Irish Catholics rebelled in 1641, launching more than a decade of violence between Protestants and Catholics. The conflict drew to a close when Oliver Cromwell famously invaded Ireland in 1653, reportedly slaughtering much of the town of Drogheda in the process.
A new archive of testimony related to the rebellion is now online. It is quite a collection. According to the Irish Independent newspaper, the archive includes “19,000 pages contained in 31 volumes” and consists of 8,000 depositions given by onlookers in 1641. (The Guardian newspaper also reports on the new site.)
Irish President Mary McAleese and former Democratic Unionist Party leader Ian Paisley (who has certainly changed a lot since the bad old days of the Troubles!) unveiled the new collection.
The depositions are available at: http://1641.tcd.ie/.