Item 6 - Copy letter from Charles Lynch

4 pp; typescript

A copy of a letter from Charles Lynch to ‘Willie’ referring to his company taking positions in a cinema on Dame Street during the latter stages of the Rising. He notes that the cinema had previously been ‘occupied by Sinn Feiners who had been driven out by the bayonet, and the walls were bullet marked in several places’. He also describes the shelling and destruction of Sackville Street and the North Quays. He affirms that his duty was to ‘prevent the Halfpenny Bridge being used as a way of [rebel] escape to our side of the river’. He later describes the capitulation of some of the rebel garrisons, and particularly the surrender of Constance Markievicz. He refers to the mistakes made by the rebels during the insurrection and to the ‘unchecked looting’ which took place. He also suggests that ‘a noticeable change took place’ upon the arrival of General Sir John Maxwell. Thereafter the fighting ‘took an ordered course’.

Reference is also made to the youth and inexperience of the British soldiers, the casualties suffered by the army, and the reasons for their heavy losses. Incidences of indiscriminate shooting and civilian deaths are also mentioned. Lynch wrote ‘Personally, I never used my rifle through the whole of the trouble, not that I would have done so had I seen a definite enemy’. Finally, Lynch expresses his opinions on the reasons for the outbreak of the Rising. The letter is titled ‘Letters from Dublin. Easter 1916. 5th Letter’. An annotation in pencil on the second page reads ‘Charles M. Lynch / 29 Antrobus Street, SW1’. The annotation is dated 28 January 1942.