New book goes from the top of the morning to top of the tree

'm going to start this column with a pub quiz question dear readers, so come closer... what have the Duke of Wellington and the man who invented the penalty kick in football got in common? The answer is that they were both born in Ireland. The Duke, was born Arthur Wellesley in Dublin in 1769, the son of Garret Wesley, the first Earl Mornington and his wife Anne. He was quite a character by all accounts, attending school at Eton College - which he apparently disliked intensely - and living in Belgium and France before joining the army, where he made his career. He served in the Netherlands and India, returning to Britain as a Major-General, before heading to Spain in 1808 to take on the invading Napoleonic forces. His victories in what became known as the Peninsular War saw him made the Duke of Wellington, and made him the natural choice to lead the British army when Napoleon first returned from exile, leading to the decisive victory at Waterloo. After defeating Napoleon at the Battle of Waterloo in 1815, he was quoted as saying it was a "damn near-run thing". I'll bet. Meanwhile, William McCrum came from Armagh and while playing goalkeeper for his local club he was witness to a lot of cynical foul play around the penalty area. He proposed the idea of a penalty kick, and it was accepted by the Irish Football Association a year later in 1891 as 'rule number 13' in the 'Laws of the Game' The reason I'm such a mine of information readers is because I've just read a book by an Irishman (naturally), called Seamus Moran, who owns a cabaret bar in Spain called The Emerald Isle, that I have worked in from time to time.

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In between pulling pints, Seamus painstakingly took 25 years to put together his book and he's chronicled the achievements of his fellow countrymen by the county in which they were born.

The island of Ireland itself has 32 historic counties all told, and Seamus started with Antrim and finished with Wicklow.

Being an island where music runs through the landscape and the blood of all its people, there's nearly a song for every one of those 32 counties, and I couldn't help humming and whistling songs like The Green Glens of Antrim and Galway Bay as I browsed through the pages.

Another thing I noticed was that how many Irishmen actually won Victoria Crosses in both the First and Second World Wars, and that made me as proud as punch.