Cathal O'Shannon recalls how James Connolly told him that a date had been fixed for the Rising. He describes here the reaction in Belfast among Volunteers when the Rising started and his attempt to get Dublin to take part. This extract is taken from an interview recorded with Cathal O'Shannon for a television project 'The Survivors' in 1964.

Survivors was a ‘special project’ undertaken in the early years of Irish television. In the early 1960s Telefís Éireann (RTE Television) began to record interviews with individuals who had taken part in the Easter Rising and the War of Independence.

Individuals were interviewed under a working title of ‘The Survivors’. The first of these interviews were organised by Jack White and recorded at the television studios in Donnybrook on 31 August 1964. Cathal O’Shannon was interviewed by Brian Farrell. The studio director was Burt Budin.