Alice Furlong

She was born at Old Bawn, near Tallaght, County Dublin, the daughter of John Furlong, a sporting journalist. She trained as a nurse in Dr Steevens' Hospital. In the 1890s her father was injured in a race-course accident and ended up in her ward, where he died shortly afterwards, and her mother died two months later.[1] Her first literary contributions were to the Irish Monthly at age 16.[2]

In 1899, Furlong published Roses and Rue, favourably reviewed by Stopford Brooke and others, and in 1907 Tales of Fairy Folk and Queens and Heroes. Her verse appeared in several anthologies.[2] She contributed to several journals, including the Irish Monthly, the Weekly Freeman, Chambers's Journal and the nationalist Shan Van Vocht, run by Alice Milligan and Anna Johnston (Ethna Carbery).[3] After 1916 she started studying Irish, and in the 1920s published poems in Irish and translated from Irish, and added the Irish Press to the journals she contributed to.[4]

In 1900 she was a founder-member of Inghinidhe na hÉireann, the revolutionary women's organisation led by Maud Gonne. Furlong was elected a vice-president of the association, along with Jenny Wyse Power, Annie Egan and Anna Johnston.[5]

Two of her sisters, Katherine and Mary, also wrote poetry, but died young, while another sister, Margaret, married the songwriter P. J. McCall.