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| Royal College of Surgeons of Ireland building in the scale model created for 'Surgeons & Insurgents: RCSI and the Easter Rising' exhibition, open to the public until 17th April 2016. Free entry, book place here. Image credit: Billy Cahill.
St. Stephen's Green in 1916 was a fairly well-to-do part of the city having received a proper facelift in the 1870s from the gift of Sir Arthur Edward Guinness (later known as Lord Ardilaun), whose statue faces RCSI today. Sir Arthur purchased the Green, paid off its debts, returned it to the public and took an active part in the landscaping which aimed to provide an 'oasis of calm' within the city for all citizens.
Caricature of Sir Arthur Edward Guinness (1840-1915) published under the title 'A Practical Patriot' in Vanity Fair, 8 May 1880; Statue of Lord Ardilaun in St. Stephen's Green completed in 1892 by Dublin sculptor Thomas Farrell, who would be elected President of the Royal Hibernian Academy the following year.
Using Thom's Dublin City Directory 1916, it is possible to understand the neighbourhood of St. Stephen's Green and surrounding streets at the time of the Rising when the rebels arrived on their doorsteps on Easter Monday morning. Thom's as it was known was a well-established directory for the city used for business purposes, but it was also a bit of a Who's Who too.
As soon as the insurgents arrived they began digging trenches, and a witness statement from a Detective of the Dublin Metropolitan Police who was following them also noted that they began "pulling up the shrubs planted by Sir John Ross with such ceremony a few years before." Ross was the former Commissioner of the Dublin Metropolitan Police and a keen horticulturist who had been invited to plant the first shrubs in the Park in 1913. [Reported in the statement of Eamon Broy to the Bureau of Military History, WS1280]
The map below gives a flavour of what the actual streets looked like, and you can find the full House to House listing for 1916 here.
Perhaps the most notable difference today, besides the motor-car traffic, is the absence of St. Vincent's Hospital on the East side of the Square, though the buildings remain largely in tact. The other most notable changes to the streetscape are on the West side of the Square, with the Royal College of Surgeons and the Unitarian Church as the only buildings to remain unchanged in terms of frontage and function.
Our favourite entry is "M'Kenny's Veterinary Turkish Bath & Hospital for Dogs" which was housed in 116A St. Stephen's Green West, around where The Fitzwilliam Hotel is on St. Stephens Green today. Doggie Day Spas days are not so 'modern' after all!
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| From top left: Russell Hotel, Harcourt St; Fusiliers' Arch from the top of Grafton St; Looking down Grafton St from St. Stephen's Green; St. Stephen's Green North; Shelbourne Hotel; St. Vincent's Hospital (IARC); Doorway, Leeson Street Upper; Earlsfort Terrace (slightly later); Harcourt Street Train Station. St. Stephen's Green (background image). Design: Johanna Archbold. |