The Easter Rebellion was an armed uprising of Irish nationalists against the rule of Great Britain in Ireland. The uprising occurred on Easter Monday, April 24, 1916, and centered mainly in Dublin. The chief objectives were the attainment of political freedom and the establishment of an Irish republic. Centuries of discontent, marked by numerous rebellions, preceded the uprising. The new crisis began to develop in September 1914, following the outbreak of World War I, when the British government suspended the recently enacted Home Rule Bill, which guaranteed a measure of political autonomy to Ireland. Suspension of the bill stimulated the growth of the Citizen Army, an illegal force of Dublin citizens organized by the labor leader Jim Larkin (died 1948) and the socialist James Connolly (1870-1916); of the Irish Volunteers, a national defense body; and of the extremist Sinn Fin. The uprising was planned by leaders of these organizations among who were the British consular agent Sir Roger David Casement, the educator Padhraic Pearse (1879-1916), and the poet Thomas MacDonagh (1878-1916).Irish liberation from British rule was achieved as the result of a struggle extending over several centuries and marked by numerous rebellions. Following the Easter Rebellion, an uprising of Irish nationalists on Easter Monday, April 24, 1916, Sinn Fin became the most influential political party in Ireland. This party, founded in 1905 by Arthur Griffith, a Dublin journalist, campaigned in the parliamentary election of 1918 on a program that called for the severance of all ties with Great Britain, an end to the separatist movement in Northern Ireland, and the establishment of an Irish republic. Candidates of Sinn Fin won 73 of the 106 seats allotted to Ireland in the British Parliament.In January 1919 the Sinn Fin members of Parliament assembled in Dublin as the Dil ireann, or national assembly. Proclaiming the independence of Ireland, the Dil forthwith f...
