Easter 1916

Speaking to my Mother moments ago, she told me of the easter parade in Dublin commemorating the events of this week 90 years ago in Ireland.

It was 90 years ago today that my Grandfathers Mick Wade & Paddy Kiernan were getting ready to strike a blow for Irish freedom.

Being Ireland & the Irish, The head of the Irish Volunteers ordered that Body to stand down; almost all did including my Grandfather Kiernan’s battalion in Co.Cavan.

My Grandfather Wade’s comrades in Dublin were a different matter. He was a very young adjutant under the command of a man called Eamonn DeValera, a U.S. born teacher of mathematics at Blackrock College and a rising light in the Independence movement.

They occupied Boland’s Mills guarding the approaches from (then) Kingstown’s harbour and denying the British easy egress to the city Center with re-inforcements.

Many talk, indeed sing about the G.P.O. and that doomed but beautiful struggle that lit the torch paper of Irish freedom but Boland’s Mills was different. It was a successful military operation, imposing huge casualties on the occupying forces.

My own Counties of Dublin (birth) & Wexford (upbringing) rose against the British that week plus an action in Galway.
My Grandfather Wade had a huge fondness of all things Wexford as a result ever since that date and indeed for those areas that obeyed Pearse’s instructions on that fateful Easter weekend.

At the end of the week, With the city ablaze & the native populace spitting at the participants - the British thought they had killed Irish freedom forever, but three days later as the executions began & the peals of the requiem bells rung out across the land, Freedom rose from the grave and as in the words of the poet, “a terrible beauty was born”. The irony is not lost on one as I write these words on this particular day.

I’ll write more of the events of this week later but it’s Easter Sunday. I can’t help thinking of my Grandfather Mick now. At this time 90 years ago, what thoughts were going through his young mind preparing for war. The fear & anticipation he must have felt, the anxiety & the determined knowledge that he was right. To free his homeland, a war of independence. His sacrifice and My God!., did he sacrifice a lot. He must have realized that life would never be the same again