Free Uncommon Valour by Paul O'Brien

fire from the Royal Hospital. At 7 p.m. a party of British soldiers moved from the convent (8) towards the Nurses’ Home (10). In the dwindling light of the day they fired on some of their own men who were at that moment attempting to storm the front of the Nurses’ Home. Anticipating the confusion outside in the front courtyard, Commandant Ceannt ordered his men to fire into the ranks of the attackers.
    â€˜Retire men,’ called out a British officer, ‘we are surrounded.’ Both groups of British soldiers retreated to safer positions.
    From 7.30 p.m. to 9.30 p.m. the battle for the Union raged across the barrier. Volunteers lay flat on the landing of the stairs firing with revolvers, automatics and rifles out over the barricade. The continuous barrage prevented the British from storming the building. Meanwhile, ‘A’ company of the Sherwood Foresters had succeeded in clearing the left and front flanks of the column near Rialto Bridge. Captain Martyn’s attack on the Nurses’ Home had distracted the Volunteers so that firing on the column had practically ceased and it was decided that it was safe to bring the wagons over the bridge at a gallop. The horses charged the bridge, the wheels of the wagons scraping the cobbled stones. The drivers of the wagons brandished loaded rifles in one hand, while holding the reins in the other. The transport crossed safely with only one bullet hole appearing in a single vehicle. 40 The main body of troops followed this and soon the entire column reached the main gates of the Royal Hospital. A message was relayed back to the sections providing covering fire within the Union to withdraw to Rialto Bridge. The left flank withdrew without incident but the Irish Volunteers constantly harried the right flank. Lieutenant Monk Gibbon later wrote of the withdrawal:
    The convoy is formed up and we move off. It is doubtful if we need ever have been halted. It is 7 p.m. now. I am filthy, deaf from firing in the little room and most of my ammunition has gone. Someone gives me a lemon to suck. We continue along the South Circular Road. 41
    Both sections of British troops regrouped near the bridge by 9.45 p.m. and immediately marched towards the Royal Hospital arriving at 10.15 p.m. They billeted for the night on the floors of the Hospital’s Great Hall and around the altar in the baroque chapel. Though many slept, others reflected on the past days’ actions, the losses to the battalion and the fighting that they would face in the coming days.
    The skyline had turned a blood red as flames relentlessly consumed the metropolis. Dublin city was burning.

Chapter 9
    Intermission
    Crown forces made no further assaults on the South Dublin Union and by midday on Friday the Volunteers realised that the British had completely withdrawn from the complex. The days that followed were uneventful except for the sporadic sniper fire that came from the roof of the Royal Hospital, Kilmainham.
    The British contingent that had attempted to occupy the Bakehouse (18) retired, having received orders from Captain Martyn on Thursday evening. Removing their boots to prevent noise, they rushed back across the courtyard to a place of refuge on the east side of the square. During this withdrawal, a British soldier became detached from his unit and realising that he was pinned down and unable to escape, took cover in the nearby carpentry shop. He stayed in the building overnight and most of Friday as Volunteer snipers sporadically opened fire. Later, as a hearse arrived and Union patients placed the dead body of a British soldier in a coffin, the soldier hiding in the carpentry shop saw his means of escape. Stealthily moving from cover, he climbed into an empty coffin beside that of the corpse. The two coffins were then loaded onto a cart in full view of the Volunteers who permitted the vehicle to leave the area as it travelled under a Red Cross flag. Later, the khaki-clad Lazarus emerged from