Irish Republican Brotherhood

The Irish Republican Brotherhood (Irish Phoblacht na hÉireann Bráithreachas, BPE or shorter Bráithreachas na Poblachta, English Irish Republican Brotherhood, IRB) was founded in 1858 by James Stephens in Dublin. The IRB was instrumental in the uprising of 1867, but especially during the Easter Rising of 1916. Their demands it published in the newspaper The Irish People.

The IRB 's strategy was to win as a small secret society through targeted infiltration of mass organizations to maximize the impact. In particular, the Irish Volunteers were aim of this policy; the IRB is to fill a large part of the important items with their own members while they renounced aware to take on the chairmanship managed.

At the same time, and coordinates with the founding of the IRB the founding of the Fenian Brotherhood by John O'Mahony took place in New York, which saw itself as an American wing of the same movement. The term " Fenians " (Irish na Finini ) was used later become a synonym for all of Irish independence supporters and in particular in Northern Ireland until today.

The American organization served mainly to raise money and weapons for the Irish struggle for independence. 1866, she underwent a series of raids on the British colonies in Canada talked about. This represented an attempt to prevent British troops in North America, and thus to support the armed struggle in Ireland.