On This Day. A Ballyshannon woman an eyewitness to the First Dáil

Susan O'Daly an eyewitness to the First Dáil with her husband Cecil Stephens

The fascinating memoirs of a lady who spent the greater part of her life in Ballyshannon, reveal the role played by her, in events in Dublin during the 1916 period and the independence struggle. Susan O’Daly from County Monaghan, as a young student in Dublin, witnessed the immediate aftermath of the 1916 Rising and learned of the execution of one of her teachers, Thomas McDonagh, one of the signatories of the 1916 Proclamation. She acted as a courier during the independence struggle carrying messages to people like Michael Collins and was a classmate of Ernie O’Malley. Susan also took a keen interest in Gaelic culture, was an Irish speaker, and engaged in the politics of the day. In the 1918 Election she canvassed for the Sinn Féin party and was present in the Mansion House for the opening of the First Dáil on the 21^st January 1919 and has left her vivid memory of the day. Susan spent most of her life in Ballyshannon with her husband Cecil Stephens and her family.

Susan O’Daly an Eyewitness at The First Dáil 

On the 21^st January 1919 the Sinn Féin elected members refused to attend the parliament in Westminster but, instead, declared their independence by meeting in Dublin. This was a challenge to the British government and was also on the day two policemen were shot at Soloheadbeg Co. Tipperary at the beginning of the War of Independence. Susan O’Daly got a pass to witness this historic event and was among the audience, in the Mansion House Round Room, who looked on in some trepidation but with a sense of great pride. She recalled the meeting of the First Dáil in her memoir in 1969 on the 50^th anniversary of the first meeting.

“I have a vivid recollection of the whole procedure- Fr. Flanagan began with a prayer. Then the reading of the proclamation in Irish, English and French and on to the roll call every second name called, met with the response “Faoi glas in nGallaibh” (in prison in England) and this rang out through the whole building. I can still hear it! Outside, Dawson Street was packed with people, spilling over into Molesworth Street and St. Stephen’s Green.  On that famous occasion fifty years ago, it was all very different from what one reads in the papers about it. There was a tremendous feeling of exaltation mingled with fear? Nobody knew what might happen, would there be am raid by the military, a stampede, wholesale arrests, shooting? The ‘big shots’ as I call them, were only very ordinary people. They became ‘big shots’ very much later-some of them. Some were afterwards killed by Black and Tans or executed in Mountjoy when the Irish Free State came into existence”.

 Fr. Flanagan, the priest who said the prayer at the beginning of the First Dáil, had been stationed, at an earlier stage, in Cliffoney Co. Sligo, where he championed the people’s right of access to the turf bog which was being denied. Susan recalled that there was a tremendous air of excitement around the meeting of the First Dáil, but this was tinged with fear that there would be a raid by the British military, with perhaps wholesale arrests and shootings.

“I wonder how many in the Round Room and in the streets outside thought the whole performance an act of sheer madness-the idea of defying the might of the British Empire. What reasonable person could think it possible that a Dáil could ever be established! Certainly not in 1919; it just couldn’t happen! But it did!”

On her marriage to Cecil Stephens in 1922 Susan O’Daly devoted her life to family, the business and their shared love of Gaelic culture and music. She would still be remembered by members of the community, as she was engaged in the extensive family hardware and fancy goods business on Castle Street in the town. A teacher by profession, with her commercial training, she was well suited to keeping the financial records for the business. She also established an Argosy lending library in the shop and this was popular with the local population, as they could rent books, at a nominal cost, long before the days of television and public libraries. Her husband Cecil played an active role in the development of the G.A.A, the Gaelic League and was a member of the delegation from Ballyshannon to the Boundary Commission in Enniskillen in 1925. Cecil Stephens was for many years Town Clerk, Conductor of Ballyshannon Brass and Reed Band, Conductor of the local Musical Society and a founder of the Donegal Democrat along with John Downey. Susan and Cecil Stephens had four children; Donal, Nan (Sister Colmcille), Aiden and Cecil. Susan Stephens died on 7^th May 1979 and is interred in Abbey Assaroe. Very few outside her family circle knew that Susan Stephens (nee O’Daly) had been in Dublin during the 1916 period and that she had been active in Cumann na mBan, acted as a courier in the War of Independence and was present when the First Dáil met in the Mansion House in Dublin on 21^st January 1919.

                        Susan and Cecil Stephens had their business premises where A Novel Idea Bookshop 

is today ( to the right of the group of men)

This book is available in a limited hardback edition with dust jacket  in A Novel Idea Ballyshannon and for postal delivery from Anthony Begley anthonyrbegley@hotmail.com

The book is also available in softback in A Novel Idea, Local Hands  in Ballyshannon and the Four Master's Bookshop Donegal Town. Lots of colour, history and rare photographs of the area from Rossnowlagh to Finner to Belleek and all local townlands