TRINITY COLLEGE DUBLIN has compiled a selection of rare photographs and letters documenting the havoc wreaked on Dublin city centre during the Easter 1916 Rising.

In a new blog, Changed Utterly (inspired by the WB Yeats poem Easter 1916), the university will highlight an item or collection each week such as diaries, letters, photographs and items of clothing.

Estelle Gittins, Assistant Librarian at Trinity, said the blog showcases as yet unpublished records written by ordinary people, from dramatic as-it-happened accounts to carefully amassed scrapbooks.

This week’s blog focuses on a collection of photographs taken by Thomas Johnson Westropp (1860-1922), a Limerick-born scholar and graduate of TCD.

The images were taken in the days and weeks following the Rising and show the damage inflicted on the architectural fabric of central Dublin, including the GPO, Liberty Hall, the Four Courts and Clerys.

Incredible photographs show devastating impact of the Rising

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The GPO from Nelson’s Pillar, view of east and south wings
The Royal Hibernian Academy, Abbey Street
The Dublin Bread Company, 24 July 1916
The DBC, east side of Sackville Street, 17 May 1916
Ruins in Dublin city centre, May 1916
Source: Digital Resources & Imaging Services
Thomas Johnson Westropp at Creevagh Wedge Tomb, Carran, County Clare, circa 1911.
Ruins in Dublin city centre, May 1916
Source: Digital Resources & Imaging Services

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Previous blog posts have included the experience of Thomas Bodkin as a St John Ambulance stretcher bearer working out of Dublin Castle and the story of Eileen Corrigan, one of four female students to brave sniper bullets to make it into Trinity to sit exams.

More information on the blog is available here.

Read: Not everyone’s pleased about Dublin’s mayor being a Sinn Féin-er in 2016

Pictures: Thousands pack O’Connell Street for Rising event

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