Madam, - It is disingenuous for Tom Clonan in his article of March 20th to suggest that the women of 1916 are forgotten. In writing "their contribution remains largely unrecognised in the debate today on the legacy of 1916" he is dismissing almost a quarter of a century of scholarship.
Margaret Ward's seminal Unmanageable Revolutionaries was first published in 1983; Ruth Taillon's Women of 1916 was published in 1997; Sinead McCoole's Guns and Chiffon book and exhibition appeared in 1997 and the documentary of the same name was screened in 2003. Also McCoole's series Women of 1916 was broadcast in 1997 and her No Ordinary Women was published in 2003.
There is an extensive archive of women's material in Kilmainham Gaol that McCoole collected and correlated with the assistant curator of Kilmainham Gaol, Niamh O'Sullivan, which has been central to major work on this area; much undergraduate and postgraduate work has been done in this field.
Tom Clonan made reference to the invaluable source of the Military Bureau, which has already been used by many scholars, including Annie Ryan in her Witnesses, published in 2005.
These are merely some of the works of the undersigned; there are countless other academic articles and material available on this topic. - Yours, etc,
SINEAD McCOOLE, Ballina; MARGARET WARD, Belfast; NIAMH O'SULLIVAN, ANNIE RYAN, Dublin; RUTH TAILLON, Monaghan.