Padraic Pearse

Description

PADRAIC PEARSE. IRISH REVOLUTIONARY. EXECUTED 1916.

This is a brand new artwork and is part of a larger collection of Irish revolutionaries.

PADRAIC (PÁDRAIG) PEARSE was born in Dublin, Ireland, and was the author, along with Socialist leader James Connolly, of the Irish Proclamation of Independence.

Early on Easter Monday, April 24th, 1916 Padraic Pearse read aloud the Proclamation of the Republic in front of the rebellion headquarters, the GPO (General Post Office) on O’Connell Street in the centre of Dublin. The history of Ireland would never be the same again.

One of the founder members of the Irish Volunteers Pearse led the seizure of the General Post Office in Dublin City Center in 1916 by the volunteers and was Commander in Chief of the Irish revolutionary forces who fought the vastly superior British Army to a standstill.
Pearse surrendered to prevent greater civilian losses and was executed by British firing squad on May 3, 1916, and buried in quicklime.
For good measure, the British also executed his younger brother Willie Pearse.

A SHORT HISTORY OF THE EASTER RISING:
In 1916, in a rebellion known as the Easter Rising, a small group of uniformed and organized but poorly armed Irish patriots took on the might of the British Empire and sought to end 800 years of subjugation and oppression.
Although outnumbered, for twelve extraordinary days in May 1916, they fought the British army to a standstill until finally forced to surrender as prisoners of war.
Most were promptly executed without mercy and with their executions the Irish people, who initially had rejected them as hopeless dreamers and troublemakers, were so outraged by these brutal murders that they rose in huge numbers against the British and eventually succeeded, after years of armed struggle and massive help from the Irish diaspora in America, in ejecting the British and declaring independence.