Easter Uprising

  • the supreme council of the Irish Republican Brotherhood had planned a rebellion for 1916 - Easter Sunday April 23

  • the ostensible leader of the Irish Volunteers - John MacNeil - was kept in the dark about the uprising

  • the leader sent to Germany to purchase arms and munitions and was arrested in County Kerry after he had been brought back by a German U-Boat on April 21st

  • MacNeil cancelled the mobilization orders for his volunteers, thus leaving only 2,000 out of the small force available

  • on Easter Sunday the general post office and other parts of Dublin were seized

  • for a week Dublin was paralyzed by street fighting until military bombardment and fires forced the leader Patrick Pearse and others to surrender

  • the leaders of the uprising - including John MacBryde - were executed for treason



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