Castle Leslie - The Anglo-Irish - Anita & Desmond Leslie - 1986

This programme explores the challenges faced by the Anglo-Irish in the new Irish Free State in this insightful 1986 documentary featuring Anita and Desmond Leslie of Castle Leslie. It explores the complexities of post-War of Independence Ireland, where the old aristocracy found themselves redefining their role within Irish society amist the burgeoning Irish Republic.
Desmond candidly shares his thoughts on the Act of Union, expressing his belief that the abolition of the old Parliament in Dublin was a misstep. Anita, now residing in Oranmore Castle, County Galway, offers her perspective as an accomplished author, highlighting the Irish love and mastery of language and her admiration for Gaelic sensibilities.
Desmond also reflects on Britain's historical reliance on Irish talent, citing renowned generals like Alexander and the Duke of Wellington. This documentary provides a thought-provoking exploration of the cultural and political shifts that shaped the Anglo-Irish identity.

[@bealtainecottage]

Thank you so much for posting this. It was incredible to watch and listen to! I have always thought that language reflected a culture and the more extravagant the language the more rich the culture! In fact, when I was at university in London our literature Doctor, Patrick Campbell, once exclaimed that the English spoke in black-and-white and the Irish in glorious technicolour!

[@helmutsecke3529]

"I see the flash of him at dawn." Bloody marvelous. 🦊

[@tangodelta7617]

Fascinating period piece - thank you for posting it.

[@Hy-Cearnaidh]

Fascinating and charming, thank you for sharing.

[@ULYSSES-31]

I would love to see this entire series.

[@richardnieuwhof2028]

I still have Anita Leslie's 'Edwardians in Love' on my bookshelf. Beautifully written and fascinating.

[@richardnieuwhof2028]

All that Irish nationalism, and now beholden to the EU and their migration policies. There's a certain irony.

[@macdeathburger]

The Leslie family have been Catholic for a few generations and some of them are very Green Irish. Desmond Leslie was a pioneer of electronic music in the 1950's.

[@sowitandhopeitgrows]

Sir John I believe....

[@Shane-zx4ps]

What’s green Irish?

[@siobhan3937]

They are not Irish.

[@macdeathburger]

@@Shane-zx4ps Irish Gaelic rather than Anglo-Irish (something that is rapidly going extinct). I am an Irish pleb.

[@niall4588]

​@@siobhan3937 Grow up. If you are born in Ireland or your parents were born in Ireland you are Irish. A nation is a diverse collective culture, not a restrictive set of DNA sequences.

[@seanfagan8490]

They left a great legacy it should be cherished.

[@H-nx8wr]

That was very kind of Anita to say that the Irish have a lovely turn of phrase.

[@Kitiwake]

Yes. . Very kind indeed.

[@H-nx8wr]

Could it be that no matter what she says about Ireland, she will be condemned? I choose to take her words as a great compliment, especially as I have always loved creative writing and it is not a craft that one can take lightly. So, actually, her words mean a great deal to me.

[@smacwhinnie]

I think she offended the English under class

[@patrickmccutcheon9361]

@@smacwhinnieI wonder where she got the numbers on the size vocabularies of the respective “under” classes.

[@sylviasimpson-n2o]

@@patrickmccutcheon9361 Dunno who she is.

[@raymondmurphy9593]

Very interesting insight into the history of the Anglo-Irish . Thanks for posting.

[@JamesMurphy-ry2mx]

Wonderful to see Anita Leslie. Loved the insight from her book Train to Nowhere.

[@danielhealy2524]

Thanks! very interesting.

[@jofasable]

Amazing video.

[@bikeman9899]

It's remarkable to see this snapshot of a family in modern Ireland (ok, 40 years back) which by language, accent, social class, are clearly from a different era. The funny thing is, while there are no lords and dukes in a republic, the human urge to be upper class so to speak is very much alive. The modern form is different, but the principle is still there.

[@mjh5437]

Yes,the modern form is flaunting a ghastly self-indulgent vain lifestyle on social media

[@danielwarren3138]

Fascinating

[@philiprufus4427]

'Hello, Who Are You ?' Excellant.

[@Elkjær_Nersting]

Marvellous.

[@MrResearcher122]

Clan Leslie also had Gaelic roots in Scotland, as they were descended from Macolm III, a Gael and King of Scotland.

[@patrickcullinane7461]

England and Ireland are Two Different Countries Always have Been Always Will be Everyone Born in Ireland are Classified as Irish Here's To Those Brave Protestant Men Who Gave There Lives to Free Ireland All the People Sang There Praises Then For Those Brave United Irishmen The Irish An Odd Race They Don't Want to be England Winston Churchill

[@mariannehepple4907]

Thanks for posting this. I have 500 years of Anglo-Irishness behind me on my father's mother's side. L"Estranges. Protestants of course who came over with the Elizabethan Plantation. Many of them had important positions in Ireland - Attorney General and Surgeon General etc. Do I feel a smidgeon of guilt still? I have learnt Irish and to play the uilleann pipes (as many Anglo-Irish did) out of genuine linguistic and musical interest - not as atonement. The L'Estranges were originally Anglo-Normans from East Anglia (would have been Catholic before the Reformation as there was no other option!)

[@MolloyPolloy]

If you speak irish it speaks volumes... immeasurably more than some knuckledragger waving the tricolour shouting abuse. Also, you are not responsible for the actions of your ancestors.

[@irishboer7124]

Maybe time to atone.

[@Conorguill]

Little point on feeling guilt for your forebearers, whether logically justified or not. Sounds like you are contributing to Irish life and culture. That’s a far more positive step than feeling guilt imo

[@sklenars]

Status, wealth, power over others does not necessarily make one happy. I wonder if these transplanted Anglos were ever truly at ease and content in their Irish inheritance.

[@bogbay]

The size of the house tells you they were. Very happy. Oblivious to suffering or indifferent to it

[@siobhan3937]

They love cheering on the infestation of this Island by Jihadis. They are no friend of the Irish people.

[@silverkitty2503]

Yes I have met some of them. They were.

[@siobhan3937]

Oh yes, they are totally at ease with their stolen wealth on their stolen land in the castle built on the blood of the true owners of the land, the Indigenous Irish.

[@siobhan3937]

@bogbay They were responsible for the suffering.

[@paulinelee1762]

Beautiful speaking Family .God Bless them Always XXXXX

[@phillipsugwas]

The accent is unimportant. The content is , however, important. And the content reveals everything about them.

[@kevinwhelan9607]

The oldest aristocratic families in England and Scotland were, like the Leslie's, Roman Catholic: the Fitzalan-Howard's, Crichton-Stuart's, Stourton's, Parker Bowles's, and more. These so-called "Recusants" kept the faith through 300yrs of anti-Catholic laws. Respect❤

[@kevinbeaumont8750]

Yes - the Reformation was a disaster for the world.

[@waynemcauliffe-fv5yf]

Erin Go Bragh

[@katejacobs5491]

Who is the narrator? Cyril Cusack? Lovely to see Ulick in his prime.

[@vincentrathbone26]

Erin, that's my wife's name and "In the land of Erin" by Thin Lizzy is one of my all time favourite songs.

[@waynemcauliffe-fv5yf]

@@vincentrathbone26 I like their cover of Whiskey in a Jar mate

[@vincentrathbone26]

@@waynemcauliffe-fv5yf yes, it's brilliant, coincidentally I was watching a documentary on Eric Bell earlier today.

[@waynemcauliffe-fv5yf]

@@vincentrathbone26 Sweet man enjoy

[@babylonsburning1]

The actress Rose Leslie from GOT is part of this family.

[@dinty66]

The Leslies always had a certain variant to the rest of the Anglo aristocracy ! They seem to march to a different drum !

[@H-nx8wr]

11:34 the narrator states that many Anglo-Irish decided to leave; he omits, however, the fact that many Protestants of all classes were intimidated into leaving Ireland, which was their home.

[@bogbay]

The protestant population of Ireland decloined for several reasons, the biggest being the loss of many young men in WW1. The second big drain was the simplicity of colonisation, Many protestants worked for the British civil service in Ireland and were on the wrong side in the war of independence. In most conflicts, those people always leave. In short, they lost. Many protestants were associated with big houses, the estates which evicted hundreds of thousands of starving people during An Gorta Mór. They were burned out. Entirely understandable. Those Protestants who remained flourished in the south of Ireland, were elected to the highest positions in government and played/play as big a part as anyone else in modern Ireland without anyone noticing or caring what religion they follow

[@sklenars]

When Ireland became a free state within the commonwealth De Valera told the Anglos if they sent their offsprings to Irish universities rather than Oxford/Cambridge he would allow them to keep their estates in Ireland and thereby contribute to the building of the newly independent state. The Leslie family appear to have been part of this cooperation.

[@H-nx8wr]

It was completely unacceptable to burn anyone out of their home. You seem unaware that up until the civil war, Ireland had an equal amount of Protestants and Catholics. Members of both communities had suffered during the famine, as did five million English people two decades later, not to mention the Highlanders, who were also told to emigrate or starve.

[@H-nx8wr]

The Protestants who remained in the Republic did not flourish, quite the opposite.

[@bogbay]

@@H-nx8wr You fell at your first fact, Ireland has never had an "equal number of protestants" 10 to 1 the ratio in 1916 Vastly disproportionate number of deaths among catholics 1847/52. Protestant tenant farmers had bigger farms, better treatment. Poor protestants died in the NOrth, for the same reason everyone else died. London left the ports open and huge amount of food was exported. 5m died in an English famine? What? You just made that up child Why bother arguing at all when everything you know is spectacularly wrong. Not just a bit wrong but mind blowingly wrong? The Highland Clearances? A genocide too. Done by the same people.

[@dinty66]

Glaslough is a lovely village that the Leslies created !

[@siobhan3937]

With money and land stolen from the Native Irish.

[@PatTigue]

Not hard when you have supply of dollars from others not from sweat from your brow lik my dad. R I p

[@gillps5130]

​@@PatTigueNot hard, perhaps. Not necessary either. They could have gambled it away.

[@patbash5718]

The servants says it all

[@neilrafferty2097]

Don't worry about it.

[@patbash5718]

@@neilrafferty2097 I'm not just saying

[@Dominic-mm6yf]

It is difficult being of mixed Anglo Gaelic descent today. You are part of both worlds but fit in neither.

[@vannjunkin8041]

That's too bad it's not as easy as it is in the States.

[@nicnaimhin2978]

I’m native to Ireland - nothing with using the word native!🤔

[@H-nx8wr]

Exactly. Being native is to be indigenous to the region, it’s a beautiful thing 😊

[@TimBray-qc3vr]

Anyone know if Sean is still alive ?

[@scottblack9213]

Cyril Cusack narrator?

[@drewprice8468]

Sounds like it

[@patrickmccutcheon9361]

It is acknowledged in the credits.

[@paullooney2522]

Um yea,Um yea,Um yea,that's correct.

[@orionxtc1119]

Is Castle Leslie still in the family?

[@silverkitty2503]

Yes as far as I know.

[@marydonald1658]

Yes, it’s now a hotel, run by Desmond’s daughter, Samantha

[@T7_XR]

They speak with dislocated romanticism for what they think Ireland is - they have no idea. They come from a long line of people who kept their foot firmly on the neck of the Irish for their own gain. The Leslie's hanged Irish in Glaslough, fought against Catholic Emancipation, lead protestant militia's against Irish rebellion and were effective pawns of the crown for centuries, until Shane came along. But yet here we are and Shane's descendants are speaking about Irish Mysticism in English accents from big castles and somehow thats nothing new.

[@siobhan3937]

100%. They are pro mass immigration today so nothing has changed, they still hate the Native Irish.

[@ihavenomouthandimusttype9729]

Without them we would not have much of the history of the country. And without the Violent Irish Nationalists we'd have much more of it. Ireland is in the landscape and it's monuments not at the bottom of a pint of Guinness.

[@silverkitty2503]

Yes there is a bit of that. But there you go.

[@davidgray3321]

I am surprised that the British are often so unpopular in Ireland , consider this two of my family do is in WW1 I have no emnity for the Germans

[@silverkitty2503]

But that was such a long time ago. The troubles only ended in 1996 and British politicians still say offesive things. And they still occupy 6 counties in the north. And whatever you say about the british there many irish still have to live there and the irish language only became legal in courts this year. You dont get it.

[@paulbyrne6231]

The Germans didn't occupy England for 8 centuries, destroy an ancient culture, loot the resources, commit countless atrocities and divide the country. Etc etc etc. They are not compatible situations.

[@foggybottomfarm]

I don't think you can draw a comparison as you have just tried to here with what happened to the Irish under the rule of the British. Nobody should nor can forget 800 years genocide and savagery it becomes part of your personality of culture! Erin go bragh

[@davidgray3321]

@@foggybottomfarm I don’t know enough about that to comment but I have met people from ulster and the culture is odd, tribal nonsense from both sides, they need to grow up and stop the crime scene that is fuelled by “the troubles” I have met people who know about it who say it’s actually about money. Pathetic.

[@phillipsugwas]

What a monument to poor values and prejudice the Anglo Irish were. The West Brits. Class ridden, entitled- and only as a result of conquest holding influence. The sooner the whole of Ireland is one country again, the better for all.

[@nicholasworth3736]

Wonderful to watch and listen, they loved their country - is that so wrong? To be born into that class and world was their good fortune, so sad that in most part it has gone, so few people speak beautifully now.

[@conormorgan6280]

Their good fortune meant the destruction of our culture and our people. They slept in silk when our children slept in the clay

[@siobhan3937]

Their country is Scotland and their titles are British.

[@nicholasworth3736]

@@siobhan3937 How many years does a family have to live in a country, before they can call it home?

[@sylviasimpson-n2o]

@@nicholasworth3736 What matters if they stole it ?

[@nicholasworth3736]

@@sylviasimpson-n2o missed my point by miles

[@Esse-vp1bc]

What about the cancelled relative?

[@genghisthegreat2034]

A kind of Miss Havisham existence of a people on whom the tide has truly ebbed.

[@silverkitty2503]

Not at all they still live here in Ireland and are richer than ever and their offspring behave with a lot less generosity and have a pinched victim mindset resulting in far right politics.

[@markilleen4027]

@@silverkitty2503 far right politics, like what

[@tomaseire]

Such stuffed shirts! Imagine, asking them in for an Cupán Tae and then inviting them to, ‘Pull up the floor and make yer selves at home!’ Good heavens!

[@genghisthegreat2034]

Poor Ulick neglects to mention there wasn't a single Catholic in that Parliament for which he's wistful. Pas de parler sauf entre leurs même.

[@Conorguill]

There were some hidden Catholics, outwardly converted to Protestantism. But his broader point is that parliament would have reformed in time including (eventually) universal suffrage

[@genghisthegreat2034]

@@Conorguill it only took 295 years to win the right to worship freely; Parliamentary Membership on a basis blind to religious affiliation would, of course, have rapidly followed.

[@geoffduke1356]

The English lower class have 500 words 😂😂😂

[@anthonym3351]

The British were once rich and sophisticated

[@Adaman368]

Nah they were savages

[@silverkitty2503]

Were they?

[@phillipc3286]

He edited the Adamski books

[@paulohagan3309]

Is this the same family of the that guy Desmond Leslie who had an interest in UAPs {aks UFOs back in the 60s and 70s?

[@ajadrew]

Yes

[@richardmoloney689]

The natives! Awful.

[@silverkitty2503]

why its the truth??

[@davidgray3321]

So typo, two of my fammily died in WW1

[@H-nx8wr]

Good observation, David.

[@clario2178]

Colonial pirates 🇮🇪

[@JohnBurman-l2l]

I always felt that the Irish exploited their tennants as much as anyone, given half a chance. Victimhood was dropped once Irish went to America and out of the tentacles of the church that stirred up anger, just as it did in Africa later on.

[@connoroleary591]

Yes they did, and the exploitation carried on well into independence.

[@bogbay]

@@connoroleary591 Nonsense. Names please. Which Irish landlords behaved the same as the ango-irish aristocracy?

[@suburbanyobbo9412]

@@bogbayLol, the absolute state of Irish nationalists.

[@bogbay]

@@suburbanyobbo9412 Nothing to do with nationalism. Historical fact is the issue. A handful of native Irish families held onto their land by the time the Penal Laws were repealed. Almost all the eviction and rack-renting was done by the Angloi-Irish aristocracy, all descendants of people granted land by English kings and queens. These absentee landlords lived in England. Some behaved themselves but not many. After that, it's politics and corruption. All nations have corruption and greed, Ireland is no exception.

[@trevorodoinn3288]

@@suburbanyobbo9412Are you ok,hun?

[@iainsanders4775]

They patronise the English a lot..

[@Kitiwake]

The brought to English class system with them to Ireland.

[@markadams738]

Imposed on England by the Norman invaders.

[@nigelsheppard625]

Norman rather than English. The Normans invaded England, replaced everyone from the native nobility even down to village Headmen, everyone from the clergy, the judiciary, trade. The English stopped owning their own land in 1066, their Norman over lords bred amongst themselves and pauperised the native English. When the Norman French invaded Ireland their intention was to recreate what they had done in England in 1066, in Wales in 1076 and 1282 and through intermarriage in Scotland.

[@markadams738]

​@@nigelsheppard625well said. Even now the divisions exist. I was taught it as an hostile invasion (1066) with nothing benign .

[@Adaman368]

​@nigelsheppard625 Except when Henry II King of England invaded Ireland in 1171 and claimed it for the English Crown- contemporary sources detail he arrived with a large "English Army - the inhabitants of England at that time being a hodgepodge of Angles Saxons Freisans Jutes Danes and yes even Normans with the main language spoken being nothing like later English which is a mix of Anglisc Latin and French and lots more. Henry was a descendant of and successor to William the Conqueror, who had been crowned King of England over a hundred years earlier in 1066. The same William who was a first cousin once-removed of the English King Edward the Confessor, the same who allegedly named William as his successor in 1052. (With Williams great aunt, Emma of Normandy having married the Anglo-saxon king of England Æthelred the Unready in 1002) Henry's family had also married into both the Anglo-saxon and Scottish Royal families, with Henry's grandmother being the daughter of King Malcolm III of Scotland and the Anglo-Saxon

[@paulbreen8533]

Gaelic society was aristocratic and highly stratified. Muireadhach Albanach Ó Dálaigh murdered a tax collector who he considered was a lower class to him and had been insolent towards him.

[@phillipsugwas]

The piano badly needs tuning, as do their views.

[@phillipsugwas]

"Done their bit" mind numbing self conceit.

[@triestodrum2215]

No Surrender 🇬🇧

[@michaelmessenger5742]

Ireland doesn't want your surrender We await your decision to join with us And we only want what's best for us both Reconciliation forgiveness & peace for all And be an example to other nations Including the Israelis & Palestinians. No need to surrender we await you all🕊

[@noodlyappendage6729]

@@michaelmessenger5742Reconciliation will come. Look at all of the Irish and English, Irish and Scottish, and Irish and Welsh marriages. We will become one again ❤ 🇬🇧 👑

[@michaelmessenger5742]

@@noodlyappendage6729 No need to surrender then is there Us Irish or southerners have no intentions whatsoever of wanting to rule over you And that almost all of us despise sf and any other unruly untrustworthy group We say let the people of Ulster decide for themselves and if it's to unite to create a new Ireland for us all, then we're willing God bless the tribes of Ulster🕊

[@noodlyappendage6729]

@@michaelmessenger5742 Oh, a new Ireland, and and new Great Britain in a united British Isles. ❤️ 🇬🇧 👑

[@michaelmessenger5742]

@@noodlyappendage6729 A new Ireland and neighbour to Britain But whatever floats your ferry boat is fine