Kilmainham Jail

Kilmainham Gaol, also known as Kilmainham Jail, is a former prison located in Kilmainham, Dublin, Ireland. It is now a museum.

Kilmainham gaol has played an important part in Irish history, as many leaders of Irish rebellions were imprisoned and some executed in the jail. The jail has also been used as a set for several films.

When it was first built in the late 1780s it was called the "New Gaol" to distinguish it from the old jail it was intended to replace - a noisome dungeon, just a few hundred metres from the present site. Over the 140 years it served as a prison it held in its cells many of the most famous people involved in the campaign for Irish independence. The leaders of the Easter Rising, 1916 were held and executed here. The last prisoner held in the jail was Eamon de Valera. It was abandoned as a jail in 1924 by the government of the new Irish Free State. Following lengthy restoration it now houses a museum on the history of Irish nationalism and offers guided tours of the building.

Films that have been filmed at the jail

• The Italian Job, 1969
• In the Name of the Father, 1993
• Michael Collins, 1996

Among its many famous prisoners were:-

• Henry Joy Mc Cracken, 1796
• Robert Emmet, 1803
• Anne Devlin, 1803
• Michael Dwyer, 1803
• William Smith O'Brien, 1848
• Thomas Francis Meagher, 1848
• Jeremiah O'Donovan Rossa, 1867
• Charles Stewart Parnell, 1881
• Michael Davitt
• Padraig Pearse, 1916
• James Connolly (nationalist), 1916
• Countess Markievicz, 1916
• Eamon de Valera, 1916
• Michael Collins, 1916
• Joeseph Mary Plunkett, 1916

This article is licenced under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "Kilmainham Jail".