Remembering the Execution of 1916 Leaders Today 1916

Connolly and MacDiarmada

Born in Edinburgh in 1868 and emigrated to Dublin in 1896 where he founded the Irish Socialist Republican Party. He traveled, worked, wrote, and lectured extensively in the US before becoming a full-time trade union organizer. He returned to Ireland to campaign for worker’s rights with James Larkin in 1913, Connolly was one of the founders of the Irish Citizen Army. He was appointed Commandant-General of the Dublin forces, leading the group that occupied the General Post Office. Injured and unable to stand he was executed while sitting down on 12 May 1916. He was the last of the leaders to be executed.

Seán MacDiarmada

Born Leitrim, MacDiarmada joined the Irish Republican Brotherhood in 1906 while still in Belfast, before moving to Dublin in 1908 where he assumed managerial responsibility for the I. R. B. newspaper Irish Freedom in 1910. Although afflicted with polio, he was appointed as a member of the provisional committee of Irish Volunteers from 1913. During the Rising MacDiarmada served in the G. P. O. He was executed on 12 May 1916.