Close up of plaque. Notice bulletholes in stonework.
One of the great mysteries of O’Connell Street for me was always the location of this Cathal Brugha plaque I’d seen photographed. Showing an English visiting friend around Fortress Dublin last week, I was surprised to find it right above Burger King. It’s a small plaque and easy to miss, but a great one to a fascinating character.
Brugha’s plaque was once a vanishing one, as this Irish Press report from 1934 notes:
Cathal Brugha, or Charles Burgess as he was first known before changing his name upon joining the Gaelic League, is one of the most celebrated characters of the revolutionary period. Educated at Belvedere and company director at Lalor’s candle factory on Ormond Quay, he famously survived a grand total of 25 injuries sustained in the 1916 rebellion.
It was out of the building marked by the plaque today that Brugha emerged during the Civil War, a leading figure in the Anti Treaty IRA who had refused to surrender, as ordered. The excellent recently released History of Cathal Brugha Barracks noted that Brugha appeared from the doorway of the building, revolver in hand, and was hit by a snipers bullet from the Findlater’s building. I noted here in a previous article on Nurse Linda Kearns that:
Linda Kearns witnessed the wounding of Cathal Brugha, who had refused to surrender to the forces of the new state. She held his severed artery between her fingers as he was driven to hospital, but he would die two days later. Cumann na mBan activists stood guard over Brugha when his body lay in state.
In a great write-up for sadly lost Tribune, Valerie Shanley put it all beautifully when she noted how the revolutionary history of the city is to be found in a very different one today.
fI the events of Dublin’s rebel past were transported to the modern capital, the result would have a Flann O’Brien touch of the surreal. The Irish Volunteers would be ensconced in the Ambassador cinema, which is now a gig venue; the 1916 leaders fleeing the GPO would emerge from the Swarovski crystal shop on Henry Street; and Cathal Brugha would be shot coming out of Burger King on O’Connell Street.
Notice the bullet holes in the stone work around Brugha’s plaque today. Next time you pass Burger King, look up!
Click on the book for more.
Click on the book for more.
Donal
Ciarán
Sam
Come Here To Me! 
Really interesting and excellently written! Will defintely have a look up at Burger King on my way to work tomorrow!
Are they really bullet marks? I’d have thought they looked like the connections for an old shop sign that has since been removed. (Me being an expert in neither military matters or street architecture, an’ all.)
(Bullet marked stonework included as part of memorial) comes from theirishwar.com and elsewhere.
My initial thoughts were the same as yours Tomboktu!
Wow brilliant post
It’s amazing just how much I miss when walking through a city that I think I know.
I am visiting Dublin in August from Australia and will definitely be looking up this very important piece of Irish history
I’m pretty certain that the marks were made by a shop sign, rather than bullet holes. If memory seves me, there was a mens’ clothes shop called Kingstons on this site until the 1970s. If not here then it was nearby. Kingstons was set up by Kathleen Kingston, widow of Cathal Brugha, after his death. That might also explain the plaque being placed where it is.
I hate to be picky, especially with such an interesting entry and comments as above, but Brugha emerged from the back of the (present day) Gresham Hotel. It was then known as the Hammam Building. He ran onto St Thomas’s Lane, where he was shot. This lane is parallel to O’Connell St for the most part and is east of it. So the plaque is within a few hundred yards of where he was shot, but not at the exact location. I’ve looked into this futher and, yup, Kingstons was where Burger King now is, and Kingstons was owned by the Brugha family until the 1970s, thus explaining in part why the plaque is situated there. Sin é!
Cheers Fergal, thanks for these comments.
Fergal is correct about where Brugha fought and emerged from and the street at the side of the Gresham was named after Brugha. I didn’t know he was shot in Thomas Lane having believed that he ran out facing troops in O’Connell St, brandishing a gun after being called on to surrender — a kind of suicide which always puzzled me. Shot dead in a lane makes more sense.
Brugha was an amazing man, badly portrayed in the Michael Collins film. Wounded up to 25 times in the Four Courts in 1916, he continued to fire at the enemy and singing. His wounds and expected death probably saved him from execution. Even from his hospital bed he began the reorganisation of the Volunteers.
The cautious side of his nature was also shown by his removing a number of names from Collins assassination list for what became Bloody Sunday, recruiting also from the ICA and the initial work was his, not Collins’.
The Free State would not allow his funeral to proceed down O’Connell Street and despite the official disapproval and general State repression and intimidation, thousands attended its eventual route.
Sorry, forgot to say that I too had failed to notice this plaque and also speculated that the marks might not be bullet holes (i.e. why just there?). But the placing there might be intended to be on the main street and so visible to everyone passing which intention of course is not achieved with its size and being placed so high.
I was an employee of Kingston’s on O’Connell Street in the 70’s and Cathal Brugh’s son Ruiri Brugha was the general manager at the time . Hence the connection to the building to on O’Connell Street .