James Connolly was born on June 5, 1868, in the Cowgate, Edinburgh, a slum known locally as 'Little Ireland'. His parents, John and Mary Connolly, hailed from County Monaghan originally. John worked as a carter, and Mary as a servant, the drudgery of which took her life early. James had two elder brothers, Thomas and John, and attended a local school until the age of 10, when he joined the same newspaper as his brother Thomas, cleaning the rollers of dried ink. At the age of 14, he joined the British Army in 1882, and served seven years, all of it in Ireland, mainly in and around Cork. Here he witnessed first hand the brutal treatment of the Irish by the British and the landlords, which led to his intense hatred of them in the future. He left the army in 1889, and married Lillie Reynolds in Perth in 1890. He had met her in Ireland whilst stationed there. The couple moved back to Edinburgh, where James worked as a labourer and then carter like his father. At this time he became interested in Socialism, and joined the Scottish Socialist Federation, becoming secretary after his brother. He also became involved with Keir Hardie's Independent Labour Party, which had been formed in 1893. James opened a cobbler's shop in an attempt to break out of the cycle of periodic unemployment, and to provide for his family as he and Lillie now had three young daughters. This shop was not a success, and he accepted a position in Dublin as the organiser of the Dublin Socialist Society. His family joined him there, and in May 1896 Connolly founded the Irish Socialist Republican Party, and soon after founded the newspaper 'The Worker's Republic'. He then undertook a lecture and fund-raising tour back in Scotland, and continued to write pamphlets and essays with a socialist theme. Following a 5-month lecture tour of the USA in 1902, he returned to Dublin and chaired the first meeting of the Socialist Labour Party, the ISRP having foundered. The party did not become very successful, and, disillusioned, he emigrated to the United States with his family. Here, he was a founder member of the New York-based Irish Socialist Federation, "The Harp" newspaper, and was appointed organiser of the Industrial Workers of the World in 1908. He published "Socialism Made Easy" in 1909 and made a long lecture tour of the United States that year and the following one. He returned to Dublin in 1910 after publishing "Labour in Irish History" in the States. In 1911 he was appointed Belfast organiser for James Larkin's Irish Transport and General Workers Union, and the following year co-founded the Labour Party. He was heavily involved in opposition to the Employers Federation during the Great Lock-Out, at which time he also formed the Irish Citizens Army at Liberty Hall (HQ of the ITGWU), with the aim of defending the rights of the working people. He revived "The Worker's Republic" newspaper, which published articles on guerrilla warfare, and attacked the Irish Volunteers for their refusal to allow the Irish Citizens Army to have any input into the Provisional Committee. The Irish Volunteers were by this time around 180,000 strong and were being urged by their leadership to support England in the war against Germany. Half of the Provisional Committee of the Irish Volunteers were supporters of John Redmond, leader of the Irish Parliamentary Party. The Irish Volunteers split, with the majority siding with Redmond and becoming known as the National Volunteers - but around 11,000 of the membership refused to join Redmond and his people. In February 1915, The Workers' Republic newspaper was suppressed by the Dublin Castle authorities, even as Connolly's "Reconquest of Ireland" was being published. He also became Acting General Secretary of the ITGWU in 1915. Connolly had become increasingly militant. During January 1916, the Irish Republican Brotherhood (those who did not go with the National Volunteers at the split) had became alarmed by Connolly's ICA manoeuvres in Dublin and at Connolly's impatience at the apparent lack of preparations for a rising, and they decided to take Connolly into their confidence. Throughout the months which followed, he took part in the preparation for a rising and was appointed Military Commander of the Republican Forces in Dublin, including his own Irish Citizen Army. James Connolly was one of the seven signatories of the 1916 Proclamation. He spoke to the Irish Citizen Army on 16th April 1916 thus: "The odds are a thousand to one against us, but in the event of victory, hold onto your rifles, as those with whom we are fighting may stop before our goal is reached." He was Commander- General of the Dublin Brigade during the Rising, in command of the Republican HQ at the GPO during Easter Week, and was severely wounded in the fighting. He was arrested following the surrender, was propped up in bed before a court-martial in the military hospital in Dublin, and sentenced on 9th May to die by firing squad. In a leading article in the Irish Independent on May 10, William Martin Murphy, who had led the employers in the Great Lock-Out of the workers in 1913, urged the British Government to execute Connolly. In the early morning hours of 12 May 1916, James Connolly was taken by ambulance from Dublin Castle to Kilmainham Jail, carried on a stretcher into the prison yard, strapped into a chair in a corner of the yard, and subsequently executed. Connollys body, like that of the other 14 executed leaders, was taken to the British military cemetery adjoining Arbour Hill Prison and buried, without coffin in a mass quicklime grave. This act, as well as the execution of the other leaders, was the catalyst in turning the Irish people against British rule. The fact that he was one of the seven signatories of the 1916 Proclamation bears evidence of his influence. We will leave his story with his final statement, given at Dublin Castle on May 9th, 1916, at his court-martial. "We went out to break the connection between this country and the British Empire, and to establish an Irish Republic. We believed that the call we then issued to the people of Ireland, was a nobler call, in a holier cause, than any call issued to them during this war, having any connection with the war. We succeeded in proving that Irishmen are ready to die endeavouring to win for Ireland those national rights which the British Government has been asking them to die to win for Belgium. As long as that remains the case, the cause of Irish freedom is safe. Return to History Index |
