Eirí Amach na Cásca (Part 8)

Posted by Jim on November 19, 2015

 

On Easter Sunday, after sending out new mobilization notices from the Hibernian Hall to local Volunteer companies, Pearse ordered the Louth Volunteeres to demolish a section of the Portleix railway to prevent troops from reaching Dublin.  They also raided the Wolfhill RIC Barracks becoming the first to fire shots in the Rising.  Meanwhile, 1000 copies of the Proclamation were printed in the basement of Liberty Hall as the Countess painted the words Irish Republic on a green flag that would fly over the GPO the following day next to the tricolor raised by Argentine-born Volunteer Eamon Bulfin.  Bulfin had attended Pearse’s school at St. Enda’s and his sister would later marry Nobel Laureate Sean MacBride.

As Easter Monday dawned, a smaller than normal group of Irish Volunteers, Citizen Army, Cumann na mBan and Fianna hEireann gathered at Liberty Hall. John J. Scollen, knew by the cancellation notice in Sunday=s paper that some- thing was afoot so he ordered his Hibernian Rifles to gather at the Hibernian Hall as well.  Posts were assigned to each leader: the Four Courts to Ned Daly; Jacob=s Factory to Tom MacDonagh; Boland=s Mill to Eamon deValera; the South Dublin Union to Eamonn Ceannt; St. Stephen=s Green to Michael Mallin and Countess Markievicz; and the Mendicity Institute to Sean Heuston. They were to capture surrounding buildings as necessary and follow the battle plan laid out by Joseph Plunkett to prevent British troops from reaching the General Post Office (GPO) Headquarters. They hoped to hold out long enough for the world to pressure Britain to free Ireland since the excuse for WW1 was to free small nations.

At noon on Easter Monday they marched into the streets of Dublin and onto the pages of Irish History.  One of the men asked Connolly, Is the Citizen Army in the lead and Connolly replied, there is no longer a Citizen Army or Irish Volunteers, only the Army of the Irish Republic!  For the first time since the invasion of Canada 49 years earlier, the Irish Republican Army was back in the field.  The insurrection was to start with a bang as the Magazine Fort, a Phoenix Park storehouse of British munitions, was to be blown, but the men sent to blow it couldn’t get into the locked storeroom so they blew the fort but the storeroom did not explode.  At noon, Pearse, with Clarke and Connolly at his side, read the Proclamation of the Irish Republic to startled passers-by.  There were a few cheers, but for the most part the people were simply astonished.  Inside the GPO, men were filling mail bags with scraps and blocking the windows. They also used figures from the Wax Museum on Henry Street and thought it ironic that King George, Queen Mary and Lord Kitchner would stop incoming British bullets.

That afternoon The O=Rahilly, long opposed to a rising, drove up in his classic De Dion Bouton automobile loaded with rifles.  To those surprised to see him he said, I=ve helped to wind this clock, I=ve come to hear it strike!  Sadly, neither he nor his expensive auto would survive the rising.  His car would be buried with the rubble from the Rising at the railway end of Croke Park B the GAA athletic field B and covered over.  Later immortalized as Hill 16 it became perhaps one of the most famous sports terraces in the world.  The four British Barracks: Marlborough, Richmond, Royal and Portobello were caught napping with only 100 soldiers on duty in each.  The first British incursion into Dublin took place Monday afternoon as a group of mounted Lancers rode up O=Connell Street to clear the GPO; they were scattered by firing from the Post Office roof.  The first thing the IRA did was to cut the telephone wires to prevent the British from calling for aid, but a Castle telephone exchange was secure and soon troops from Athlone, Templmore, Belfast and the Curragh were on their way.

In order to get word out to the world, Joseph Plunkett sent a party of 7 men to the Wireless School of Telegraphy which had been shut down.  They managed to repair a 1.5 Kilowatt transmitter and Dave Bourke, an experienced Marconi operator, began transmitting in Morse Code the message >Irish Republic declared in Dublin . . . Irish troops have captured the City and are in full possession . . . the whole country is rising=. Since early telegraphic communications were station to station, Marshal MacLuhan, philosopher of communication, considers this diffused message to be the world’s first radio broadcast!  One of the 7 men was the Dublin-born, Protestant patriot Arthur Shields, later an American movie star who would appear as the Protestant minister in the Quiet Man with his brother Barry Fitzgerald.  John J. Scollan sent a message to Connolly that the Hibernian Rifles were ready to assist.  Connolly replied saying he was glad of the assistance and at later sent orders to the Hibernian Rifles to proceed to the G.P.O.  They were put under the command of The O=Rahilly who ordered the group to break and barricade all the windows on the upper floors. One member P.J. Walsh was stationed at the telegraph station on the second floor since he had a good knowledge of Morse Code and was able to pose as a government agent sending out queries about the rising to the government station in an effort to obtain information.  He received a few items of information which he reported to Plunket and Pearse.  Connolly detailed Scollan to check reports of British troops in the area while other Hibernian Riflemen helped to construct barricades in the streets.  On Easter Monday evening in the GPO, Pearse commissioned Jack Stanley proprietor of the Gaelic press to issue an official bulletin. Stanley seized O=Keefe=s Printworks on Halston Street and printed >Irish War News=, a four-page news sheet on Tuesday morning which had ASTOP PRESS!@ on the back page announcing the establishment of an Irish Republic.  Although the Proclamation of the Irish Republic does not name the Hibernian Rifles as participants in the rising, >Irish War News= lists them as part of the >Dublin Division of the Army of the Republic=.  The surprising tranquility of the first day of the Irish Republic passed with little confrontation, but that was about to end. On Tuesday morning, British General Lowe arrived with orders to put the rebellion down in any way possible.