Philip Gray - 1848 Rebellion

1848 Rebellion

While William Smith O'Brien attempted to arouse a Rebellion in the South of Ireland, Gray tried to instigate an insurrection in County Meath, and failing, left his position in the Railway office in Drogheda and made his way to County Tipperary. After the failure at Ballingarry on July 29, 1848, he joined up with John O'Mahony, who entrusted the command of the County Waterford insurgents to John Savage and Gray. He was involved in an attack on the Portlaw police barracks. O'Mahony described Gray years later as the most indomitable man he met in 1848.

Gray underwent many hardships while eluding capture by both the police and military in County Waterford for four months in the autumn and early winter of 1848. Hiding out in the Knockmealdown and Comeragh Mountains. He worked to form a secret society pledged to Irish freedom in the valley of the Suir. He then returned to Dublin, were he put a lot of his old friends from the Swift Confederate Club under oath, and was reputed to have had a thousand members in Dublin alone after which he escaped to France. While in France he met up again with O'Mahony and Stephens.