Julia Grenan

Julia Grenan (Sighle, Sheila, 2 July 1883 – 6 January 1972) was an Irish nationalist, republican, suffragette and socialist and member of , best known for being one of the three last women to leave the Headquarters during the Easter Rising of 1916.

Background Julia Grenan was born on 2 July 1883 to Patrick Grenan, a joiner of Lombard Street in Dublin near to where Elizabeth O'Farrell grew up. She had two brothers and was the only girl. Her mother was Elizabeth Kenny, daughter of Hugh Kenny, who died in 1900 from chronic bronchitis, amongst other ailments. She went to the Sisters of Mercy school and after that became a dressmaker. During the 1913 Dublin Lock-out they supported the workers. They worked with Constance Markievicz to try to prevent recruitment into the British Armed forces. She trained them both in the use of firearms. Grenan and O'Farrell nursed the wounded there until the final surrender was decided. They were then taken to Richmond Barracks and finally imprisoned with the rest of the women arrested in Kilmainham Gaol until 9 May. While she heard the executions their wardress originally told the prisoners that the shots were from ongoing fighting. Grenan continued her work for with her friend O'Farrell. They carried dispatches during the Irish War of Independence. After the Anglo-Irish Treaty was signed in 1921 they remained Anti-Treaty and remained hostile to the Free State.

Julia Grenan died in Dublin on 6 January 1972 and was buried alongside Elizabeth O'Farrell, who had died in 1957, in the republican plot in Glasnevin cemetery, Dublin. The significant closeness they displayed, the fact they lived together for 30 years, the fact that neither was ever married to a man and the fact they were buried beside each other are all considered indicators of a more intimate relationship than publicly stated. Similarly, their comrades in the 1916 Rising, Kathleen Lynn and Madeleine ffrench-Mullen, are also considered to be another "unstated" couple, as were Margaret Skinnider and Nora O'Keeffe, all of whom were featured, along with Eva Gore-Booth and others, in a 2023 TG4 documentary about "the radical queer women at the very heart of the Irish Revolution": (Radical Hearts).