Paula Fitzpatrick

 

My “Little Story” is about my great, great, grandmother Elizabeth O’Connor, a formidable lady, who lived in the Dublin Mountains during the period of the 1916 Easter Rising and the Irish Civil War, where she owned Ballyboden House, and other properties and land in the area.

 

Her two granddaughters Catherine and Elizabeth Doyle were my

maternal grandmother and grandaunt.  Gran and Aunty, as I called them, were brought up by Elizabeth O’Connor following the early death of their mother Teresa Doyle, nee O’Connor.

 

One of the stories I overheard as a young girl was when word came one evening that the brutal Black and Tans were about to raid

Ballyboden House, where a small group of Republican fighters were meeting.  Elizabeth O’Connor saved them by hiding them in the potato drills in the field behind the pub. My research continues into many similar stories about her.