Charles Hammond was a British civil servant who served as Assistant Under-Secretary for Ireland under Matthew Nathan at the time of the 1916 Easter Rising.
Biography[]
Charles Hammond was born in England, and he entered the British civil service; he was once sent to East Africa (where he had an affair with a local African woman) and was later sent to Dublin, Ireland to work for Under-Secretary for Ireland Matthew Nathan during World War I. Despite being married to Vanessa Hammond, he had an affair with his secretary May Lacy, impregnating her in 1916. In April of that year, he promised to run off with her to India or the United States, but the Easter Rising on 24 April interrupted their plans. Hammond sent Lacy to the safety of his house, where she awkwardly stayed with Vanessa, while he was kept at Dublin Castle by Under-Secretary Nathan so that he could oversee the suppression of the uprising. He declined Nathan's request to resign alongside him, as he sought to ensure that peace would be restored in the aftermath of the failed uprising. Hammond later helped Lacy cover up her involvement in the uprising by claiming that her leaking of sensitive documents to the IRB was a military ruse to expose the rebel leaders.