DISPLAY CASE
Internees’ Writings
First edition copy of Darrell Figgis’ Chronicle of Jails (1917), a record of his time spent in Irish, English, and Welsh prisons following the Easter Rising.
Figgis writes, ‘Reading, being set in a dep valley at the confluence of two rivers, is an unhealthy town’. But he adds, ‘The gaol is a handsome building, erected in red brick after the manner of an old castle, with battlements and towers’. He was astonished at the ‘prodigality of flowers’ within the Prison walls, noting that ‘even the graves of hanged men could not be seen beneath the blooms that covered them’.
(Courtesy of University of Reading Special Collections)
First edition copy of MacSwiney's Principles of Freedom
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First edition copy of MacSwiney’s Principles of Freedom, (1921). This copy belonged to one of MacSwiney’s sisters. The pasted insert is signed “Eithne mcSuibne’.
The Irish inscription translates, ‘Nothing becomes a person as much as giving his life up for his friends. Pray for all our Soliders – May God free the Republic’.
(Courtesy of University of Reading Special Collections)
Programme for the Abbey Theatre's production of MacSwiney's The Revolutionist
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The Abbey Theatre mounted the first production of MacSwiney’s play in 1921, following his death in October 1920.
(Courtesy of University of Reading Special Collections)
The Abbey Theatre's production copy of MacSwiney's The Revolutionist
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The Abbey Theatre’s production copy of MacSwiney’s The Revolutionist (1914). The play is a love story set against the events leading towards the Easter Rising.
(Courtesy of University of Reading Special Collections)