During the Irish 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 and the other on sacrifice. On the tenth day, he almost surrendered, but what kept him resolute was shame before his fellow hunger strikers.