Uí Luasa Maighréad

Tue, 29 Mar, 2022 - 18:03

An active Cumann na mBan member since the age of 20 and from a well-known republican family, Blarney Street’s Maighréad Uí Luasa was another woman who risked her job, arrest and imprisonment during this time.

A shorthand typist at Crosse & Blackwell food cannery on Morrison’s Quay, from her desk Maighréad covertly typed dispatches referring to planned IRA ambushes and other highly-sensitive
material.

“My principal task was the typing of dispatches and various other documents given to me by the IRA Brigade Headquarters in Cork. Some of these referred to planned ambushes and were generally of such vital importance to the IRA organisation in Cork City and county that their capture, or loss, would have very serious repercussions.

“I am glad to be able to record that not one of these documents fell into the hands of the enemy whilst they were in my care. To ensure their safety was no easy task, as my employers were not at all sympathetic to our movement and the typing work, which was done by me during office hours, had to be done surreptitiously, so as not to arouse suspicion.”

Helped by a colleague, Maighréad also used her Crosse & Blackwell position to gather tin cans for the Volunteers to use in bomb-making. It wasn’t all plain sailing though, the shrewd typist had a near miss while on one of her frequent meetings with a Cork IRA No 1 Brigade intelligence officer.

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At this meeting in Cork’s GPO, Maighréad had just obtained a cipher to pass on when armed Auxiliaries arrived to search everyone present. Knowing that if the cipher were found, the consequences for herself and the officer would be dire, she deftly unscrewed the cap of her fountain pen, successfully hid the message inside it and survived unscathed.

A good friend of Terence MacSwiney and family, between 1918-1919, Maighréad used her typing skills to transcribe then-Vice-Brigadier of the Cork No.1 Brigade and future Cork Lord Mayor’s essays – posthumously published as Principles of Freedom.

The book was later translated into many Indian languages and was considered essential reading by members of the Gandhi movement.

“Quite naturally I got to know Terence MacSwiney very well. I came to be regarded as a trusted friend of his and indeed, of all his family.

“He was a man of gentle disposition, in no way aggressive either in manner or speech, but one whose whole desire seemed to be to give all he had in the service of his country.”

Maighréad also typed a copy of Terence’s sister Annie’s harrowing diary entries, which recounted the last days of his hunger strike in Brixton Prison in October 1920.