CENTENARY: Christmas Day marks a special anniversary in Tipperary

Christmas Day marks the centenary of the death of Joe MacDonagh TD who died on Christmas Day 1922.

Joe, the younger brother of Thomas MacDonagh, was elected as the Sinn Fein TD for North Tipperary at the 1918 election and also at the 1921 and 1922 elections.

He was very active in the War of Independence and was interned on several occasions.

He participated in hunger strikes in Mountjoy, Dundalk , Belfast and Reading Jails.

Joe voted against The Treaty and was interned by the Free State government in October 1922.

He again went on hunger strike as a protest against the Free State's treatment of political prisoners.

While on hunger strike he fell acutely ill from appendicitis and sadly he died on Christmas Day at the age of 39 years.

Last September the biography of Joe MacDonagh, written by Gerard Shannon, under the auspices of the Tipperary in the Decade of Revolution group was launched at the Thomas MacDonagh Museum.

Contributed to Cloughjordan Notes in the Tipperary Star.