Ireland's Alcatraz Spike Island

Known as Ireland’s Alcatraz, Spike Island has a long and varied history. The island is quite large at around 103 acres, lying off the lovely harbour town of Cobh in Cork. The first recorded habitation of Spike Island comes from the Early Medieval period. Saint Mochuda (also known as Saint Carthage), is said to have founded a monastic site on Spike in 635 AD.
It is thought that after his campaign in Ireland in the middle of the seventeenth century, Oliver Cromwell used Spike Island as a holding area for Irish Catholics who were being transported to work as indentured labourers on British plantations in the West Indies. This would not be the only time Spike Island served as a prison in its history.


In 1847 Spike Island again was used as a holding area for convicts before transportation to Australia and Tasmania. The convicts had a harsh life, and were used as forced labour to carry out numerous building programmes on the island, as well as constructing the docks and forts on the neighbouring Haulbowline Island. Conditions on the island were said to have been very poor.



A number of political prisoners were held on Spike Island following the 1848 Rebellion. John Mitchell was probably the best known of these prisoners: Mitchell was an Irish nationalist and journalist was held on Spike Island before his transportation to Tasmania. Mitchell managed to escape the hellish life on Tasmania and settled in America, where he became a prominent pro-slavery voice of the Confederate side during the American Civil War. By 1883 all prisoners had been removed from the island and it reverted to being used as a military base.

During the First World War, Spike Island became an important base of operations against the German submarine fleet. During the War of Independence, hundreds of political prisoners and Republicans were interned at Spike Island. Under the Anglo-Irish Agreement, Spike remained a British military base until 1938 when it was handed over to the Irish government. The Irish army and navy occupied the island, many living their with their families until 1985. The island served as a prison again, this time for young offenders, who remained on the island until 2004.