1916 Easter Rising Broadcast

On Easter Tuesday the 25th of April 1916, one day after the declaration of an Irish Republic strange radio signals began to emanate from Dublin. Amid the fighting for the city something different in the world of radio was taking place. On the day before Easter Monday an order was sent forth from the GPO headquarters of the rebellion. That order was to lead to an innovation, and a worlds’ first in the history of radio, maybe even several worlds’ firsts. One of the leaders of the Irish forces Commandant-General Joseph Mary Plunkett gave the order for the occupation of the Dublin Wireless School of Telegraphy which was located on the corner of Lower Abbey Street and Sackville Street (now O’Connell Street). This building now houses a trendy bar. The school had been closed down, and sealed up by the British at the start of the First World War in case the equipment was used to communicate with German ships. The authorities had however failed to remove the transmitting equipment located in the school even though it had been largely dismantled. Plunkett gave instructions for a Wireless Station to be set up with the equipment in the School. He had carefully chosen the men in the unit sent to occupy the Wireless School as among them were Fergus O’Kelly who had been in the British army as a member of the Army Signalling Corps, Joseph O’Connor who was an Electrician and had knowledge of Wireless Equipment and David Bourke who had experience as a Marconi operator. Their instructions were to transmit messages to ships in the Atlantic in the hope that they would in turn, relay them onwards to the United States to illicit help from Irish sympathisers there, and possibly the U.S. Government. The plan was to transmit a message to any receiving stations within range. Hopefully several ships would receive and relay the messages. This was a new idea, as up to that point transmissions were sent to be received by a particular receiving station in point to point communications. This new type of transmission was a broadcast which of course we all familiar with today. After the taking of the building, the first task of the rebel unit was to rebuild the dismantled transmitters. The selected a 1.5 KW transmitter that had been a former ships transmitter. This transmitter was rebuilt and set to transmit on the 300mtr band MW. The next task was to erect an aerial on the roof of the building. This task had to be completed under a hail of bullets from British snipers and possibly friendly fire from some of the more excitable rebels located on the roof of the GPO as well. The first transmission took place sometime in the early evening of the 25th of April, and the broadcast lasted for nearly twenty four hours. The Rebels themselves were unable to get any receiving equipment working so we shall never know if any reply was ever sent. It has been claimed that at least one American ship did receive the transmissions and did indeed pass them along. Evidence for this may be that the U.S. newspapers of the day carried a fuller account of the Rising much earlier than the British press. The British forces had by this stage recovered from their initial shock as a result of the Rising. Although they were not in the position to crush by force of numbers the Irish forces at this early stage. The British did bring several artillery pieces to bare this included weapons on the gunboat ’Helga’ which sailed up the River Liffey to shell the Rebel positions. The radio station came under sustained bombardment, although no one on the British side could have known or guessed exactly what was taking place inside. It was however considered to be a Rebel stronghold. By the late evening of the 26th the position in the Wireless school had become desperate. The building was now ablaze, as were most of buildings surrounding it. The transmitter was shut down and dismantled for transport to another location. The Rebel unit were forced to withdraw to the relative safety of Headquarters in the GPO. They decided to try to continue broadcasting from that location. Under withering fire pocking the ground all around them, several of the erstwhile broadcasters carried a number of pieces of the transmission equipment with them in an upturned table. They reached the GPO headquarters only to find it was impossible to return for the rest of the equipment. The Wireless School was now totally engulfed in flames. The world’s first broadcasting station was closed down. The transmitter parts were themselves engulfed in the flames that consumed the GPO later in the week never to be seen again. It’s safe to say that no Pirate Radio station since was ever put off the air in a more dramatic fashion. Another version of this video is also available on my channel with a music background.