Ireland1916

April 23, 1916 – Easter Sunday My family found it interesting that this year my twentieth birthday coincided with the rising of our Lord.  I didn’t really think much of it.  Perhaps I should have been somewhat proud of the similarity, but it wasn’t exactly the most pressing issue on my mind.  Father got me a present this year, just like he said he would.  He spent nearly all of his money to buy me a Winchester 1897 12-gauge shotgun that was smuggled into the country. It was hard to come by ever since those damned Brits put up the imported weapons ban.  But Father didn’t want me to be stuck with some German piece of junk

                The name is adopted by a number of armed groups who have been dedicated to ending British rule in Ireland and have claimed allegiance to an independent Irish republic. The term is most commonly applied to the contemporary Provisional Irish Republican Army, (PIRA, also known as "Provo's" or "Provisional") formed in 1972. Since that date the IRA has waged a terrorist campaign against the British state to force the British to withdraw their military forces from Northern Ireland and to establish a united Irish republic.  English control of Ireland was formally established in 1541 when the Irish Parliament gave English king Henry