Clarke, Kathleen, 1878-1972

Kathleen Daly was born in Limerick in 1878 into a republican family. Her father had been arrested for Fenian activities and her uncle, John Daly, sentenced to life imprisonment. In 1901, she moved to New York to marry Thomas Clarke, who had previously been incarcerated with her uncle. Together they ran a small farm and market before returning to Ireland in 1907.

Kathleen Clarke was a founding member of Cumman na mBan in 1914. During the Easter Rising, she was arrested and afterwards, her husband and brother were court-martialed and executed. She formed the Committee of the Irish Volunteer Dependents Fund to aid dependents of imprisoned and executed volunteers.

In 1918, she was elected vice-president of Cumman na mBan as well as the Executive of Sinn Fein. She campaigned against conscription and was arrested for treasonable conspiracy. Along with Constance de Markievicz, Hanna Sheehy-Skeffington, and Maud Gonne, Clarke spent nine months in Halloway Prison in England.

In 1919, Clarke was elected alderman of Wood Quay and Mountjoy wards. She was also a judge, chaired the north city republican courts, and was active in the Irish White Cross. She was elected to the second Dail in 1921 and opposed the Anglo-Irish Treaty. Clarke lost her seat in 1922, regained it in 1927 and lost it again in 1928. She left Sinn Fein and joined Fianna Fail in 1926.

From 1927 to 1936, Clarke served as a Fianna Fail Senator; however, she disagreed with Fianna Fail policies that she thought contradicted provisions concerning women in the 1916 proclamation. Clarke was elected the first female Lord Mayor of Dublin in 1939. She disagreed with Eamonn de Valera and Fianna Fail over treatment of republican prisoners during the 1940s. At the end of her mayoral term, Clarke retired from Fianna Fail. Later, she ran unsuccessfully on the Clann na Poblachta ticket. On the 50th anniversary of the Rising, Clarke received an honorary degree from the National University of Ireland. In 1967, she opened a Fenian Exhibition in Kilmainham Jail in Dublin.

She died in Liverpool in 1972 and was given a state funeral in Dublin.