The 13th Apostle: A Novel of a Dublin Family, Michael Collins, and the Irish Uprising (4 page)

5

E
OIN
K
AVANAGH’S
D
IARY
W
EDNESDAY
, A
PRIL
26, 1916

General Post Office
Sackville Street
Dublin, Ireland

W
hat a day! My wound is bandaged and I have dry clothes on at last. Safe—if you can call it that—in the GPO. It looks like a bloody disaster here. Nothing but wounded men and broken glass. It was safer over at Jacob’s
.

After we took Jacob’s, we were very busy the first few hours. Commandant MacDonagh and Major MacBride had us fill up the windows with sacks of flour to guard against snipers. We were covered in flour, swiftly moving white ghosts on a mission. “Keep your bloody head down, boy,” MacBride warned me with a wink, “and welcome to the fight!” We also unwound the fire hoses just in case of fire. Most of our rifles were aimed at the Ship Street army barracks near the Castle. After we had our fill of biscuits, it got quite dull. We knew the British army was out there, but they didn’t make a rush to take us. The only excitement was caused by Vinny Byrne, who was sent out on patrol and had a ruckus with the fine citizens of the Blackpitts. Apparently they don’t care if Ireland is free or not. Anyway, some eejit tried to take Vinny’s gun away from him, and someone was shot—and it wasn’t Vincent Byrne.

Tuesday the skies were dark, and it was pouring bucket after bucket without any sign of letting up. It was like the heavens were weeping for poor old Ireland. We ate more crackers and patrolled the factory. We’d filled up every available vessel with water in case the city water supply was interrupted or tampered with by the British. The only grousing from the men is because we’re not allowed to smoke for some reason. Still, some go off and hide for a quick puff.

Jacob’s must be a nice place to work, clean and not too many mice around. They have an employees’ canteen, and there is plenty of tay for everyone. Their bathrooms are cleaner than anything we have at the Piles. You could eat your dinner off the floors here. They are even cleaner than the toilets under Tommy Moore’s arse in Westmoreland Street. And unlike the public toilets on the quays, I don’t have to watch some wrinkled old priest waving his willie at me.

During the night, Commandant MacDonagh had a few of us lads brave the elements to place empty biscuit tin boxes outside the factory as noise booby-traps so that we would know if the British were sneaking up on us. A cunning stunt on the commandant’s part, I think. He also explained to us the importance of Jacob’s in the fight. He said that we now controlled Dublin because we held the GPO, the Four Courts, Stephen’s Green, and the South Dublin Union. The British army would probably land at Kingstown and march on Dublin. We at Jacob’s were in a position to cut them off, depending on where they crossed the Grand Canal. Commandant de Valera, he said, would probably have first shot at them at Boland’s Mills. We could also block any advance by the British, MacDonagh explained, from Portobello Barracks just to our south and Richmond Barracks to the west. We were right in the middle of it all. Commandant MacDonagh is a good egg, and it’s surprising to me that such a quiet, gentle man like him would sign such a bloodthirsty proclamation. But the British war with their first cousins, the Germans, is beginning to grate on the Irish. Even gentle folk are threatening sedition.

But revolution is boring! We sat around all day—as the British surely did—waiting for the rain to let up. I thought I would die just sitting around and eating more crackers. Finally Commandant MacDonagh asked for a volunteer to go to the GPO, because the phones are dead. I stuck up my hand and told him I was his man. The commandant was doubtful because of my age, but I insisted I knew Dublin City and this neighborhood in particular better than any man in Jacob’s that evening. Sure, wasn’t I born just blocks away in Camden Row, off Wexford Street?

The commandant asked me what my plan was, and I told him that I doubted there would be many men out on either side this terrible night. I would head for the River Liffey and see if I could get over one of the bridges and make my way to the GPO. I told him my youth was an advantage—how could the British think that this innocent boy was with the rebels? My face was fresh and eager, and MacDonagh, thoughtfully scratching his curly hair, finally agreed, adding, “Just be careful, son.” I promised him I would.

Commandant MacDonagh wrote out a note on Jacob’s stationery and sealed this in an envelope. “Take this to Commander-in-Chief Pearse.”

I exited on Peter Row and went down the side streets. I actually went by my mother’s house, and our paraffin lamp was alight. I was tempted to go in and tell them that I was alright, but I couldn’t take the chance. I had that letter to Commander-in-Chief Pearse, and I had to get it through. I couldn’t take the chance that Mammy and Da might try and stop me. And as luck would have it, when I got to the Ha’penny Bridge, there wasn’t a sinner in sight, not even the toll man. I ran up the steps and started to make my way across when there was a terrible burning in my lower back that dropped me to the footpath of the bridge. It took me a minute to realize I had been shot in the high hole of me arse. I didn’t know where the shot came from, but there was noise from up Sackville Street way. I crawled the rest of the way over the bridge as bullets hit the metal bridge above me. I kept crawling down the steps on the north side and jumped up with a fright to get past the old Woolen Mills and up Liffey Street. There wasn’t a soul to be found on the streets, and I dashed, my arse dripping blood, to Henry Street and banged on the first door I came to in the GPO. No one answered at first, and the looming presence of Lord Nelson atop his pillar staring down at me began to frighten the shite out of me. Finally the door opened a squeak, and I told your man that I had a communiqué from Commandant MacDonagh for C-in-C Pearse.

After a quick look up and down, he saw that I was no threat to the revolution. They let me in and brought me to a young officer named Collins. I handed over the letter to Captain Collins, and, after that, I felt faint. The next thing I knew I hit the deck in front of Collins, out for the count.

6

C
ollins picked the boy up and called out for Róisín O’Mahony. She was a nurse and a member of the
Cumann na mBan
, the women’s auxiliary of the Irish Volunteers, and she was all business: “Where’s he hit?”

“Looks like his back,” said Collins, the boy’s blood all over the arms of his impeccable uniform.

O’Mahony rolled the boy over and felt his back from the shoulders down. No blood. She was puzzled. “Help me with his pants,” she said to Collins.

“Yes, Countess O’Mahonyevicz,” said a mocking Collins, knowing that Róisín was a fervent admirer and follower of the real Countess Markievicz.

“Come on, ya big git,” shot back O’Mahony. “Come on, big fella, for once show you have a set of brains.” Collins first instinct was to retort, but one look at the determined O’Mahony quickly put that thought out of his mind. The nurse wondered why she had to put up with such testosterone-fueled eejits. She looked at the gangly twenty-five-year-old Collins and figured his actions were dictated by his bollocks, not his brains. By right, she should have been with Markievicz over in Stephen’s Green, but she was urgently needed at the GPO. Collins undid Eoin’s belt, and O’Mahony pulled the britches down, displaying Eoin’s long-johns. She unbuttoned the arse trapdoor and exposed the wound in the right buttock. “He’s lucky,” she said. “A clean flesh wound. Just nicked him. All the blood makes it look worse than it is.”

Eoin opened his eyes and looked at Collins and then at O’Mahony, who was swabbing his arse with disinfectant. “Am I dying?” he asked, the sting of the medication bringing him further into consciousness.

“You’ll live to be a hundred,” said Collins.

“I gave me only arse for Ireland,” said Eoin, which forced both Collins and O’Mahony to smile in rare unison.

“What’s going on?” said Commander-in-Chief Padraig Pearse. He was surveying Eoin’s bare butt with interest, perfectly framed by the longjohns’ trapdoor. But it was never easy to tell what direction Pearse was actually looking in because of that cast eye. The right one was straight on, but the other was heading off in the direction of Belfast.

“Messenger from Jacob’s,” said Collins, leading Pearse away from the boy. “He has a dispatch from Commandant MacDonagh for you.”

Collins handed him the blood-smudged envelope, and Pearse opened it and read aloud. “‘All quiet on Bishop’s Street. Phones are dead. Rain has quenched the British. Jacob’s well cracked. The men are ready to fight. MacDonagh’s doing his best to help de Valera over at Boland’s Mills.’” Collins nodded, and Pearse went back to the command center, which was in the front of the building where they sold stamps.

O’Mahony was bandaging Eoin’s aching, stinging behind. “That’s one penny-ha’penny bottom you have there,” said Nurse O’Mahony. By now Eoin was wide awake and covering up his privates, as his mother called them. O’Mahony smiled at his modesty, and Eoin felt his willie getting hard.

“Yeah,” said Collins to O’Mahony, “he has an arse on him just like you—that of a skinny thirteen-year-old boy.”

“I’ll be fifteen in October,” corrected Eoin.

“Get away from me,” shouted O’Mahony to Collins, her voice rising. “You’re nothing but a Cork culchie, a ruffian, a bogman, and a Nighttown guttersnipe.”

Eoin looked around at O’Mahony and saw that she was beet-faced. Beet-faced but beautiful, with long brown hair, exquisite eyes, and a smile stolen from the Irish Madonna. He didn’t mind this beauty patting him on his bare arse at all. In fact, he felt that Collins somehow envied the attention his bottom was receiving from O’Mahony.

“You alright, boy?” asked Collins.

“My name is Eoin Kavanagh.”

“Are you alright, Eoin?”

“I’m fine.” He paused a second before adding, “I hope you two will make up.”

“Make up!” hissed O’Mahony. Collins didn’t say a word, just turned on his heel and headed back to the front of the GPO. He knew he had met his match. “Fookin’ men,” said O’Mahony.

“How old are you?” asked Eoin.

Róisín was taken aback by the freshness of the question. “Too old for you, sonny boy.”

Eoin was quiet for a second. “We’ll see,” he said with enough cheek to match his patriotic arse.

7

E
OIN’S
D
IARY
F
RIDAY
, A
PRIL
28, 1916

General Post Office
Sackville Street
Dublin, Ireland

M
e arse is sore, but I’m recovering. Róisín says I’ll live, and she’s awful busy with all the wounded, including Commandant-General Connolly, who has a severe leg injury. Connolly is in terrible pain from being hit in the ankle by a shell. Besides the rest of the wounded, Commandant-General Plunkett is very sick. By right, he should be in hospital. They say he has consumption of the neck glands. I wonder if his disease is related to me Ma’s. Captain Collins seldom leaves his side
.

Collins has put Jack Lemass in charge of me. Jack’s a couple of years older than I am and is from Capel Street. Jack was supposed to be with Commandant de Valera over at Boland’s Mills, but with all the disarray caused by the countermanding of maneuver orders, it looks like the Volunteers are going to the nearest location they can get to. Collins has told me to stay out of the way and to keep my head down. He ordered Jack to go up to the roof and bring down the tricolour. I have a feeling we are coming to the end. As soon as Collins left, Jack asked if I was well enough to help him.

We got up to the roof, and, from the parapet, the scene in Sackville Street shocked me. Total destruction on the east side of the street. Right opposite the GPO, at the entrance to North Earl Street, there was a burnt-out tram. I counted at least two dead horses. The Dublin Bread Company building, the tallest on the thoroughfare, was totally gutted. Commander-in-Chief Pearse had sent men out earlier in the week to stop the looting. The women from the neighborhood had their way with Clery’s. The poor children from Tyrone Street and Greg Lane enjoyed Christmas in April as they did their mischief in Graham Lemon’s Sweetshop. The wreckage is a lot worse than I ever imagined. I had a feeling someone was looking at me, and, as I looked up, I realized it was Lord Nelson atop his pillar, just as he had peered down at me when I first gained access to the GPO with my letter for Pearse. Mammy once took the first three boys—me, Charlie, and Frank—to the top, and it was like we were on top of the world, looking down on the Dublin Mountains. Why a British admiral is in the middle of an Irish street is beyond me. I look down on Dan O’Connell’s statue at the foot of the Liffey and see Charles Stewart Parnell’s monument at the Rotunda end of Sackville Street. Nelson’s Pillar is an insult to these two great Irishmen.

I have yet to meet an Irishman who gives a shite about Trafalgar. Just another battle in endless English wars. Maybe someday, someone will blast the admiral’s stone arse into the sky, the closest the adulterant hoor will ever get to heaven. As Jack and I got close to the flagpole, we had to hit the deck because of the sniper fire. I think it’s coming from the D’Olier and Westmoreland Streets area. Maybe from the top of Trinity College. It was hard to say with all the smoke and soot in the air. “Fook this,” said Jack, and we left the poor tricolour to fend for itself.

All the lads have been very kind to me. One of the Volunteers, Arthur Shields, came over and asked if there was anything he could do for me. He told me he was an actor over at the Abbey Theatre. He’s another of the misdirected. He told me that when he heard the rebellion was on again, he went to the Abbey to get his rifle, which he had hidden under the stage, and then joined Connolly around the corner at Liberty Hall. That’s how he found the GPO.

Arthur is about six or seven years older than I am. He asked me where I was from, and I told him I was born on Camden Row. He said we were from the same neighborhood because he was born in Portobello, down by Harrington Street. He asked about my people, and I told him my mother’s people, the Conways, were from Temple Lane. It’s turning out to be a small world, because Arthur said he lived on the next block, Crow Street, as a child. I feel a little bit more comfortable now, having a neighbor for company in the GPO.

Arthur was chatting with me when the Angelus bells rang about the city, revolution not stopping devotion. I blessed myself, but some of the Volunteers dropped to their knees, starting banging their craws, hugging their rosaries, and began reciting: “The angel of the Lord announced unto Mary.” Looking around, Shields said: “I wonder if I’m the only Church of Ireland man in the GPO this week?” Then be added with a wink and an actor’s flair: “Pray for us, O Holy Mother of God!”

We were joined by a comrade of Arthur’s. “You may be the only Church of Ireland man here, Arthur,” he interrupted, “but I know I’m the only Jew.”

Arthur then introduced me to Abraham Weeks, just over from London. “My God,” I said, “what are you doing in Dublin?”

“I’m avoiding conscription,” he said defiantly. “I will fight for the working man, but not for the corrupt bourgeois.” I had no idea what he was talking about.

“He’s devoted to Jim Connelly” Arthur helpfully added. “Abraham is a dedicated trade unionist.”

“That’s a unionist I can deal with!” I said, getting a laugh out of the two of them.

The men were still working on the Angelus when Captain Collins came by. “Jaysus,” he said dismissively as he observed the kneeling men. “Will these people ever learn?”

Seán MacDiarmada, one of the big shots who signed the Proclamation, has also come over to say hello. He is from the North and is strikingly handsome. He has a stiff leg and walks with a cane. I asked him if he was wounded. He smiled and said no, that he had a bout of what he called poliomyelitis a few years ago. It seems to me that there are more unpronounceable diseases to fight in Dublin then there are British soldiers. It looks like we’re in an awful fix.

The shelling has finally stopped. The men are running around with buckets and pots of water, trying to put out fires. With all the fires we’re roastin’ in inside the GPO, it can’t be much hotter than this in hell. They say there is a gunboat on the Liffey, and that’s where the shells are coming from. All in all, our spirits remain high. There’s been plenty of grub for us all. Some of the
Cumann na mBan
women are manning a makeshift kitchen, and there is enough commandeered bread and butter, spuds, and meat to go around. I wonder how long we can hold out. I’m sure the British aren’t finished with their shelling yet.

Yesterday I was bored, so I quietly went to the front of the GPO to see what the bosses were doing. It was quite remarkable. Several of them—Pearse, old Tom Clark, the newsagent from Parnell Street, MacDiarmada, even Collins—were sitting where the postal tellers usually sit. I didn’t tell anyone, but those teller cages, with the bars in front of them, did not seem to foretell a bright future for them—or for myself either, now that I think of it.

I can’t stop thinking of me Mammy. I hope I haven’t broken her heart, and I hope I don’t get sent to prison, because the strain just might kill her, with the delicate condition she’s in. But I didn’t get a lot of time to dwell on Mammy. Jack Lemass came over to me and said, “We’re off.”

“To where?” I asked.

“To Moore Street,” said Jack, without fear. “We’re going to make a break for it.” Jack must have been thinking of the Moore Street fishmongers when he added: “Alive, alive Oh!”

Alive, alive Oh
, I thought. At least for the present.