By mid-September 1922 the Republican forces were on the retreat throughout Ireland and were reverting to rural guerrilla tactics while the Free State controlled the cities and towns. Free article

The day after Michael Collins was shot, Richard Mulcahy, Chief of Staff of the Free State Army, sent a message to his soldiers. He urged them to “stand calmly by your posts” and said: “Let no cruel act of reprisal blemish your bright honour.” Yet in Dublin, within days of that message, and as the body of Michael Collins lay in state in City Hall, Free State forces carried out atrocities which up to recent times were largely forgotten. Free article

We are seeing a deluge of media coverage on the centenary of the death of Michael Collins. This is natural for such a towering figure in our history. It is unfortunate, though, that so much that is said and written about the Treaty and the Civil War is dominated by the figures of Collins and Dev, often to the exclusion of other key figures and usually glossing over the political issues involved. Free article

Arthur Griffith died 100 years ago as the Civil War escalated, a war brought about as a direct result of his decision to sign the Treaty. Griffith’s legacy will forever be defined by that one act. Free article

Arthur Joseph Griffith was born at 61 Upper Dominick Street, Dublin, son of Arthur Charles Griffith, printer, and Mary Whelan. He attended the local Christian Brothers school and began work as an office boy in Franklin Printing at 13. He was a voracious reader and studied for the rest of his years. He was deeply interested in Irish history, culture and language and was a member from his teens of many clubs such as Young Ireland League, the Celtic Literary Society and Conradh na Gaeilge (the Gaelic League). Free article

Often in history, and in politics, plans are overtaken by events. This could be said of the execution by two IRA Volunteers of Henry Wilson, the British military advisor to James Craig's Stormont parliament in 1922. Shot dead on the steps of his home, his death has been associated with the Free State's decision to attack the republican garrison in the Four Courts, thus setting the Civil War in train in earnest. Free article

Síle Darragh’s ground breaking account of her imprisonment in Armagh Gaol has been republished with a new foreword by Rita O’Hare who writes of Síle’s moving and powerfully evocative story. You can read it exclusively here. Free article

Mairéad Farrell reviews the republished ‘John Lennon’s Dead’ by Síle Darragh Free article

At the Prisoners Day book launch of ‘The Armagh Women’ in the Felons Club, Richard McAuley referred to the question every author asks of themselves. “Where to start?” So, they started at the beginning, with a brief history of the jail itself from its construction in 1780 to its closure in 1988. Female political prisoners were moved to Maghaberry prison in 1986 before they were eventually released as part of the Good Friday Agreement. Free article

On the evening of 6 May 1882, the newly appointed Chief Secretary for Ireland, Lord Frederick Cavendish, and Permanent Under Secretary Thomas Burke were assassinated by seven men wielding surgical knives. Free article

2022 is benchmarking two critical events in Sinn Féin’s electoral history. This October marks the 40th anniversary of the Prior Assembly elections where Sinn Fein won five seats and 10.1% of the poll. 17 May was the 20th anniversary of the party’s major leap in representation in Leinster House. The party won five seats in the 26 County general election. Free article

The death of Harry Boland, coming less than a month after that of Cathal Brugha, was a major blow to the Republican cause. He was fatally wounded in Skerries, Co. Dublin, 100 years ago and died in hospital on 1 August 1922. Free article

ONE of the first leaders of the Irish people to lose his life in the Civil War in 1922 was Cathal Brugha TD who for many years had been a key figure in the IRA, Sinn Féin and Conradh na Gaeilge. Free article

Republicans in Antrim recently marked the centenaries of volunteers killed in Cushendall and Glenariffe. Sinn Féin MLA Pat Sheehan was the speaker and told those assembled that the executed volunteers and “all their comrades 100 years ago opposed the undemocratic, unjust, and sectarian partitioning of our country”. Free article

The threat of renewed war made by the British government at the end of the Treaty negotiations was finally carried out on 28 June 1922 but it was the Provisional Government of the Free State that started the threatened war using borrowed British guns. Free article