"Zorro" based on Irish-Catholic freedom fighter in Mexico

According to the pages of The Honourable Society of the Irish Brigade, which was formed in 1994, on the 300th anniversary of the death of its founder, Justin MacCarthy, to commemorate the lives and achievements of the Irish Soldier in Foreign Service, the historical figure behind the tales of the masked swordfighter, Zorro, was "an Irish gentleman of noble birth named William Lamport, born in 1615 in County Wexford [Ireland]." The masked hero and freedom fighter "Zorro" was the creation of Johnson McCulley, and first appeared in August 1919 as a serial in a pulp fiction journal entitled All-Story Weekly. But the historical antecedent, as the claim goes, was the 17th century William Lamport, who "hailed from a Catholic family," left Ireland during the confederate conflict as a result of oppressive English rule," in 1643 "enlisted in one of the three Irish regiments in Spanish service (O'Neill, O'Donnell and Fitzgerald) to fight against the French forces in Spanish Flanders," was "commended for bravery and entered Spanish Royal service," "went to the then-Spanish colony of Mexico," assumed the name "Guillen Lombardo," and became a notorious freedom fighter in the Mexican independence movement. Read more.

"Here's to the Irish
The Men that God made mad
For all their wars are merry
And all their songs are sad."
- G.K.Chesterton.