Merrion Press 🔖has just published a new book by John Durney.
OUT NOW
JAILBREAK GREAT
IRISH REPUBLICAN ESCAPES 1865–1983 James Durney
The first complete
history of audacious republican jailbreaks, both north and south of
the border, Jailbreak recounts every
major escape, from Fenian leader James Stephens’ rescue from
Richmond Prison in 1865, to the sensational 1983 IRA H-Block
breakout. Featuring first- hand accounts of the plotting and
execution of astonishing escapes that left an indelible mark on our
history, this is a thrilling, accessible and hugely engaging book
of prison breaks and ingenuous escapes.
The IRA’s spectacular
1983 breakout from the Maze Prison was the biggest jailbreak in UK
penal history. It was the culmination of a long and valiant
tradition of escape bids by Irish republican prisoners, who saw it
as their moral duty to escape, attempting to do so in increasingly
daring and audacious ways.
Spanning the period 1865–1983, Jailbreak features escapes on
land, air and sea, including bomb blasts, tunnel escapes, mass
breakouts and helicopter airlifts. James Durney has put together a
fascinating chronicle, with each chapter featuring a remarkable
jailbreak, such as Éamon de Valera’s cunning rescue from Lincoln
Jail in 1919, the ‘Greatest Escape’ of 112 anti-Treaty prisoners
from Newbridge Barracks in 1922 and the movie-like helicopter
airlift of IRA leaders from Mountjoy Prison in 1973.
In this hugely entertaining book, James Durney deftly records
twenty-three action-packed factual accounts of daring rescues,
incredible escape bids and jailbreaks that raised the morale of
nationalist Ireland and defied the might of empires and
governments.
Paperback •
€18.99 | £17.99 • 264 pages • 215 mm x 135 mm
• 9781785374920
‘We
crawled out in single file. All was quiet. When outside we
turned to the right, along the river bank for perhaps a hundred
yards, in order to avoid going too close to where we knew there
was an outpost on our left, and then struck straight across the
river...On the other side of the river was a steep bank. We
climbed it and into a large field. Then we were free. Never
have I experienced such delight which that sense of freedom
gave me when going up that field.’ - Anti-Treaty prisoner Séamus O’Connor
on escaping from Newbridge Barracks in 1922
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
James Durney is an award-winning
author of over twenty books on Irish national and local history,
including Interned: The Curragh Internment
Camps in the War of Independence (2019). He works at
Kildare County Archives and Local Studies.
Former IRA volunteer and ex-prisoner, spent 18 years in Long Kesh, 4 years on the blanket and no-wash/no work protests which led to the hunger strikes of the 80s. Completed PhD at Queens upon release from prison. Left the Republican Movement at the endorsement of the Good Friday Agreement, and went on to become a journalist. Co-founder of The Blanket, an online magazine that critically analyzed the Irish peace process. Lead researcher for the Belfast Project, an oral history of the Troubles.
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