Seán Mac Diarmada

Who was Seán Mac Diarmada?

Seán Mac Diarmada, also known as Seán MacDermott, was an Irish political activist and revolutionary leader. He was one of the seven leaders of the Easter Rising of 1916, which he helped to organise as a member of the Military Committee of the Irish Republican Brotherhood and was a signatory of the Proclamation of the Irish Republic. He was executed for his part in the Rising at the age of thirty-three.

Raised in rural County Leitrim, he was a member of many associations which promoted the cause of the Irish language, Gaelic revival and Irish nationalism in general, including the Gaelic League and the Catholic fraternity the Ancient Order of Hibernians. He was national organiser for Sinn Féin, and later manager of the newspaper Irish Freedom, started in 1910 by Bulmer Hobson and others. Within the Irish Republican Brotherhood, he was a close colleague and friend of veteran republican Tom Clarke.