The Easter Rising 1916 - Molly's Diary (Hands-on History)

by Patricia Murphy

  “Hold fire! Ambulance!” several voices rang out.

  But the ambulance crew was taking no chances and the driver parked broadside across the street. A woman stretcher-bearer jumped out of the back and I crawled on my hands and knees across the cobblestones to join her. Jane shouted out at them to head to Merrion Square and the driver said that was a good move.

  We wriggled across the street, pulling the stretcher after us. A random shot pinged off the metal exterior and ricocheted round, raising brick dust, just as we closed the ambulance doors behind us.

  “I bet it’s worst than the Western Front,” said the woman, laughing with relief as we settled Anto into the rear of the ambulance. Her hair was cut in a bob.

  Anto was now breathing raggedly, pale as the dawn beneath his freckles.

  “Come on, Anto,” I tried to rally him. “We can’t afford to lose our future national bard.”

  He opened his eyes briefly and I thought I saw the ghost of a smile.

  As we drove by O’Connell Bridge, I peeked out the lookout slit and saw fireworks erupt and light up the sky. A girl strutted in a sable fur coat with a top hat on her head, while two snipers shot at each other from the roof of the corner buildings. And beside me Anto fought for his life.

  7 a.m. Wednesday 26th April.

  Merrion Field Hospital.

  It was a nerve-racking drive through the south of the city to the Merrion Field hospital last night. Much of the south of the city, we learned, had been plunged into darkness by the rebels dismantling the Gasworks.

  It was a mercy Dr Ella was still there when we arrived. Anto was taken straight away into a back room. She surveyed the wound to his foot. Luckily the hospital had some electric light, on account of being a supply depot. By now, many places in the city had none.

  “By gosh, Molly, you have not only saved that boy’s life but maybe also his limb.” She signalled to the nurse to give him chloroform. “The site around the bullet wound looks clean. But, alas, he will lose his big toe.” She pointed to the injured toe, which looked badly infected.

  “Is it gangrene?”I asked.

  “That usually takes about twenty-four hours, after the cells begin to die. Wet gangrene can then spread very quickly. I don’t think it’s that. But I don’t like the look of that infection. It might be gas gangrene that spreads very rapidly. But we don’t have time to wait for a second opinion.” She felt his pulse. “He is cold and clammy and his pulse is rapid and weak. If we do not remove the toe, it will infect his whole leg and go into his bloodstream. We can’t take the risk. And the bone is so badly shattered it is unlikely to heal.”

  She allowed me to assist her during the procedure. I held Anto’s hand and urged him to be brave, as much for my sake as for his.

  She disinfected the tweezers and then removed the bullet in one swift movement. Then she sawed through the bone of his big toe quickly with a circular saw just above where the big toe joined the foot. It was done in the blink of an eye, the sound worse than the sight. Mercifully there was little bleeding and enough of a flap of skin to cover over.

  “Now, young man, you will have to go in goal and avoid taking penalties. But you will regain most of your mobility and your leg will develop new muscles to compensate.”

  Even though Anto was barely conscious, I valued her good humour under the most trying circumstances.

  She allowed me to hold the bottle of antiseptic solution while she cleaned the wound. She placed a dressing over the middle of the foot from where the bullet was removed. Then she threaded a needle to sew back over the flap of skin of the missing big toe. No sooner had she begun threading than a nurse ran in.

  “Dr Ella, quick! A child has come in with a gunshot wound!”

  Dr Ella handed me the needle. “Molly, after sewing, you can bandage his foot. We’ll put a dry dressing and a stocking over the toe. And a splint on his leg to stop him moving around. We want complete immobility to help him heal. I’ll get the nurse to put your name on the charge sheet at the front door. I’m trying to keep track of our volunteers coming in and out.”

  My hands shook but I breathed slowly to calm my nerves for Anto’s sake. Dr Ella’s confidence in me gave me the courage to finish the job. All the time, even under anesthetic, Anto held onto the belt. Even Miss Nugent would have been surprised at my deft sewing under the circumstances. I applied the dry dressing treated with iodine over his toe. A nurse glanced at my efforts and seemed satisfied. Then she bandaged the whole foot and made a simple splint from his heel to his knee using two slide rules and bandages.

  I anxiously watched his breathing as he slept. Despite my best efforts to keep awake, I dozed beside him for a few hours, my eyelids feeling like they were stones.

  As dawn broke, I heard my patient stirring.

  “Where am I? Am I dead?” he murmured.

  “Oh Anto!” I cried, my tears splashing onto his face.

  “I had a dream you were an angel,” he said.

  I brought him some water and he winced when he saw his bandaged foot.

  “You have just lost your big toe,” I said.

  “Sure what do I need that for? I could never score goals anyway.” His laugh was a whisper.

  “You’d better stick to poetry,” I said. “You know, your poem really was a bit good.”

  He grinned with pleasure, and I was relieved to see the old cocky Anto back again.

  “Where’s Jack? Did he drag me to the yard?” he said. “Why I am holding the Sam Browne?”

  I bit my lip to hold back the tears and showed him my brother’s initials: JFO’D.

  But he shook his head.

  “No, that’s Gerald Keogh’s. He won it at cards on your roof. Saturday night – just before you warned us your mother was coming.”

  Was it possible? I felt terrible for wishing it were Gerald and not Jack.

  I took his hand and looked intently into his eyes.

  “But, Anto, I saw the body just now in Trinity College.”

  “No, no. Jack wanted to hang onto the belt as long as possible and promised to give it to Gerald when the scrap started,” he murmured. “We were teasing Gerald about it as we marched, saying he’d never get his hands on it. But Jack had to give it to him. It was Gerald wore the belt. I saw him put it on meself.”

  I jumped up, electrified. Could it be true? I remembered the image that I had tried to suppress in my mind. The handsome waxen face covered in blood. But so swollen, battered and bruised it was hard to make out the features. The matted hair – I had only glimpsed it from the door – it was so drenched in blood, in truth it was impossible to tell the original colour in the dim light. I looked into Anto’s eyes.

  “Did you see Jack?” I searched his face.

  “He had orders to speak to Connolly in person. He’s lost a few lives . . . slipped on Jacob’s Tower . . . Check my jacket pocket . . .”

  But he began to groan again. The nurse came in and settled him on his pillow.

  “Let him rest,” she said.

  He closed his eyes in sleep. I found the tin of humbugs I’d given him in his pocket – dented with a bullet mark. This may have saved his life. And then in the left pocket – a small tin soldier painted green! I felt the tiny bird of hope take wing.

  Jack is still alive! It’s not certain. But there is a chance.

  I felt light-headed. I blew my nose and wept. Poor George! My hope was his parents’ nightmare. Another boy was dead. I could not blame Private McHugh. He is a soldier, shooting is his job. But what a wretched business is war! Between the two sides of life and death, only a breath.

  I will pick up Jack’s trail again but it’s eight o’clock in the morning now and the most awful sounds are rending the air.

  & & &

  Later, Wednesday 25th April.

  Field Hospital Merrion Square.

  An ambulance brought some casualties from the side streets.

  “They’re shelling Liberty Hall,” the driver told us. “The gunboat Helga has co
me up the Liffey and they’re firing big guns from the opposite bank.”

  I raced up to the roof where there was a little balcony in front of a parapet. This was a new noise – a heavy dull pounding as if the very axis of the earth was tearing apart. That must have been the shells from the Helga.

  But there was also a weird sort of wave of sound, more like a whistle. An arc of fire crossed the Liffey, there was a delay, then an explosion. I watched it a few times and realized the flash was coming from Butt Bridge. It must have been the big guns they brought from Trinity. There was a rhythm to it. Flames leaped up from Liberty Hall as the sun rose in the sky.

  “I pray to God there is no one still in Liberty Hall,” I said, clutching the parapet.

  The woman stretcher-bearer from the night before joined me. She introduced herself as Linda Kearns.

  “I’ve heard Liberty Hall’s been evacuated and there’s nobody in there,” she said. “But nobody told the British. But sure they’d probably do it anyway to show who’s boss.”

  Then the ground began to shake. We clung to each other. Even from this distance we could hear the tinkling of a thousand glass panes after the shelling ceased.

  We looked across as the smoke cleared and saw that Liberty Hall was now a fireballed shell, like the face of a skull. Flames raged within. Only the façade was untouched. The roof began to cave in.

  “The sooner this is over the better,” she said. “There’s madness on both sides. They’ve arrested Sheehy Skeffington.”

  “What! But he’s trying to stop the looters. He’s the most innocent man in Dublin!” I cried.

  “He was detained last night at Portobello Barracks, as he was being followed by the usual bowsie crowd of Dubliners jeering at him and making fun of him.” Linda rubbed her eyes in tiredness. “Some officer by the name of Captain Bowen Colthurst took him hostage and was using him as a human shield.”

  She barely finished her sentence before she began to sway. She was so tired she was nearly falling asleep standing. I helped her down the stairs and took her to a room set aside for staff needing a rest.

  “One of the other stretcher-bearers is a very young fellow too. An Englishman, Neville.” She yawned. “I heard his father is head of the Post Office.”

  The son of Mr Hamilton Norway! I breathed a sigh of relief that he had not come from the Castle in the ambulance, as he might have told about Anto. But then I felt comforted that I wasn’t the only young one out and about.

  “Can you take over from me? You seem a girl with a head on her shoulders and there’s no one else,” she yawned.

  “Dr Ella told me to stay here,” I said. But she was already asleep

  Somewhere out there, Jack was still alive, I prayed God for it to be so. Martin had been told at the College of Surgeons that Jack had been sent to the GPO. The head porter at Trinity College said that the three dispatch riders had been shot at when they came pelting down from Stephen’s Green. Anto said Jack had orders to speak directly to Connolly. He was the next link in the chain.

  I went to look for Dr Ella to beg her to let me take over from Linda.

  In the ‘ward’ a couple of the nurses were hiding Anto’s knapsack and changed him from his Fianna uniform into an old pair of trousers and shirt. He was in a deep, deep sleep and oblivious to their efforts.

  “Just in case soldiers come to check. They’re already suspicious of us,” one of them said to me. “Look at him, sleeping like a baby.”

  “Dr Ella’s been called over to Baggot Street,” the other one said.

  They moved Anto’s mattress onto the floor.

  “We’re trying to stay away from the windows,” the first nurse explained. “There are so many random bullets flying about, you’re not even safe indoors. A few people have been shot in their own homes!”

  At that moment the ambulance driver came in, holding a charge sheet.

  “Molly O’Donovan? You’re down for the next ambulance shift.”

  I looked up, surprised. “But Dr Ella told me to stay here.”

  The driver, a young man in his twenties called PJ Cassidy, with a pleasant face and wiry build, showed me the sheet, and there indeed was my name. I couldn’t believe my luck.

  “You’re on the young side,” he said.

  I fished in my knapsack and pulled out my First Aid Certificate.

  He looked at my name and smiled. “That’s good enough for me.”

  “Are you going to the GPO?” I asked.

  “Among other places,” he smiled wryly.

  Dr Ella must have changed her mind and, delighted, I got ready straight away and didn’t need to be asked twice. I could ask Connolly at the GPO if he’d seen Jack. And I could ask around a lot more places if I was in an ambulance. Even in all the chaos and confusion, someone must have seen my brother.

  I was glad my mother had bought me a cream coat, as this was the colour the medics wore. It was getting rather dirty but was passably clean. So I donned a fresh Red Cross tabard, put on my Saint John’s Ambulance armband and, pulling my hat down low, went out to the vehicle, proud to be of service.

  PJ asked me if I’d crank up the engine as he sat into the drivers seat. I asked if it was okay to sit beside him in the front cabin, which was open at the side. He said I might be better in the back. Our vehicle was a proper armoured ambulance and had a Red Cross flag on the nose and a big red cross emblazoned on each side. I asked him how we were to get through the barricades and cordons and he held up a sheaf of documents that were permits from the British Military to be let through. I jumped in the back and we were off.

  Some time Wednesday night.

  Saint Patrick Dun’s Hospital, Grand Canal Street, South Dublin.

  The day has been a storm of shifting images, like a kaleidoscope. I have seen things no person, let alone a child, should see. But I pray to God to make me strong so I can take it.

  PJ drove the ambulance up Westland Row and across from Liberty Hall, to the terrible sound of cannon pounding. We saw the gunboat Helga – more of an armoured yacht. PJ enquired of the military guard at Butt Bridge opposite if there were any casualties.

  “It’s all been a waste of toime,” the soldier said in a Cockney accent – I recognized it from having lived in London. “There was just a caretaker and he ran like billyo!”

  So Linda had been right!

  At O’Connell Bridge we had to come to the aid of one of our Saint John’s Ambulance men, Henry Olds, who was attending the blind beggar who I often pass on the bridge, God help him. He must have just wandered out, unseeing.

  Mr Olds was shot in the shoulder but astonishingly continued to treat his patient. He managed to stagger with him to O’Connell’s statue. I dressed Mr Olds’ wound in the ambulance as best I could, as he talked me through the folding technique for bandaging his shoulder. But after my talk with Dr Ella, at least I was reassured that doing a little was doing a lot. The poor blind beggar was shot in the abdomen but I was relieved that Mr Olds had already treated him as best he could.

  At the Richmond Hospital, where we dropped our casualties, it was so dangerous that the mattresses were placed on the floor to avoid sniper fire from the housetops.

  “The shelling’s not as bad as the Western Front,” PJ, who had served with the Ambulance Brigade in Flanders, said as we unloaded supplies for the hospital. “But the machine gun and rifle fire is worse. It’s impossible to tell in these narrow streets where it’s coming from.”

  “The rebels aren’t out in the open. Once they occupy the buildings they dig in and defend them like fortresses. They have some outposts and forays to outside,” I said. “They are tunneling through the buildings.”

  PJ looked at me with interest. “You know more about them than the military,” he joked.

  There was an ominous lull as we set out to drive up Sackville Street and I risked sitting in the seat beside him. Gone was the mad circus of looters. But odd shoes, a rainbow of torn clothing and abandoned broken toys were scattered all around. I th
ought the looters were not bad people but just overcome with a frenzy of greed because they have nothing. We saw the corpses of horses buzzing with flies.

  When I told PJ that there was a First Aid unit in the GPO, he said we should check if they needed any supplies or had casualties that needed hospital treatment.

  “Our code is to treat whoever needs it no matter what side. I’m from Ringsend and my brother and school friends are with the rebels in Boland’s Mill.”

  I admired his humanity and resolved to make it my code too.

  We were admitted easily when there was a break in the firing. I was struck once again by the ominous air of waiting. I noticed a group stuffing tins, not with explosives but with metal letters.

  “It’s type from the Freeman’s Journal Office across in Middle Abbey Street. We’ve run out of fuses and detonators,” said the rebel.

  “I thought we’d sent over to Jacob’s for some?” said his companion.

  “We’ll be lucky to get a few crates of broken biscuits,” laughed the rebel.

  Another young boy spat out some tea he was drinking and was teasing Louise Gavan Duffy and Min Ryan.

  “You’re called what sounds like the ‘Cumann na Man’, but you are the Cumann na Monsters! That’s the worst tea I ever tasted!”

  Louise laughed behind her hand. “Oh no, we used the old water from the turnips.”

  “And served it in the bucket for Jeyes Fluid,” said the boy, pointing to the makeshift teapot in disgust.

  “I’ll have to send you over to my brother Jim Ryan,” said Min to the lad. “He’s only a medical student yet he’s running our field hospital over by the Prince’s Street entrance. At your own risk!”