During the Civil War, when Ernie O'Malley lay under sentence of death in Mountjoy prison hospital, some of his notes were smuggled out. 'Most of all,' he wrote, 'I would have liked to talk about the rank and file where I found solace. '
Raids and Rallies, an account of various offensives against the British in 1920– 21, is his tribute to that rank and file. 'It was a people's war. That is why we fought so well from November 1920.'
'What helps to make these memoirs notable … is that O'Malley writes more than a documentary in his constant awareness of nature in the background. ' – Sunday Press;
'Entrancing reading … for those who seek an insight into the mentality of the men who took on the might of the British Empire. ' – Sunday Independent;
'Where O'Malley differs from virtually all others who have published their recollections of those years is that he was a writer and an intellectual who was constantly weighing and analysing all that was happening. ' – The Irish Post