1903 in Ireland

Events

• 3 January – the Norwegian ship Remittant is towed into quarantine in Queenstown with the entire crew suffering from beriberi.
• 3 February – the proposed canonisation of Oliver Plunkett is discussed in Rome.
• 26 February – the ocean liner SS Columbus is launched by Harland and Wolff at Belfast.
• 27 February – a meeting at the Mansion House, Dublin, enthusiastically welcomes a movement to establish Saint Patrick's Day as a national holiday.
• 8 March – Charles Gavan Duffy is buried at Glasnevin Cemetery in Dublin. He is laid to rest near others who took part in the Young Irelander Rebellion of 1848.
• 17 March – in Waterford, Saint Patrick's Day is marked as a public holiday.
• 26 March – the Chief Secretary for Ireland, George Wyndham, introduces his Irish Land Bill in the House of Commons of the United Kingdom.
• 31 March – the Lord-Lieutenant announces that Edward VII and Queen Alexandra intend to visit Ireland within the coming year.
• 15 May – the Chief Secretary for Ireland, George Wyndham, asks for support for his Irish Land Bill.
• 23 May – extracts from the annual report of the British Army shows that there are 35,717 Irishmen in its service.
• 9 June – the University of Dublin announces that it is to award degrees to women following a vote. The first women will be admitted as full members of its sole constituent, Trinity College, Dublin, in 1904.
• 1 July – the Belfast and Northern Counties Railway becomes the Northern Counties Committee of the Midland Railway.
• 19-27 July – first visit to Ireland as monarch of King Edward VII, landing at Buncrana.
• 14 August – the Wyndham Land Act is passed in the House of Commons of the United Kingdom, offering special incentives to landlords to sell their entire estates.
• 5 September – Irish painter Henry Jones Thaddeus is granted permission to paint the first portrait of Pope Pius X.
• 13 November – the 2nd Battalion of The Royal Dublin Fusiliers is welcomed home after nearly 20 years of foreign service.
• 22 December – the well-known Irish optician, Patrick Cahill, who had the sole privilege of supplying the late Pope Leo XIII with spectacles, is to supply the present pontiff, Pope Pius X.
• ;Undated
• :*Independent Orange Institution is formed, as a breakaway from the Orange Institution.
• :*Pigeon House generating station in Dublin starts producing electricity.
• :*Withdrawal of the last British Royal Navy guard ship to be permanently stationed at Kingstown, the cruiser.
• :*Cork International Exhibition is re-opened.

  Arts and literature

• January – An Túr Gloine, the cooperative studio for stained glass, is established by Sarah Purser in Dublin.
• 8 October – first performance of a play by J. M. Synge, In the Shadow of the Glen, at the Molesworth Hall, Dublin.
• 7 December – first performance of the opera Muirgheis with music by Thomas O'Brien Butler and libretto by Thadgh O'Donoghue at the Theatre Royal, Dublin, the first Irish language opera.
• Padraic Colum's Broken Soil is performed by W. G. Fay's Irish National Dramatic Company.
• George Moore's short stories The Untilled Field are published.
• 'Æ' 's The Nuts of Knowledge, lyrical poems old and new is published by Elizabeth Yeats's Dun Emer Press at Dundrum, Dublin.
• W. B. Yeats's In the Seven Woods, being poems of the Irish heroic age is published by his sister's Dun Emer Press; he also publishes his essays Ideas of Good and Evil.
• County Cork-born Chicago chief of police Francis O'Neill's collection O'Neill's Music of Ireland is published.

  Sport

Football

• ;International
• :14 February – England 4–0 Ireland
• :21 March Scotland 0–2 Ireland
• :28 March Ireland 2–0 Wales
• ;Irish League
• :Winners: Distillery
• ;Irish Cup
• :Winners: Distillery 3–1 Bohemians
• Bohemians becomes the first Dublin team to join the Irish Football League.
• The Oval football stadium, home of Glentoran, is rebuilt with the pitch being turned around ninety degrees.

  Motor racing

• 2 July – the Gordon Bennett Trophy race is run on Irish public roads, the first international motor race in Ireland. The winner is Camille Jenatzy.

  Births

• 15 January – Joe Stynes, Irish Republican and sportsman.
• 19 January – Alfred Lane Beit, British politician, art collector and philanthropist, honorary Irish citizen.
• 28 January – Kathleen Lonsdale, X-ray crystallographer.
• 2 February – Hilton Edwards, actor, director, co–founder of Gate Theatre, born in London.
• 5 February – William Teeling, author, traveller and UK politician.
• 23 February – Alec Mackie, soccer player.
• 11 March – Michael Hilliard, Fianna Fáil TD, Cabinet Minister and MEP.
• 13 March – Joseph Blowick second leader of Clann na Talmhan, TD and Cabinet Minister.
• 5 April – Leo Rowsome, teacher, player and maker of uilleann pipes.
• 12 April – Paddy Collins, Cork hurler.
• 25 May – Ewart Milne, poet.
• 8 June – Harry Duggan, soccer player.
• 17 July – Dinny Barry-Murphy, Cork hurler.
• 18 July – Charles Hill, cricketer.
• 5 August – Achey Kelly, cricketer.
• 17 September – Frank O'Connor, short story writer and memoirist.
• 6 October – Ernest Walton, physicist, 1951 Nobel Prize for Physics.
• 23 October – Patrick Cogan, Independent TD.
• 1 November – Max Adrian, actor.
• 18 December – Harry Forsyth, cricketer.
• ;Undated
• :*Leo Maguire, singer, songwriter and radio broadcaster.
• :*Stanley Woods, motor cycle racer, with 29 Grand Prix wins and 10 Isle of Man TT wins.

  Deaths

• 9 February – Charles Gavan Duffy, nationalist and Australian colonial politician.
• 5 April – Mary Anne Sadlier, novelist.
• 24 April – Walter Osborne, impressionist painter.
• 27 April – William Travers, lawyer, politician, explorer, and naturalist in New Zealand.
• 25 July – John Michael Clancy, Democratic Party United States Representative from New York.
• 31 August – Charles O'Hea, Catholic Priest, baptised Ned Kelly and ministered to him before he was hanged in 1880.
• 12 September – Maxwell Henry Close, geologist.
• 22 October – William Edward Hartpole Lecky, historian.
• 24 October – James Adams, recipient of the Victoria Cross for gallantry in Afghanistan .