Wexford had been relatively quiet during the Irish War of Independence, but the Treaty split in 1921 creates deep divisions. The South Wexford Brigade under Thomas O’Sullivan is overwhelmingly anti-Treaty, while the North Wexford Brigade under Joseph Cummins is nominally pro-Treaty but contains a significant anti-Treaty minority. This division means that when the Irish Civil War breaks out on June 28, 1922, Wexford becomes one of the most violent counties, with Republican forces rapidly moving to secure strategic towns.
On July 4, anti-Treaty IRA units, including Tipperary volunteers and escaped Four Courts fighters, move into Enniscorthy, take over key positions and force the surrender of Free State troops. In the opening fighting, three combatants are killed — two IRA and one National Army — marking the first major Republican gains in the county. James Roche, an IRA member, is fatally wounded in an accident outside Newtownbarry (now Bunclody) on the same day, one of several accidental deaths among IRA personnel in Wexford during the Irish Civil War.
The capture of Enniscorthy is part of a broader Republican offensive in County Wexford in early July 1922. However, the balance of power shifts quickly. By July 6, a large relief force of government troops sets out from Dublin to retake the town. This marks the beginning of a protracted and bloody campaign in County Wexford, which sees the county become one of the most violent in the Irish Civil War.
In summary, the capture of Enniscorthy on July 4, 1922, is a significant Republican victory in County Wexford, driven by the Treaty split and reinforced by external IRA units. It reflects the rapid escalation of violence in the county and sets the stage for a prolonged and destructive phase of the Irish Civil War in County Wexford.
(Pictured: Enniscorthy at the turn of the last century, National Library of Ireland collections)
Barry returns to Bandon in early 1919. He describes in his guerilla days in Ireland a Damascus-like conversion to Irish nationalism on hearing of the Easter Rising while with the Mesopotamian expeditionary force, but he is only accepted into the IRA with considerable caution. Initially tested in intelligence and training work, in mid-1920 he takes charge of the new brigade flying column, which is used both to train officers and to stage offensive actions.
Barry adapts his military experience successfully to the demands of guerrilla warfare, becoming the most famed of column leaders during the Irish War of Independence. In his memoirs, he pours scorn on the obsession of many with military titles and orthodox procedure, complaining of a “paper army.” He stresses the need for spontaneity, initiative, and knowledge of local conditions. “The reality,” he writes, “was a group of fellows, mostly in caps and not-too-expensive clothing, wondering how to tackle their job and where they would sleep that night or get their supper.” (The Reality of the Anglo–Irish War (1974)). He well realises that the war’s character does not permit any close control from the IRA’s GHQ in Dublin, hence increasing the importance of local leaders. His tactics put strong emphasis on speed of movement and on the need to attack the enemy at his weakest point. The column’s ambush successes are small in number but among the best-remembered of the war. He admits, however, that his own and his column’s lack of experience with mines frequently weakened their offensives.
The column’s first successful ambush is at Tooreen on October 22, 1920, followed on November 28 by the dramatic ambushing of a patrol of auxiliaries at Kilmichael while traveling from their Macroom base. A column of thirty-six men, divided into three sections, kill sixteen auxiliaries, with one captured and later shot, suffering two fatalities of their own. Controversy has raged since over whether a false surrender by the British force caused the brutality of some of the deaths. Together with the Bloody Sunday killings of a week earlier in Dublin, Kilmichael has a profound effect on the British military and political establishment, with the declaration in December of martial law for much of Munster and the implementation of wide-ranging internment, together with the authorisation of official reprisals.
After a short period in hospital with a heart condition, in early 1921 Barry leads unsuccessful attacks on Kilbrittain, Innishannon, Drimoleague, and Bandon barracks. The seizure of Burgatia House, outside Rosscarbery, in early February, and the successful resistance made there to British troops, wins much publicity but has little military significance. He is a leading figure in the brutal final stage of the war in the first six months of 1921, which sees widespread shooting of suspected spies and destruction of loyalist property. By March 1921, his flying column, with 104 men, is easily the largest in Ireland, and an explosives expert, Capt. McCarthy, has joined them.
The protracted engagement between Barry’s column and encircling British forces at Crossbarry on March 19, 1921, comes at a time when large-scale sweeps are making life increasingly difficult for the IRA. It consists of a daring and courageous breakout. Crossbarry is the largest action of the war, and Barry is to regard it as even more important than Kilmichael. Soon afterwards, Rosscarbery barracks is successfully attacked by a Barry-led party, representing one of the few successful such initiatives in 1921. Isolated triumphs, however, cannot hide the fact that pressure is increasing on the column, and he becomes increasingly critical of inactive regions. He is later to say that all County Kerry does during the war is to shoot one decent police inspector at Listowel Racecourse and a colleague of his. He is strongly critical also of the lack of assistance from GHQ and of the divisionalisation policy. He visits Dublin in May, travels around with Michael Collins, and is present when two American officers demonstrate the Thompson submachine gun. He is more aware than most of his 1st Southern Division colleagues of the scarcity of arms and ammunition at the war’s end.
During the truce, Barry becomes liaison officer for Munster, riling the British by insisting on his military rank, and criticising the IRA liaison men in Dublin for being overly deferential. He joins the overwhelming majority of the Cork IRA in opposing the Anglo–Irish Treaty but plays a characteristically maverick role throughout the treaty split. His independent attitude is heightened by his dislike of Liam Lynch, the republican IRA’s Chief of Staff, and his continuing respect for Michael Collins. He shows impatience at the long-drawn-out peace initiatives. In March 1922, therefore, he advocates armed confrontation with pro-treaty units over the occupation of barracks in Limerick, and on June 18 he submits a resolution, which only narrowly fails, at the army convention, giving British troops seventy-two hours to leave Dublin.
At the beginning of the Irish Civil War, Barry is arrested entering the Four Courts disguised as a woman. He escapes from an internment camp at Gormanston in early September 1922. For the rest of the war his actions mirror its confused nature. In late October 1922, he leads successful raids on the small towns of Ballineen and Enniskean, and later on Inchigeelagh and Ballyvourney. In December his column takes Carrick-on-Suir, demonstrating the weakness of the Free State army, but his talk of advancing on the Curragh and of large-scale actions does not materialise. There is no evidence that he is acting in accordance with any coordinated plan. By February 1923, he realises that the Republican IRA cause is hopeless and he is involved with Fr. Tom Duggan in efforts to get 1st Southern Division to declare a ceasefire. He journeys to Dublin to put pressure on the intransigent Lynch in this connection, telling Lynch, “I did more fighting in one week than you did in your whole life.”
Barry avoids capture in roundups after the war, remaining on the run until 1924. Unlike many republicans, he does not turn to constitutionalism, remaining strongly militaristic. He is always an unreconstructed republican, though by no means a naive one. In 1924 he becomes attached to Cleeves Milk Co., based in Limerick and Clonmel, and from 1927 to retirement in 1965 is general superintendent with the Cork harbour commissioners. He strongly advocates preserving the independence of the IRA army executive during the republican split of 1925–27. He is instrumental in continuing the drilling of IRA members and is a strong supporter of armed opposition to the Blueshirts.
During the 1930s Barry is arrested at various times for possession of arms and seditious utterances. He promotes an attack against a Freemasons’ meeting in Cork in 1936 and gives the orders for the killing on March 4 of that year of Vice-AdmiralHenry Boyle Somerville. He is opposed to the use by Frank Ryan of IRA volunteers to support the republican cause in the Spanish Civil War and to the proposals of Seán Russell for a bombing campaign in England. To maintain the link with traditional republicanism, he is elected IRA chief of staff in 1937. His plan, however, for the seizure of Armagh city, as part of a direct northern offensive, quickly collapses due to a leak of information, and he soon resigns his position. He forcefully attacks the bombing of English cities in 1938, regarding attacks on innocent civilians as immoral and counterproductive. He enlists in the National Army on July 12, 1940, only to be demobilised a month later. In 1946, he stands as an independent candidate in a by-election in the Cork Borough constituency, finishing at the bottom of the poll. He is more comfortable the following year touring the United States on an anti-partition platform.
In 1949 his Guerilla Days in Ireland is published. It proves a best-seller and has frequently been reprinted. It is well written in a forceful and direct style, one memoir needing no assistance from a ghost writer. Age does not mellow him: lawyers and bank managers are threatened by him over matters relating to his own column, and in 1974 he publishes a fierce pamphlet, angry at perceived slights in the Irish War of Independence memoir of Liam Deasy. He does strive to achieve a public reconciliation with Collins’s memory by unveiling the memorial to Collins at Sam’s Cross in 1966. On the outbreak of the Northern Ireland crisis in the late 1960s, he takes a militant line, castigating the argument that the Six Counties can be brought into the Republic by peaceful means, and asking when had peaceful means existed there. At the memorial meeting in Carrowkennedy, County Mayo, in 1971, he claims that there is a perfect right at the opportune time to take the Six Counties by force. He remains opposed to IRA bombing of civilian targets.
Barry dies in Cork on July 2, 1980. He is buried in St. Finbarr’s Cemetery, Cork. Early in the truce of 1921 he marries Leslie Price, one of the most active of Cumann na mBan members during and after the rising. They have no children.
While Barry always remains an influential figure in republican circles, he will be remembered best as the pioneer of guerrilla warfare, the hero of Kilmichael and Crossbarry. His military flair, individualism, and ruthlessness are well suited to the 1919–21 conflict. After that, his strained relations with colleagues and his lack of flexibility reduce his importance. While his life after the revolutionary era appears anti-climactic, he retains much of his charisma. In later years, he is ever willing to remind politicians and historians how far Ireland has retreated from republican ideals. He is often prickly and autocratic yet could be generous to old colleagues of either side of the treaty split. He is arguably the most intelligent but also the most intolerant of the revolutionary leaders.
(From: “Barry, Thomas Bernadine (‘Tom’)” by M. A. Hopkinson, Dictionary of Irish Biography, http://www.dib.ie, October 2009)
During World War I, the Royal Dublin Fusiliers expand to six additional battalions and see action on the Western Front, the Mediterranean, and the Middle East. The regiment suffers heavy casualties at battles such as LeCateau and the Gallipoli landings at Helles, where only 11 of 1,100 men survive the landing. Members of the regiment are awarded three Victoria Crosses for acts of bravery during the war.
Following the establishment of the Irish Free State in 1922, the Royal Dublin Fusiliers, along with four other southern Irish regiments, is disbanded. The regiment’s history and the service of its soldiers are commemorated by the Royal Dublin Fusiliers Association, which maintains archives, exhibitions, and digitised collections of letters and records from World War I. These archives provide insight into the experiences of Irish soldiers and the conditions they face on the front lines.
The regiment is remembered for its courage and sacrifice, with dedicated websites and museum collections preserving its history, medals, and personal accounts of soldiers. The Royal Dublin Fusiliers remain a significant part of Irish military heritage, reflecting both the contributions of Irish soldiers to the British Army and the complex history of Ireland during the early 20th century.
The train is returning from Belfast, where King George V has just opened the first Parliament of Northern Ireland on June 22. It is part of a heavy security escort for the King, including the 10th Royal Hussars (machine gun troop) and their horses, who have been stationed at the Curragh in County Meath. Three special trains have been arranged to bring them back to Dublin, but the third is attacked.
The IRA plants a mine or detonates a bomb that partially derails the train a mile north of Adavoyle Station, between Newry and Dundalk. The derailment causes ten carriages to be thrown across an embankment, killing and injuring many soldiers and horses.
At least three British soldiers are killed (including a sergeant and a private) and twenty are wounded, some of whom later die from their injuries. The train guard, Frank Gallagher, is killed and two other railway officials are seriously injured. Reports vary about the number of horses killed. Some say over 40 horses are killed while others claim as many as 100. Many horses are shot to prevent them from being captured or causing further casualties. Soldiers reportedly weep for their dead horses, as they had served together in World War I. A local farmer and a train guard are also shot dead in the aftermath.
The attack causes an outcry in Britain, highlighting the IRA’s ability to strike high-profile military convoys. The incident underscores the vulnerability of British forces returning from political events in Ireland and is one of several such attacks during the War of Independence.
The Adavoyle ambush is remembered as a symbolic and brutal act in the conflict, combining military casualties with the killing of animals that have been comrades in war. It also illustrates the IRA’s use of railways as a strategic target during the campaign.
Today, the Adavoyle railway station is in ruins, though the Belfast-Dublin line still passes the site.
The United Irish rebels, under Fr. John Murphy’s command, have been encamped on land belonging to a Mr. Donovan at the foot of Carrigrew Hill on June 2 and 3. This small respite from hostilities and marching affords the rebels some rest and time to re-group from previous skirmishes. Some of the rebels take leave to visit their families during these two days before re-joining the camp in advance of their move north toward Gorey.
On the morning of the June 4, Lieutenant-General Loftus and Lieutenant-Colonel Walpole march out of Gorey with 1,200 men with the intention of attacking the rebel encampment at Carrigrew Hill. Loftus leads his 600 men out the Ballycanew road to attack the camp from the east while Walpole heads due south via Clough to attack the camp on its northern side.
Having received advanced warnings of the British plans, the poorly equipped rebel army of 10,000 to 12,000 men sets out from Carrigrew Hill and marches through Ballyoughter on to Tubberneering. Their aim is to defeat the Crown forces in Gorey and release rebel prisoners that have been captured and imprisoned there.
On approaching Tubberneering, a vanguard of rebels is warned by a scouting party returning from Clough that the British forces are heading their way. The vanguard sets up an ambush with musketeers on top of the rock at Tubberneering and pikemen laying in wait inside the ditch along the road south of Cain bridge.
The battle is an ambush of a British force of 400 men under Lieutenant-Colonel Walpole, containing one troop of regular cavalry (the 4th Royal Irish Dragoon Guards) and militia and yeomanry auxiliaries. They are ambushed in a narrow defile by United Irish rebels, led by Fr. John Murphy. Walpole and one hundred men are killed, while the rest throw away their weapons and uniforms and flee. The regular dragoons make an attempt to fight back but are in a bad place for cavalry so they withdraw. This defeat allows three cannon to be captured which are subsequently used against British troops at the Battle of Arklow. The rebels are unable to take Arklow however. The day after the engagement at Tubberneering, the United Irishmen attempt to take New Ross in the south of County Wexford but are repulsed at a heavy cost.
The Battle of Naas is one of the early confrontations in the 1798 Irish Rebellion, which aims to end British rule in Ireland. On the night of May 23, 1798, a large group of rebels, primarily composed of United Irishmen, mobilize in County Kildare, preparing to attack the garrison in Naas, which is considered one of the strongest military positions in the area.
At approximately 2:30 a.m. on May 24, the rebels, led by Michael Reynolds, launches their assault from multiple directions. They initially achieved some success, pushing the garrison back to a barricade near the jail. However, the defenders, numbering around 250 men and equipped with artillery, manage to regroup and repel the attack.
The battle lasts about an hour, during which the rebels face heavy resistance. Ultimately, they are forced to retreat, suffering significant casualties—around 135 rebels are killed, while government forces lose about 25 men. The aftermath sees many rebels arrested, and the military pursues the fleeing insurgents, leading to further casualties among the retreating forces.
In a contemporary development, skeletal remains believed to be linked to the 1798 Rebellion are discovered in Naas in late September 2025. This site, known as Gallows Glen, is associated with executions during the rebellion, and the discovery sparks interest in the historical significance of the battle and its aftermath.
The Battle of Naas is a pivotal moment in the 1798 Rebellion, illustrating the fierce resistance of the rebels against British rule. The recent archaeological findings further highlight the ongoing historical interest in this event and its impact on Irish history. The battle remains a significant part of the narrative surrounding the struggle for Irish independence.
The siege of Enniskillen takes place at Enniskillen in Fermanagh, in present day Northern Ireland, in 1594 and 1595, during the Nine Years’ War. In February 1594, the English capture Enniskillen Castle from the Irish following a waterborne assault and massacre the defenders after they surrender. From May 1594, an Irish army under Hugh Maguire and Cormac MacBaron O’Neill besiege the English garrison in the castle, and in August they defeat an English relief force in the Battle of the Ford of the Biscuits. A second relief force is allowed to resupply the garrison, but the castle remains cut off. Eventually, in May 1595, the English garrison surrenders to the Irish and are then massacred.
Enniskillen Castle sits on the River Erne and commands the strategic bottleneck between Upper and Lower Lough Erne. On January 25, 1594, English Captain John Dowdall arrives at Enniskillen by boat with three infantry companies. They dig trenches in which they place light cannons and musketeers, but the cannons are too small to make much of an impact on the castle walls. On January 30, Captain George Bingham arrives with 300 men.
They launch a waterborne assault on the castle. While musketeers in boats and artillery on land fire at the castle, a large boat holding 67 men anchors at a vulnerable part of the walls. They make a breach in the wall with pickaxes, forcing the Irish to take shelter in the keep. Dowdall threatens to destroy the castle with gunpowder if the garrison does not surrender. An Irish witness claims there are 36 fighting men and 40 women and children in the castle, while Dowdall claims there are 200. After they surrender, Dowdall has them put to the sword and claims to have killed 150. Captain Thomas Lee, who is present, describes this as a great dishonor to the Queen as the defenders had surrendered “uppon composicion, And your majesties worde being past to the poore beggars that kept it, they were all notwithstandinge dishonourably putt to the sworde in a most miserable state.”
Dowdall writes on February 2 to the Lord Deputy of Ireland that he has captured the castle from the “rebel” Hugh Maguire. An English garrison is left in place. A detailed coloured illustration of the siege is made shortly after.
On May 17, 1594, now acting with the covert support of Hugh O’Neill, Earl of Tyrone, Hugh Maguire and Cormac MacBaron O’Neill lay siege to Enniskillen which is now isolated in hostile country. Their army consists of 1,400 foot soldiers and 600 horsemen. It quickly grows with support arriving from Hugh Roe O’Donnell. The English commander, James Eccarsall, has only 50 foot soldiers and 24 horsemen to defend the castle, along with some light artillery. Eccarsall launches a sortie by boat but has to retreat under heavy fire. Irish fortifications cut off access by river and the castle is attacked nightly. Many of the garrison fall sick due to food shortages and exhaustion brought on by incessant skirmishing with the Irish.
On August 7, Maguire and his allies defeat an English relief force for Enniskillen at the Battle of the Ford of the Biscuits. A second relief force commanded by the Lord Deputy of Ireland, William Russell, is sent by another route. Although it is not attacked by the Irish, none of Russell’s scouts or messengers reach the castle nor return. Russell relieves the beleaguered garrison by August 30 with six months supplies, then withdraws. Following this, there is a truce, but “subterfuge and deception were the hallmarks of this stage of the war.”
Maguire raises the clan and the castle is again attacked in January 1595 (Third Siege of Enniskillen). This time, forty selected men dressed in chain mail and armed with Lochaber axes attack at night. His men overrun the outer defences but the garrison holds out in the tower. The Irish withdraw but take with them the garrison’s three boats, preventing the English from patrolling the Erne and cutting them off.
The garrison’s plight is not lost on the authorities in Dublin, but the Crown does not have enough troops for a relief force, and Lord Deputy Russell considers withdrawing the garrison. A report to the Lord Deputy of Ireland suggests that Clan Maguire plans to bring down the walls with gunpowder. In May 1595, the garrison agrees to surrender Enniskillen to the Irish in exchange for their lives. However, the entire garrison is then massacred. Russell claims that the garrison had surrendered on terms to Cormac MacBaron O’Neill, who then reneged upon his word and had the surrendered garrison executed en masse. This is inconsistent with the treatment of other English garrisons, such as the Blackwater Fort, who are granted liberal terms to leave their position in February 1595. However, the Enniskillen garrison may also have been slain as retaliation for Dowdall’s similar violation of the surrender terms and massacre of Clan Maguire’s defenders of the castle and their families in the year before.
On July 1-2, 1915, in Gallipoli, Turkey, when, owing to hostile bombing, some of his troops had retired from a sap, Sergeant Somers remains alone there until a party brings up bombs. He then climbs over into the Turkish trench and bombs the Turks with great effect. Later on, he advances into the open under heavy fire and holds back the enemy by throwing bombs into their flank until a barricade has been established. During this period, he frequently runs to and from his trenches to obtain fresh supplies of bombs.
In a letter to his father, Somers writes:
“I beat the Turks out of our trench single-handed and had four awful hours at night. The Turks swarmed in from all roads, but I gave them a rough time of it, still holding the trench. It is certain sure we are beating the Turks all right. In the trench I came out of, it was shocking to see the dead. They lay, about three thousand Turks, in front of our trenches, and the smell was absolutely chronic. You know when the sun has been shining on those bodies for three or four days it makes a horrible smell; a person would not mind if it was possible to bury them. But no, you dare not put your nose outside the trench, and if you did, you would be a dead man.”
Somers had previously been severely wounded during the Retreat from Mons in August 1914.
Deasy is the third among six sons of William Deasy, seaman, and Mary Deasy (née Murray). He is educated locally at Ballinadee before leaving school at the age of thirteen to work in nearby Bandon.
During the Irish War of Independence (1919–21), Deasy is adjutant of the IRA’s 3rd Cork Brigade (West Cork). He serves under Tom Barry in one of the unit’s best known actions, the Crossbarry ambush in March 1921. His younger brother, Pat, dies in action at the Kilmichael ambush in November 1920, an engagement at which Deasy is not present. He also takes part in the Tooreen ambush.
Deasy opposes the Anglo-Irish Treaty. In the months that follow he tries to persuade Collins to renegotiate aspects of the treaty, especially to remove an oath to the British king from the constitution of the new Irish Free State. When fighting breaks out in Dublin in June 1922 between pro and anti-Treaty forces, he sides with the Anti-Treaty IRA in the ensuing Irish Civil War. However, he is reluctant to fight his former comrades and voices the opinion that the fighting should have ended with the Free State seizure of the Four Courts.
In late July 1922, Deasy commands 1,500 anti-Treaty fighters who hold a line around Kilmallock south of Limerick city against about 2,000 Free State troops under Eoin O’Duffy. His men are the most experienced IRA fighters of the 1919-21 war and hold their position until August 8, when they are outflanked by seaborne landings on the southern coast. His men then disperse. He goes on the run in the southeast of the country.
In August 1922, Deasy is in command of a band of republican guerrillas in West Cork when they hear that Collins is in the area. Deasy has his men prepare an ambush for Collins’ convoy at Béal na Bláth, should it return by the same route it had taken earlier.
Deasy and most of his men do not take part in the ambush as they had retired to a nearby pub, assuming that they had missed Collins. However, Collins arrives as the last of Deasy’s men are clearing the mine and barricade that had been erected on the road at Béal na Bláth. Collins is killed in the ensuing firefight. Deasy later writes in his memoirs that he profoundly regrets the death of his former commander.
In January 1923, by which time Deasy has become Deputy Chief of Staff of the IRA, he is captured by Free State forces near Clonmel, County Tipperary, and sentenced to death. He is aware that the newly formed government plans on wholesale executions and knows that the IRA will retaliate with reprisals. He decides that it is now time to end the war. He signs a document (written by his captors) ordering the men under his command to surrender themselves and their arms to the government. He is spared execution. On the day that his order is published, Free State authorities demand that the prisoners in a jail in Limerick sign a statement agreeing to unconditional surrender, threatening wholescale executions to those who refused. Some republicans denounce Deasy as a traitor and a coward for this action, but he argues in his book, Brother against Brother, that he was opposed to continuing the civil war anyway and would have called on republicans to surrender whether or not he had been captured.
Deasy takes no further part in politics following the end of the Irish Civil War. In 1924, he sets up a business making weatherproof textiles. On November 24, 1927, he marries Margaret Mary O’Donoghue. They have three daughters together.
During The Emergency, Deasy serves in the Irish Army from 1940 to 1945, reaching the rank of commandant. He later writes two memoirs about his experiences during the revolutionary period: Toward Ireland Free and Brother against Brother, the latter being published after his death.
Deasy dies at St. Anne’s Hospital, Northbrook Road, Dublin, on August 20, 1974. He is buried in Bohernabreena Cemetery in Dublin.
The Clogheen Ambush takes place in the early morning of March 23, 1921, as six members of “C” Company, First Battalion, 1st Cork Brigade of the Irish Republican Army (IRA) are shot by a party of Black and Tans and Royal Irish Constabulary (RIC) at a farm at Ballycannon, Clogheen, just outside Cork, County Cork, during the Irish War of Independence. The IRA believes that they have been betrayed by Patrick ‘Cruxy’ Connor. Connor has returned to Cork after the Coolavokig Ambush, which had taken place on February 25. Once in Cork he is soon arrested by the RIC for the possession of a revolver. The IRA believes that Connors broke down under interrogation and betrayed them.
Cornelius O’Keefe farms 105 acres at Ballycannon, on the road leading from Clogheen to Tower. His house is a known ”safe house” where volunteers can shelter when it is unsafe for them to sleep at home. On the farm there are secure hiding places for the guns and explosives with which they carry out their missions.
At 4:00 a.m on the morning of Wednesday, March 23, O’Keefe is awakened by the arrival of a large force of police. They break down the farm door with blows from their rifle butts. The family is ordered back to the bedrooms and the house is thoroughly searched. The British then search the farmyard, where six volunteers are discovered asleep in a barn.
A local schoolteacher whose house overlooks the two fields outside the barn is awakened by the sound of gunshots at about 4:30 a.m., while it is still quite dark. He watches the lights moving around the farmyard. He hears one voice scream out and another shout “run for it.” He can barely see a man breaking away and running across the field. A volley of shots ring out and the man falls. Another man with a light walks toward the body. After ten minutes there are more shots but this time he sees nobody fall. Later he sees another man fleeing and more shots ring out. As the light increases, he identifies the men with guns as police. Later he watches as the police bring down bodies in blankets and lay them outside the house in the boreen, which leads from the O’Keeffe farmyard to the public road. Around 6:00 a.m. the bodies are placed in lorries which then drive away.
Meanwhile Cornelius O’Keeffe, the farm owner, is brought across the field where he sees five bodies laid out in blankets. He watches as they are placed in the lorries. In his sworn deposition he states that a sixth man is then brought out blindfolded, still alive, and is also put in the lorry. O’Keefe is put in a third lorry, which follows the other two to Victoria Barracks. There the first two lorries speed off and he loses sight of them. He is imprisoned in a cell in the Barracks and is kept there until on April 17, when he is finally released without charge.
The six IRA men killed are:
Daniel Crowley, aged 23. occupation plasterer, of 171 Blarney Street, Cork
William Deasy, aged 20, of Mount Desert , Blarney Road, Cork
Thomas Dennehy, aged 21, of 104 Blarney Street, Cork
Daniel Murphy, aged 24. occupation pig buyer, of Orrery Hill, off Blarney Street , Cork
Jeremiah O’Mullane, aged 23, of 237 Blarney Street, Cork
Michael O’Sullivan, aged 20 of 281 Blarney Street ,Cork
(From: “Ballycannon, Clogheen – IRA ambushed by the British – 23 Mar 1921,” posted on http://www.theauxiliaries.com | Pictured: The Clogheen Ambush Memoral in County Cork)
seamus dubhghaill 