Custom House Burning - Part 1 / John Wilson

[kristof]

The autograph books are actually held at Kilmainham and they were kind enough to send me a scan of them.  It is possible that Kilmainham are also going to scan the list of customs house prisoners for me as well, so i might end up with a copy soon and can check myself.

[seanod]

That's great. I have them on my list of contacts but I haven't got around to writing to them yet. I wonder if there's anything else relating to the CH in the archives there? 

[Gary Deering]

Just an Update, John Wilson never spoke to his family about the War of Independence or the Civil War, so theres not much the family can add,But there is one good thing, Seanod do you remember me asking you about the picture of the prisoners from the CH ? Well I got the book Dublins Fighting Story, I have scanned the picture to John Wilson`s daughter & she thinks he father might be the 3rd prisoner from the left,if this is the same picture that appeared in the newspaper years ago we have a match I think.

[kristof]

I have 4 photos of prisoners from Kilmainham; as i'm sure many of you know already, some of the prisoners smuggled in a camera and took some group photos.  These particular photos were donated to Kilmainham by the son of Frank Carberry (marked in some of the photos with an x).  According to the autograph books, Frank Carberry shared a cell with Frank Brennan, hence the "two franks" and the "inseperables" from the autograph books from my previous post.  So, essentially there is a very good chance that most (or at least some) of the prisoners in the photo's are from the "fire brigade", the customs house men.

I am unable to identify if frank Brennan is any of the photos but sitting next to Frank Carberry in one of the photos (19PC1A5408 first one below) is a man in a white shirt and black vest who bears a striking similarity to Frank Brennan (i'm almost sure that it is but its hard to be 100% sure. 

[kristof]

next two photos.

[Ms. Smokestoomuch]

Great pictures.
Would be great if a few faces are spotted.
2nd one, I wonder what they're reading.
And they're holding up some writing. ? ?

There's a grand mop of hair at the front. That mop is akin to Tom Barry's.

[seanod]

They are terrific pictures.  I wonder who they all are and if it would be possible to put names to some of the faces? I particularly like the second one. They are obviously having some kind of Irish lesson. It looks like Má thá sibh (if you are - should be Má tá sibh) on the board, in the old Gaelic script. Thanks a lot for posting them.

[seanod]

On closer inspection, I think it's Má thá uait, which means "If you want", or something like that.

[kristof]

Glad you liked the photo's; though its an immense shame that we've no idea who they were. The only person named is Frank Carberry and i'm uncertain of his history and role at this stage.