VIDEO: New James Durney book looks at those interned in Kildare camps during War of Independence

The Curragh Internment Camps in the War of Independence by Kildare historian and author James Durney is the first book to investigate the Curragh Internment Camps, which housed thousands of republicans from all over Ireland.

Mr Durney includes a list of names and addresses of some 1,500 internees, which will be fascinating to their descendants and those interested in local history, as well as an exploration and details of the 1921 escape, which was one of the largest and most successful IRA escape in history

During the War of Independence, faced with an armed insurrection it couldn’t stop, the British government introduced increasingly harsh penalties for suspected republicans, including internment without trial.

This led to the incarceration of thousands of men in camps around the country, including the Rath and Hare Park Camps at the Curragh in County Kildare.

Interned is the first book to tell the story of the men who were held in the Curragh internment camps, which housed republicans from all over Ireland. Faced with harsh conditions, unforgiving guards and inadequate and often inedible food, the prisoners maintained their defiance of the British regime and took whatever chances they could to defy their jailers, including a number of escapes.

The most audacious of these was in September 1921, during the Truce period, when 60 men escaped through a tunnel.

James Durney