From O’Donovan Rossa funeral to the Civil War, the Capuchin order made their faces known

Members of the Capuchin order had key roles in the Irish revolution, writes Niall Murray

THE constant presence of Capuchin friars at key moments of Ireland’s revolution a century ago is being placed under a historic microscope.

From the infamous 1915 funeral of fabled Fenian Jeremiah O’Donovan Rossa to the bloody 1922 street-fighting of the Civil War, members of the Capuchin Franciscan order were regularly seen amid the famous faces of Irish history.