Lyr Req: Dunlavin Green

Subject: Dunlavin Green
From: Abi Kirk
Date: 26 Jul 97 - 11:09 AM

Does anyone have any information regarding the background of the song "Dunlavin Green," which I found on the album "Winds of Change" by Geraldine MacGowan and Anne Conroy? Thankyou in advance, Abi.

Subject: RE: Dunlavin Green
From: Barry Finn
Date: 29 Jul 97 - 05:21 PM

Taken from 'Songs of England, Ireland & Scotland-A Bonnie Bunch of Roses' by Dan Milner & Paul Kaplan, 1983. Nine yrs after the Bastille was stormed, the 1798 rebellion broke out. Some causes were the inability of the new Irish Parliament to bring about full religious emancipation, the Parliament's own undemocratic & corrupt makeup, the systems of field enclosures, tithes and high taxes throughout the countryside. The town of Dunlavin lies near where the Wicklow Mts. fold below the Curragh of Kildare. On May 26, 1798, 36 suspected United Irishmen were tricked into assembling by the military, then taken off to the village green & shot. Michael Dwyer was a rebel leader who held out in the Wicklow Mts. for several yrs. after the rebellion. After his surrender, he was transported to New South Wales. Barry

Subject: Lyr Add: DUNLAVIN GREEN
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 21 Oct 09 - 10:38 PM

From Wikipedia:


DUNLAVIN GREEN
(Author Unknown)

In the year of one-thousand seven-hundred and ninety-eight,
A sorrowful tale the truth unto you I'll relate
Of thirty-six heroes to the world they were left to be seen.
By a false information they were shot on Dunlavin Green.

Bad luck to you, Saunders. Their lives you sold away.
You said a parade would be held on that very day.
The drums they did rattle and the fifes they did sweetly play.
Surrounded we were and quietly marched away.

Quite easily they led us as prisoners through the town.
To be shot on the plain we then were forced to lie down.
Such grief and such sorrow in one place was ne'er before seen
As when the blood ran in streams down the dykes of Dunlavin Green.

There is young Andy Ryan; he has plenty of cause to complain.
Likewise the two Duffys who were shot down on the plain;
And young Mattie Farrell whose mother distracted will run
For the loss of her own darling boy, her eldest son.

Bad luck to you, Saunders. bad luck may you never shun,
That the widow's curse might melt you like snow in the sun.
The cries of those orphans whose murmurs you shall never sheen
For the loss of their own dear fathers who died on the green.

Some of our boys to the hills they have run away.
Some of them have been shot and more have run off to sea.
Michael Dwyer of the mountain has plenty of cause for the spleen
For the loss of his own dear comrades who died on the green.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Dunlavin Green
From: GUEST,Roughyed
Date: 26 Jul 11 - 01:38 PM

I visited Dunlavin a few years ago. There is a monument to the United Irishmen on the green which includes the names mentioned as being shot in the song.