Lions Led By Donkeys Podcast - Episode 48 - Easter Rising Part 2: The Provisional Irish Republic

Episode Date: April 29, 2019

On Part 2 of the Easter Rising Home Rule is put on hold while Irish Republicans remember the words of Wolfe Tone: Launch an uprising while the British Empire is distracted fighting a foreign enemy. Support Dogs For the Disabled: https://dogsfordisabled.ie Buy your very own Irish Republic shirt: https://teespring.com/shop/easter-rising-1916?tsmac=recently_viewed&tsmic=recently_viewed#pid=2&cid=566&sid=front Support the show: https://www.patreon.com/lionsledbydonkeys Follow us on twitter @lions_by

I was born on a dimpling street where the liled rums did beat And those loving English feet they walked all over us And every single night when me da would come home tight He'd invite the neighbours out with his chorus Come out you black and tans, ship-legging tans Come out and fight me like a man Show your wife how you won medals down in Flanders Tell her how the IRA made you run like hell away

From the green and lovely lanes of Kilishandra Come let us hear you tell How you slandered great Parnell when you thought him well and truly persecuted. Where are the sneers and jeers that you loudly let us hear? Hello. Skish, skish, skish. Welcome to another episode of Lions Led by Donkeys. Joe. Nick. Nick. Yes. Hello, welcome to another episode of Lions Led by Donkeys. I'm Joe, and this is Nick, and we are still in this room talking about the Irish Rising of 1916.

And unlike most of our other series, we're doing this back to back, so we're still here, we're still drinking. I hope you're ready. Shit's about to get weird. Is it? Eh, weirder. People start to get shot. People got shot last time. People's about to get weird. Is it? Eh, weirder. People start to get shot. People got shot last time. People did get shot last time. Yeah.

So more people get shot. Oh, way more people. Oh, fuck. Thank God Superman's here. A cardboard cutout. I'm actually going to expand. So when you're gone, if I have a guy on, I'll put Superman. If I have a girl on, I'll put fucking Supergirl

on. I don't know. So I have a host. Cardboard cut out of Leica. He looks good over there. He's looking alright. I don't know. He's a fucking lazy piece of shit. Last time he was on, he never even said anything. Yeah. Weak Nick.

So when we left you last week, the third Irish Home Rule Bill passed, the Irish Parliament and the United Kingdom found themselves in the middle of the Great War. The wolves came out of the den. But, fuck the Great War, the Irish can finally rule themselves, right?

They got Home Rule, right? Yeah, that's it. End of the episode. Thanks for tuning tuning in of fucking course they didn't nothing ever goes our way no and you know what things are just so much worse when the british and the irish are involved like this could not get any dumber and the british like allow me good sir yeah you can they affix two monocles not glasses two monocles

and then they quickly get around to fucking shit up nice monopoly man so at the same time all this is happening British Prime Minister

H.H. Asquith sent a bill to the king for what is known as a royal assent that's a good name to start off with Asquith

alright let's keep going think of a royal assent as's a good name to start off with ask with all right let's keep going um think of a royal assent as just like a he says sign it okay because at this point the king's not actually supposed to be in charge but because of old-timey stupid rules he still has to sign a bill okay um he struck a deal with the tories in parliament. Fuck, you went over Tories last episode. Yep. Conservatives. Okay.

Yeah, don't worry. You should probably forget all this because British politics are dumb. Okay. Will do. But I feel like British politics is the only politics on Earth that make ours seem almost normal,

but also really dumb. Theirs is really confusing to me. It's all fucking stupid. I'm just ready for the heat death of the universe. Let those lizard people come rule us. Yes. They're going to come out a rainier. Yeah, I hope so.

We still have IPAs. That's true. And good weed. So the conservatives in parliament struck a deal with Asquith. So they could send another bill. So they could just focus on the fucking war. Because everybody knew that home rule, something was going to happen. Like somebody was going to get shot.

Something stupid was going to happen. And now they have to fight the war to end all wars. They need to focus. They keep their eye on the prize. Unfortunately for the Irish, that bill was called the Suspensory Act of 1914.

Now, there's another part of that bill that had to do with disestablishment and the Welsh church, which isn't important to our story. But, you know,

send love out to our Welsh listeners. Yeah. Sorry. Do we have any Welsh listeners? I don't know. Let us know. I'd like to know.

We have a surprisingly high number of Danish fans. What's up, guys? Yeah. Really? Yeah, I don't know how to say hello in Danish. We did have a Danish character

last episode. I don't know character. No. Person. Just Denmark. We just talked about Denmark for like five seconds. No, no, no. I don't know character. No. Person. Just Denmark. We just talked about Denmark for like five seconds. No, no, no.

I'm talking about the female, the Danish. Can't remember her name. She's part of the Lord of the Houses. Fuck. Scones. God damn it. Keep going.

You know what? Don't even edit that out. Leave that in. Fuck it. No. Don't edit anything out. that in fuck it no i don't edit anything why would a danish person be in the british house of lords i'm not talking about a danish person i'm talking about somebody with a danish in their name that has to do with first of all a scone is not a danish you goddamn monster they're exactly which is why i had to correct myself yeah and i said scone next thing you call're going to call it Baroness of Crawler. You fucking monster.

Baroness of Crawler. Those are good. Now I just need a whole parliament of donuts and pastries. First of all, I want to get one now. Second of all, keep going. All right. I'm ready. So, the Spensatory Act of 1914 had only one section in it and it read, quote, no steps will be taken to put the Government

of Ireland Act into operation. Now the Government of Ireland Act was Home Rule as the actual law was called. The King not only signed the Government of Ireland Act, but also signed the Suspensatory Act. Meaning he both approved and then took away Irish Home Rule literally the same day.

What the fuck? He's like, oh, fucking licks his quill. Congratulations. And also go fuck yourself. Yes. Which is like the most kingly move you can do. If you think that this would cause a massive clusterfuck in Ireland, you would be surprisingly wrong. Did they not give a fuck?

It's not that they didn't give a fuck. It's that, so I know you were kind of young. Yes. Not back then, but like during 9-11, you were kind of young. Yes. For the most part, on the outside, now the Americans are always awful and racist towards one another, but for the most part, American society all kind of came together.

Right? Because of Alan Alan Jackson he helped us out who the fuck is Alan Jackson he came up with country songs and shit like which one was his there's so many at a time did we forget yeah have we forgotten remember when oh god they're all

so bad but that was kind of what world war one did to ireland kind of sorta really yeah um both the nationalists and the unions supported the war effort this went even for the militias um commander of the ulster volunteer force edward carson urged his men to enlist in the army and fight on the mainland to prove their loyalty to england irish volunteer force was not nearly as united as their ulster enemies john rudman who was an irish politician and moderate member of the irish parliament party who kind of began to build some power within the IVF. He brought a lot of people with him

because most relatively fringe organizations, when they start to moderate, they'll get a larger support base. He urged members of the IVF to enlist in the British Army. Not that he wanted to prove their loyalty to England because he really did think fighting Germany was in the best interest of Ireland. Mostly because he thought, you fighting Germany was in the best interest of Ireland. Mostly because

he thought you have the British Empire on one side that they're calling themselves the United Kingdom and you have the German Empire on the other. Where the fuck does it leave Ireland? Tiny little Ireland in the middle of the fucking ocean. We have to fight for the ability for small countries to survive.

That's what he thought. They would end up actually fighting in the trenches of the Western Front side by side with Ulster volunteers. And that's where the good news ends. Oh, what? Okay. This split put the Irish Republican Brotherhood firmly and effectively in control of what remained of the IVF, which is still 13,500 men.

You made me feel good there for a second. I mean, there is kind of a good, I mean, say which will, the Kaiser fucking sucked. Yeah. I mean, we got to go crush empires and shit, but then a whole bunch of bad stuff happened. There is... You know, I really wish that if you just took England out of the equation completely, like,

yes, these two completely different religions banded together and fought off the German Empire. The end. Nothing bad happened ever again. There certainly wasn't civil wars and shit. Nothing ever happened again. Yeah, but unfortunately, we live in the real world. Yes. It turns out that the Irish Republican Brotherhood

had not forgot the tactics of Wolfe Tone. Yes. I've never, I haven't forgotten. I'll never forget Wolfe Tone. So, the IRB. I haven't forgotten. I'll never forget Wolftone. Bow-chicka-bow-wow. So the IRB Supreme Council. Put your pants back on, please. Absolutely not.

They met in September 1914 and decided they would act while the British Army was away fighting in the trenches. They would, however, need some help. Roger Casement was one of the guys

who helped smuggle weapons with the yacht. And also, side note, total fucking badass. Roger Casement was one of the guys who helped smuggle weapons with the yacht and also side note total fucking badass Roger Casement was one of the people who helped expose King Leopold the second of Belgium's Congo free state crimes yeah like he literally

how? he literally so he actually never went there he just noticed like the only thing Belgium is sending out is guns. This dude's fucking awesome. Roger Caseman's a bad motherfucker for being a journalist. Um, probably a double O.

Oh, he's a bad motherfucker. Like he's probably a double O. He's like a journalist who also definitely has a body count. Definitely a double O then. so he made contact. He fucks. Oh,

Roger Caseman fucks. Nice. Just like Wolf. Oh, I He fucks. Oh, Padraig Casement fucks. Nice, just like Wolf. I fucking love this. He made contact with the Imperial German ambassador to the United States to start talking about German support for the uprising. Obviously, Germany did not give a fuck about Irish freedom. Okay. That much doesn't really need to be said.

They were a pawn. They just wanted to fuck the British. The Germans actually attempted to do much of the same thing in India with much less success. Really? Yeah. What? Casement eventually got invited back to Germany. And by November, the Germans openly announced their support for an independent Ireland.

But? They did it just because they obviously liked the British. Yeah, they just wanted to fuck the British. I mean, they fighting the british in the most devastating war in human history at that point right i see where they're going yeah but casement was not done by this point where the first british armies at the front had already seen a lot of fighting resulting in a lot of pows being held by the germans like this is after the battle of Frontiers, you know, shit like that. Casement saw no better place for a recruitment rally than a German POW camp.

He separated the Irish prisoners away from everybody else and attempted to rally them together to form something of a free Irish brigade. It turns out... The Irish got a lot of shit going on. Well, it turns out

Casement finally found his limit of what he was good at because he only recruited about 56 dudes out of thousands. That's great. No, it turns out Casement finally found his limit of what he was good at because he only recruited about 56 dudes out of thousands. That's great. No, keep your hands up. I'm at 56. No, that's everybody. Do I see you at 57?

I'm pretty sure 56? Alright. Good enough. Casement and a few other IRB members planned out an entire fucking plan for the German invasion, which was dubbed the Ireland Report. The plan depended on an Irish uprising

in Dublin, diverting British soldiers away so the Kaiser's army could land on the west coast and march toward the river Shannon. The Germans were like, nah, nah, I'm good, bro. We'll just give you guns. Okay. That's kind of weird. It's kind of weird. Theish do a complete 180 on this later on but the the the rising definitely the backbone of that was the imperial german military

that's fucking awesome yeah now well that's an imagination now here's another interesting part at the same time all this is happening with the irB. Remember the ICA? James Conley? Yes, I do. Conley wants a fucking uprising now. And Conley... Fucking smacks table. Fuck yeah. Remember, the IVF has about 13,000 dudes under their command. Conley has about 200. Fuck yeah, let's go.

And Conley's like, fuck it, I'm doing it anyway. Yeah. And... Cops fighting in the background. Still punching themselves. And so, uh, finally Conley went to him.

He's like, look, I'm going to go fucking start some shit, which will put you in the position to be forced to do some shit. Cause the Brits are just start shooting at all. Us. This dude's a fucking badass. Conley's a bad motherfucker.

Love him. So he was a socialist organizer, but at the same time, like his big, his big thing for, um, going back to Ireland because, you know,

socialism, international socialism wasn't supposed to be a nationalist thing. Um, and when other socialists bad mouth them for it, and he's simply said, well, they forget that I'm Irish. And then he went back to fighting. Uh,

and the IRB talked to Conley like, whoa, whoa, whoa, slow down. Join us. We all do this together. Don't go off on your own. And Conley's like, yeah, fuck it. All right, let's do this. Because Conley kind of saw them all as bougie pricks.

Now, Conley had spent most of his life organizing labor unions, fighting strike breakers, getting a literal fucking fist feist with the cops this why he should why isn't there a movie i don't know that's awesome um he was a bad fucking guy and he he kind of was never really involved the irb up until that point because then they gave him a part in the military council um but he still thought of them all as bougie pricks they're all like yeah they're all uh most of them are former military officers shit like that um but the irb thought conditions were not quite right for a rising and they weren't entirely wrong

the everyday leadership of the ivf only support the idea of a rising if the British tried to take their weapons or introduce conscription into Ireland, which they had not done yet. People still supported the Great War. Even the chief of staff of the volunteers, Ewan McNeil, only supported the idea that the British took away Home Rule for good

rather than just suspending it. One of the founding members of the IRB, Jeremiah O'Donovan Rossa, died while living in exile in the US. His body was sent home to Ireland and a man named Patrick Pierce, or Pierce, one of the two.

I'm going to go with Pierce, was chosen to give his graveside eulogy. Pierce, not sure what to say, asked the IRB how far he should go and tom clark one of the leading members of the irb said make it hot as hell so make it hot as hell like spit hot fire okay waiting for ross's body to be put in the ground and pierce began to do just that, saying, quote, we only know one definition of freedom in Ireland. It's Tone's definition.

It's Mitchell's definition. It's Ross's definition. His speech made it very clear that there would not only be an armed struggle for Ireland, but it would be soon. He closed with this, quote, they think they have pacified Ireland. They think that they have purchased half of us and intimidated the other half. They think they have foreseen everything.

They think they have provided against everything. But they're fools. They're fools. They're fucking fools. They have left us Arfinian dead. While Ireland holds these graves, Ireland unfree shall never be at peace. Fuck yeah, dude. The speech turned many people to the side of the IRB.

And so for people, I've not brought this up before. Finian, kind of another word for Irish Republican Brotherhood. Not going to go into it. Okay. Think of the two as connected. And a rising for Easter began to be planned. Slowly but surely, they began to win over the IVF commanders to their side.

But they also decided not to tell their commanders about the plans. They didn't really, they weren't sure who they could trust. Look of confusion. Oh, okay. They wanted an Easter Rising, but at the same time,

they knew a lot of people, they may have been whipped up by Ross's graveside eulogy, but they weren't ready the same time they knew a lot of people they may have been whipped up by the ross's by ross's graveside eulogy um but they used they weren't ready to start pulling triggers on people did he write that speech yes okay i thought he just did it right there like he was like in the moment no he spit hot fire man that's that was pretty good there's five greatest rappers in ireland pierce pierce pierce Pierce, Pierce and Pierce because he spits out fire. Nice. I got a little

chub going. It's nice. You want to see it? I'm showing you. Put it away. Look at it. That's saying an Ireland unfree shall never be at peace continues to be a centerpiece on Republican

dissident murals in Northern Ireland to this fucking day. To this day. One of the people that the IRB decided not to tell about the rising was their chief of staff, McNeil. And eventually,

McNeil found out about the rising. He said he's going to cancel it. And he sent out orders saying as He said he's going to cancel it. And he sent out orders saying as much. He's going to cancel it? So, I mean, he's technically the chief of staff. Now, the IRB, to plan this, they didn't just put an ad out in the news. They were like, hey, bro, coup tomorrow.

Show up at noon. They put it out as a parade or a gathering or a demonstration. Like, we're all just going to get together, which is not uncommon. Parades are the shit. Yeah. So he put out that it was going to be canceled, saying, quote, there will be no waste of life for which I am directly responsible. And that was when McNeil found out he wasn't really in charge of anything anymore.

So, fun fact, parades were the only time I was able to get donuts as a kid. I'm going to need more info on that. Why? I don't know. Your family had a parade-centric food. I don't know, actually. It's really weird. Now I get donuts probably once a weekend in the morning.

I'm not a big fan of donuts. Honestly, it's probably why I like it so much. Maybe. Because maple donuts are the shit. I fucking love maple donuts. Maple bars. Oh, man. So good.

I don't get people's addiction to crack and heroin and everything, but I get the maple bars. They're so fucking good. That makes me understand substance abuse every time I buy a new maple bar. God. Oh, I see it. Fuck.

I'm going to put this bitch in a spoon and inject it in my fucking neck. Just a chunk of fucking pastry in your neck. Oh, man. But yeah, considering my dad was a cop back in the day, yeah, I never got donuts. Maybe that's why.

Maybe that was exactly why. Yeah, maybe that's why. Okay. Continue. So that's when McNeil found out he was no longer in charge of the IVF. The IRB pointed out that fuck him, we're in charge, not you. And besides, it was too late to back down. We're in too deep, man.

So what did he do? McNeil sent out a letter saying, hey, fuck you. Nobody get together on easter um now at the same time the german imperial navy had dispatched this ship now it was under the cover of like a norwegian ship called like the ard but everybody knew it was the fucking imperial navy everybody knew it yeah like they did not like like British intelligence was on it like since day one. They're not good at these things. Tens of thousands of rifles was on board.

Yeah, we're Norwegian, but we just really like the Kaiser. There's tens of thousands of rifles. You have a lot of pictures of the Kaiser and German flags up everywhere. And millions of rounds of ammo. They knew once it hit shore, the British would not only know about it,

but it would make like, it's like the Rube Goldberg project where the marble falls down and starts a whole chain reaction. The British know that you're just stockpiling weapons. Like there's something's going to happen. I'm so glad I heard you right. Because for some reason in my head,

I heard RuPaul project. And I was thinking- That would make this whole thing way more interesting. Like everybody, like instead of- I really liked that show. Imagine if every war was decided by, like, a drag queen show. Sausage away. Yeah.

Do a spin move. Oh, and we surrender. Okay. Okay. War in Afghanistan's over. Now, sausage away. Yep. McNeil sighed when he was told about this whole plan.

He's like, this is when he finally found out about the weapons. Like, dude, you can't fucking back out. The goddamn Kaiser's sending over tens of thousands of rifles. We're in too deep, man. Hey, we're already committed, man. And that's when McNeil said, quote, if I have to fight or be oppressed, I suppose I'm going to fight. Which is like the participation trophy for guerrilla war. I suppose I'm going to fight. Which is like the participation trophy for guerrilla war.

I suppose. And then Tom Kelly, an alderman and member of Sinn Fein, which is like a political party off to the side here. Also very well connected to the IRB and the Finian movement. Just know that they're on the same side. That's all that's important to you. Okay. Gave the IRB a memo that he said leaked

from Dublin Castle, which was the headquarters of the British administration of Ireland. The memo said the British army was about to arrest the leading members of the IRB and seize all the IVF's weapons. Uh-oh. The memo terrified everybody, and soon, even the most moderate members of the command structure

went over to the side of the uprising. The memo, now known as the Castle Document, was a total fake. Ah, they didn't look at the font. The font was wrong. The memo was a fake. The British did have orders to do something like this if conscription was put

into place, which it had not been. But somebody got the template for that memo holy fuck and just spread it everywhere like look what the British are gonna do and then now the IRB that's what I ask every fucking week

we got the template for this shit now the IRB military council knew this was fake and was like got an idea and so they spread it to everybody to scare everybody rolled with it that's that's pretty good and quickly their plan fell to shit because the german ship carrying all their weapons had been tracked by british intelligence since day one yeah the norwegian german ship that fucking tricked me yeah god damn it good fucker. Now, to make matters worse,

the IRB had not actually got the time right for the drop-off, so when the German ship showed up, there was nobody there to fucking pick it up. They're just sitting there at the port like... And then the Royal Navy showed up. Oh, fuck. So the German commander just sunk the bitch. Just in the port like... What if he stayed with the ship like fucking George Clooney

I picture like the perfect storm like George Clooney just chilling in the ship god damn it just in the port but it doesn't sink all the way yeah it sticks out like fuck now with the weapons gone McNeil went back to his old stance of not

wanting to fight and once again he sent an order to all volunteers printing in the newspaper sending out runners and they else canceling a volunteer muster that had been planned for the easter this guy just thinks he has canceling abilities yeah i don't feel like he's picked up on the fact he's not actually in charge anymore like he's just basically kind of like no it gets one worse than that british intelligence did more than just track the arms shipment they actually knew everything due to the fact that the germans were talking to their ambassador in the u.s which had been acting as a good between for germany and the irb and the british actually had american and German communications completely tapped, even though Americans were not involved in the war yet.

They knew about the planned uprising on Easter, the arms shipment and everything else. Holy fuck. Tapped? Oh, yeah. Now, when this intelligence and information was sent to the undersecretary of Ireland, Sir Matthew Nathan, it was given to him without telling him what the sources were, because it's generally bad practice to go on telling everybody that you've been listening on your enemy's radio traffic or your ally's radio traffic or anything, just like, hey, look, we got this, don't ask questions.

Because of that, Nathan didn't really trust the info. Nathan still proposed, however, arresting the leadership of the IRB, raiding headquarters of the Citizens Army. Fuck, this is not looking good. But he's undersecretary. He couldn't act without the approval of the secretary, Augustine Burrell,

who was away on vacation to London. So he wired away for approval. That approval would not come before Easter. It would actually come two hours after the uprising began. Whoops. Meanwhile, the IRB sent out conflicting orders to volunteers to muster on Easter once again, going against McNeil.

Conflicting? Yeah. Okay. So McNeil was sending out- The canceling, like he's like- Stay at home. And the IRB, who is now in control of the IVF, was saying, everybody fucking show up.

Hide Easter eggs with your family. Yes. The Easter eggs are against the door. The chair is the Easter eggs. Show up with your rifle. Shoot British people. I don't know what to do. Our cipher sucks.

The muster, of course, was the start of an uprising unfortunately on the morning of april 24th significantly less people showed up because they were following mcneil orders to stay at home oh fucking horseshit but still around 1200 people showed up around dublin once a good amount once they gathered they fanned out across city capturing key points throughout they set up barricades throughout the street and began to fortify their positions they cut off transportation routes communication wires wherever they could fucking police are still fighting at their station oh they come out too fighting some units of volunteers began digging trenches through the streets all waiting for the british to get their shit together now the main thrust of the

rising was toward the general post office led by connelly and his Irish citizens army with Connolly and four other members of the middle military council, including Patrick Pierce. Uh, they took over the post office. Pierce took to the steps of the post office and proclaimed the birth of the Irish Republic and rose the Irish tricolor above the building. Now the Irish Republican, um,

uh, proclamation of, of their country, incredibly progressive for the time universal suffrage um complete equal rights for everybody catholic or protestant um everything like that who doesn't like that uh turns out british ass One, can I also point out, who's playing Connolly in the movie? Ooh, that's a good question. Now, he doesn't look as heroic as you think. He kind of a bit on the overweight side of the full mustache. Okay, but I didn't know that, so Ryan Gosling.

Ryan Reynolds. We're going with Ryan Reynolds. Ryan Reynolds. I feel like that's a biased opinion. He needs an Irish accent. That's really biased. He needs an Irish accent. I know. We'll go with Ryan Reynolds. Ryan Reynolds? Ryan Reynolds. I feel like that's a biased opinion. He needs an Irish accent. That's really biased. He needs an Irish accent. I know who you're going with.

I feel like I know who you would go with. I don't remember his name. I think I know who you're going with, too. Who? Black hair. Fucking. You're naming every Irishman. That's not true.

I think he was in the movie SWAT. No? I don't know. All this needs to be cut out. This is terrible. It can stay in. There needs to be a movie either way. God damn it. He was in the fucking Harry Potter movie. He was.

He's literally the only Irish actor I can think of off the top of my head. Is it Colin? Colin Farrell! Yes! Yes! High five. We'll do it later.

This table's kind of long. That's what she said. The British commander of Ireland was actually on leave in England, and the guy he left in charge was gone and nobody could find him. Eventually, an officer was located at colonel cowan who had no fucking idea what was going on he was getting like confused conflicting reports of random armed irish people like storming the post office and another group seizing a biscuit factory somebody's not getting their mail somebody's not getting good biscuits i don't see the problem with

this before you came over to my house to record today, I told you to pick up a certain brand of whiskey, right? Yes. What brand was that? I didn't have to pick any up because I had some at the house. Okay. I don't know what that says about me, but I guess it's Jameson, I hope. Jameson.

So, which brings us to a main fighting position that the volunteers picked out, the Jameson Distillery in Dublin. Ooh. So, this one is triple distilled. So I imagine they had triple the defense. That's right. Yes. Yes. The Jameson Distillery in Dublin was a fighting position

during the Easter. That is fucking awesome. Holy shit. So Colonel Cowan sent out soldiers to see just what the fuck was going on. Soldiers from the 6th Reserve Cavalry Regiment mounted on a horseback, walked down to the post office to see what was going on, and then probably got shot at by volunteers, killing three of them.

What's going on over here? What's all this then? Oh, God, they're shooting us. The fucking cops are just punching each other in the background so not expecting to get shot at the soldiers quickly retreated back to their barracks this episode is hilariously known as the charge of the lancers that's what the irish because they charge in the wrong direction because they retreated yeah that's the joke nick god damn it oh that's awesome meanwhile the volunteers assaulted Dublin Castle

and then shot a policeman who was standing guard outside. What? Just rare. He wasn't standing guard. He was fighting himself. And then they began exchanging gunfire with a few people inside. A few people?

Now, they did not, however, press the attack. The volunteers did not know that inside the castle was only a couple soldiers as Sir Nathan and Colonel Cowan himself who were also shooting at them. I'd be fucking pissed off to have the detail. There's only a few of you here. There's literally only like a dozen.

Yeah. And like the second in command of all of Ireland is shooting at you with a pistol out the window. Go fuck yourself. Soldiers from the Royal Irish Regiment were ordered to march on Dublin Castle. Apparently, nobody told them that people were actively shooting at one another because when they showed up at the castle, their weapons were slung over their backs and their rifles were unloaded.

So when they stumbled upon an outpost manned by volunteers they were quickly shown how dumb that was by being shot at a point blank rage and their commanding officer was shot directly in the face eventually the royals are able to get their shit together bring a machine gun into the fight

and then drive the volunteers from their outpost more people are getting shot in this episode than the last one. Tends to happen. Yeah. The Dublin police, who were unarmed, mind you, were ordered from the street after three of them were killed on the first day

as they tried to investigate what the fuck was going on. They were just investigating. Yeah, they're like, people are getting shot. What's all this then? Now with all the shooting and no cops uh a wave of looting broke out across the city the cops are still fighting each other just hiding the next day martial law was declared by brigadier general william lowe oh we uh he was put in charge uh i hope that makes it over there putting this this whole thing under control. Unfortunately for the volunteers, they failed to capture any of Dublin's main railways or

ports, making it incredibly easy for thousands of British reinforcements to be rushed into the city. They not only came with machine guns, but artillery. What? Remember, this isn't just any old british field artillery these are artillery units fresh from the western front yeah dude all they know is fisting yeah like all their problems are solved by the correct application of just massive waves of artillery and then a british patrol ship known as the Helga

sailed up the Liffey River, which cuts straight through Dublin, like right up the middle, and then began shelling everything in sight. This is overkill. Not yet. Not yet. So, if I didn't know

and I wasn't really thinking about it, I totally think of this as a... Because we bring up castles and obviously there's castles around. I would think of this as like some night shit or maybe even some flintlock type shit. But no, this is right after... During World War I. This isn't just like during World War I.

This is like the same year the Battle of the Somme happened. Oh, fuck. Oh, my God. You can imagine just the firepower that they had. Yeah. Oh, my. It's so bad. Now, it should be said that the Irish did not think they would actually fight the British.

It's pretty much all the firsthand accounts that I have found. Like when the Helga sailed up the Liffey River and started shelling everything in sight, like the revolutionaries were completely speechless that they would like shell the fucking city. Like they thought they might fight the cops. They might fight a couple of garrison soldiers. But like they didn't think they'd get fucking shelled. Because like Dublin was considered the second city of the UK. As soon as artillery goes off, I would definitely have second thoughts.

But I still probably... But that's where these guys are way more manly than we are. Yeah. And not just manly, because a good portion of them are women. Yeah. The main volunteer positions at the post office, the forecourts, and the biscuit factory were surrounded and

instead of moving soldiers in, the British did what British soldiers do in 1916. They began pounding the fuck out of them with artillery. One volunteer at the post office said we did practically no shooting because there was no targets.

Fuck. They're sitting there getting shelled. Oh my God. Soon, the outlaying volunteer positions would be snuffed out one by one. At St. Stephen's Green, volunteers were chased out of their positions. Their British soldiers mounted machine guns at an overlooking hotel and then just rained fire down on them. at an overlooking hotel and then just rained fire down on them. At City Hall,

volunteers had been under sustained bombardment and machine guns since the first night of the rising. Eventually, they began to hear British soldiers that got so close scream out, Surrender in the name of the King! And then they answered them by shooting them in the face as they came through the

windows. Holy fuck. Eventually, the volunteers inside ran out of ammo um and the soldiers fought their way inside and they were shocked to see that the building was full of women volunteers who've been holding them off for hours wow at first they thought the women i wonder how they felt i hope bad yeah because they were like not not because women don't make good soldiers but because like when they came in they thought they're like oh you must being held captive by the rebels they're like no we are the rebels you fucking assholes that's fucking awesome meanwhile a guy named sean houston and about 20 volunteers were held up inside kingsbridge station um holding

off 400 soldiers with little more than rifles and some handmade bombs. They weren't really hand grenades. He just made them. They fought the soldiers for hours at an incredibly close range, sometimes as close as 20 feet. Holy shit.

They were so close that the British kept tossing grenades in and the Irish picked them up and chucked them back. And they were exchanging insults the whole time. Eventually, they ran out of ammunition and they were forced to

surrender. And Houston's position would be the first of the Irish positions to just surrender. And the third day of the rising four full battalions of the Sherwood Foresters were marching to the city. These had just been conscripted to fight in World War I

and had been in uniform for as little as eight weeks. There's actually some people who literally thought they were in France. Really? Some of the soldiers thought they were walking into France. Because all they know is they got on a boat, they got off a boat, they got off a boat, and people were shooting at them. Must be in World War I.

Yeah. Now, main problem with that is training at the time did not actually consist of marksmanship. So most of them had never fired their rifles. I think we talked about this in what episode? The Hague? Yeah, with the new army. Yeah, this is the era of the new army. talked about this in what episode? The Hague? Yeah. With the new army.

Yeah. This is the era of the new army. Okay. Where they had basically fucking broomsticks. Kind of.

Yeah. For training. They had been trained on how to assault trenches and stuff like that. Pretty much it. Like they weren't

trained in flanking maneuvers. Like pretty much bayonet charges at trenches. Solid. Now, there is parts of Ireland, like like for instance the uh the irish rising not super popular among ireland in general so like when they hit

when they hit the shore and we're walking people are like waving giving them cigarettes give them high fives whatever and then they just like start getting shot at out of nowhere um so they their main point that they were supposed to take was across the mount street bridge and they got about 300 meters from that point that's when volunteers opened fire on them soldiers immediately got pinned down and because uh they were mobilized so quickly had no support weapons with them they had no machine guns they didn't even have hand grenades um instead of pulling back off the bridge or attempting to move around and flank the volunteers, there's only about 15 to 20 volunteers shooting at them.

Remember, four battalions of soldiers. So instead of doing anything, the officers unsheathed their swords, stood up, and ordered a bayonet charge across the bridge even though they're facing like i said 20 at most volunteers the forces lost 250 men on the bridge so and the volunteers only abandoned their position because another volunteer position nearby refused to reinforce them and they run out of ammo. They lost only four people.

Fuck. The British took nine hours to advance 300 yards. Oh, God. As British soldiers got closer and closer to the four courts area, they ran to more and more volunteer positions. Uh, the British soldiers, many of whom had just been fighting in mainland Europe in the trenches across no man's land,

uh, they were totally unprepared for house to house fighting with Irish guerrillas. The British continuously attempted bayonet charges through city streets, only to be shot down by volunteers, hidden windows, rooftops, and behind chimneys. the British. Now now if you listen to the show uh long enough um or you know enough about you know history of conflict guerrilla war irregular war

against a uniformed force eventually tends to drive the uniformed force nuts. They start to get enraged. They forget what they were trained. They forget morals and ethics. British started doing that too. They started executing people. One Irish pacifist came up and said, Hey, I'm in this house.

I got people with me. We're not fighting you. Just please leave us alone. Execute on the spot. Strangely enough, the British guy who ordered the execution of the Irish pacifist found insane in court. Really? Whoops. Yeah.

Turns out the British just had a crazy guy. Who would have thought? the British just had a crazy guy. Who would have thought? And also the British began slapping makeshift armored trucks together in order to protect them from the withering rifle fire. Pulling some like Mad Max shit out of their ass to creep their way down the streets.

Now remember, these are trucks from 1916 bogged down with bits of metal and wood just bolted onto the side. Just going at a crawling pace. Rolling down the street at the speed of like a creeping fart. So at this point did any recruitment

for the Irish go up? So during the rising a lot of the people that stayed home showed up to fight. Like when that listened to McNeil's order to stay at home like oh fuck there's a revolution outside. gotta go join it yeah that's pretty much it

also there's parts of this parts of the rising leadership realize if we want to be seen and more importantly internationally recognized as an independent nation during this era we need to prove

that we are Irish fighting for Ireland as an independent nation during this era, we need to prove that, um, we are Irish fighting for Ireland. Like, um, there's a picture in the book, uh, that I was sent that has like all these, uh,

Irish volunteers holding rifles under a giant sign that says, um, we don't fight for the Kaiser and shit like that. Didn't really do a lot of good pointed out, you know, it's good. Yeah. You it out. You know, it's good. Yeah. You put it out there.

Yeah. So even after building these armored vehicles and shit, advancing down the road for the British was pretty much a death trap. And that wasn't just for the British. It was for virtually anybody. The streets kind of just turned into no man's land. Yeah.

Now this whole city going crazy with looting at the same time. So like men, women, and children just getting gunned down and cold blown in the streets if they run out in front of the wrong position. Both sides are guilty of that part. And the British decided to try to get through going, instead of going across the street, they'd just blow a hole in an adjoining building

and then just crawl through it so they didn't have to advance on the street. Smart. Like I said, this whole thing started just wearing on the British. They couldn't advance more than 20 feet at a time, so they started taking on the Irish. At one point, soldiers from the South Staffordshire Regiment

kicked down a door and then bayoneted 15 people they found inside. Nobody inside was armed. That's fucked. Unfortunately for the volunteers headquarters, the constant British shelling had set one hell of a fire inside the city that eventually spread to the post office. They had to blow a hole in one of the walls and escape to set up headquarters in 16th Moore Street, where they planned a breakout into the Irish countryside. Remember, this is all just happening in Dublin. This isn't like Ireland-wide.

Right. But then finally, Pierce accepted that everything was lost. Pierce issued an order to all volunteers to surrender, stating, In order to prevent further slaughter of Dublin citizens, and in hope of saving the lives of our followers now surrounded and hopelessly outnumbered, the members of the provisional government present at headquarters have agreed on unconditional surrender, and the commandments of the various districts of the city and county will order their commands to lie

down arms. And all about 500 people have been killed in a week of fighting. More than 2,600 have been wounded, mostly civilians, from the British shelling. All of the 16 cops and 22 of the British soldiers

that were killed in the fighting were Irishmen themselves. While the fighting was over, the killing was not. The British government arrested 4,000 people in response to the Easter Rising. 90 people would end up being sentenced to hang

or being shot, including all seven of the men who signed the Proclamation of the Republic. And that's when our boy Conley, the commander of the Irish Citizens Army, our favorite guy in the entire story, who had been badly wounded while fighting at the post office, he took a bullet to the ankle,

which bounced awkwardly up into his leg and fucked him up real bad. Oh, fuck. And he was on the verge of death. Uh, when his sentence came down, a doctor actually told the court that the man only had a day or two left to live. And he was almost dead to the world. He couldn't walk. He couldn't sit up,

shit like that. Right. Sentenced to death. Anyway, he couldn't stand for the firing squad. So he was carried out to the execution ground, tied to a chair, and then shot. The Maxis

executions of the leaders of the Rising led to a public outcry in Ireland, even though most of the Irish population did not support them during the Rising itself. Since they couldn't kill everyone they wanted to, the British simply tossed the rest in the concentration camps.

The concentration camp was actually in Wales. Really? Yeah. These camps would end up spawning the next generation of Irish revolutionaries, earning the camp itself the University of Revolution. After crushing the Easter Rising... Like X-Men.

Yeah, but no. Extraordinary Irishmen. The League of Extraordinary Irishmen. like x-men yeah but no extraordinary irishman the league of extraordinary irishman the british thought that ireland had learned its lesson and would no longer be a problem for them and then they did introduce conscription into ireland this led shin fein riding a wave of public support and office, Declaration of Independence, and finally the Irish War of Independence and later Irish Civil War. Then the Irish Free State and the Republic of Ireland. Now Northern Ireland, the Republic of Ireland, and the Troubles. So a lot of modern Ireland and a lot of modern Irish problems can be led back to the British fucking themselves over and fucking the Irish over at the beginning of World War I. And that is the Easter Rising.

Now, I'm really happy we covered covered this honestly i enjoyed it i i personally really love irish history um i think it is one troubling how comfortable everybody seems to be with it um now i guess i should i guess i should go on record that no i do not support republican or unionist terrorism in northern ireland but when you look at uh you know like i did like i'm i'm not irish i have no no Irish blood in my system. I'm more than certain that you're in the same boat as I do. I've never been to Ireland. I only know Irish people through the internet from the outsiders looking in. And when you, especially like myself, I have a European historyan history degree but um irish history is

very heavily glossed over um but when you look at it and you realize like holy shit like they just the the irish people are just some of the most victimized people in all western world yes um when it when it comes to like the non-native people of Northern America. But it continues to this day. I mean, there's still a partition in Ireland. There's still people getting fucked up over British decisions in Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland. It led through the Troubles, and it led through death squads

and terrorist bombings and all sorts of other horrible shit. And it's, it's always really interesting to me to be able to find something that like we kind of technically live through. Um, like it's our age, like this happened while we were alive and we can kind of go back in, in history and see like, Oh,

this is how that started. I'm not saying the, like the acrimony between the British and the Irish began on the rising, but like you can definitely chart, like you can really begin to connect the fucking dots. I'm not saying the acrimony between the British and the Irish began on the rising, but you can definitely chart. You can really begin to connect the fucking dots when concentration camps start popping up. It's really interesting. When Irish veterans returned from World War I,

and they happened to be from the wrong neck of town, and they were Catholic, or they maybe had some kind of connection to a volunteer unit. Um, they got thrown in concentration camps too. Um, so like it's something that I don't know. I really felt like I really fell in love with Irish history during the

research for this. And that's, that's why like I absolutely want to do a series on the troubles, but I feel like it's almost impossible to do. I don't know. We'll see. I want to say the first time I ever heard of the IRA or any type of Irish history,

again, I'm going to take it back to the shirt that I guess I'm wearing where it says Captain Cosplay. Yeah. That's where it goes back to. Did you have IRA cosplayers? Yes. That's a thing? It is definitely a thing.

You know, I have known you for years, and we've been doing the show for almost a year, and these things shouldn't surprise me anymore. They shouldn't, but they do. But I'm sitting here surprised. And I ended up talking to one of the dudes because I was really confused. I was like, so basically, long story short,

this guy was basically naming off all the history things because we had this little event called Marching Through History. And I was on the World War II side of the history thing. But they had all the way back to, they had fucking legionnaires there and all this other shit but then the ira came up and i was like interesting record scratch i bet you're wondering how i ended up here there's dudes with bolt actions all the way on the end over here and shitty looking shit and then shit going all the way up to like how like people

dressed not too long ago like some dude in jeans carrying an Armalite saying, fuck the British. What's going on here? So I asked him about it. He's like, oh, yeah, most of the guys here, we all have Irish in our blood. And so we're here to represent the IRA in history. I was like, OK, I want to look into this. It's one of those things that's really hard to say because I'll say up and down I completely support

Irish Union and independent Ireland. I feel like the partition is illegal. But I'm not going to go as far as to say I support the fucking provisional Ireland.

So that's the thing. The Irish Republican Army was a faction that fought during the War of Independence, the Irish Civil War. Very different than the Irish Republican Army who's blowing up cafes in the 80s. Huge difference. So that's our series for Easter. Thank you for tuning in. And because we did it last episode,

I have to point out that if you support our show, obviously we'll always love your donations. Thank you so much for keeping this show afloat and helping us get research materials and stuff like that. But if you're going to support

us this week, if you're going to donate to Patreon. I didn't say this the last episode, but our Patreon is split into three ways. Our contribution to our Patreon, we just

pay our SoundCloud bills, we pay our producer, we pay for books and the new mics and everything else um but for this month we're going to donate everything minus our our bills to this charity which is called the uh dogs for the disabled dot ie um they train service dogs for children, uh, with medical conditions that require service dogs. Um, they're, they get no money from the Irish government.

Um, all their money goes in taking care of these dogs and it's awesome. Obviously we're dog people. We have podcast dogs. Um, also I understand how important these are for kids with seizures and diabetic issues and whatever other disability that you need a dog for. It doesn't matter. They do a great service. And if you're going to support us, support them instead. They deserve your money way more than we do. A good friend of ours who sent us shit for weeks now, months now, probably close to a fucking year now. He's

doing a hike across Iceland to raise money. You can follow all his journeys at hashtag walkforthedogs. Four is the number four. We're wearing shirts right now. We're giving money to him. We highly suggest

you do the same. Captain Cosplay approves. Yeah. Lieutenant Cosplay. Not We highly, at least just do the same. Captain cosplay approves. Yeah. Yeah. Um, you know, cause Lieutenant cosplay, not nearly as cool. Captain though.

Yeah. We still got promoted. That's nice. That's two C's. Sergeant cosplay just sounds lame. Uh, uh, so thank you for tuning in for our bonus,

uh, Easter special. Cause the two parter. Yeah. Um, you can follow us on Twitter lines underscore by, you know where to find us. Um,

thank you so much for supporting the show and we'll see you next book. Yeah. Later.