DAOINE
Foireann inniu: Bróna, Orla, Eileen agus Diarmuid.
And we had a lot of people with specific Moore Street connections, both as a street market and as a 1916 battleground, visit us today.
Suzanne O’Connor (née Carthy) is descended from Margaret Gannon Carthy who sold fresh fruit and vegetables up near the Ilac entrance, with her sisters Marcey and Annie. Another sister, Mary Carthy, sold fish. Suzanne posed for a solidarity portrait.
The grand-niece of two Plunkett brothers and granddaughter of a third, Anne Gibney, came to sign the petition and to swap stories with Bróna about relatives and have or know. Her family home had a secret room where items were hidden from British house searches. All three brothers were in the GPO garrison and ended up in Moore Street. Anne’s grand-uncle Joseph Plunkett was one of the Seven Signatories of the 1916 Proclamation; though quite ill after an operation on his throat, he joined the Rising which he had helped plan and spent his last days of freedom in Moore Street. And married Grace Gifford hours before his execution. But Anne’s grandfather George Plunkett picked up a wounded British soldier from the Moore Street junction with Salmon’s Lane and carried him into No.10 Moore Street (junction with Henry Place) where he was cared for in the field hospital there set up by Cumann na mBan Volunteers Julia Grennan and Elizabeth O’Farrell and survived the Rising. It is recorded that George made another trip under fire to recover the British soldier’s rifle, probably the Lee Enfield .303 with its five-bullet clip.
Anne and her partner posed for a solidarity portrait.
Bróna’s son Diarmuid Ó Loing was in Dublin from Australia, where he lives and is involved with Gaelic Games and the Asian Gaelic Games, the Asian ‘County Board’ of the GAA. Diarmuid from our team was asking him about the battle at the Eureka Stockade (in which a lot of Irish miners fought the British soldiers) and about the famous ‘bushranger’ Ned Kelly; Bróna’s Diarmuid has been to many of the associated locations.
Bridget Burke told us she had worked on a number of stalls in years past. She lives in Montpellier Hill but before that, in O’Devanney Gardens. She too posed for a solidarity portrait.
As we were packing up we had a visit from Brendan Mulvihill, relative of Irish Volunteer Michael Mulvihill from Kerry who was killed in Moore Lane, at the junction with Henry Place. Michael’s sister in London was married to Austin Kennan from Dublin. Both men were working in the British Civil Service in London and were recruited into the Irish Volunteers in London by Sam Maguire (yes, of GAA fame). They came to Dublin on the Friday for the Rising on Sunday but then learned of its cancellation.
On Monday they were sightseeing in Dublin when they saw the insurgents occupy the GPO, joined them and were allocated to the upper floor with shotguns and bombs to fight off expected British assaults which never came, the British by this time deciding they were losing too many that way and were going to rely on artillery bombardment.
On the Friday, Michael and Austin got separated, Michael being in the main evacuation party leaving through Henry Place. Austin volunteered for the O’Rahilly’s charge but took cover from the fierce machine-gun and rifle fire from the British Army barricade on Parnell Street and was sheltered in a local house off Moore Street. He did not surrender; his pregnant wife came from London to collect him a few days later and they went back to London together on the ferry.
AIMSIR Deciding we’d been punished enough by the monsoon as we were packing up last week, perhaps, the weather cleared up in time for our stall today, which is every week 11.30am-1.30pm. After that it was cool, warm, cool …
UASDHÁTÚ: Gan nuacht/ No news on either appeal to An Bord Pleanála or Hammerson High Court case against Dublin City Council.
