First published in 1984, Mike Milotte’s classic study of Irish communism in the early twentieth century leaves no stone unturned.

The book offers a clear and meticulous reconstruction of Irish communism in the 1920s, reassessing the movement and its key figures in light of previously overlooked or misinterpreted material from the Comintern archives. Milotte follows a wide range of characters who shaped Irish communism in this period. During the revolutionary era, Roddy Connolly’s Communist Party robbed banks to fund its activities, and 20-year-old Connolly engaged in gun-running for the IRA while struggling to maintain control of his fractious party. In a later period of retreat, James Larkin refused to submit to the “imperialistic” British Communist Party or follow the dictates of Moscow’s Stalinist bureaucracy, resisting its policies and practices on instinct.