ABSTRACT
Pearse, the head of the Irish Republican Brotherhood and the Dublin revolt, felt that the cause of Irish nationalism demanded a blood sacrifice whatever the prospects of success. Thus on Easter Sunday 1916 a few score of armed republicans occupied the Dublin Post Office and other strategic points in the city until overwhelmed by superior British force. In the course of the fighting 130 British soldiers and sixty-four rebels were killed. It was however the execution by firing squad of a further fifteen court-martialled rebels, including Pearse himself, which transformed the mood in the Nationalist community in large parts of Ireland from one of indifference or even hostility to the rebels into hostility towards the British.
