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Hello all, Kilmichael Part 1, my new #podcast episode on the 1920 Kilmichael Ambush is online & available on #iTunes, #Soundcloud, Podcasts App, & most other places. Part 2 will be out shortly. Enjoy

https://itunes.apple.com/ie/podcast/the-irish-at-war/id1365677620?mt=2

Gallipoli 1915:

The Allied forces land an invasionary force into two points in Gallipoli. Cape Helles and Gaba Tepe, later renamed Anzac Cove.
The Royal Munster Fusiliers & the Royal DublinFusiliers landed at V beach. Of the first 200 men off the SS Clyde only 21 men made it to shore. Of the 1,012 Dubliners who landed, just 11 survived the Gallipoli campaign unscathed.

After the landings, so few men remained from the Dublin and Munster Fusiliers that they were amalgamated into The Dubsters.

Tuesday 25/4/1916
Second Day of the Rising.
British soldiers flood into the city as the rebels have failed to take the railway stations.
British troops set up machine-guns in the upper floors of the Shelbourne and kill 4 of Micheal Mallin’s men who have dug trenches in St. Stephen’s Green. Many rebels make their way into the Royal College of Surgeons.

James Stephens reported: “Inside the Green railings four bodies could be seen lying on the ground. They were dead Volunteers. Some distance beyond the Shelbourne I saw another Volunteer stretched out on a seat just within the railings. He was not dead, for, now and again, his hand moved feebly in a gesture for aid; the hand was completely red with blood. His face could not be seen. He was just a limp mass, upon which the rain beat pitilessly, and he was sodden and shapeless, and most miserable to see.”

On O’Connell street widespread looting takes place. Kids rob fireworks and set them off on the main Dublin thoroughfare, most likely replicating their surrounding by playing soldiers.

King Henry II of England sent his son Prince John across the Irish Sea as Lord of Ireland to claim authority over the Gaelic and Norman Lords.
Gerard of Wales said that “upon seeing these strange long bearded Kings, John and his retinue laughed and pulled them about by their beards”. The Irish kings complained about “how John was “an ill-mannered child… from whom no good could be hoped”.

John’s time in Ireland was not seen favourably by most. He left in December having run out of money and most likely because of the powerful Hugh de Lacy.

On this day 102 years ago, at 12:04 Patrick Pearse and his 1,500 followers in the Irish Volunteers and Irish Citizen Army take various buildings like the G.P.O., Boland’s Mills, City Hall and others around Dublin City centre. The Easter Rising had begun.
A military failure right from the start, Pearse knew it would be but wanted a blood sacrifice.
‘Death was not the cost but the reward of sacrifice’
The Rising would last barely six days.
However, it started a push for Irish independence that would be achieved five years later.