The Proclamation of the Irish Republic is the most significant document in Irish history. The credo contained therein, to cherish 'all of the children of the nation equally,' has come to define its seven signatories, marking a common bond in their life's work.

Their memory intensely moulded by their political activities, history forgets the diverse background from which these seven men came-family histories that touched upon twenty counties and economic environments ranging from extreme poverty to privilege.

Thomas Clarke and James Connolly were born in the USA, their family having been uprooted by the Famine; Thomas MacDonagh and Patrick Pearse, alternatively, had immediate English forebears.

The signatories' pasts from before they were born were an essential component in determining their ideas-each firmly their own-of an Irish republic. Their extended histories, fully disclosed within the pages of this book, are a riveting realisation of the complexities that defined nineteenth century Ireland and the lives of the seven signatories whose pasts reveal the many-faceted draw towards rebellion.