← All events
markets · Saturday 27 June 2026 · 2:00pm 
King House - Connaught Rangers Display Launch
At King House · Main Street, Boyle, Co. Roscommon
At King House · Main Street, Boyle, Co. Roscommon
On Saturday 27 June 2026, King House in Boyle opens two new permanent displays dedicated to the Connaught Rangers - free to attend, open to everyone, and with a talk by an academic who has spent years researching the regiment’s connection to India. If you have any interest in Irish military history, or in the complicated story of Irish soldiers who served in the British Army and then turned against it, this is a genuinely significant afternoon out.
The Connaught Rangers Association is unveiling two separate exhibitions, each covering a different chapter of the regiment’s history.
The first traces the Connaught Rangers Mutiny - the 1920 uprising in Jullundur and Dagshai, India, when a group of Irish soldiers refused to serve in protest at British actions back home during the War of Independence. The centrepiece is a recreated prison cell developed in collaboration with the Dagshai Jail Museum in India, where the mutineers were held. James Daly, the only man executed for the mutiny, is remembered here. Audio-visual narration brings the story to life without requiring any prior knowledge to follow it.
The second display looks back further, to the Peninsular War of the early 1800s, when the Rangers built a fearsome reputation for close-quarters fighting. After the Battle of Talavera in 1809, the Duke of Wellington reportedly said they were “as steady under fire as on parade” - high praise from a man not given to handing it out.
Dr Jyoti Atwal, Associate Professor at Nehru University in New Delhi, will give a talk on the broader connections between India and the Connaught Rangers. Descendants of the 1920 mutineers have been personally invited and many are expected to attend, which means the room will carry its own atmosphere.
Boyle sits on the N4 between Carrick-on-Shannon and Longford, roughly an hour from Sligo and 90 minutes from Dublin. Bus Eireann connects the town on the Dublin to Sligo route. King House is right on Main Street in the town centre - the building is hard to miss - and street parking is available nearby. The town is compact enough to walk from any public car park.
Boyle Abbey, one of the best-preserved Cistercian monasteries in Ireland, is a short walk away, and the Lough Key Forest Park is just a few minutes outside the town. There is more to see in Boyle and across Co. Roscommon.
Heading to King House in Boyle? Roscommon has plenty more to see. Read the Boyle area guide, find what else is on, and explore the towns and villages nearby.