 O'Connor was born in Dublin November 28, 1883, and executed as a reprisal on December 8, 1922.He was born in Kildare Street, Dublin, and educated in St Mary's College, Dublin and then in Clongowes Wood College, a public school run by the Jesuit order and also attended by James Joyce, and by the man who would later condemn Rory O'Connor to death, his close friend Kevin O'Higgins.In 1910 O'Connor took his Bachelor of Engineering and Bachelor of Arts degrees in University College Dublin, then known as the National University.