Apr 15, 2016 – We speak to the world’s best sommeliers for their advice and tips on becoming theBest Sommelier of the World.

The Argentinian  Irish Connection

So how did this connection come about? To find the answer, we must take ourselves back to the beginning of the nineteenth century when Spain was the imperial power in Argentina. In this period a wave of wars of independence swept Spanish America, led by Simon Bolivar, Bernardo O’Higgins, Jose Artigas and Jose de San Martin. San Martin was the hero of the Argentine War of Independence which was achieved in 1816. Admiral William Brown from Foxford, Co Mayo played a prominent role in the war of independence, being the founder of the Argentine Navy.

Another Irishman, John Thomand O’Brien from Wicklow, also played a prominent role in the war, being adjutant to San Martin. It is said that San Martin asked O’Brien to go back to Ireland for 200 emigrants at a time when Argentina was a country of vast unclaimed lands and there was an opportunity for advancement in the wool and meat trades. O’Brien spent the 1827/28 period trying to recruit emigrants in Ireland, without success. However, he met John Mooney from Streamstown, near Ballymore and persuaded him to move to Argentina. His sister Mary Bookey and her husband, Patrick Bookey went with him and they began work on a sheep farm in the Pampas area.

Amongst the Argentinians who claim Irish ancestry was Che Guevara, born in Buenos Aires to Mary Lynch from Galway. The

The man who raised the Irish flag over the GPO at Easter 1916 was from Argentina. Shortly after midday on Easter Monday 1916, the Argentinian born Eamon Bulfin climbed onto the roof of the GPO and unfurled the Irish Republican tri-colour. Argentina was one of the first countries to recognise Ireland as an independent State in 1922.

Eamon Bulfin was the son of William Bulfin, who arrived in Argentina in 1884, and was to become an early editor of the Southern Cross and a best-selling travel writer.

Eamon was born in Buenos Aires in 1892 and returned to Ireland with his family at the age of 16. He attended Pearse’s school, St Enda’s, and UCD, where he joined the Irish Volunteers and captained the 1915 Fitzgibbon Cup-winning hurling team. He worked closely with Pearse on the planning and preparation of the Rising, including storing arms and ammunition at St Enda’s.

On the morning of Easter Monday, April 24th, in the GPO, James Connolly asked Sean O’Kelly to fetch two flags from Liberty Hall. When the flags arrived, Connolly asked Bulfin to put them up on the flagpoles on either end of the roof. Bulfin hoisted the Tricolour at the corner of Henry Street and a green flag with the inscription “Irish Republic” at the corner of Prince’s Street.

After the Rising, Bulfin was sentenced to death, but – like Eamon de Valera – his foreign passport saved him. Following the intercession of the Argentine ambassador, he was deported to Buenos Aires in March 1917. Afraid to anger Britain, whose economic and thus political influence in Argentina was still enormous, the Argentine authorities imprisoned him for evading military service, even though he had been a schoolboy when he had left Argentina with his family eight years previously.

When he was released from prison in 1919, he was appointed by de Valera as the first consul of the Irish republic in Buenos Aires, a post he held until he returned to live in Derrinlough, near Birr in Co Offaly, his father’s native place, in 1922.