Origins of
Orangeism
Nestling in the heart of Armagh is the Ancestral Home of Dan
Winter, one of the founders of the Orange Order.
This early 18th-century listed vernacular thatched farmhouse was
re-thatched and restored in 2000 with a large proportion of the orginal
fabric having been conserved. The cottage has been maintained by the Winter
family down the years and on display for visitors are relics from the
Battle of the Diamond and old farming and dairy artefacts. The orginal
timber, used to build the cottage has just been dated to reveal that this
is probably one of the last houses to use Irish oak as a building
timber.
The house is officially listed as "the meeting place following
the Battle of the Diamond where the decision to form the Orange Order was
made." Still owned by the Winter family the house is open daily for
visitors.
(7)The Orange Lodge is based on an entirely different system
of belief. In this booklet we will look at the similarities but we wish to
concentrate mainly on the differences, so that you can judge our society on
its own merits and beliefs. SIMILARITIES BETWEEN ORANGE LODGES AND OTHER
LODGES The Orange Order was founded in Ireland in 1795. Its background was
the conflict between Roman Catholics and Protestants, which exists sadly to
this day. The history and nature of this conflict would take a book in
itself to explain. In Ireland as a whole, Protestants have always been the
minority and have suffered much for their faith under the Roman Catholic
majority.
In the year 1641 for instance, there was a terrible massacre in
Ireland in which it is estimated that up to 100,000 Protestants were
brutally murdered by their Catholic neighbours, who were in many cases
encouraged by their priests. It was partly the fear of acts like this
recurring, which led the Protestants in the 1680's to look to the Prince of
Orange, later King William III, for protection. William's victory in 1690
secured civil and religious liberty for all and was the beginning of
western democracy. One hundred years later however there was still
tension.
In the 1790's around the time of the French Revolution,
Protestants living in rural areas of Ireland were suffering attack. There
was a general air of fear and a heightening of tension with the foundation
of the United Irishmen in 1791. After a disturbance in Benburb on 24th June
1794, in which Protestant homes were attacked, the Freemasons' organisation
was appealed to by one of its members, James Wilson, to organise themselves
to defend the Protestant population. The Masons refused, whereupon Wilson,
indignant at their lack of help, left them and prophesied that he "would
light a star. . . . which would eclipse them forever". (8)He had already
organised the Orange Boys at the Dian (County Tyrone) in 1792, as is
evidenced by the notice in the Belfast News Letter on 1st February 1793,
which referred to a meeting of the 138 members of the Orange Boys held on
22ndJanuary 1793. After the Battle of the Diamond (near Loughgall, County
Armagh), on 21st September 1795, the Protestants vowed to adopt means to
defend themselves. Thus a new organisation was formed - the Loyal Orange
Institution of Ireland, into which James Wilson brought his Orange Boys,
for which he was awarded the first Orange Warrant - LOL 1.
While James Wilson was at the Battle of the Diamond and involved
in the origins of the Orange Institution, a more prominent figure was James
Sloan of Loughgall who issued Warrants for the formation of the first
Lodges. Because of the hostile environment, the new society had to maintain
some structure of secrecy for the preservation of life, yet it is worthy of
note that the first public demonstration took place with the full approval
of the authorities in 1796, the year after the Order was founded. This
new Institution found a wide acceptance among the beleaguered Protestants
of Ireland, and grew rapidly in the early years. Because some of the
founders had been Masons they used the Masonic system, which they knew
worked. However, this new society was not Protestant Freemasonry but an
organisation with a totally different philosophy and motivation.
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