Jeremiah O'Donovan Rossa

Jeremiah O'Donovan Rossa (Irish: Diarmaid Ó Donnabháin Rosa; 4 September 1831 (baptised) – 29 June 1915) was an Irish Fenian leader who was one of the leading members of the Irish Republican Brotherhood (IRB). Born and raised in Rosscarbery, County Cork, he witnessed the Great Famine. Rossa founded the Phoenix National and Literary Society and dedicated his life to working towards the establishment of an independent Irish Republic. He joined the IRB, was arrested by the British and sentenced to life imprisonment. In 1869 he was elected to the British parliament while in prison. After being exiled to the United States in 1870 as part of the Cuba Five amnesty, Rossa worked with other Irish revolutionary organisations there to oppose British rule in Ireland.

Rossa was one of the primary advocates of physical force Irish republicanism and organised the Fenian dynamite campaign, which saw Irish republican groups carry out bombing attacks in Great Britain, targeting both government and civilian targets. The campaign caused widespread outrage among the British public and Rossa was subject to a failed assassination attempt from an Englishwoman in 1885, the same year the campaign ended. Following his death in 1915, he was buried in Dublin's Glasnevin Cemetery. His funeral served as a rallying point for Irish republicans and is often cited as a direct stepping stone towards the events of the Easter Rising in 1916.