How a Pirate became a Symbol of the 1916 Irish Uprising

The first time I heard the song Oro Se do Bheatha Bhaile was at a Wolfe Tone concert. It was sung in Gaelic but I recognized Grainne Mhaol—the Gaelic form of one of the Irish pirate Grace O’Malley’s nickname, Grace the Bald. She earned the nickname by cutting off her hair so she could go sailing with her father. Intrigued I researched the lyrics and found out the song was about Grace O’Malley coming back to Ireland to lead a rebellion.

Grace wasn’t the original subject of the song. It was Bonnie Prince Charlie. During the 18th century the Jacobite Rebellion tried to overthrow the Protestant king and put the Catholic Prince Charles in his place. The Irish supported Prince Charles in the hope that he would remove the English landlords. (An interesting footnote, the melody to the song is often associated with “What Do You Do with a Drunken Sailor?”)

When the Irish Rebel leader Padraig Pearce rewrote the song he kept the original melody but replaced Bonnie Prince Charlie with Grace O’Malley because she was Irish, while the prince was Scottish. She was a symbol of a home grown, Irish resistance, having used Irishmen in her battles and not the Spanish and French that made up Charlie’s army.

In 1577 Grace O’Malley was captured by the Earl of Desmond and was held in a Limerick jail for a year before Desmond, as a sign of his loyalty to the English crown, handed her over to Lord Justice Drury. She was transferred to Dublin in chains and was finally released in 1579. To Pearce, her imprisonment symbolized England’s imprisonment of Ireland.

Oro Se do Bheathea Bhaile was sung by the Irish Volunteers during the Easter Rebellion and Padraig Pearse whistled the song as he was being escorted to the firing squad for his part in the rebellion.

The romantics among us can picture those two Irish rebels, Grace and Padraig, enjoying a pint together in Fiddler’s Green.