Rory O'Connor: To Defend the Republic

By Gerard Shannon

On 8 December 1922, Rory O' Connor was executed alongside three comrades in Mountjoy Jail. It was a moment that shocked Ireland, a bitter turning point in the Civil War, and one of the most infamous reprisals in modern Irish history. An unlikely revolutionary, O' Connor worked as an engineer on the Canadian railroad before returning to Ireland in 1915 and throwing himself into republicanism. He fought in Easter Week 1916, helped rebuild the shattered movement, and rose to become the IRA's Director of Engineering, working closely with Collins and Mulcahy. Devoted and uncompromising, he spearheaded IRA operations in Britain and plotted audacious prison escapes, including his own. O' Connor became the face of resistance to the Anglo-Irish Treaty, diverging forever from his onetime friend Kevin O' Higgins, who sat in the cabinet that would ultimately sanction his execution. In this first biography, historian Gerard Shannon draws on rich archival sources to capture the enigma of O' Connor's life, the tangled friendships and betrayals of Ireland's revolutionary period, and the captivating story of a man whose death propelled him into the pantheon of Irish republican martyrs.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1785375849
• ISBN13: 9781785375842
• Release Date: April 2026
• Publisher: Merrion Press
• Length: 288 Pages
• Weight: 1.50 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.9" x 5.9" x 9.1"