The Irish Mail on Sunday

George is a Boy of the Old Brigade...

TV show reveals singer’s great uncle was IRA hero

- By Martin Healy

HE’S best known for his feminine dress sense and camp personalit­y, but Boy George can lay claim to a very macho family past – his great uncle was an IRA hero executed during the War of Independen­ce.

The pop star, whose real name is George O’Dowd, was shocked to learn about his martial history when he took part in TV show, Who Do You Think You Are?

But his great uncle’s death wasn’t the only tragic surprise in store for the singer.

George’s six-year-old grandmothe­r, Bridget Kinehan, was snatched off the street by the NSPCC for ‘wandering’, and sent to Goldenbrid­ge industrial school. She had been standing outside her Dublin home and never saw her parents again. Both were alive when she was snatched, which indicated that they let her go in order to give her a better life. ‘She was kind of nabbed like a stray dog,’ said the pop star.

The Culture Club singer grew up in London with his Irish mother and his father, who was born in England to Irish parents.

His great uncle was Thomas Bryan, who was arrested for an attack on a police convoy in Drumcondra in 1921, and executed with five other IRA men. He was buried alongside Kevin Barry in an unmarked grave.

Who Do You Think You Are?, airs on BBC One on Wednesday at 9pm.

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pAST: Boy George has learned of his Irish family’s sad history
TRAgIc pAST: Boy George has learned of his Irish family’s sad history
 ?? ?? RELATIVES: From left, Thomas Bryan, grandmothe­r Bridget, George with mum Dinah
RELATIVES: From left, Thomas Bryan, grandmothe­r Bridget, George with mum Dinah
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