![]() In those bygone days, maybe a game of football broke out during a Faction Fight, nowadays of course a Faction Fight occasionally breaks out during – or after - a game of football. The rivalries the GAA is built on have roots in such hostilities: Parish versus parish, club versus club, county versus county… Legend has it that a man arriving late at the Crossmaglen fair way back when asked a man coming out whether it was any good. There were some terrible injuries and, in some cases like the one in Acton, deaths.įaction fights often broke out at funerals and weddings but the favoured venue was at town or country fairs. The rules were straightforward: groups of men, and sometimes women, from a parish or a clan would call out a rival faction and they’d meet – armed with blackthorn sticks and shillelaghs and even firearms sometimes - and beat the living daylights out of each other until either the authorities arrived to break it up, or one clan drove the others (those who could still walk) into retreat. Acton has never been a metropolis but the row was reported to have been between: ‘The villagers’ and ‘the countrymen’. Well, for a very good reason – a man was killed there in a Faction Fight over 200 years ago and the name stuck which, to be fair, is the least you might expect if you were the unfortunate deceased.įaction fighting was common throughout Ireland in the 1800s and this fight took place in the little hamlet of Acton (birthplace of Ireland rugby captain Rory Best). ‘Why does it bear such a dramatic name?’ you might ask. NOT far from our house there’s a steep hill that I discovered recently is known as ‘Kill Brae’. ![]()
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