1888 in Ireland

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Events

• March — The Pan-Celtic Society is founded by William Butler Yeats.
• April — Pope Leo XIII issues a decree denouncing the "Plan of Campaign" as the Holy Office issued a rescript to the Bishops of Ireland to boycott the Campaign. This is ignored by many.
• 20 August — The Christian Brothers College is founded in Cork.
• September — James Joyce enters the Clongowes Wood College as the school's youngest student.
• Irish members of the British House of Commons attempt to introduce an Irish Local Government Bill; however the Bill is opposed by Chief Secretary Arthur Balfour.
• Belfast is awarded city status by Queen Victoria.
• The Belfast Central Library is founded.
• A large flock of 110 Pallas's Sandgrouse, a rare species of birds in Ireland, is recorded, one of the last known migrations witnessed in Ireland.
• W. B. Yeats joins the Esoteric Section of Theosophistical Society.
• James Daly sells the Connaught Telegraph to employee T. H. Gillespie.
• Thomas Lindsay Buick becomes Secretary of the Gladstone branch of the Irish National League.
• Reverend Henry Lett publishes a research paper on several unknown forms of fungi found in Ulster; however this document, as well as other research by Lett, were later lost.

Arts and literature

• William Allingham's Laurence Bloomfield or rich and poor in Ireland is published.
• J. E. Gore publishes A revised catalogue of variable stars.
• William Henry Hulbert publishes Ireland Under Coercion.
• John Kells Ingram publishes A history of political economy and Essays in political economy.
• T. Dumbar Ingram publishes Two Chapters of Irish History.
• MacGregor Mathers's Qabbalah Unveiled is published.
• Kuno Meyer publishes The Wooing of Emer.
• George Moore publishes Spring Days.
• Oscar Wilde's publishes The Happy Prince.
• W. B. Yeats publishes Fairy and Folk Tales of the Irish Peasantry and writes Down by the Salley Gardens.

Sport

Cricket

• Several Irish Cricket Teams travel for their second tour of Canada and the United States.

Football

• International

3 March Wales 11–0 Ireland (in Wrexham)

24 March Ireland 2–10 Scotland (in Belfast)

7 April Ireland 1–5 England (in Belfast)

• Irish Cup

Winners: Cliftonville 2–1 Distillery

• Distillery win the Irish Junior Cup.

Gaelic Games

• Several Cavan GAA football teams are formed including the Kildallan Wolfe Tones, Castletara, Butlersbridge Emmets, Drumlane sons of O'Connell, Ballintemple Bob Sextons, Ballinagh Erins Hope, Bawnboy Gallowglasses, Milltown Owen Roes, Arva Michael Davitts, and the Cavan Slashers.
• April — The First Cavan GAA All Ireland Finals is held in Birr.
• April 7 — A Cavan GAA football game between the Cavan Slashers and Belturbet Rory O'Moores was reported by an Anglo-Celt reporter as "..A disgrace, I must state that a more rowdy and disgraceful meeting I have never witnessed and the conduct of the party that came along with the Cavan club was simply what I could not wish to describe" and "The filthy expressions used by them towards the Rory O'Moores is simply not fit for publication"
• April 30 — The first Cavan GAA County Championship Final was played at Cavan as the Maghera McFinns defeat the Ballyconnell First Ulster's.

Golf

• The Royal Portrush Golf Club is founded as The County Club at Portrush, County Antrim.
• The Cork Golf Club is founded at Cork.

Horse racing

• The Leopardstown Racecourse is established by Captain George Quin becoming the first modern fully enclosed race track.

Births

January to June

• 7 January — Eugene O'Callaghan, Bishop of Clogher 1943–1969 (d.1973).
• 8 January — Matthew Moore, actor (d.1960).
• 10 February — Michael Joseph MacManus, journalist.

Desmond FitzGerald

• 13 February — Desmond FitzGerald, Sinn Féin MP, TD, Cabinet Minister and Seanad Éireann member (d.1947).
• 10 March — Barry Fitzgerald, Academy Award winning actor (d.1961).
• 4 March — Grace Gifford Plunkett, Sinn Féin member and politician.
• 9 June — Basil Brooke, 1st Viscount Brookeborough, Ulster Unionist Party MP, third Prime Minister of Northern Ireland (d.1973).

July to December

• 1 October — William Cosgrove, recipient of the Victoria Cross for gallantry in 1915 at the Battle of Gallipoli, Turkey (d.1936).
• 16 October — Edmond Pery, 5th Earl of Limerick, peer and soldier (d.1967).
• 24 October — Francis de Groot, upstaged New South Wales Premier Jack Lang at the 1932 official opening of the Sydney Harbour Bridge (d.1969).
• 1 September — Frederick Maurice Watson Harvey, soldier, recipient of the Victoria Cross for gallantry in 1917 at Guyencourt, France (d.1980).
• 25 September — Harold Jackson, cricketer (d.1979).
• 28 September — Seán Lester, diplomat and last Secretary General of the League of Nations (d.1959).
• 29 September — Michael J. Stack, U.S. Representative from Pennsylvania (d.1960).
• 8 November — Gerald Robert O'Sullivan, recipient of the Victoria Cross for gallantry in 1915 at Gallipoli, Turkey (d.1915).
• 19 November — Seán Moylan, member Irish Volunteers, Sinn Féin and Fianna Fáil TD, Cabinet Minister and Seanad Éireann member (d.1957).
• 7 December — Joyce Cary, novelist and artist (d.1957).

Full date unknown

• Cornelius Colbert, nationalist and rebel, took part in Easter Rising, executed (d.1916).
• Dick Doyle, Kilkenny hurler (d.1959).
• Linda Kearns MacWhinney, nurse, Sinn Féin member and politician.
• Seaumas MacManus, writer.
• W. F. Marshall, Presbyterian minister and poet (d.1959).
• Art O'Connor, Sinn Féin MP, member of 1st Dáil, Cabinet Minister, lawyer and judge (d.1950).

Deaths

• 10 January — Philip Cross, army surgeon, hanged in Cork Jail for the murder of his wife.
• 12 May — John Joseph Lynch, Bishop of Toronto (b.1816).
• October — Frank O'Meara, artist (b.1853).
• 22 November — John McGovern, soldier, recipient of the Victoria Cross for gallantry in 1857 at Delhi, India (b.1825).
• 1 December — John Divane, soldier, recipient of the Victoria Cross for gallantry in 1857 at Delhi, India (b.1822).

Full date unknown

• Thomas Henry FitzGerald, farmer and politician in Queensland,Australia (b.1824).