A talk on the life of Margaret Skinnider by Maggie Chetty for International Women's Day.

Presented in partnership with 1916 Rising Centenary Committee - Scotland

Margaret Skinnider was a revolutionary and feminist born in Coatbridge, Scotland. She fought during the 1916 Easter Rising in Dublin as a sniper, among other roles, and was the only female wounded in the action. She was mentioned three times for bravery in the dispatches sent to the Dublin GPO.

Skinnider also wrote and published her autobiography– "Doing my Bit for Ireland". Skinnider later returned to Ireland and took up a teaching post in Dublin in 1917. 
During the War of Independence she was arrested and imprisoned. In the civil war she became Paymaster General of the Irish Republican Army until she was arrested in 1923 .

She later worked as a teacher in Dublin until her retirement in 1961. She was a member of the Irish National Teachers' Organisation (INTO) throughout her teaching career and became its President in 1956. 

She sat on the Committee that advised on the 50th anniversary commemorations of the 1916 rising.