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Durney, James

James Durney is the author of 'The Civil War in Kildare' (2011). He is a historical tour guide, working in the Local Studies department of Kildare library. He gives several talks per year to local history groups on various local history subjects as diverse as Irish gangsters in America, and Kildare men and women in the Spanish Civil War. He has had material published in various newspapers and has been interviewed on RTÉ several times.

During the War of Independence, faced with an armed insurrection it couldn’t stop, the British government introduced increasingly harsh penalties for suspected republicans, including internment without trial. This led to the incarceration of thousands of men in camps around the country, including the Rath and Hare Park Camps at the Curragh in County Kildare. Interned is the first book to tell the story of the men who were held in the Curragh internment camps, which housed republicans from all over Ireland. Faced with harsh conditions, unforgiving guards and inadequate and often inedible food, the prisoners maintained their defiance of the British regime and took whatever chances they could to defy their gaolers, including a number of escapes. The most audacious of these was in September 1921, during the Truce period, when sixty men escaped through a tunnel.

This unique book is the first to investigate the Curragh Internment Camps, which housed thousands of republicans from all over Ireland. It contains a list of names and addresses of some 1,500 internees, which will be fascinating to their descendants and those interested in local history, as well as an exploration and details of the 1921 escape, which was one of the largest and most successful IRA escape in history.

The Civil War in Kildare The Civil War left a more violent mark on Kildare than the War of Independence had. As a garrison county with military barracks situated on the main Cork and Limerick roads in Naas, Newbridge, the Curragh and Kildare town, it had a low level of republican military activity. By the Truce of 1921, however, Kildare’s two IRA battalions had evolved into quite efficient military units. Forty-three people in or from Co. Kildare died during 1922–3, while only fifteen people died in the 1916–21 period as a result of hostilities. Kildare had one of the highest numbers of IRA volunteers executed during the war – eight – and the largest single execution – in December 1922 when seven men from the Rathbride column were executed at the Curragh. Fifteen National Army soldiers were killed in ambushes in the county, yet only three RIC men died. Two internment camps – Tintown and Newbridge – housed nearly 3,000 prisoners in 1922–3, while the Rath Camp held 1,200. The internment camps were the scene of mass hunger strikes and mass jail-breaks and the escape from Newbridge is the biggest in republican prison folklore, with 112 prisoners getting away. Includes the full untold story of the Rathbride column when 7 out of 10 arrested were executed in 1922 while other prisoners in Kerry caught in the same circumstances were reprieved. €19.99

The War of Independence in Kildare With its position on the axis between the Curragh camp and Dublin Castle, Kildare was one of the most important, but also the most dangerous counties for the rebels in the struggle for independence. €16.99

The War of Independence in Kildare The Kildare IRA was heavily outnumbered by crown forces and had neither the manpower nor weaponry to seriously challenge them. With about 300 activists in County Kildare, and only about a third of them ready to take to the field at one time, they faced nearly 6,000 troops and hundreds of police and Black and Tans. However, the county was an important axis for intelligence gathering and communications to the south and west, and it is here Kildare made its greatest impact. The open flat plains of Kildare militated against ambushes, while its proximity to the capital also inhibited the Kildare Volunteers. Nevertheless there was a strong revolutionary element in the county. The book looks at the group of Volunteers who followed the railway track into Dublin to partake in the 1916 Rising and details attacks at Greenhills, Maynooth and Barrowhouse. The author also examines the Rath internment camp in the Curragh, reaction in the county to the Truce and Treaty, and the eventual split in the republican movement in the lead up to civil war. This comprehensive account will be a valuable addition to literature on this formative period in Ireland's history. €16.99

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