Jack Murphy (Irish Politician) - Early Years

Early Years

Jack Murphy was born in 1920 at the back of Synge Street, Dublin. He was the second youngest son of a carpenter and had five brothers and five sisters. His father, a well-known athlete who won the all-Ireland walking championship in 1903, was active in the republican movement and was a founder-member of the National Union of Woodworkers. Murphy joined Fianna Éireann at the age of 10. Up to the age of 14 he attended St Mary’s National School, Rathmines, and then started work as an apprentice carpenter, while attending Bolton Street Technical College in the evenings. He became a member of the Irish Republican Army at 16. He was also an active trade union member from an early age as demonstrated when, as a carpenters apprentice, he became one of the leaders of a strike on the River Liffey Reservoir Scheme (popularly known as the Poulaphouca Scheme). The strike lasted several months until only three of the original committee remained, with Murphy being one of them.

Arrested in 1941 by the Fianna Fáil Government, he was interned with a number of other republicans in the Curragh until the end of the The Emergency in 1945. These four years afforded him time to study, broadening his interest and outlook. A fluent Irish speaker, he was interviewed in Irish for his entry into the National College of Art and Design after his release from the Curragh. In the Mansion House Exhibition of 1950 he won an arts and crafts certificate for his leather and craftwork.

He returned to his trade of carpentry where he was quickly re-elected shop steward after he took a leading part in several actions and strikes for better conditions, most notably the strike to end the campaign of sackings by employers which took place in 1953. However in 1956, during which record unemployed figures were reached in Ireland, he found himself one of the many thousands out of work.

He emigrated to England, but returned after four months as he missed his family. He later said:

I am against emigration for many reasons, one is that it wrecks family life. When I worked in England I nearly broke my heart thinking of my wife and youngsters all the time I was there. Here in Ireland the clergy and politicians are always preaching about the sanctity of the Christian family, but they do nothing about the unemployment and emigration that is breaking up thousands of families.