McCains and Gaelic Society

One of the harder things to communicate about the McCains is their place within Gaelic society, of how they looked, their physical culture, etc. This is because of Hollywood and it reliance upon Victorian concepts of Gaels, and Victorian development of the stage Irishman or stage Highlander. Hollywood and the media in general picked up these themes to the extent that much of the modern concepts of what is Irish or Scottish or Gaelic, comes not from anything remotely real, but dates to some very silly Victorian era concepts.






















While I do not have the time today write a decent article on this subject, I did want to post the illustration to the left as I thought it communicated so well the Gaelic World that the McCains did live in, the real Gaelic world.

The illustration is done by Angus McBride, noted illustrator of history books, especially those dealing in military history. I like the illustration as in it you see several times of Gaels that you would have normally seen together including the Gallóglaigh class of the McCains.

My son sent me the illustration and I am not sure which Angus McBride book it is from, but it looks to be a gathering of Gaels landing at Dunluce Castle in north Antrim. You can spot the Gallóglaigh in the foreground with the long saffron coloured leine that comes down to his lower calf. You can see the Irish lord, probably a Mac Dónaill, with his red cape looking down on the off-loading of perhaps Spainish wine. Irish and Argyll Gaels are also in the illustration, an obvious Highlander with his belted plaid, then some Irish Gaelis in saffron shirts (i.e. the leine) that are shorted and not a 'fashionable' as is the Gallóglaigh one. The dress of the Gallóglaigh is very much like that of the Irish lord, as his status in Gaelic society was high. If you click on the illustration it will bring up a larger version.

If you would like to know what a McCain would have looked like, he would be dressed in the long saffron coloured leine down at the water's edge, with the brown plaid around his shoulders. That very easily could have been 'an Mac Eáin' or the head of the McCain family in Antrim circa mid 1500s.


Barry R McCain (c) 2008

John McCain's real views

Senator John McCain's remarks about the Pledge of Allegiance.

As you may know, I spent five and one half years as a prisoner of war during the Vietnam War. In the early years of our imprisonment, the NVA kept us in solitary confinement or two or three to a cell. In 1971 the NVA moved us from these conditions of isolation into large rooms with as many as 30 to 40 men to a room.

This was, as you can imagine, a wonderful change and was a direct result of the efforts of millions of Americans on behalf of a few hundred POWs 10,000 miles from home.

One of the men who moved into my room was a young man named Mike Christian. Mike came from a small town near Selma , Alabama He didn't wear a pair of shoes until he was 13 years old. At 17, he enlisted in the US Navy. He later earned a commission by going to Officer Training School Then he became a Naval Flight Officer and was shot down and captured in 1967. Mike had a keen and deep appreciation of the opportunities this country and our military provide for people who want to work and want to succeed.

As part of the change in treatment, the Vietnamese allowed some prisoners to receive packages from home. In some of these packages were handkerchiefs, scarves and other items of clothing. Mike got himself a bamboo needle. Over a period of a couple of months, he created an American flag and sewed on the inside of his shirt. Every afternoon, before we had a bowl of soup, we would hang Mike's shirt on the wall of the cell and say the Pledge of Allegiance.

I know the Pledge of Allegiance may not seem the most important part of our day now, but I can assure you that in that stark cell it was indeed the most important and meaningful event. One day the Vietnamese searched our cell, as they did periodically, and discovered Mike's shirt, with the flag sewn inside, and removed it. That evening they returned, opened the door of the cell, and for the benefit of all of us, beat Mike Christian severely for the next couple of hours. Then, they opened the door of the cell and threw him in. We cleaned him up as well as we could. The cell in which we lived had a concrete slab in the middle, on which we slept. Four naked light bulbs hung in each corner of the room.

As I said, we tried to clean up Mike as well as we could. After all the excitement died down, I looked in the corner of the room, and sitting there beneath that dim light bulb with a piece of red cloth, another shirt and his bamboo needle, was my friend, Mike Christian. He was sitting there with his eyes almost shut from the beating he had received, making another American flag. He was not making the flag because it made Mike Christian feel better. He was making that flag because he knew how important it was to us to be able to Pledge our allegiance to our flag and country.

So the next time you say the Pledge of Allegiance, you must never forget the sacrifice and courage that thousands of Americans have made to build our nation and promote freedom around the world. You must remember our duty, our honor, and our country.

'I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice, for all.'

One hears much from the media and talk show radio hosts about who is a 'conservative' and who as not, like they 'know.' I think the words above of John McCain pretty much speak for themselves. It is good to read them, a study in reality and truth. I have to ask myself, who was it that climbed into a fighter bomber, and flew into enemy territory in the service of this county, who was it who placed his life on the line for this county? I tend to pay more attention to a man of the mettle of John McCain, than that of radio jockeys.

Barry R McCain