Desmond Ryan introduces a series of short accounts of personal recollections of the events of the Easter Rising 1916.
In this second episode Tom Walsh recalls his memories of the battle of Mount Street Bridge. Walsh was one of seven Irish Volunteers who occupied Clanwilliam House.
A small group of Volunteers occupying four buildings at Mount Street Bridge inflicted heavy casualties on a British forces. Many of the British soldiers had been sent to Dublin as reinforcements and were trying to make their way to Trinity College.
Tom Walsh was one of those who occupied Clanwilliam House here he recalls his memories of the battle that he says even, "Even forty years later remains in the memory like a nightmare."
With Tom Walsh in Clanwilliam House were his bother Jimmy, George Reynolds, Paddy Doyle, Jimmy Doyle, Dick Murphy and Willie Ronan.
Tom Walsh describes how in firing his Mauser rifle for the first time he knocked himself briefly unconscious. As the British soldiers charged attempting to cross Mount Street they came under fire as the dead and wounded fell they were replaced by comrades. "Again and again this mad attempt was made until the bridge was heaped with dead and wounded."
Three of the Volunteers in Clanwilliam House were killed before Tom Walsh and the others left the building after hours of intense fighting.
