Out of the Attic: My Grandmother was a Hero

by Jo Ann Graham

Screen capture from Irish War Romance (1921) clip, British Pathé

My grandmother, Josephine Edith Mulholland was a hero and it brought her romance.

Edie, as she was known, was born in Dublin in February 1899, the daughter of a British soldier. She
lived in many areas of the British Empire until returning to Dublin in early 1919 following the death of her father. Her family was Irish and Roman Catholic. Trained as a nurse, Edie worked at one of the major hospitals in downtown Dublin.

Her family’s return to Dublin coincided with the beginning of the Irish War of Independence between the revolutionary Irish Republican Army (IRA) and British forces. Religious differences between the Roman Catholic Irish and the Protestant British along with economic suppression of the Irish fueled the dispute. The war was essentially a guerilla war with frequent surprise attacks on occupying British forces throughout Ireland.

My grandfather, Frederick William Jarrett, was born in December, 1900 in Sussex, England to a very strongly Anglican British family. He enlisted in the British Army and was sent to Dublin as part of the forces defending British interests there. Unexpected attacks by the IRA on all matter of places and services were common when British soldiers were on duty throughout Dublin.

In August 1920, my grandmother was riding the street car to work along the banks of the River Liffey in the heart of Dublin. Although she did not know him at the time, a handsome British soldier, Fred Jarrett, was assigned to guard the street car that day. As the street car stopped across from the Customs House, an important government building, a group of IRA rebels boarded and attacked Jarrett. He was shot, stabbed, and thrown off the street car into the river while horrified passengers watched and some, who sympathized with the IRA, applauded. Edie, being a nurse, could not stand by and allow him to die. While the street car continued on its way, she quietly got off at the next stop and went back to the steps down to the river where Jarrett had been thrown. She managed somehow to pull him out of the water (she was 4’10” and he was 6’4”!) and with the help of others, he was transported to the nearby hospital where she worked.

Fred Jarrett recovered at least in part through the ministrations of Nurse Edie Mulholland (although my mother told me that he bore the scars of his injuries throughout his life). During his convalescence Fred and Edie fell in love and became engaged. The story of Jarrett’s rescue and their subsequent romance “went viral” as we would say today. It was a popular story demonstrating that the divides between the Irish and English could be crossed. When Fred and Edie were married on August 15, 1921, just a year after the attack and rescue, their wedding at a Roman Catholic church close to Edie’s home was chosen for the newsreels.

Silent movies in 1921 usually featured newsreels (also silent) before the start of the main feature movie. The linked video is a copy of their newsreel.

The back story of this romantic tale reveals even more intrigue. It turns out that Fred Jarrett had not told his adamantly Protestant parents back in England of his romance and marriage to the lovely Catholic Edie Mulholland. But his secret would not be a secret for very long. It just so happened that Fred’s younger brother Sidney went to the movies that weekend when the newsreel was shown throughout England and Ireland. Imagine his surprise when he saw his own brother getting married! Sid rushed home and told his parents – and that is how they discovered the marriage! I was told that, when some time later Fred and Edie visited his parents, Edie was not allowed to stay in their home and that the relationship was quite rocky until after the birth of my mother in 1924.