Celtic PenitentiaryLiffey Stones · Historic Dublin Walks · Est. 2015 EN | GA
Walk Two · 3 hours

The Rebel Mile.

3 hours, 3 km, six stops. Meet at the GPO portico, finish at the Custom House. The 1916 Rising and the 1922 Civil War, told from the columns where the Proclamation was read to the corner of the Four Courts that burned. €48 per walker. 12 walkers max.

Duration
3 hours
Group size
4 to 12
Distance
≈ 3 km
Meeting point
GPO south columns
This walk is outdoors only We do not enter the GPO. We do not enter the Custom House Visitor Centre, the Four Courts, Liberty Hall or any other building on the route. The walk happens entirely on Dublin's public streets, footpaths and small public parks. The GPO Witness History Museum is excellent and you should book it separately at gpomuseum.ie — ideally the morning after our walk.
The walk in brief

The Republic was read on a pavement, not inside a building.

Stand under the south columns of the GPO where Pearse read the Proclamation on Easter Monday, 1916. Walk past the bullet-pocked granite. Cross to the Garden of Remembrance and the Children of Lir. Walk west along the Liffey to the Four Courts — shelled across the river to start the Civil War, June 1922. Finish at the Custom House, burned by men who arrived on foot in 1921. Six stops, three hours, every key location of the founding of the Republic.

Meet under the GPO south columns at 10:00 (morning walk) or 14:00 (afternoon walk). Finish in the gardens of the Custom House Quay, three minutes from the Luas red line. The GPO Witness History Museum runs the inside tour worth booking on a separate day at gpomuseum.ie.

A guide and small group at the south columns of the GPO on O'Connell Street, the columns showing 1916 bullet damage.
The route

Six stops, two seated rests.

Pacing depends on your guide and the questions your group asks — but every Rebel Mile walk visits all six, in order.

  1. 0:00 · The GPO, south columns

    Where Pearse read the Proclamation, twice.

    We meet under the south columns of the GPO, beneath the bullet-pocked granite that has not been repaired since 1916. Forty minutes on the morning of 24 April, on Pearse's two readings of the Proclamation, on the men and women of the garrison, and on what the British army shelled the building with from a gunboat in the river.

  2. 0:45 · O'Connell Street, west side

    The street that burned.

    We walk slowly down the west side of the street — past the O'Connell Monument, the spot of Henry Street's barricades, the rebuilt façade of Eason's. Twenty minutes on the firefight of 28 April, on the surrender, and on what was rebuilt where. A short stop at the Spire on the spot of Nelson's Pillar.

  3. 1:15 · The Garden of Remembrance, Parnell Square

    The garden of the children of Lir.

    Up Parnell Street to the sunken cross-shaped pool of the Garden of Remembrance, dedicated in 1966 to those who gave their lives for Irish freedom. Twenty-five minutes here, with the bronze swans of the Children of Lir behind. Our first sit-down on the granite benches at the head of the cross.

  4. 1:50 · The Four Courts, north quay

    Where the Civil War began.

    Across the river by O'Donovan Rossa Bridge, a stop at the south corner of the Four Courts. Twenty minutes on 28 June 1922 — the morning the Free State opened fire on the anti-Treaty IRA inside the Four Courts, the explosion that took the Public Records Office and a thousand years of Irish parchment with it, and the smoke seen from College Green.

  5. 2:20 · Liberty Hall & the river

    Connolly's union, Connolly's army.

    Back along the south quay to Liberty Hall — the Irish Transport and General Workers' Union headquarters of James Connolly, the rebuilt sixteen-storey brutalist tower of 1965, the wreath laid for the 1913 Lockout. A coffee stop in the small concourse café (we don't take you in for the building; we take you in for the coffee).

  6. 2:45 · The Custom House, Custom House Quay

    Gandon's masterpiece, burned twice.

    The closing stop at the Custom House gardens. Fifteen minutes on James Gandon's eighteenth-century building, on its burning by the IRA in May 1921, and on the Civil War shelling that finished the job. The bronze Famine Memorial figures on the riverside path are our final reading. Open Q&A and a recommendation for which museum to book tomorrow.

What's included

  • Three hours with a resident guide
  • Small group, no more than twelve walkers
  • Two seated stops along the route, including coffee at Liberty Hall concourse
  • Printed pocket-map of the Rebel Mile route
  • A one-page recommendation for the GPO Museum and other interior tours, sent on booking

Good to know

  • About 3 km on flat city paving
  • Step-free throughout
  • No interior visits to any building on the route
  • We walk in light rain — bring a waterproof
  • The Garden of Remembrance closes at 18:00 in winter; the afternoon walk starts at 14:00 to allow a full visit
  • Children welcome from age 12 with a paying adult
From the route

Photographs from recent walks.

A guide reads the south columns of the GPO to a small group, pointing to the bullet-pocked granite.
The bronze Children of Lir sculpture in the Garden of Remembrance.
The dome of the Four Courts seen from across the Liffey.
The Custom House and its riverside gardens at the end of the working day.
Book the Rebel Mile

Three hours along the streets that wrote the Republic.

Send us your dates and group size; we'll quote within one working day. We hold each walk to twelve walkers.

Request a quote See all three walks