During the War of Independence Frank Gallagher was interned in Mountjoy where he took part in a mass hunger-strike of republican prisoners demanding political status. Gallagher's remarkable diary reveals his internal conflict during the hunger strike in April 1920. He describes a 'double personality', one half bent on self-preservation & the other on sacrifice. On the tenth day, he almost surrendered, but what kept him resolute was shame before his fellow hunger strikers. ' If there were an honorable way of escape, I should be glad...I'm afraid to die, & I'm going to die because I'm afraid not to... The papers will call me a hero & a martyr...a miserable, frightened fool, who hadn't the courage not to die.'