The O'Rahilly

Although commemorated by Yeats’s poem, Michael O’Rahilly is one of the forgotten leaders of the 1916 Rising — the first leader to die, the only one killed in action. This is his story written by his son, beginning in Ballylongford, County Kerry. O’Rahilly was educated at Clongowes, married a Philadelphia heiress, and had a brief career as a country gentleman and JP. O’Rahilly spent several years in the USA, returning in 1909 to Dublin, writing for the Sinn Féin press and joining the Gaelic Leagu