The penultimate session of our Spring Seminar Series will take place on Tuesday, 7 April at 7pm GMT.
Our speaker for the session is Dr Samuel Beckton, who will be talking about his research on ‘A minority within a minority: The role of women in the Protestant Associations of Cavan, Donegal, and Monaghan, 1920-2016’, which culminated in his recently published monograph The History of the Protestant Associations of Counties Cavan, Donegal, and Monaghan from 1920 to 2016 (Palgrave Macmillan, 2025). It has been quite some time since we’ve been joined by a historian working on religious history, and we’re really looking forward to hearing Samuel’s paper.
If you are interested in hearing Samuel speak about his research, please do sign up for the session here. The seminar will run as an online-only zoom webinar comprising a 40-minute paper and a Q&A session.
About the Paper
While there are many studies on the history of Irish Unionism and Protestantism, there has been a lack of academic study concerning the political history of the Protestant community in the border counties following partition. Many Protestant Unionists in counties Cavan, Donegal, and Monaghan felt betrayed by their six county counterparts breaking the Ulster Covenant in abandoning a nine county Northern Ireland. However, the Unionist Associations of these counties evolved after the implementation of the Anglo-Irish Treaty in 1922 and adapted to their new political environment by becoming ‘Protestant’ Associations. These organisations were able to galvanise their respective counties’ Protestant communities into an effective voting bloc, being able to return PA candidates in general and local elections up to 2004, an intriguing achievement for local political bodies.
This paper will investigate the history of these Protestant voting blocs and Associations in the border counties, from 1920 to 2016, to understand what roles women played in these unique organisations. How were they involved in the establishment of these Associations? What roles did they play within these Associations, both as executive members and as candidates? In what manner was the Association of Loyal Orangewomen of Ireland a pilar of support for these Associations? Lastly, how did these Associations react to political changes during the 20th century, and how did it affect local Protestant women?
About the Speaker
Dr Samuel Beckton is a historian of Modern Irish History. He has an MPhil in International Peace Studies from Trinity College Dublin, an MPhil in Politics from Queen’s University Belfast, and undertook a Department of Education PhD scholarship in History from Ulster University, where he has also taught. Samuel is currently engaged in archival research of the events and victims of the Troubles to support the work of theIndependent Commission for Reconciliation and Information Recovery (ICRIR). He has published a number of books and journal articles, including his most recent monographs The History of the Protestant Associations of Counties Cavan, Donegal, and Monaghan from 1920 to 2016 (Palgrave Macmillan, 2026) and The Unbroken Covenant: Could Ulster Unionists have controlled a nine-county Northern Ireland, 1920-1945? (Peter Lang, 2025).