Author Description

"If any one building is synonymous with the 1916 Rising it is the GPO- The General Post Office on O'Connell Street, or Sackville Street as it was then, was the headquarters and the epicenter of the Rising in Dublin and indeed the entire country. Patrick Pearse stood outside the GPO to read the Proclamantion at noon on the 24th April 1916, and thereafter the city was convulsed by fighting for six days with the country's principle street and the GPO itself eventually engulfed by fire, leaving the once great Sackville Street almost unrecognisable. Who were the men and women who took over the GPO with Pearse and Connolly on Easter Monday 1916? This book is a comprehensive biographical listing of every man (498) and woman (74) involved- their names, details, backgrounds, and even what happened to them after the Rising. The majority of them were young, from Dublin's north inner city, and for many the fighting was a family affair, with a total of 106 families fighting in the Rising. This book without question will prove indispensable to all those who are interested in the seminal 1916 period of Irish history." -- Foreword