Protestant Ascendancy) and Elizabeth Bowen, whom it claims acted as a British spy in Ireland during the Second World War and hence lacking any Irish identity. AHS has worked with some writers who might be seen as representing a more traditional republican perspective, including

Desmond Fennell Desmond Carolan Fennell (29 June 1929 – 16 July 2021) was an Irish writer, essayist, cultural philosopher and linguist. Throughout his career, Fennell repeatedly departed from prevailing norms. In the 1950s and early 1960s, with his extensiv ...

, Brian P. Murphy osb, Eoin Neeson and

Meda Ryan Meda Ryan is an Irish historian. She has written extensively on the Irish revolution of 1916-23. Among her books are ''The Tom Barry Story'' (1982)- later updated and revised as ''Tom Barry, IRA Freedom Fighter'' in 2003 - ''The Day Michael Coll ...

. AHS has also denied that the killing of two young

Cooneyite : ''This article refers to the Christian sect founded by Edward Cooney. In some places, the term ''Cooneyites'' refers to Two by Twos, the church from which this sect split in 1928.'' The Cooneyites are a Protestant sect which split from the namel ...

Protestant farmers at Coolacrease, Co. Offaly in 1921 was sectarian (it claims''Coolacrease: The True Story of the Pearson Executions'' edited by Philip O'Connor, AHS, 2008. they were properly executed for attacking the forces of the legitimate, democratically elected ( Dáil) government). It has been associated with commentators and the Roger Casement Foundation who argue that the diaries ascribed to

Roger Casement Roger David Casement ( ga, Ruairí Dáithí Mac Easmainn; 1 September 1864 – 3 August 1916), known as Sir Roger Casement, CMG, between 1911 and 1916, was a diplomat and Irish nationalist executed by the United Kingdom for treason during Worl ...

were forged by British Intelligence while arguing that Casement's published opposition to England and participation in the First World War was a correct position for Irish people to take. It often presents itself in populist terms as a group of amateurs speaking for the plain people of Ireland as against academic historians, whom it presents as elitist snobs with sinister political agendas. The AHS's interpretation of Irish history has been criticised by some Irish academics.Anthony Coughlan reviews the AHS' book ''James Connolly Re-Assessed''.
''Irish Democrat''

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External links

* {{Authority control Anti-Revisionism (Ireland) History of County Cork Irish historians Marxist historians Historical societies based in the Republic of Ireland Millstreet