Members of the Second Dáil - Daniel O'Callaghan

Daniel (Donal) O'Callaghan was an Irish Sinn Féin politician. He was elected unopposed as a Sinn Féin Teachta Dála (TD) to the 2nd Dáil at the 1921 elections for the Cork Borough constituency. He opposed the Anglo-Irish Treaty and voted against it. He stood as an anti-Treaty Sinn Féin candidate at the 1922 general election but was not elected.

Members of the Second Dáil - Mary MacSwiney

Mary MacSwiney

Mary MacSwiney (pronounced 'MacSweeney'; Irish Máire Nic Suibhne) (27 March 1872 – 8 March 1942) was an Irish politician and educationalist.

Born in London,to an Irish father and English mother, she returned to Ireland with her family at the age of six and was educated in Cork. After working at private schools in England and France, at the age of twenty, she studied for a Teaching Diploma at Cambridge University, which was normally reserved for men, and worked at Hillside Convent, Farnborough and the Benedictine Convent, Ventnor.

On the death of her mother, she returned to Cork to look after the younger members of her family and took a post at St Angela’s Ursuline High School where she had been a pupil. Influenced by her staunchly republican brother, Terence MacSwiney,she joined the Gaelic League and Inghinidhe na hÉireann, and was a founder member of Cumann na mBan when it was formed in 1914 in Cork and became a National Vice-President of the organisation. In 1916 she was arrested and imprisoned following the Easter Rising and also was dismissed from her teaching position for her republican activities. Several months later, upon her release from prison, she and her sister Annie founded Scoil Íte, modelled on Padraig Pearse's St. Enda's School, and she remained involved with the school for the rest of her life.

She supported the Irish war of independence in 1919-21. After the death of her brother Terence in October 1920 on hunger strike during the height of the Black and Tan War she was elected for Sinn Féin to the Cork Borough constituency (taking her seat in Dáil Éireann) in 1921. Another brother Seán was also elected to the Dáil in a different Cork constituency. She gave evidence in Washington, D.C. before the American Commission on Conditions in Ireland. For nine months she and Terence's widow, Muriel, toured America lecturing and giving interviews.

She strongly opposed the Anglo-Irish Treaty, debated in December 1921-January 1922, preferring to resume the war: 'This matter has been put to us as the Treaty or war. I say now if it were war, I would take it gladly and gleefully, not flippantly, but gladly, because I realise that there are evils worse than war, and no physical victory can compensate for a spiritual surrender.' On 21 December she spoke for three hours criticising the agreement from all angles.

During and after the Irish Civil War she was interned and went on hunger strike twice. She retained her seat in the 1923 election and along with other Sinn Féin members she refused to enter the Dáil. She later broke with Éamon de Valera and Fianna Fáil over their entry to Dáil Éireann in 1926, and continued to maintain a hardline republican position until her death. She lost her seat in the 1927 election.

In December 1938, MacSwiney was one of a group of seven people, who had been elected to the Second Dáil in 1921, who met with the IRA Army Council under Seán Russell. At this meeting, the seven signed over what they believed was the authority of the Government of Dáil Éireann to the Army Council. Henceforth, the IRA Army Council perceived itself to be the legitimate government of the Irish Republic and, on this basis, the IRA and Sinn Féin justified their rejection of the states of the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland and political abstentionism from their parliamentary institutions.

Members of the Second Dáil - Patrick Brennan

Patrick Brennan was an Irish Sinn Féin politician, and Teachta Dála (TD) in the 2nd Dáil. He was re-elected to the 3rd Dáil as a pro-Treaty Sinn Féin TD.

He was later Assistant Commissioner of the Gárda Siochána.

Members of the Second Dáil - Sean Liddy

The Liddy Medal

John Joseph (Sean) Liddy (1890–1965) was an Irish politician and founder member of the Garda Síochána (the police force of the Republic of Ireland). On his retirement, he also founded and became the first President of the Garda Pensioners Association (1961–1966), later to be renamed the Garda Síochána Retired Members Association(GSRMA).

Alongside lifelong friend Michael Collins, he was a prominent veteran of the Irish War of Independence. Subsequently, he served as a Teachta Dála (TD), Army Officer and Garda Chief Superintendent.

In the 1921 elections, he was elected unopposed to the 2nd Dáil as a Sinn Féin TD for the constituency of Clare. He supported the Anglo-Irish Treaty and voted in favour of it. He was re-elected unopposed as a pro-Treaty Sinn Féin TD at the 1922 general election. He resigned as a TD on 18 December 1922.

He died as a result of a motor accident in March 1965.

The Liddy Medal – the Garda Veterans Injury Award – is named in his memory. The medal is presented to retired Gardaí who were injured in the line of duty while in the Force.

Members of the Second Dáil - Seán Milroy

Seán Milroy

Seán Milroy (1877 – 30 November 1946) was an Irish politician. He was born in Maryport in Cumberland. He was a journalist by profession.

He contested a by-election for Sinn Féin in Tyrone North East unsuccessfully. He was elected a Sinn Féin Teachta Dála (TD) at the 1921 elections for both the Cavan constituency and for the Fermanagh and Tyrone constituency. He supported the Anglo-Irish Treaty and voted in favour of it.

He became a member of Cumann na nGaedhael but left the party in 1924 along with seven other TDs in opposition to the Government's actions to the so-called Irish Army mutiny. He contested the June 1927 and September 1927 general elections unsuccessfully.

In later years, he made up with his former colleagues and was elected to Seanad Éireann, serving for both Cumann na nGaedhael and later for Fine Gael from 1928 until the Free State Seanad was abolished in 1936. He was re-elected to the new Seanad in 1938, following the 1937 general election but failed to be re-elected following the 1938 general election.

Members of the Second Dáil - Gearoid O'Sullivan

Adj. Gen. Gearoid O'Sullivan

Members of the squad and others with Adj. Gen. Gearoid O'Sullivan (standing)

L to R :- Joe Leonard, (Dublin Brigade member) Joe Slattery, Joe Dolan, William Stapleton. (Squad members): Charlie Dalton (Dublin Brigade member)

Gearóid O'Sullivan (1891 – 5 August 1994) was an Irish teacher, army officer, barrister and Sinn Féin and Fine Gael politician.

O'Sullivan was a native of County Cork. While living in Dublin he followed his cousin, Michael Collins, into the Irish Volunteers, the Irish Republican Brotherhood (IRB) and the Gaelic League. During the 1916 Easter Rising, he served at the General Post Office. He was given the honour to raise the Irish flag over the building.

After the Rising he was interned in Frongoch in Wales with Collins and others. Upon release he resumed his involvement with the IRB. During the War of Independence, he was one of the adjutant-generals of the Dublin Brigade of the Irish Republican Army and one of Collins’ closest confidantes. At one stage, there was a £3,500 bounty on his head.

At the 1921 general election, he was elected unopposed as a Sinn Féin Teachta Dála (TD) to the Second Dáil for the constituency of Carlow–Kilkenny. He was re-elected at the 1922 general election as a Pro-Treaty Sinn Féin TD. During the Irish Civil War, he served as adjutant general of the National Army. He did not contest the 1923 general election. After the war, he left military life to work as a teacher.

In 1927, after the assassination of the then Minister for Justice Kevin O'Higgins, O’Sullivan contested the resulting by-election in the Dublin County on August 25 and retained the seat for Cumann na nGaedhael. He was re-elected at the three subsequent three general elections for the party in the same constituency. He unsuccessfully contested the 1937 general election for Fine Gael. In 1938, he was re-elected to Seanad Éireann but was unsuccessful in the 1939 Seanad election. He qualified as a barrister and commenced a legal career.

He died on 5 August 1994, the last surviving member of the Second Dáil.

Members of the Second Dáil - Edward Aylward

Some of the members of the Second Dáil are the same people in the First Dáil. I will not, therefore, repeat them.

Edward Aylward (1894 – February 1976) was an Irish Sinn Féin politician. He was elected unopposed as a Sinn Féin Teachta Dála (TD) to the 2nd Dáil at the 1921 elections for the Carlow–Kilkenny constituency. He opposed the Anglo-Irish Treaty and voted against it. He stood as an anti-Treaty Sinn Féin candidate at the 1922 general election but was not elected.