Showing 22201 results

A copy of a letter from Charles Lynch to ‘Willie’ describing his company’s march from the Phoenix Park to Dublin city centre and to skirmishes with rebels occupying the Four Courts which resulted in the deaths of several fellow soldiers. He also refers to the incompetence of his commanding officer. He affirms that he is currently guarding the approaches to Dublin Castle. The letter is titled ‘Letters from Dublin. Easter 1916. 3rd Letter’.

A copy of a letter from Charles Lynch to ‘Willie’ giving an account of the opening hostilities of the Easter Rising. Reference is made to skirmishes, ambushes, and military casualties around the Four Courts on the North Quays and the General Post Office on Sackville Street in Dublin. The letter is titled ‘Letters from Dublin. Easter 1916. 1st Letter’.

A copy of a letter from Charles Lynch to ‘Willie’ referring to attacks on the magazine fort in the Phoenix Park and on Dublin Castle during the Rising. Lynch also refers to various rumours such as a plan to shell the Four Courts and the arrival of army reinforcements from England. He also mentions the successful use of a ‘locomotive boiler casing on a Guinness motor wagon’ to assault rebel-held positions. The letter is titled ‘Letters from Dublin. Easter 1916. 2nd Letter’.

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.

A copy of a letter from Charles Lynch to ‘Willie’ providing further details of exchanges of fire with rebels in the Four Courts area. He also refers to a ‘damnable’ incident in which an older civilian was shot by his commanding officer. The letter is titled ‘Letters from Dublin. Easter 1916. 4th Letter’.

A typescript copy letter from Daniel Crowley, Royal Irish Constabulary, Ballyheihue (Ballyheigue), Tralee, County Kerry to the editor of the ‘Constabulary Gazette’ re his recollections of the Casement landing and the ‘Aud incident’. The letter is dated 21 April 1917. The letter reads ‘On Thursday the 20th April 1916 I was on patrol duty (five miles away) and noticed at about 2 pm a vessel far out to sea, a steamer, I watched her for some time, became suspicious, and on my return to Barracks I sent a constable to Kerry Head to watch her and report her to the Coast-Guard here if she was suspicious. He did so’.

Copy letter from Fr. Albert Bibby OFM Cap. The typescript copy notes that the original ‘belongs to L.T. Langley, 164 Iveragh Road, Gaeltacht Park, Whitehall, Dublin. The letter is incomplete, and no indication is given of the person to whom it is addressed’. The letter provides an account of the ‘closing scenes of Sean Heuston’s life’. Fr. Albert contends that ‘shortly after Easter Week, 1916, I gave a rather full account for publication in the Catholic Bulletin, but owing to the Censor’s restrictions it could not appear in print’. The letter reads: ‘At about 3.45 A.M. a British soldier knocked at the door of the cell and told us time was up. We both walked out together down to the end of the Jail yard; here his hands were tied behind his back, a cloth tied over his eyes and a small piece of white paper, about 4 or 5 inches square, pinned to his coat over his heart’. Reference is also made to Fr. Augustine’s Hayden’s ministry to Ėamonn Ceannt and Michael Mallin.

Copy letter from Fr. Aloysius Travers OFM Cap. to the editor of the 'Irish Catholic' protesting against the ‘obvious and unkind suggestion’ made in relation to Thomas MacDonagh in a recent edition of the paper. Fr Aloysius declared: ‘I feel bound to emphatically assert that his preparation for his last moment manifested a depth of Catholic Faith and a tenderness of piety most edifying and impressive and that he received the rites of his Church with a devotion which not easily be forgotten by The Priest who assisted him’

A copy letter from Fr. Edwin Fitzgibbon OFM Cap. to the Most Rev. Daniel Cohalan, Bishop of Cork, claiming that he knew nothing of Fr. Dominic O'Connor's appointment as chaplain to the IRA until his attention was drawn to a report in the local newspapers.