The first biography of the enigmatic Robert Barton, a central figure in the Irish Revolution. The enigmatic Robert Barton was a central figure in Irish Revolution. From an Anglo-Irish ascendancy background, he joined the British army in 1915. He was sent to Dublin to guard Republican prisoners after the 1916 Easter Rising. Within two years he underwent a political conversion and joined Sinn Féin. He was elected to the Dáil and incarcerated during the War of Independence, but was released to help negotiate the truce which ended the conflict. He was a member of both Irish delegations to London in 1921, and was one of the plenipotentiaries who reluctantly signed the Anglo-Irish treaty in December. He voted for the treaty at Cabinet and Dáil level, but when he had done so, he switched his allegiance to the anti-treaty side in the Civil War, during which he was imprisoned again. After Irish independence, he enjoyed a long life of public service and died in 1975. AUTHOR: Dr Chris Lawlor is a former head of the History Department in Méanscoil Iognáid Rís, Naas, and has published eleven history books and many historical articles, essays and chapters in journals, magazines and anthologies. Chris won the Lord Walter Fitzgerald Prize for Original Historical Research in 2003 and the Irish Chiefs' Prize for History in 2013. He is the treasurer of the West Wicklow Historical Society and co-editor of the society's biennial journal. He is also a member of the Dunlavin Writers' Group and continues to write, publish and lecture during his retirement. He lives in Dunlavin. --This text refers to the paperback edition. 10 b/w illustrations
