Raids and Rallies

During the Irish Civil War, when Ernie O'Malley lay under sentence of death in Mountjoy prison hospital, some notes of his were smuggled out. 'Most of all,' he wrote, 'I would have liked to talk about the rank and file where I found solace.' Raids and Rallies, an account of various Republican offensives against the British in 1920-21 during the War of Independence, is his tribute to that rank and file. He took part in three of the actions recounted here and had first-hand knowledge of the others. 'It was a people's war, that is why we fought so well from November 1920…'