Video: Appeal to find relatives of 38 children killed in 1916

A two-year-old girl shot in her mother’s arms and two unidentified children are among 38 who died violently in the 1916 Rising and about whom information is being sought.

Broadcaster Joe Duffy has appealed for help in finding information for the relatives of the children. Duffy has spent his spare time in the last year trawling records to find any children aged 16 and under who died violently during the period.

As a result he found 38 death certificates of children who died from injuries due to bombs, bullets, crossfire and explosions. Among the death certificates he found were for two children who died by gunshot wounds and who were delivered to the morgue with no names. The appeal is “just trying to put names and faces and stories on to children”, he said.

'A lot of information'
"We know that there is a lot of information and great stories out there, and in memory of these forgotten children, we want to formally gather these details so that the facts can be properly documented," said Duffy. "One two-year-old child was standing outside tenement house in Summerhill and a bullet went through the mother's hand and killed a baby in her arms," he said.

A grand-nephew of Christina Caffrey was at the GPO yesterday, joining Duffy and other relatives of the forgotten "children of the revolution". "I can't see why we remember everything else and we can't remember the kids who died in 1916," Francis Caffrey said.

Postcard
"Dad never talked about his brother Paddy," said Breda Rowe from Cabra West. Her uncle Patrick Fetherston (12) of Dorset Street was hit by a bullet when her father was 14. She thinks her father did not talk about his brother because "he was out during a curfew when he shouldn't have been," she said.

As part of the campaign, a painting by Duffy will be on a free postcard at the GPO on O’Connell Street, listing the names and addresses of children who died in the rising.

Any new information can be sent to Joe Duffy at PO Box 1916, Freepost, Dublin 3, or to joed1916@gmail.com

Caught in the crossfire: Five young victims

Christina Caffrey (2)
Killed by a bullet when she
was being held in her mother's arms, standing outside their tenement home in Corporation Buildings. Her mother Sarah, a charwoman, was injured by
the bullet .

Patrick Fetherston (12)
The boy from Long Lane, Dorset Street, was scavenging when he was hit in the thigh by a bullet on Easter Monday. His remains were removed from the hospital on a handcart draped in the Irish flag.

Walter Scott (8)
Was walking from his home on Irvine Crescent, East Wall, with his mother when he shot by a stray bullet, believed to have been from the gunship Helga.

Margaret Veale (13)
Was "peeping" out of her bedroom window on Haddington Road on Easter Monday when she was hit by a spray of bullets from a Gatling gun (10 bullets were counted).

Joseph Murray (14)
Shot in the head after he was sent from his home on St Augustine Street to fetch
sugar. He was waiting for a door to be opened.

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