Grace Gifford and Joseph Mary Plunket – A Love Story like No Other

One hundred and eight years ago Joseph Mary Plunket was murdered by imperialist occupation forces in Dublin on the 4th of May 1916.
Much has been written about those days, but few of the love stories that accompanied our struggle have been re-told. The love between Jo Plunket and Grace Gifford, possibly the most poignant.

“Plunkett was one of the original members of the IRB Military Committee that was responsible for planning the Easter Rising, and it was largely his plan that was followed. Shortly before the rising was to begin, Plunkett was hospitalised following a turn for the worse in his health. He had an operation on his neck glands days before Easter and had to struggle out of bed to take part in what was to follow. Still bandaged, he took his place in the General Post Office with several other of the rising’s leaders such as Patrick Pearse and Tom Clarke, though his health prevented him from being terribly active. His energetic aide de camp was Michael Collins”.
“Joseph Mary Plunkett (Irish: Seosamh Máire Pluincéid, 21 November 1887 – 4 May 1916) was an Irish nationalist, poet, journalist, and a leader of the 1916 Easter Rising.”
Joseph Mary Plunkett
“Following the surrender Plunkett was held in Kilmainham Gaol, and faced a court martial. Seven hours before his execution by firing squad at the age of 28, he was married in the prison chapel to his sweetheart Grace Gifford, a Protestant convert to Catholicism, whose sister, Muriel, had years before also converted and married his best friend Thomas MacDonagh, who was also executed for his role in the Easter Rising. Grace never married again.” Listen to the embedded song above for yet another poignant love story in the conflict zone.
Ireland divided shall never know peace.

Kilmainham Gaol
Tiocfaidh ár lá 

Here’s another love story that was terminated with British high velocity lead.
I sat with Suzanne whilst she told me of the day when her husband Ronnie Bunting and best man at their wedding Noel Little were assassinated and there was no doubt whatsoever in Suzanne’s mind that the assailants were well trained, military hitmen. The Brits smashed their way into the house all dressed in matching black & wearing Balaclava’s, spraying bullets indiscriminately in every direction. After wounding my three IRSP comrades, they systematically went over to Noel and Ronnie’s bodies and added execution shots to ensure they were dead, Suzanne witnessed that. They didn’t do the same to Suzanne because part of her face had been effectively blown off and they assumed she was dead. It was the most brutal story I have ever heard, and I heard it from the only surviving witness, with all the facial reconstruction scars to show the horrors of her injuries.
I think it was a revenge killing ordered by Thatcher after the courageous INLA had blown up the arch bigot and racist Tory MP Airey Neave at the House of Commons in one of the truly great military operations of the war. Neave was a card-carrying fascist! The life and death of British spy turned politician Airey Neave
“The family of a senior INLA member killed in unexplained circumstances have called for a fresh inquest amid claims that the RUC removed a surveillance team before the gun attack.” The removal of the surveillance team shortly before the home invasion is evidence of at least collusion and more likely connivance and complicity!
Suzanne’s love for Ronnie and Noel shone brightly as she told me this chilling story! I was just a young kid from the diaspora, fresh in the war zone, stories like that were “10 a penny”!
I heard one woman ask an adolescent girl what she wanted to do when she left school and without a second’s hesitation she replied, “I want to join the IRA and drive the Brits out of Ireland”, I kid you not: Repression breeds resistance! As we bear witness to the latest genocide in Palestine us Irish know, that the bulk of the survivors will join the resistance.
Claims that RUC were watching house where two INLA men were shot dead


I had a love affair of my own during the war in Occupied West Belfast, for the edited highlights > Adventures of a Member of the Diaspora in Occupied West Belfast

For anyone who knows me from Facadebook they will know that my profile picture is of Mairead Farrell. The comments section is a homage to Mairéad with some spectacular interviews with her, grab a box of tissues before reading or watching the videos of Mairéad being interviewed!
My Maternal Grand Father was a Quartermaster in the Irish Citizen Army. He was caught with weapons, incarcerated in the Free State and did a 23-day hunger strike before it was called off, possibly due to pressure from the Catholic Church!

Seán was shot 18 times. “Farrell, Watson said, “was hit by five bullets to the face and neck and three in the back. Danny McCann was shot twice in the head and twice in the back.” 18 bullets hit IRA man Inquest told.

Executed whilst walking unarmed in a public street, when they could have easily been arrested.
I had to walk over the footpath in Gibraltar where Mairéad, Seán and Dan were machine gunned first and finally executed with shots fired down into their bleeding shredded bodies! The day after the triple execution, council workers arrived with pneumatic jack hammers to chip the lead out of the bullet impacts to the footpath. They destroyed the evidence of bullets fired directly down into the bodies of these three volunteers in a classic British “Shoot to Kill” operation.
I was in Gibraltar delivering yachts around the Mediterranean. I had a fascinating conversation on one delivery with a French F111 Mirage Fighter Jet pilot off the coast of Libya, as you do!
A Conversation Between a French F111 Fighter Jet Pilot, a Kiwi Yacht Skipper and Everything in Between. Interestingly they never boarded my yacht!
Below is a great article on the role that women have played in our struggle.
Cumann na mBan & Women in Irish Republican Paramilitary Organisations, 1969-1986

Gone but never forgotten comrades. Tiocfaidh ár lá 

Readers can “Buy me a Coffee” or in reality a beer here: or on PayPal – kevin@iconicproperties.co.nz

About Kevin Hester

I'm an anti-imperialist, environmental activist and blue ocean sailor, who is passionate about the earth and all it's inhabitants without favour. Brace for imminent impact as we bare witness to the non-linear unraveling of the biosphere and habitability disappearing for most if not all complex life on the only habitable planet we know of. To quote President Niinistö in North Russia: ‘If We Lose the Arctic, We Lose the World’. Folks we have lost the Arctic.