It may be true that “Irish affairs had long been regarded with a mixture of indifference and apathy in England”, as Dr Peter Neville asserts (Letters, 13 March), but it is misleading to suggest that the BBC neglected Irish history until Robert Kee’s “excellent television history of Ireland” in 1980, “twelve years after the start of the Troubles”. In fact, in 1972 the BBC made a 10-part series entitled Ireland: Some Episodes From Her Past, followed by two further “specials” on the subject. The series was produced by the late Howard Smith, a deeply honourable man who wrote an accompanying hardback book, drawing on the expertise of such eminent Irish historians as Prof FSL Lyons, Prof JC Beckett and Prof Oliver MacDonagh. The series was critically well received, both in the North and in the Republic, where one paper approvingly described the opening episode as a “quick trot through 700 years of bondage”. The series was repeated in 1974.

Giles Oakley

Researcher, Ireland: Some Episodes From Her Past

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