3/2/1919 Éamon de Valera busts out of Lincoln Jail

Éamon de Valera is the leader of Sinn Féin, the radical Irish nationalist party. Since last May he has been under arrest, rounded up with other Sinn Féin leaders on suspicion of involvement in an imaginary German plot to invade Ireland.

De Valera is being held in Lincoln Jail in England, but is keen to escape and return to Ireland. And his comrades at home are keen to set him free. Hidden in a cake they send de Valera a blank key and a set of files. With the aid of another prisoner, de Valera creates a master key. Tonight he and fellow Republicans Sean McGarry and Sean Milroy let themselves out of their cell and then through a door to the outside world in the prison’s exercise yard. Waiting for them are fellow revolutionaries Michael Collins and Harry Boland, who whisk the fugitives away to a safe house…