[1] Other prominent members included Seán O'Casey, Constance Markievicz, Francis Sheehy-Skeffington, P. T. Daly and Kit Poole.

[3] The Citizen Army arose out of the great strike of the Irish Transport and General Workers Union (ITGWU) in 1913, known as the Lockout of 1913.

However, Larkin was arrested by strikebreakers in October; James Connolly, his deputy, took control for the duration of the lockout, announcing a call to arms of four battalions of trained men with corporals and sergeants.

[4] The violence at union rallies during the strike prompted Larkin to call for a workers' militia to be formed to protect themselves against the police.

The Citizen Army for the duration of the lock-out was armed with hurleys (sticks used in hurling, a traditional Irish sport) and bats to protect workers' demonstrations from the police.

In addition to its role as a self-defence organisation, the Army, which was drilled in Croydon Park in Fairview by White, provided a diversion for workers unemployed and idle during the dispute.

The ICA armed itself with Mauser rifles, bought from Germany by the Irish Volunteers and smuggled into Ireland at Howth in July 1914.

Tom Clarke called a meeting of all the separatist groups in Dublin on 9 September 1914 to assist a German invasion of Ireland, and prevent the police disarming the Volunteers.

Whereas during the Lockout the ICA had been a workers' self-defence militia, Connolly conceived of it as a revolutionary organisation dedicated to the creation of an Irish socialist republic.

Other active members in the early days included the Secretary to the council, Seán O'Casey, who tried to have Constance Markievicz expelled for her close associations with the Irish Volunteers.

Men who might have joined the ICA were now drilling—with the blessing of the Irish Republican Brotherhood (IRB)—under a command that included employers who had stood with Murphy against those trying to "assert the first principles of Trade Unionism".

John Devoy, the prominent Irish-American member of IRB Fenians, believed the existence of "a land army on Irish soil" was the most important sign since the founding of the Gaelic League.

[14] James Connolly, a convinced Marxist socialist and Irish Republican, believed that achieving political change through physical force, in the tradition of the Fenians, was legitimate.

Appalled by the participation of Irishmen in the First World War, which he regarded as an imperialist, capitalist conflict, Connolly began openly calling for insurrection in his newspaper, the Irish Worker.

Worried that Connolly would embark on premature military action with the ICA, they approached him and inducted him into the IRB's Supreme Council to co-ordinate their preparations for the armed rebellion which became known as the Easter Rising.

On Monday, 24 April 1916, 220 members of the ICA (including 28 women) took part in the Easter Rising, alongside a much larger body of the Irish Volunteers.

Michael Mallin, Connolly's second-in-command, along with Kit Poole, Constance Markievicz and an ICA company, occupied St Stephen's Green.

[18] A total of eleven Citizen Army men were killed in action in the rising, five in the City Hall/Dublin castle area, five in St Stephen's Green and one in the GPO.

[citation needed] James Connolly was made commander of the rebel forces in Dublin during the Rising and issued orders to surrender after a week.

[3] Following the signing of the Anglo-Irish Treaty, the ICA adopted a stance of "neutrality" between the pro and anti-treaty sides of now emerging Irish Civil War.

[3] In the end, a majority choose to stand by the Labour Party and to campaign for peace between the Pro and Anti Treaty sides.

[19] In 1929 Roddy Connolly and Helena Molony encouraged the formation of a "Workers' Defence Corps" that was to be a "New ICA"—an idea that British Intelligence was also associating with Jack White.

[3] Dynamic new figures such as Frank Ryan and Michael Price made the move into the ICA and helped give it new strength.

Taking inspiration from the Bible, and following the internationalist aspect of socialism, it reflected the belief that war would be redundant with the rise of the Socialist International.