De Valera in sensational escape from Lincoln Prison
Lincoln, 6 February 1919 - Éamon de Valera MP has escaped from Lincoln Prison along with Seán Milroy and Seán McGarry.
The prison authorities are perplexed as to how it happened and despite issuing detailed descriptions of the escaped men, there are no clues as to their current whereabouts. One line of thinking is that men may have taken a motor car and headed for the coast, the nearest coastal point being Grimsby, a distance of some 30 miles from the prison.
Lincoln Prison is situated in the north of the city and is surrounded by a very high wall, about 20 ft high. Positioned between two main roads, the Greetwell and Wrangley roads, the only entrance to the prison is via Greetwell Road and this is well guarded by day and night.
It is believed that the fugitives escaped the prison on Monday 3 February between the hours of 4pm when they had their tea and 9pm when their absence was discovered and the alarm raised.
The authorities believe the three men opened a back door, possibly using a master key thrown over the prison wall by accomplices. A motor car with a single occupant was seen slowing down at the point nearest the rear door between 7pm and 8pm. The road on which the car was spotted is one of the main thoroughfares to Hull and as such every coastal town was warned.
Séan Milroy, Éamon de Valera and Séan McGarry, who escaped from Lincoln Prison. (Image: Cork Examiner, 8 February 1919)
The three fugitives are all high profile Sinn Féin figures. Mr de Valera, party president, together with Mr McGarry, a journalist who edited the O’Donovan Rossa memorial publication, was arrested as part of a general round-up of Sinn Féin activists in May 1918.
Seán Milroy served several periods of incarceration before the 1916 Rising and unsuccessfully contested a by-election in East Tyrone last year. He was due to contest the Westminster election last December but declined following the Catholic Church-brokered agreement with regard to a number of Ulster seats.
This latest episode brings the number of Sinn Féin prisoners who have now escaped from English prisons to seven, the three Lincoln escapees joining other ‘on the runs’, Barney Mellows, Jack Shouldice, Joseph McGrath and G. Geraghty.
Other prisoners have been unconditionally released owing to ill-health, including Sean Etchingham MP and William J. Brennan-Whitmore, leaving approximately 60 Sinn Féin prisoners still in English jails.
[Editor's note: This is an article from Century Ireland, a fortnightly online newspaper, written from the perspective of a journalist 100 years ago, based on news reports of the time.]
