The governor of Mountjoy Prison said yesterday it was only right the bodies of the 10 volunteers executed in the jail during the War of Independence were being released by the prison for burial in consecrated ground.
Mr John Lonergan said he "never agreed with the State's right to keep the bodies of people within the confines of a prison".
He was addressing relatives of the 10 volunteers before the removal of the men's remains from the Laurel Garden in Mountjoy, where they had lain for 80 years, to the Pro-Cathedral for Requiem Mass and State funerals.
Mr Lonergan said it was a very historic morning. "A big part of the history of Mountjoy, a chequered history maybe, will be leaving Mountjoy. They were very much, those 10 men, part of the history of Mountjoy and they will be missed in the context of Mountjoy," he said.
"I think it's a right decision to have those men released after 80 years and returned to the wider community where I hope they will continue to rest in peace in Glasnevin and in the case of Patrick Maher in Limerick".
Referring to the "many rumours" about the way the men had been treated before burial, he said it was important for him, representing the governor of the time, to say now there was evidence to indicate they were buried "in a civilised and decent fashion and I think that's very important in the context of the history of Mountjoy".
The bodies of the men were exhumed over a month and their coffins, each draped in the Tricolour, were laid out in the Laurel Garden just inside the prison walls. Their coffins stood on the exact spot where they had been buried.
During a short service, prayers were said for all those who had been hanged in the prison; their families; those still in prison; ex-prisoners; and all who died in the War of Independence. Afterwards, all six representatives of each of the men's families carried their coffins to waiting hearses. They were moved in the order in which they were buried - first Kevin Barry, then Patrick Moran, followed by Thomas Whelan, Patrick Doyle, Bernard Ryan, Thomas Bryan, Frank Flood, Thomas Traynor, Edmond Foley, and Patrick Maher.
Prison chaplain Father Declan Blake sprinkled each coffin with holy water to the haunting voice of soloist Patricia Bourke D'Souza who sang from There Is a Place and Songs of the Angels, accompanied by harpist ┴ine N∅ Dh·ill.
The Minister for Justice, Mr O'Donoghue, and the director general of the Irish Prison Service, Mr Sean Aylward, were present.
The hearses left, flanked by a guard of honour provided by prison officers, to the sounds of The Dawning of the Day on the uileann pipes and as they exited the prison gates the crowd which had gathered outside cheered.
Mr Lonergan said the men accorded State funerals yesterday were just 10 of up to 100 prisoners who had been executed in the prison and buried on prison ground but the graves of others were "unfortunately" unmarked.