2008/05/01 by Bernard Aspinwall · 1 citation
Arts and Humanities · Social Sciences · #Scottish History and National Identity #Historical Studies of British Isles #Irish and British Studies
paper · doi:10.3366/e0020157x08000164
openalex publication_date 2008/05/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/05/21
Catholics in Scotland and their historians have recounted their past in several ways. We have many celebrations of the faithful Irish immigrant steadfastness while their Scottish-born brethren have had at best negligible recognition. 2 At the other extreme the Banffshire-born conservative priest Rev. Aeneas Dawson airbrushed the Irish from his massive nineteenth-century history: even Daniel O'Connell did not merit a mention. On the other side, the pioneering lay activist James Walsh virtually ignored native-born Scots in his monumental study. 3 In more recent times several historians have begun to capture something of the complexity of the Catholic experience. 4 The independent-minded Catholic laity, restless Irish-born clergy and working class leaders have received consideration. Highlanders, Italians, Lithuanians, Belgians, Poles, English, converts and religious orders of men and women have received some long overdue attention. 5 Some leading clerical and lay figures who tried to create and sustain a sense of community now have their biographers. 6