CACrown ArchivesThe cinema collection
Menu
Research dossier · History & Society

Swatragh GAC

Association football club

Layered newspapers, civic records and oral-history reels arranged as chronological evidence
History and societyInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionSep 18, 2026
Entity authorityQ7654056 ↗
Source-derived summary

Michael Davitt's GAC Swatragh (Irish: CLG Míceal Mhic Dhaíbheid Suaitreach) is a Gaelic Athletic Association club based in the village of Swatragh, Northern Ireland. The club is a member of the Derry GAA and currently caters for Gaelic football, hurling and camogie. The club is named after republican patriot and revolutionary Michael Davitt.

Swatragh fields Gaelic football and hurling teams at U8, U10, U12, U14, U16, Minor, Reserve, Thirds and Senior levels. There are also camogie teams across similar age groups.

History

In 1946 John McCormack proposed the idea of forming a Gaelic football club in Swatragh. Other founder members included Patsy Collins, Jim McMullan, John Eddie Friel and James McGurk. They choose to name the club after Michael Davitt, because he had given Irish Land League speeches in Swatragh in the late 19th century. It also marked 100 years since Davitt's birth. The club colours were initially red and white, but in 1949 the present green and white colours were adopted.

Editorial summary

Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Swatragh GAC” is association football club. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Swatragh, Association and football, not as a finished interpretation.

Editorial reviewA strong contextual entry point for chronology, institutions and public events when official records are distinguished from later interpretation. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1946, 1949—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 1946. For this dossier, Swatragh, Association and football is the immediate research focus.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

The phrase “association football club” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.

Evidence profile

Contemporary correspondence, administrative files and participant testimony can test how later narratives organized the event or institution. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 18, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q7654056. Authority coordinates are 54.917, -6.663. 2 of 2 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1946 and 1949.

Critical limits

Later summaries often reconcile disputed chronology or motive more neatly than the contemporary record permits. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Compare institutional narratives with records created by participants and affected communities. Dates and formal titles are useful anchors, but not substitutes for context.

Best used for
  • Event chronology
  • Institutional context
  • Locating named record creators
Verify next

Contemporary correspondence, government or organizational records, oral histories and cited historical scholarship.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “Swatragh GAC”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow Swatragh GAC primary sources, Swatragh GAC archive and Swatragh research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Swatragh GAC”?
  2. Which voices are present, absent or mediated by the institution?
  3. Who created the surviving record, and for what administrative purpose?
Subject index

Search terms from this dossier

Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “Swatragh GAC” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.