Michael Carolan

Michael Carolan (1875 – 1 May 1937) was an Irish republican activist.

Biography Carolan was born in Belfast in 1875 and lived in the Ardoyne area of North Belfast. Carolan joined the Irish Volunteers in 1913, This was a unionist stronghold, and he took only 3.8% of the vote. At the 1920 Belfast Corporation election, he was one of five Sinn Féin candidates elected. Following a protest, he was sentenced in February 1920 by the Special Criminal Court in Belfast to six months imprisonment with hard labour in Mountjoy Prison for unlawful assembly and attempting to promote dissatisfaction. He took part in a hunger strike in protest. Carolan's position was declared vacant during a meeting in April 1920. Following his release, he returned to the IRA in September 1920 and became Officer Commanding for the 2nd Battalion of the Belfast Brigade and organised the Belfast Boycott Committee. An opponent of the Anglo-Irish Treaty, he sided with the anti-treaty forces in the Irish Civil War. Carolan was shot and wounded in the hip attempting to escape and he was imprisoned in Mountjoy Prison. Frank Kerlin replaced him as Director of Intelligence. On 27 November 1925, George Gilmore arranged a successful jailbreak and Carolan was one of nineteen men sprung.

Death Carolan died on 1 May 1937 in Dublin.