Photograph of Nora Ashe sitting on a motorcycle, 1915 -1916.

The motorcycle was later offered as a prize in an auction to raise money for the construction of the Ashe Memorial Hall, Tralee, Co. Kerry (now Kerry County Museum).

Nora Ashe, from Lispole, Co. Kerry, was a sister of Thomas ('Tom') Ashe who died on hungerstrike in Mountjoy Prison, Dublin on 25 September 1917. As Commander of the Fingal battalion of the Irish Volunteers, Ashe was a major figure in the 1916 Easter Rising in the Dublin area. He was imprisoned in 1917 for speaking at a Sinn Féin meeting in Ballinalee, County Longford.

At the time of the Rising Nora was thirty-four years of age and working as a teacher in Cappamore, Co. Limerick. She was not a member of Cumann na mBan but in her own words 'did odd jobs for Tom Clarke and others [and]...during the Black and Tan period took messages from Limerick to Dublin'.

Nora’s contribution to the 1916 Rising is not as apparent as that of her fellow country-women who were members of Cumann na mBan. However, it is clear that events during and as a consequence of Easter Week 1916, particularly the death of her beloved brother, laid the foundations of her political activism during the War of Independence – essentially: the Easter Rising inspired Nora Ashe to further action.