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| Lucy Agnes Smyth |
One of the most interesting aspects of researching for this introductory talk, and for a series of conference papers on Irish revolutionary women and Australia I am writing, has been both the neglect of these women in public and academic historiography and the very recent interest in the topic. The RTÉ series Rebellion is a good example. This 5 part series follows 6 fictionalised characters through their involvement in the fighting. Significantly three of them are women.
There are also books, websites, and social media devoted to the women of the rising. This has not always been the case. One of the stories a Dublin friend told me when we first met was about her grandparents and what they had done during the rising and the revolution. She said that her grandfather was in the history books, but trying to find out what her grandmother had done was much harder. I was in Dublin at the time
researching medieval women, so I didn’t then know much about the women of 1916.
My friend told me about her granny, who worked at Prescott’s dry cleaners and how she had hidden ammunition and guns under the counter
to be collected.
In many ways this sums up much of what we
know of the women of 1916 – they were ordinary women, who did extraordinary
things. Like their fathers, brothers and
sweethearts, they followed through on their convictions and desire for a better
future and were just as brave, scared, exhausted, hungry and extraordinary.
There
were many women involved in the Rising, mostly through two organisations. The
Irish Citizen Army led byJames Connolly, who explicitly included women as a point of
politics. Connolly said “that no movement was assured of success that had not
women in it”..Well known women who were in the ICA included Countess Constance
Markeviez, Helena Moloney, Dr Kathleen Lynn, Madeleine ffrench-Mullen. The
other organisation was Cumann na mBan which formed at the same time as the
Irish Volunteers and was founded by women like, Kathleen Clarke, Louise Gavan
Duffy, with Constance Markeviez and Maude Gonne involved as well.
Members of Cumann na mBan combined two
powerful ideological traditions, feminism and nationalism. Their stated aims in
their constitution was:
To Advance the cause
of Irish liberty
- To organise Irish women in the furtherance of that objective
- To assist in arming and equipping a body of Irish men for the defence of Ireland
- To form a fund for these purposes to be called the ‘Defence of Ireland Fund’.
- To organise Irish women in the furtherance of that objective
- To assist in arming and equipping a body of Irish men for the defence of Ireland
- To form a fund for these purposes to be called the ‘Defence of Ireland Fund’.
The organisation included women of all
classes, though the most well known names are those from the elite or the
professional classes.
Cumann na mBan were always militaristic in
that many learnt to fire guns, signalling, and first aid and moving guns. They
wore a military style uniform and their badge included a rifle and had a clear
idea of what they were doing and why. Mary
Colum said "We would collect money or arms,
we would learn ambulance work, … we would practise the use of the rifle, we
would make speeches, we would do everything that came in our way—for we are not
the auxiliaries or the handmaidens or the camp followers of the Volunteers—we
are their allies."
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Rose McNamara in her Cumann na mBan uniform |
They were mobilised on Easter Monday at the
same time as the Volunteers. It is difficult to know how many women were involved, from
Cumann na mBan, the Irish Citizen Army and others, historians estimate there were probably between
180 and 300.
Some carried and used guns. Constance
Markieviz was second in command at Stephens Green and the Royal College of
Surgeons and was condemned to death with the other leaders for her role. She
was spared because she was a woman. Rose McNamara was in charge of Cumann na
mBan at the Marrowbow lane garrison. Many like Dr Kathleen Lynn, Brigid Lyons
Thornton, and Linda Kearns ran first aid stations and gave essential medical
care. Some nurses worked to protect their patients, such as Margaret Kehoe who
was killed early during the Rising while on duty at South Dublin Union.
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| Nurse Margaret Kehoe |
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| Maeve O'Leary, Lucy Smyth's granddaughter and Rosie Kennedy, Margaret Kehoe's grand niece at Brigidfest |
Others ran the kitchens and organised supplies. Louise
Gavan Duffy, a founding member of Cumann na mBan, did not support the
insurrection going ahead and marched up to Pearse in the GPO and told him so.
She then agreed to work in the kitchens and did so for the remainder of the
fighting. Many women did the dangerous work of communications, the telephone
lines went down very quickly so hand delivered messages was the only way to
communicate between the different barracks/garrisons. Much of this work was
done by women who could move around the occupied city easier than men. It was
however still very dangerous and many came under fire. May Gahan O’Carroll
served at St Stephens Green and was one of those sent with dispatches to the
GPO and then Clery’s during that week. She was later arrested and sent to
Richmond Barracks. One important message was that of
the surrender by Pearse. This was delivered by Elizabeth O’Farrell first to the
British and then to the other garrisons. Elizabeth was present at the
surrender.
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| Elizabeth O'Farrell |
After the rising was put down 77 women were
arrested and were held first in Richmond Barracks and then in Kilmainham. Most
were released fairly quickly but some were among those sent to jails in
England. Many of the members of Cumann na mBan who were involved in the 1916
rising, went on to work tirelessly for Irish independence over the following
years. Which is a whole other story that we will have to leave to a future
Brigidfest.
The way that these women have been
remembered, or rather mostly forgotten, is also an important part of their
story. For many reasons they have been largely written out of the story of the
Rising, and the best example of this is the photograph of the surrender, which
originally showed Elizabeth O’Farrell and was then altered to remove her.
Why? In
the aftermath of the founding of the Free state, many men seemed to have felt
that the actions of the militant woman were unfeminine, that they were shrill,
harpies, unmanageable. Many of these women, including the widows of the
executed leaders, opposed the Treaty meaning that after the end of the Civil
War their connections to the Rising was often awkward and unwelcome.
Women were also denied pensions because
it had been initially decided that soldiers were men, so only men could get
military pensions. This incensed the many women who had fought, been wounded,
lost their jobs etc, it was not reversed until 1934 when women were allowed to
claim for smaller pensions. It is also thought that many women were disillusioned
that the high ideals for equality of women were not realised in the Free State,
so they disengaged from public life. Others seem to have felt that they did
what they had to do, and they then went on to work, raise families and not to
talk about their experiences. There are many stories of children, nieces and
nephews who only discovered their mother or aunt’s involvement after their
death, in clearing out their effects. So
now these women, like Lucy Smyth, Margaret Kehoe and many other grannies and great aunties are being remembered.
References:
Senia Paseta, Irish Nationalist Women, 1900-1918, Cambridge University Press, 2013.
Sinead McCoole, No ordinary women : Irish female activists in the revolutionary years, 1900-1923, University of Wisconsin Press, 2003.
Margaret Ward, Unmanageable revolutionaries : women and Irish nationalism, Pluto Press, 1983.
Margaret Ó hÓgartaigh, Kathleen Lynn : Irishwoman, patriot, doctor, Irish Academic Press, 2006.
