{{Short description|Irish politician (1882–1919)}} {{Use dmy dates|date=October 2021}} {{Use Hiberno-English|date=October 2021}} {{Infobox officeholder | image = | office = Teachta Dála | term_start = December 1918 | term_end = 6 March 1919 | constituency = Tipperary East | birth_date = {{birth date|1882|8|2|df=y}} | birth_place = County Wexford, Ireland | death_date = {{death date and age|1919|3|6|1882|8|2|df=y}} | death_place = Gloucester Gaol, England | party = Sinn Féin | spouse = | children = | education = {{Ubl|Clongowes Wood College|Downside School}} }} '''Pierce McCan'''<ref name=oireachtas_db>{{cite web|url=https://www.oireachtas.ie/en/members/member/Pierce-McCann.D.1919-01-21/|title=Pierce McCan|work=Oireachtas Members Database|access-date=29 March 2008}}</ref> or '''McCann''' (2 August 1882 – 6 March 1919) was an Irish Sinn Féin politician.
==Career== McCan was born at Prospect Lodge, Ballyanne Desmesne, County Wexford,<ref name=mcC>Anthony McCan, [http://familytreemaker.genealogy.com/users/m/c/c/Anthony-Mccan-Co-Cork/PDFBOOK1.pdf "The McCan family"], accessed 22 August 2010.</ref> the son of Francis McCan, a land agent, and Jane Power. He was nephew of Patrick Joseph Power, MP for East Waterford from 1885 to 1913.<ref name=IT>Irish Times, 10 March 1919, p. 7</ref> He attended Rockwell College, Clongowes Wood College and Downside School.<ref name=IT/> He resided at Ballyowen House, Dualla, Cashel, County Tipperary, was an "extensive farmer" and was a member of the Tipperary Hunt.<ref name=IT/>
He was a founder member of Sinn Féin in 1905. {{Citation needed|date=October 2015}} He joined the Gaelic League in 1909 and was a member of the Irish Volunteers from 1914 onward.{{Citation needed|date=August 2010}}
After more than 2,000 German and Austrian prisoners were imprisoned at Richmond Barracks, Templemore following the first battles of World War I in 1914, he plotted to engineer a mass escape but was thwarted when the prisoners were removed to Leigh, Lancashire in 1915.<ref>Walsh, John P. Walsh, ''A History Of Templemore And Its Environs'', JF Walsh (Roscrea) Ltd., 1991, p 106.</ref> He was interned in 1916 after the Easter Rising for several months in Richmond Barracks, Dublin, and Knutsford, England.<ref name=IT/><ref name=adams>[http://www.adams.ie/BidCat/SearchResults.asp?keywords=countermanding Notes from Adam's "Independence" auction catalogue] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110721122954/http://www.adams.ie/BidCat/SearchResults.asp?keywords=countermanding |date=21 July 2011 }}, accessed 22 August 2010.</ref> In May 1918, he was arrested under the German Plot and detained in Gloucester Gaol.<ref name=IT/>
McCan was president of the East Tipperary executive of Sinn Féin. While incarcerated, he elected as a Sinn Féin MP for the Tipperary East constituency at the 1918 general election.<ref name=elecs_irl>{{cite web|url=http://electionsireland.org/candidate.cfm?ID=1073|title=Pierce McCan|work=ElectionsIreland.org|accessdate=1 February 2008}}</ref>
In January 1919, Sinn Féin MPs refused to recognise the Parliament of the United Kingdom and instead assembled in the Mansion House, Dublin as a revolutionary parliament called Dáil Éireann. McCan never sat in Dáil Éireann, dying in prison in 1919 during the Spanish flu pandemic.<ref name=adams/> On 9 March 1919, McCan was buried in Dualla, Cashel, County Tipperary.<ref name=mcC/>
===Vacancy=== No by-election was called to replace him in the UK constituency. After 1 April 1922, the Irish Free State (Agreement) Act 1922 prohibited any by-election,<ref>"Irish Free State (Agreement) Act, 1922", sec.1(4) "No writ shall be issued after the passing of this Act for the election of a member to serve in the Commons House of Parliament for a constituency in Ireland other than a constituency in Northern Ireland."</ref> and the constituency was abolished when parliament was dissolved on 26 October 1922 for the general election on 15 November.
The First Dáil also considered how to fill the vacancy; a select committee in April recommended that the local Sinn Féin organisation which nominated him should nominate his replacement; a June proposal to postpone action, either for six months or until a Westminster by-election was held, was referred to another committee, which recommended that "in view of the circumstances which occasioned the vacancy, it was due to the memory of the late Pierce McCann that his place should not be filled at present".<ref>{{cite web|url=http://oireachtasdebates.oireachtas.ie/debates%20authoring/debateswebpack.nsf/takes/dail1919061700018|title=East Tipperary Vacancy|date=17 June 1919|work=First Dáil Éireann debates|accessdate=12 September 2016}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=http://oireachtasdebates.oireachtas.ie/debates%20authoring/debateswebpack.nsf/takes/dail1919061800007|title=Report of Select Committee on East Tipperary Vacancy|date=18 June 1919|work=First Dáil Éireann debates|accessdate=12 September 2016}}</ref>
==Tribute on death== On 10 April 1919, Cathal Brugha told the First Dáil:<ref>{{cite web|url=http://historical-debates.oireachtas.ie/D/DT/D.F.O.191904100004.html|title=Dáil Éireann – Volume 1|work=Oireachtas Historical Debates|date=10 April 1919|accessdate=1 February 2008|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110607105722/http://historical-debates.oireachtas.ie/D/DT/D.F.O.191904100004.html|archive-date=7 June 2011|df=dmy-all}}</ref> "Before I formally move the motion, as I have mentioned the name of Pierce McCan, I would ask the Members of the Dáil to stand up as a mark of our respect to the first man of our body to die for Ireland, and of our sympathy with his relatives. We are sure that their sorrow is lightened by the fact that his death was for the cause for which he would have lived, and that his memory will ever be cherished in the hearts of the comrades who knew him, and will be honoured by succeeding generations of his countrymen with that of the other martyrs of our holy cause." The McCan Barracks in Templemore, County Tipperary, is named after him.
==Family== In the general election of January 1933, McCan's brother, Joseph, a member of the National Farmers' and Ratepayers' Association, stood unsuccessfully for the National Centre Party in the Tipperary constituency.<ref>[http://electionsireland.org/candidate.cfm?ID=1865 Joseph McCann], Elections Ireland, accessed 22 August 2008.</ref>
==See also== thumb|right|page=2|alt=British Army military intelligence file for Pierce McCann|British Army military intelligence file for Pierce McCann *List of members of the Oireachtas imprisoned during the Irish revolutionary period
==References== {{Reflist}}
==Sources== * ''Allegiance'', Robert Brennan, (1950) * ''Memoirs of Senator Joseph Connolly: A Founder of Modern Ireland'', J. Anthony Gaughan (ed), (1996)
==External links== * [http://www.census.nationalarchives.ie/pages/1901/Tipperary/Ballysheehan/Newpark/1695388/ McCan family census return, 1901] * [http://www.census.nationalarchives.ie/pages/1911/Waterford/Islandikane/Newtown/668712/ McCan's census return, 1911] * Anthony McCan, [http://familytreemaker.genealogy.com/users/m/c/c/Anthony-Mccan-Co-Cork/PDFBOOK1.pdf "The McCan family"], accessed 22 August 2010.
{{s-start}} {{s-par|uk}} {{s-bef|before = Thomas Condon}} {{s-ttl|title = Member of Parliament for Tipperary East |years = 1918–1919}} {{s-non|reason= Vacant until<br />constituency abolished in 1922}} {{s-par|ie/oi}} {{s-new|constituency}} {{s-ttl|title = Teachta Dála for Tipperary East |years = 1918–1919}} {{s-non|reason = Vacant until<br />constituency abolished in 1921}} {{s-end}} {{Authority control}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:McCan, Pierce}} Category:1882 births Category:1919 deaths Category:Irish people who died in prison custody Category:Early Sinn Féin TDs Category:Members of the 1st Dáil Category:People educated at Clongowes Wood College Category:Politicians from County Wexford Category:Members of the Parliament of the United Kingdom for County Tipperary constituencies (1801–1922) Category:UK MPs 1918–1922 Category:Infectious disease deaths in England Category:People of the Easter Rising Category:Deaths from the Spanish flu pandemic in England Category:Politicians imprisoned during the Irish revolutionary period Category:Prisoners who died in England and Wales detention