page_title: Ancient Order of Hibernians
section_title: Origins
hierarchical_section_title: Ancient Order of Hibernians / Ireland / Origins
caption_attribution_description: English: Ancient Order of Hibernians (AOH) plaque dated 1911 on a building in the Church Street, Kanturk, Co Cork, Ireland
context_page_description: The Ancient Order of Hibernians is an Irish Catholic fraternal organization. Members must be male, Catholic, and either born in Ireland or of Irish descent. Its largest membership is now in the United States, where it was founded in New York City in 1836. Its name was adopted by groups of Irish immigrants in the United States, its purpose to act as guards to protect Catholic churches from anti-Catholic forces in the mid-19th century, and to assist Irish Catholic immigrants, especially those who faced discrimination or harsh coal mining working conditions. Many members in the coal mining area of Pennsylvania had a background with the Molly Maguires. It became an important focus of Irish American political activity.
context_section_description: The organisation had its roots in the Defenders and the Ribbonmen, Catholic agrarian movements of the 18th and 19th centuries. It emerged in Ulster at the end of the 19th century in opposition to the Orange Order. It was organised by Joseph Devlin of Belfast, who was Grand Master by 1905. The AOH was closely associated with the Irish Parliamentary Party, its members mainly members of the party. It was strongly opposed to secular ideologies such as those of the Irish Republican Brotherhood (the IRB), who were most unhappy at the re-emergence of this old rival "right-wing" nationalist society. Membership in the group was initially banned by the Catholic Church, although this was lifted in 1904.
  From a membership of 5,000 in 1900, nearly all in Ulster, it climbed to 64,000 by 1909, complementing the United Irish League. By 1914 the order had spread throughout the country, mainly because of its utility as a patronage, brokerage and recreational association. As a vehicle for Irish nationalism, the AOH greatly influenced the sectarian aspect of Irish politics in the early twentieth century. In Ulster and elsewhere it acted as an unruly but vigorous militant support organisation for Devlin, Dillon and Redmond against radicals and against William O'Brien: O'Brien regarded himself as having been driven from the party by militant Hibernians at the "Baton Convention" of 1909.
caption: AOH 1911 plaque, Kanturk, County Cork, Ireland
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