Chicago kids on visit

Oak Park High School in Illinois was on a fact-finding mission in North Antrim to unearth the secrets of Irish Republican leaders from the nineteenth and early twentieth century.

Moyle Independent Councillor Padraig McShane received a request from the school to facilitate a visit to the historic site and to introduce pupils to the life of the local Republican leader.

Councillor Mc Shane said; “Casement was not drawn from the archetypical background of Irish Republican leaders of his era but his humanitarian actions at the behest of the Crown in highlighting first, the slave labour of the indigenous people of the Belgian Congo and later, the abuses against the Putumayo Indians of Peru ensured his rejection of Imperialism and his Anglo-Irish identity in favour of simply - Irishman.

“His attempts to procure arms for the Easter Rising in 1916 saw Casement charged with treason and hanged in Pentonville Prison, London. His executioner, John Ellis, said of Casement: ‘He was the bravest man it ever fell to my unhappy lot to execute’.