Easter Rising Stories

26th October

ON THIS DAY

26 October

1920. The papers report two deaths

Terence MacSwiney

Terence MacSwiney, Lord Mayor of Cork, 1920. He had died at 5.40 a.m. on 25 October.

26 October 1920 was not the day Terence MacSwiney died. That was 25 October, at 5.40 a.m., in Brixton Prison, on the seventy-fourth day of his hunger strike. It was the first full day on which Ireland, Britain and the foreign press printed the news. Arthur Griffith said he had proved that victory was not with those who could inflict the most, but with those who could endure.

RTÉ’s survey of the day’s papers records the split. The Irish Independent, then the largest-selling paper in the country, gave most of its pages to the death and bordered every column in black. The Freeman’s Journal put a portrait of MacSwiney on the front page. The Cork Examiner did the same for the city’s Lord Mayor; its editorial said eulogy was not needed for a man tested and found true. The southern-unionist Irish Times was quieter: an editorial and a prominent news column. The unionist Belfast Newsletter mentioned the death once, in a short piece that also recorded Joseph Murphy.

Abroad the weight was heavier. The New York Times made MacSwiney its main story. The Manchester Guardian printed a photograph of Terence and Muriel. At least twenty-nine French papers carried the case. The body was still in Brixton. The inquest would be held the next day.

Muriel MacSwiney

Muriel MacSwiney, 1920. The Manchester Guardian printed her with her husband.

1920. Cork reports Joseph Murphy

The same editions reported a second death. Joseph Murphy of Pouladuff Road had died in Cork Gaol at 8.35 p.m. on 25 October, after 76 days without food. He was 24. The Irish Independent, the Freeman’s Journal and the Cork Examiner of 26 October all carried it. The Cork Examiner printed his photograph. Papers that had called him seventeen were already being overtaken by the military court’s age of 24.

Michael Fitzgerald had died in the same gaol on 17 October after 67 days. Murphy was the second of the Cork strikers to die. The strike there had begun on 11 August. It would run until 12 November. He was not told, before he died, that MacSwiney was already dead.

17 October: Fitzgerald. 25 October, 5.40 a.m.: MacSwiney. 25 October, 8.35 p.m.: Murphy. 26 October: both names in the same papers.

References:
Breathnach, C. (2020) ‘Death of a lord mayor: Terence MacSwiney’s 1920 hunger strike’, RTÉ Brainstorm, 27 October. Available at: RTÉ Brainstorm (Accessed: 29 September 2026).

Doherty, G. (2021) ‘Cork Hunger Strike, 1920’, The Irish Revolution, University College Cork. Available at: University College Cork (Accessed: 29 September 2026).

Murphy, W. (2020) ‘Hunger Strikes and the War of Independence’, RTÉ History. Available at: RTÉ History (Accessed: 29 September 2026).

RTÉ/Century Ireland (2020) ‘Second Cork Gaol hunger striker, Joseph Murphy, dies surrounded by family’. Available at: Century Ireland (Accessed: 29 September 2026).

RTÉ/Century Ireland (2020) ‘Terence MacSwiney dies after 74 days on hunger strike’. Available at: Century Ireland (Accessed: 29 September 2026).

RTÉ/Century Ireland (2023) ‘Visual Guide: How the newspapers reported Terence MacSwiney’s death’. Available at: Century Ireland (Accessed: 29 September 2026).

University College Cork (n.d.) ‘Volunteer (Patrick) Joseph Murphy’, Cork Fatality Register, 1920-95. Available at: UCC Cork Fatality Register (Accessed: 29 September 2026).

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