[1] He was born 41 Alexander Street, west Belfast in 1885, parallel to the Falls Road and was the son of a baker, John Connolly, and Margaret McNeill.

On 31 January 1916 he married his fiancé, Róisín McGavock, who had completed an Arts Degree at Queen's University Belfast, and they set up home together at Divis Drive near Falls Park.

He was in Dublin for 1916 Easter Rising and Eoin MacNeill sent him to deliver his countermanding order to Drogheda, Belfast and other planned areas of Volunteer mobilisation.

After the Easter Rising went ahead anyway in Dublin, Connolly was arrested in Belfast and was interned in Knutsford Prison and Reading Gaol.

[10] After the 1922 general election, and the arrival of Professor Timothy Smiddy as an accredited Ambassador in Washington, he was informed that he no longer held any recognition in the eyes of the US Government and so he returned home to Ireland.

In February 1923, he joined the National Land Bank for some months and was persuaded to assist Sinn Féin with the 1923 general election.

[16] After the 1933 general election he was appointed as Minister for Lands and Fisheries and was sent on a special mission by de Valera to the United States to repay the Republican bonds which had been bought in the US during the Irish War of Independence.

[18] In October 1935, Connolly attended a screening of the Nazi propaganda film Triumph of the Will in Dublin's Olympia Theatre organised by the German legation.

He was based at Upper Yard, Dublin Castle and would in time be the subject of criticism from Opposition politicians and the press as lacking the necessary objectivity, discretion, tact and judgment for such a position.