seamus dubhghaill

Promoting Irish Culture and History from Little Rock, Arkansas, USA

Tag Archives: Irish Republican Army


by Leave a comment

Birth of Roger McCorley, Irish Republican Activist

Roger McCorley, Irish republican activist, is born into a Roman Catholic family at 67 Hillman Street in Belfast on September 6, 1901.

McCorley is one of three children born to Roger Edmund McCorley, a meat carver in a hotel, and Agnes Liggett. He has two elder brothers, Vincent and Felix. He joins the Fianna in his teens. His family has a very strong republican tradition, and he claims to be the great-grandson of the United Irishmen folk hero Roddy McCorley, who was executed for his part in the Irish Rebellion of 1798.

McCorley is a member of the Belfast Brigade of the Irish Republican Army (IRA) during the Irish War of Independence (1919–1922). He is commandant of the Brigade’s first battalion, eventually becoming Commandant of the Belfast Brigade. In June 1920, he is involved in an attack on a Royal Irish Constabulary (RIC) police barracks at Crossgar, County Down. On Sunday, August 22, 1920, in Lisburn, he is involved in the assassination of RIC District Inspector Oswald Swanzy, who was held responsible by Michael Collins for the assassination of Tomás McCurtain, Lord Mayor of Cork.

McCorley is noted for his militancy, as he is in favour of armed attacks on British forces in Belfast. The Brigade’s leaders, by contrast, in particular, Joe McKelvey, are wary of sanctioning attacks for fear of loyalist reprisals on republicans and the Catholic population in general. In addition, McCorley is in favour of conducting an armed defense of Catholic areas, whereas McKelvey does not want the IRA to get involved in what he considers to be sectarian violence. McCorley writes later that in the end, “the issue settled itself within a very short space of time, when the Orange mob was given uniforms, paid for by the British, and called the Ulster Special Constabulary (USC).” The role of the USC, a temporary police force raised for counter-insurgency purposes, in the conflict is still debated, but republicans maintain that the organization was responsible for the indiscriminate killings of Catholics and nationalists.

On January 26, 1921, McCorley, is involved in the fatal shooting of three Auxiliary Division officers in their beds in the Railway View hotel in central Belfast. Shortly afterwards, he and another IRA man, Seamus Woods, organize an active service unit (ASU) within the first battalion of the Belfast Brigade, with the intention of carrying out attacks, with or without the approval of the Brigade leadership. The unit consists of 32 men. McCorley later writes, “I issued a general order that, where reprisal gangs [State forces] were cornered, no prisoners were to be taken.” In March 1921, he personally leads the ASU in the killing of three Black and Tans in Victoria Street in central Belfast. He is responsible for the deaths of two more Auxiliaries in Donegall Place in April. In reprisal for these shootings, members of the RIC assassinate two republican activists, the Duffin brothers in Clonard Gardens in west Belfast. On June 10, 1921, both and Woods and McCorley units are involved in the killing a RIC man who is suspected in the revenge killings of the Duffin brothers. Two RIC men and a civilian are also wounded in that attack.

Thereafter, there is what historian Robert Lynch has described as a “savage underground war” between McCorley’s ASU and RIC personnel based in Springfield Road barracks and led by an Inspector Ferris. Ferris is accused of murdering the Lord Mayor of Cork Thomas MacCurtain and had been posted to Lisburn for his safety. Ferris himself is among the casualties, being shot in the chest and neck, but surviving. McCorley claims to have been one of the four IRA men who shot Ferris. In addition, his men bomb and burn a number of businesses including several cinemas and a Reform Club. In May 1921, however, thirteen of his best men are arrested when surrounded by British troops during an operation in County Cavan. They are held in Crumlin Road Gaol and sentenced to death.

On June 3, McCorley organizes an attack on Crumlin Road Gaol in an attempt to rescue the IRA men held there before they are executed. The operation is not a success; however, the condemned men are reprieved after a truce is agreed between the IRA and British forces in July 1921. On Bloody Sunday (July 10, 1921), he is a major leader in the defense of nationalist areas from attacks by both the police and loyalists. On that day twenty people are killed before he negotiates a truce beginning at noon on July 11. At least 100 people are wounded, about 200 houses are destroyed or badly damaged – most of them Catholic homes, leaving 1,000 people homeless.

In April 1922, McCorley becomes leader of the IRA Belfast Brigade after Joe McKelvey goes south to Dublin to join other IRA members who are against the Anglo-Irish Treaty. With McKelvey’s departure, Seamus Woods becomes Officer Commanding of the IRA’s 3rd Northern Division, which has up to 1,000 members, with McCorley designated as Vice Officer Commanding. McCorley for his part, supports the Treaty, despite the fact that it provides for the partition of Ireland and the continued British rule in Northern Ireland. The reason for this is that Michael Collins and Eoin O’Duffy have assured him that this is only a tactical move and indeed, Collins sends men, money and weapons to the IRA in the North throughout 1922.

However, McCorley’s command sees the collapse of the Belfast IRA. In May 1922, the IRA launches an offensive with attacks all across Northern Ireland. In Belfast, he carries out an assault on Musgrave Street RIC barracks. He also conducts an arson campaign on businesses in Belfast. His men also carry out a number of assassinations, including that of Ulster Unionist Party MP William J. Twaddell, which causes the internment of over 200 Belfast IRA men.

To escape from the subsequent repression, McCorley and over 900 Northern IRA men flee south, to the Irish Free State, where they are housed in the Curragh. McCorley is put in command of these men. In June 1922, the Irish Civil War breaks out between Pro and Anti-Treaty elements of the IRA. He takes the side of the Free State and Michael Collins. After Collins is killed in August 1922, his men are stood down. About 300 of them join the National Army and are sent to County Kerry to put down anti-Treaty guerrillas there. In the Spring of 1923, bitterly disillusioned by the brutal counterinsurgency against fellow republicans, he resigns his command.

McCorley later asserts that he “hated the Treaty” and only supported it because it allowed Ireland to have its own armed forces. Both he and Seamus Woods are severe critics of the Irish Free State inertia towards Northern Ireland after the death of Michael Collins. He comments that when Collins was killed “the Northern element gave up all hope.”

In 1936 McCorley is instrumental in the establishment of the All-Ireland Old IRA Men’s Organization, serving as Vice-President with President Liam Deasy (Cork No. 3 Brigade) and Secretary George Lennon (Waterford No. 2 Brigade).

In the 1940s, McCorley is a founding member of Córas na Poblachta, a political party which aspires to a United Ireland and economic independence from Britain. He dies on November 13, 1993, and is buried in the Republican Plot of Glasnevin Cemetery.


by Leave a comment

Death of Joseph McGarrity, Irish American Political Activist

Joseph McGarrity, Irish American political activist best known for his leadership in Clan na Gael in the United States and his support of Irish republicanism back in Ireland, dies of cancer on September 4, 1940.

McGarrity is born on March 28, 1874, in Carrickmore, County Tyrone. His family grows up in poverty, motivating his need to immigrate later in life. He grows up hearing his father discussing Irish politics, including topics such as the Fenians, the Irish Parliamentary Party (IPP), and Irish Home Rule. By the time he is an adult, he has developed a keen interest in politics himself.

McGarrity immigrates to the United States in 1892 at the age of 18. He is reputed to have walked to Dublin before boarding a cattle boat to Liverpool disguised as a drover, and then sailing to the United States using a ticket belonging to someone else. He settles in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and becomes successful in the liquor business. His business fails, however, on three occasions, twice due to embezzlement by his business partner.

In 1893 McGarrity joins Clan na Gael, an Irish organisation based in the United States committed to aiding the establishment of an independent Irish state. Clan na Gael had been heavily involved with the Fenian Brotherhood that McGarrity had grown up hearing about, and by the latter half of the 19th century had become a sister organisation of the Irish Republican Brotherhood (IRB). In the decade just before McGarrity joins, Clan na Gael and the Fenian movement had waged the Fenian dynamite campaign, where they attempted to force the British state to make concessions in Ireland by bombing British infrastructure. However, this had caused a split within Clan na Gael that is not mended until seven years after McGarrity joins when, in 1900, the factions reunite and plead to support “the complete independence of the Irish people, and the establishment of an Irish republic.” In the years that follow the 1880s and 1890s, he is, amongst others, credited with helping to stitch the organisation back together and bring it renewed strength.

McGarrity helps sponsor several Irish Race Conventions and founds and runs a newspaper called The Irish Press from 1918-22 that supports the Irish War of Independence. He is the founder of the Philadelphia chapter of Clan Na Gael.

During World War I, while the United States is still neutral, McGarrity is involved in the Hindu–German Conspiracy. He arranges the Annie Larsen arms purchase and shipment from New York to San Diego for India.

When Éamon de Valera arrives in the United States in 1919 they strike up an immediate rapport and McGarrity manages de Valera’s tour of the country. He persuades de Valera of the benefits of supporting him and the Philadelphia branch against the New York branch of the Friends of Irish Freedom organisation led by John Devoy and Judge Daniel F. Cohalan. He becomes president of the American Association for the Recognition of the Irish Republic. He christens his newborn son Éamon de Valera McGarrity, although their relationship becomes strained upon de Valera’s entry back into Dáil Éireann in the Irish Free State.

McGarrity opposes the Anglo-Irish Treaty and travels to Dublin in 1922 and assists the development of the short-lived Collins/De Valera Pact by bringing de Valera and Michael Collins together before the 1922 Irish general election.

The Irish Civil War sees a split in Clan na Gael just as it had split Sinn Féin back in Ireland. McGarrity and a minority of Clan na Gael members support the anti-treaty side but a majority support the pro-treaty side, including John Devoy and Daniel Cohalan. Furthermore, in October 1920 Harry Boland informs the Clan na Gael leadership that the IRB will be cutting their ties to the Clan unless the IRB is given more influence over their affairs. Devoy and Cohalan resist this, but McGarrity sees the Clan’s connection with the IRB as vital. While McGarrity’s faction is initially labelled “Reorganised Clan na Gael,” they are able to inherit total control of the Clan na Gael name as Devoy is not able to keep effective organisation of the group. In general, however, the in-fighting amongst the Irish on both sides of the Atlantic is quite disheartening for Irish Americans and in the years to come neither pro nor anti-treaty sides of Clan na Gael see much in the way of donations.

With the scope of Clan na Gael now narrowed, and Devoy and Cohalan removed from the picture, McGarrity becomes chairman of the organisation. He does not support the founding of Fianna Fáil in 1926 and opposes the party’s entry into the Dáil in 1927. Even after the Irish Civil War, he still supports the idea that a 32-county Irish Republic can be achieved through force. in the spring of 1926, he receives Chief of Staff of the Irish Republican Army Andrew Cooney to the United States. Cooney and Clan na Gael formally agree that each organisation will support the other and that Clan na Gael will raise funds, purchase weapons and build support for the IRA in the United States.

Going into the late 1920s though Clan na Gael, as are most Irish American organisations, is struggling. Having limped past the split caused by the Irish Civil War, the rejection of Fianna Fáil has caused a second split in the membership. Many Irish Americans see the IRA and Fianna Fáil as one and the same at that point and Clan na Gael and McGarrity’s hostility to them causes much friction.

By July 1929, the Clan’s membership in one of its strongholds, New York City, is down to just 620 paid members. Then in October of that same year Wall Street crashes and the Great Depression hits. In 1933 McGarrity is left almost bankrupt after he is found guilty of “false bookkeeping entries.” His livelihood is saved when he becomes one of the main ticket agents in the United States for the Irish Hospitals’ Sweepstake. He is a personal friend of Joseph McGrath, one of the founders of the Sweepstake. The sweepstakes allow him to turn his fortunes around.

Despite the trying times of both Clan na Gael and his personal life, McGarrity holds fast in his belief in physical force Irish Republicanism. In 1939 he supports the demand from Seán Russell for the “S-Plan” bombing campaign in Britain, which proves disastrous. He allegedly meets Hermann Göring in Berlin in 1939 to ask for aid for the IRA, which leads indirectly to “Plan Kathleen.”

McGarrity is a lifelong friend of fellow Carrickmore native and avid Republican, Patrick McCartan. When he dies on September 4, 1940 a mass is held in the St. Mary’s Pro-Cathedral in Dublin. He remains an unrepentant physical force republican all his life. A number of McGarrity’s papers are in the National Library of Ireland. He donates his personal Library to Villanova University.

The IRA signs all its statements ‘J.J. McGarrity’ until 1969 when the organisation splits into the ‘Official‘ and ‘Provisional‘ movements. Thereafter the term continues to be used by the Officials while the Provisionals adopt the moniker ‘P.O’Neill.’


by Leave a comment

Death of John Ford, Irish American Film Director

John Ford, American film director of Irish descent and one of the most important and influential filmmakers of his generation, dies in Palm Desert, California, on August 31, 1973.

Ford is born John Martin Feeney on February 1, 1894, at Cape Elizabeth, Maine. He is the fourth son among five sons and six daughters of Seán Feeney, Roman Catholic farmer and saloonkeeper, and Barbara ‘Abby’ Feeney (née Curran). His father had emigrated to the United States from Spiddal, County Galway, and his mother from Kilronan, Inishmore, one of the Aran Islands.

From an early age Ford has an interest in painting and sailing, and in July 1914 moves to California, where his older brother Francis is an actor with a small film company. Adopting the name ‘Jack Ford,’ he learns his trade as a filmmaker and acts in a number of silent films. Reveling in his Irish heritage, he makes his director’s debut with The Tornado (1917) and follows it with more than forty movies over the next six years. On July 3, 1920, he marries Mary McBryde Smith, a former officer in the army medical corps. They meet at a party thrown by the director Rex Ingram and have one son and one daughter.

In 1921 Ford visits Ireland for the first time and later claims to have travelled on the same boat that brought Michael Collins back from the treaty negotiations. He meets his relatives at Spiddal, falls in love with the countryside, and becomes a fervent Irish nationalist. It is later claimed that he brought over funds for his cousin Martin Feeney, a member of an Irish Republican Army (IRA) flying column.

Returning to Hollywood, Ford becomes friends with the retired marshal Wyatt Earp and makes a number of commercially successful films, now as ‘John Ford’. In 1926 he directs The Shamrock Handicap, a horse-racing yarn partly set in Ireland. In 1928 he shoots Mother Machree, a movie about Irish emigration, starring Victor McLaglen, a regular collaborator. McLaglen also stars in Hangman’s House, made the same year, Ford’s first major movie about Ireland.

In 1934 Ford purchases a luxury yacht which he names the Araner after the Aran Islands. He also begins shooting The Informer, a film set in Ireland during the Irish War of Independence and based on a short novel by Liam O’Flaherty. The picture is a major box office success and wins four Academy Awards, including Best Director. O’Flaherty is so impressed with the film that he dedicates his next book, Famine, to Ford.

In 1934 Ford visits Ireland for the second time, and approaches Seán O’Casey about directing a version of The Plough and the Stars. Released in 1936, the film stars Barry Fitzgerald as Fluther, but it is reedited by the studio, much to Ford’s fury, and is a commercial and critical flop.

Stagecoach, shot in 1938, is one of Ford’s masterpieces. It was a western starring his protégé, John Wayne, and marks the beginning of his golden decade. In 1940 and 1941 he wins Best Director Oscars successively for The Grapes of Wrath and How Green Was My Valley. With American entry into World War II, he serves in the U.S. Navy, and makes important documentaries such as The Battle of Midway (1942).

In 1952 Ford returns to Ireland to film The Quiet Man, starring Wayne, McLaglen, and Maureen O’Hara. Shot at Ashford Castle, County Mayo, the picture becomes one of the most popular Irish films of all time. He is immensely proud of the work and is in tears leaving Ireland. The following year he makes Mogambo, with Clark Gable, Grace Kelly and a young English actor, Donald Sinden, who later recalls that Ford berated him personally for all the problems of Ireland from the time of William of Orange. Ford’s strong sense of Irishness is central to his character and is crucial for any understanding of his work. Back in Ireland in 1956, he shoots The Rising of the Moon, a portmanteau film for which he takes no salary, starring Tyrone Power, Cyril Cusack, and Noel Purcell. A minor film, it makes no impact at the box office.

Two of Ford’s finest movies are made in his later years. The Searchers (1956) is a powerful study of vengeance, while The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance (1962) is an elegiac revisionist western which concludes with the famous line, “When the legend becomes fact, print the legend.”

Struck with cancer in his final years, Ford dies on August 31, 1973 at his home in Palm Desert, California, and is buried at Holy Cross Cemetery, Culver City. His will disinherits his son, Michael Patrick Roper, and leaves everything to his wife, daughter, and grandchildren.

When asked to name the finest American directors, Orson Welles replies simply, “John Ford, John Ford, and John Ford.” An alcoholic, Ford is a difficult and often tyrannical director, but he makes films of extraordinary power and vision. He ranks as one of the greatest filmmakers of the twentieth century. As Frank Capra concludes, “John is half-tyrant, half-revolutionary; half-saint, half-Satan; half-possible, half-impossible; half-genius, half-Irish.”

(From: “Ford, John,” contributed by Patrick M. Geoghegan, Dictionary of Irish Biography, http://www.dib.ie)


by Leave a comment

Birth of Seán MacEntee, Fianna Fáil Politician

Seán Francis MacEntee (Irish: Seán Mac an tSaoi), Fianna Fáil politician, is born as John McEntee at 47 King Street, Belfast, on August 23, 1889. He serves as Tánaiste (1959-65), Minister for Social Welfare (1957-61), Minister for Health (1957-65), Minister for Local Government and Public Health (1941-48), Minister for Industry and Commerce (1939-41), and Minister for Finance (1932-39 and 1951-54). He serves as a Teachta Dála (TD) from 1918 to 1969.

MacEntee is the son of James McEntee, a publican, and his wife, Mary Owens, both of whom are from Monaghan. James McEntee is a prominent Nationalist member of Belfast Corporation and a close friend of Joseph Devlin MP.

MacEntee is educated at St. Mary’s Christian Brothers’ Grammar School, St. Malachy’s College and the Belfast Municipal College of Technology where he qualifies as an electrical engineer. His early political involvement is with the Irish Socialist Republican Party in Belfast. He quickly rises through the ranks of the trade union movement becoming junior representative in the city’s shipyards. Following his education, he works as an engineer in Dundalk, County Louth, and is involved in the establishment of a local corps of the Irish Volunteers in the town. He mobilises in Dundalk and fights in the General Post Office garrison in the Easter Rising in 1916. He is sentenced to death for his part in the rising. This sentence is later commuted to life imprisonment. He is released in the general amnesty in 1917 and is later elected a member of the National Executives of both Sinn Féin and the Irish Volunteers in October 1917. He is later elected Sinn Féin Member of Parliament (MP) for South Monaghan at the 1918 Irish general election.

An attempt to develop MacEntee’s career as a consulting engineer in Belfast is interrupted by the Irish War of Independence in 1919. He serves as Vice-Commandant of the Belfast Brigade of the Irish Republican Army (IRA). He is also a member of the Volunteer Executive, a sort of Cabinet and Directory for the Minister for Defence and the HQ Staff, however, he remains one of the few Sinn Féiners from the north. On August 6, 1920, he presents ‘a Memorial’ lecture to the Dáil from the Belfast Corporation. He tells the Dáil it is the only custodian of public order, that a Nationalist pogrom is taking place, and he advises them to fight Belfast. The Dáil government’s policy is dubbed Hibernia Irredenta or “Greening Ireland.” He is asked to resign his South Monaghan seat after voting against a bunting celebration in Lurgan to mark the signing of the Anglo-Irish Treaty.

In April 1921 MacEntee is transferred to Dublin to direct a special anti-partition campaign in connection with the May general election. It remains Michael Collins‘s policy, he declares, that the largely Protestant shipyard workers of Belfast are being directed by the British, urging all Irishmen to rejoin the Republic. Correspondingly the Ulster Unionist Council rejects the call for a review of the boundary commission decision made on Northern Ireland. But when Ulstermen choose James Craig as Premier, Collins denounces democracy in the north as a sham. It is on the partition of Ireland issue that MacEntee votes against the Anglo-Irish Treaty of 1921. During the subsequent Irish Civil War, he commands the IRA unit in Marlboro Street Post Office in Dublin. He later fights with Cathal Brugha in the Hamman Hotel and is subsequently interned in Kilmainham and Gormanstown until December 1923.

After his release from prison, MacEntee devotes himself more fully to his engineering practice, although he unsuccessfully contests the Dublin County by-election of 1924. He becomes a founder-member of Fianna Fáil in 1926 and is eventually elected a TD for Dublin County at the June 1927 Irish general election.

MacEntee founds the Association of Patent Agents in 1929, having gained his interest in Patents when he worked as an assistant engineer in Dundalk Urban District Council. He values his status as a Patent Agent as he maintains his name on the Register for over 30 years while he holds Ministerial rank in the Irish Government, although he is not believed to have taken any active part in the patent business, which is carried on by his business partners.

In 1932, Fianna Fáil comes to power for the very first time, with MacEntee becoming Minister for Finance. In keeping with the party’s protectionist economic policies his first budget in March of that year sees the introduction of new duties on 43 imports, many of them coming from Britain. This sees retaliation from the British government, which in turn provokes a response from the Irish government. This is the beginning of the Anglo-Irish Trade War between the two nations, however, a treaty in 1938, signed by MacEntee and other senior members brings an end to the issue.

In 1939, World War II breaks out and a cabinet reshuffle results in MacEntee being appointed as Minister for Industry and Commerce, taking over from his rival Seán Lemass. During his tenure at this department, he introduces the important Trade Union Act (1941). In 1941, another reshuffle of ministers takes place, with him becoming Minister for Local Government and Public Health. The Health portfolio is transferred to a new Department of Health in 1947. Following the 1948 Irish general election, Fianna Fáil returns to the opposition benches for the first time in sixteen years.

In 1951, Fianna Fáil are back in government, although in minority status, depending on independent deputies for survival. MacEntee once again returns to the position of Minister for Finance where he feels it is vital to deal with the balance of payments deficit. He brings in a harsh budget in 1951 which raises income tax and tariffs on imports. His chief aim is to cut spending and reduce imports, however, this comes at a cost as unemployment increases sharply. The increases are retained in his next two budgets in 1952 and 1953. It is often said that it is his performance during this period that costs Fianna Fáil the general election in 1954. The poor grasp on economics also does his political career tremendous damage as up to that point he is seen as a likely successor as Taoiseach. Seán Lemass, however, is now firmly seen as the “heir apparent.”

In 1957, Fianna Fáil returns to power with an overall majority with MacEntee being appointed Minister for Health. The financial and economic portfolios are dominated by Lemass and other like-minded ministers who want to move away from protection to free trade. He is credited during this period with the reorganisation of the health services, the establishment of separate departments of health and social welfare, and the fluoridation of water supplies in Ireland. In 1959, he becomes Tánaiste when Seán Lemass is elected Taoiseach.

Following the 1965 Irish general election, MacEntee is 76 years old and retires from the government. He re-emerges in 1966 to launch a verbal attack on Seán Lemass for deciding to step down as party leader and Taoiseach. The two men, however, patch up their differences shortly afterwards. MacEntee retires from Dáil Éireann in 1969 at the age of 80, making him the oldest TD in Irish history.

MacEntee dies in Dublin on January 9, 1984, at the age of 94. He is buried in Glasnevin Cemetery, Dublin. At the time of his death, he is the last surviving member of the First Dáil.


by Leave a comment

Death of Éamonn Mac Thomáis, Irish Republican Author & Historian

Éamonn Mac Thomáis, author, broadcaster, historian, Irish Republican, advocate of the Irish language and lecturer, dies on August 16, 2002. He presents his own series on Dublin on RTÉ during the 1970s and is well known for guided tours and lectures of his beloved Dublin.

Mac Thomáis comes from a staunch Republican family. He is born Edward Patrick Thomas in the Dublin suburb of Rathmines on January 13, 1927. His father, a fire-brigade officer, dies when he is five years old and his family moves to Goldenbridge, Inchicore. He leaves school at thirteen to work as delivery boy for White Heather Laundry, learning Dublin neighbourhoods with great thoroughness. He says he found work to help his mother pay the rent. He later works as a clerk and is appointed credit controller for an engineering firm.

Mac Thomáis joins the Dublin Brigade of the Irish Republican Army as a young man and is active in the preparations for and prosecution of the 1956-62 border campaign. He is interned in Curragh Camp during the campaign and in December 1961 is sentenced to four months imprisonment under the Offences Against the State Act.

At the November 1959 Ardfheis Mac Thomáis is elected to the Ardchomhairle of Sinn Féin and edits and contributes to the Sinn Féin newspaper United Irishman. He is a close friend of Tomás Mac Giolla and is deeply affected by the 1970 split in Sinn Féin. He takes the Provisional side, opposing Mac Giolla.

Mac Thomáis takes over as editor of An Phoblacht in 1972. In July 1973, he is arrested and charged with IRA membership at the Special Criminal Court in Dublin. He refuses to recognise the court, but he gives a lengthy address from the dock. The following month he is sentenced to 15-months imprisonment. Within two months of completing his sentence he is again before the court on the same charge and again receives a 15-month sentence. Editors of six left-wing and Irish-language journals call for his release, as do a number of writers, and hundreds attend protest meetings – to no avail. He serves his full sentence.

Tim Pat Coogan, editor of The Irish Press, claims the charges against Mac Thomáis are politically motivated to a large degree as his activities are confined strictly to the newspaper An Phoblacht. Under Section 31 of the Broadcasting Act, due to his membership in Sinn Féin in the 1970s he is removed from his position in making some of the RTÉ historical programmes. As a historian he makes numerous contributions to various historical publications such as the Dublin Historical Review.

From 1974 Mac Thomáis writes a number of books on old Dublin. They sell well and remain in print for over 20 years. He also starts a number of walking tours of Dublin, which prove very popular.

Mac Thomáis dies in Dublin on August 16, 2002. He is buried in the republican plot in Dublin’s Glasnevin Cemetery, next to Frank Ryan.

Mac Thomáis’s son Shane, also a historian, runs similar walking tours and is resident historian at Glasnevin Cemetery before his death in 2014.


by Leave a comment

The Holywell Ambush

The Holywell Ambush is an ambush on the Ballyhaunis to Claremorris road near Holywell in the early hours of Monday, August 2, 1920, carried out by the Irish Republican Army (IRA) during the Irish War of Independence. Approximately 20 local IRA volunteers commanded by Patrick Kenny attack a British Military outpost that is guarding a broken down lorry.

A large lorry transporting petrol which is part of a British military convoy travelling from Claremorris towards Ballyhaunis comes off the road on the Claremorris-Ballyhaunis road near Holywell on Saturday, July 31, 1920. The driver of the lorry loses control and crashes off the road into the bog below. The lorry sinks somewhat and is stuck in the bog. A military guard of between 12-20 British soldiers from the 2nd Battalion Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders, who are garrisoned in the old workhouse in Claremorris, is placed on the lorry while the rest of the convoy continues on their journey.

The soldiers set up camp in a little old, abandoned house nearby, throwing a large tarpaulin over the roof of the house for shelter. They place two sentries on the road while the rest of the guard retires to the abandoned house where they light a fire in the ruin’s fireplace. Martin Forkhan, a local IRA volunteer, happens upon the scene of the crashed lorry and immediately notifies the Ballyhaunis Battalion Commandant, Patrick Kenny, of the situation. Kenny issues instructions to mobilise all officers in the Ballyhaunis Battalion area.

On that same night, a train leaving Ballyhaunis towards Westport is held up by armed and masked men not far from the military encampment. A unit of 25 IRA men under the command of Capt. Martin Forde take control of the train after firing a number of warning shots. The IRA then removes steel shutters destined for Westport Royal Irish Constabulary (RIC) Barracks and bury them in the bog nearby. The steel shutters are part of a program of fortification of RIC Barracks country-wide. Some of these men then mobilise with the other IRA officers gathering at Holywell Wood, where arrangements are made for an attempt to overpower and disarm the soldiers guarding the crashed lorry.

The assembled IRA, approximately 40 strong, march to the site of the military encampment where they take up positions. The volunteers are unsure of the size of the British force guarding the lorry, as all they can see is one sentry. An IRA officer approaches the sentry and asks for a light for a cigarette. The sentry sends him into the camp. As he lights his cigarette from the camp fire he looks around and counts 18 rifles present. It is then presumed that there are roughly 18 soldiers at the encampment. Cmdt. Kenny mades a plan and orders an attack, but as the IRA volunteers are crawling through the fields toward their assigned positions to surround the encampment, a line of motorcars appears on the Claremorris road. The headlights from the motorcars would have exposed the positions taken up by the IRA, so due to their poor positions, the delay in organising a plan and the coming dawn, it is decided that the attack is to be postponed until the following night.

The next day, Sunday, August 1, 1920, a section of men under the command of Capt. Patrick McNieve is positioned near the site of the encampment to keep it under observation while the officers mobilise the entire battalion. On this day, there are sports taking place in Aghamore and many of the battalions volunteers gather in that area so are easily located. Back at Holywell, scouts are posted on the surrounding roads to notify of any advancing British reinforcements and a trench has been dug across the road to delay any traffic from getting by. During the day, members of Cumann na mBán assist in transferring ammunition from arms dumps to the ambush site. That night, with all available men in the battalion area mobilised, the IRA assembles once more and organises a plan of attack. Orders are issued, they manoeuvre into their assigned positions and wait. D Coy (Brackloon) proceeds to their positions between Ballyhaunis and Holywell where they are on outpost duty guarding the road about half a mile from the ambush site. The IRA officers decide that while the soldiers in the camp sleep, some volunteers will attempt to sneak into the camp and take their weapons. Cmdt. Patrick Kenny leads a small ambush party of about 20 men and creeps into the camp at approximately 3:00 a.m. They are armed with shotguns and revolvers. A further 188 IRA men, many of them unarmed, from the Battalion are on scouting, road trenching, sentry and outpost duties in the surrounding district.

The ambush party successfully infiltrates the camp without alerting the sentries and Cmdt. Kenny manages to gather up five or six rifles that are stacked together. But as he is leaving the camp, the alarm is raised and the British soldiers begin to awaken. The IRA shouts a demand for the British military guard to surrender but when no surrender comes, the IRA opens fire. Three British soldiers are badly wounded in the opening salvo. One takes a full shotgun blast to his back, another has a portion of his arm blown off and the third is badly wounded in the leg. With three of their men knocked out, the British soldiers organise their defence and return fire on the IRA. The IRA ambush party retreats to positions behind a fence where they maintain constant fire on the camp. A fierce gun battle ensues. In the darkness, as Cmdt. Kenny retreats with the rifles in his arms, he is caught in the crossfire and severely wounded in the left arm and face by a shotgun blast from one of his own men. He falls from his wounds and drops the rifles he had been carrying. Capt. Martin Forde and several other officers run to Kenny’s aid. Forde and his comrades are able to carry Kenny to safety. The battle continues on for about an hour and before dawn, just as the military guard seems about to surrender, two lorries of British reinforcements come from Claremorris to their assistance. The British reinforcements open fire from their lorries on the outposts as they encounter those who return fire with their shotguns. With the IRA running low on ammunition and now out-gunned, Cmdt. Kenny issues an order for the IRA to retreat under fire. There are varied accounts of the length of time the ambush lasts. Some accounts state the attack on the camp lasts 15 minutes, with other accounts indicating that from beginning to end, the ambush lasts for between one and two hours. Dawn is breaking just as the engagement ends.

The IRA operation is deemed unsuccessful as they did not achieved their primary objective of disarming the British soldiers and their commanding officer is badly wounded in the attack. The inability to capture the British soldiers’ weapons will hamper the battalion and the wider East Mayo Brigade’s ability to conduct large ambushes in an area that is already in very short supply of rifles and ammunition. There are varying accounts of casualties from both sides. The IRA inflicts a minimum of three casualties on the British side and the ambush gives many volunteers their first experience of battle. Some of the volunteers who take part in the ambush claim that five and upwards of ten on the British side are wounded. The British claim that they killed one IRA man and wounded several others. They also admit that three of their soldiers are wounded. The following day, British police and military carry out an exhaustive search in the intervening districts. It is reported in the Western People, that in the search that follows, the police and military from Claremorris and Ballyhaunis find blood stains over the ground covered by the IRA and two shotguns, a loaded revolver and two overcoats. In reality the IRA suffers only one casualty, that of their Cmdt. Patrick Kenny. In the military drive that follows, the number of private houses raided totals one hundred and fifty, however nothing incriminating is found.

After Cmdt. Kenny is safely extracted from the engagement; he is carried by Volunteers Jack and William Caulfield along with others to a house nearby and then on to Pat Healy’s house. The British military’s account reports that the soldiers witness a body being carried into a house nearby. From there he is taken to be treated first by Dr. A Smyth, Ballyhaunis, who is the battalion’s Medical Officer. He is moved to Mayo County infirmary and treated by Dr. McBride, however, it is deemed unsafe for him to stay there so after 24 hours he has to leave and is treated by Dr. Hopkins Castlebar in Union hospital for ten days. Members of Cumann na mBan employed in the Union hospital had established an IRA ward in a disused portion of the hospital where numerous wounded volunteers are treated throughout the war. When Kenny has recovered sufficiently, he is taken to Surgeon M Ó Máille in Galway, where he receives treatment for five weeks. He then goes on to recuperate in the home of Pádraic Ó Máille TD near Maum in Connemara for four months. Ó Máille’s home is used as a safe house by the West Connemara, West Mayo and South Mayo IRA Brigades. Kenny returns to the Ballyhaunis area in April 1921.

(Pictured: Ballyhaunis IRA September 1921: Back L-R:Capt. Pat McNieve (Logboy Coy), Capt Austin Tarpey (Holywell Coy), Bn Cmdt. Patrick Kenny, Vol Joe Taylor (Aghamore Coy), Vol John Forde (Bekan Coy), Capt. Luke Taylor (Aghamore Coy), Vol Sonny Biesty (Holywell Coy), Bn Vice Cmdt. Dom Byrne, Front L-R: Vol Jack Kilduff (Bekan Coy), Bn Adjt. Austin Kenny, Capt. Michael Devaney (Brackloon Coy), Capt. Jim Kilkenny (Crossard Coy), Lt Michael Nolan (Knock Coy). Nearly all of the men photographed played some part in the Holywell Ambush)


by Leave a comment

Killing of Frank Brooke, Director of Dublin and South Eastern Railways

Francis Theophilius “Frank” Brooke PC, JP, DL, Anglo-Irish Director of Dublin and South Eastern Railway and a member of the Earl of Ypres‘ Advisory Council, is killed allegedly by the Irish Republican Army (IRA) in his Dublin office on July 30, 1920.

Brooke is a cousin of Sir Basil Brooke, the future Prime Minister of Northern Ireland (1943-63) who is later created, in 1952, the 1st Viscount Brookeborough.

Brooke is also Deputy Lieutenant of County Wicklow and County Fermanagh, a Lieutenant in the Royal Navy, a Justice of the Peace for County Fermanagh and an Irish Privy Counsellor (1918), thus he is styled The Right Honourable Francis Brooke.

In July 1912 Brooke attends a house party at Wentworth Woodhouse hosted for George V‘s stay there.

On July 30, 1920, Brooke is killed, at the age of 69, at his offices in Dublin, by Paddy Daly, Tom Keogh and Jim Slattery, members of Michael Collins‘s Squad of the Irish Republican Army (IRA). He is killed in view of a colleague, who is spared. He is marked out for his activities as a judge, anti-republican activities, and his friendship with Sir John French. As an Irish Privy Counsellor, he is a signatory of the order proclaiming Dáil Éireann illegal.

The inquest following the assassination finds that Brooke had a pistol in his jacket pocket. His killing has been termed the only outright political assassination of the Irish War of Independence.

(Photo credit: Kevin Lee)


by Leave a comment

Birth of Rosie Hackett, Trade Union Leader & Insurgent

Rosanna “Rosie” Hackett, Irish insurgent and trade union leader, is born into a working-class family in Dublin on July 25, 1893. She is a founder-member of the Irish Women Workers’ Union (IWWU) and supports strikers during the 1913 Dublin lock-out. She later becomes a member of the Irish Citizen Army and is involved in the 1916 Easter Rising. In the 1970s, the labour movement awards her a gold medal for decades of service, and in 2014 a Dublin city bridge is named in her memory.

Hackett is the daughter of John Hackett, a hairdresser, and Roseanna Dunne. According to the 1901 census, she is living with her widowed mother and five other family members in a tenement building on Bolton Street in Dublin. The available documents suggest that her father dies when she is still very young. She joins the Irish Transport and General Workers’ Union (ITGWU) when it is established in 1909 by James Larkin, which marks the beginning of her lifelong activity in trade unionism. By 1911 she is living with her family in a cottage on Old Abbey Street, and her mother has remarried to Patrick Gray.

Hackett fights for many decades for the rights of workers. Through her affiliation and work with the ITGWU, the IWWU and the Irish Citizen Army, she helps carve out and secure modern-day working conditions. Her career begins as a packer in a paper store, then becoming a messenger for Jacob’s biscuits. At that time the working conditions in the factory are poor.

On August 22, 1911, Hackett helps organise the withdrawal of women’s labour in Jacob’s factory to support their male colleagues who are already on strike. With the women’s help, the men secure better working conditions and a pay rise. Two weeks later, at the age of eighteen, she co-founds the IWWU with Delia Larkin. During the 1913 lock-out she helps mobilise the Jacob’s workers to come out in solidarity with other workers. They, in turn, are locked out by their own employers. This does not stop her work to help others, and she, along with several of her IWWU colleagues, set up soup kitchens in Liberty Hall to help feed the strikers. However, in 1914 her Jacob’s employers sack her over her role in the lock-out.

Hackett begins work as a clerk in the printshop in Liberty Hall, and it is here she becomes involved with the Irish Citizen Army. She is involved in preparations for the 1916 Rising, working in a union shop, helping with printers, and making first-aid kits and knap-sacks.

If other members of the ITGWU were looking for James Connolly, Hackett aids in bringing them to him. She “worked as canvasser and traveller and was called on to carry out many confidential jobs.”

Hackett takes up first aid training provided by Dr. Kathleen Lynn for six months before the Rising and attends night marches organised by the Irish Citizen Army. According to her own account, she says, “A week before Easter, I took part in the ceremony of hoisting the challenge flag over Hall.” Like other girls and women who are involved in the Rising, she carries messages and guns and prepares uniforms and food for Irish Republican Army (IRA) members “and sometimes risky work.”

Three weeks before the Easter Rising, the Royal Irish Constabulary (RIC) raid a shop where Hackett is working. She is alone when they come, and they are looking for a copy of “Gael.” She says to them, “wait until I get the head” and she calls for Connolly. The police are stopped by Connolly and Helena Molony who are armed, and Hackett immediately hides everything, so that when the police come back, they cannot get anything.

Through her experience of working in the printshop, Hackett helps to print the Proclamation of the Irish Republic. She is in the printing room in Liberty Hall as a trusted messenger in 1916 when the Proclamation is printed, and it is the first time she is allowed in. Three men are there when she enters the room and one comes over to her, shakes her hand and congratulates her. It makes her very proud, especially since no one else is allowed to get in. She subsequently tells family members of handing it still wet to James Connolly before it is read by Patrick Pearse outside the entrance to the General Post Office (GPO).

Hackett is an active member of the Irish Citizen Army. On Easter Tuesday, under the command of Constance Markievicz, she takes part in the 1916 Rising and is located in the area of St. Stephen’s Green and the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland. This position is heavily attacked with guns, short of first aid and “looked like a death trap.” However, after moving from an initially overlooked position in St. Stephen’s Green, it is one of the last positions to surrender. In the Royal College, as a first-aid practitioner, she is allowed entry to the lecture room sanctioned to the Red Cross only. Another first-aider, Aider Nora O’Daily, later reports that during those days, “I have a very kind remembrance of Little Rosie Hackett of the Citizen Army, always cheerful and always willing; to see her face about the place was a tonic itself.”

After surrendering, the rebels are taken to Dublin Castle. Hackett is imprisoned in Kilmainham Gaol for ten days.

In 1917, on the anniversary of Connolly’s death, Hackett, together with Helena Molony, Jennie Shanahan and Brigid Davis, print and hang a poster detailing the anniversary. After the first poster displayed by the ITGWU members is taken down by the police, they work to ensure that their poster will stay on Liberty Hall much longer by staying on top of the roof to defend it. They barricade the door using a ton of coal and nails on the windows. The poster is hanging there until 6:00 p.m. and thousands of people can see it.

After the Rising, Hackett returns to the IWWU which, at its strongest, organises over 70,000 women. After the 1945 laundry strike, they win an extra week of paid holidays for the workers. She attends many important labour union events such as the opening of the new Liberty Hall on May 2, 1965, and Arbour Hill memorial services. Until her retirement, she runs the trade union shops resulting in over five decades of active participation in the Irish trades union movement work to improve conditions for Irish workers. In 1970 she is awarded a gold medal for fifty years of ITGWU membership.

In the 1970s, Walter McFarlane, then branch secretary of the ITGWU, awards an honorary badge for Hackett’s fifty years contribution to the union.

Hackett never marries and lives in Fairview, Dublin, with her brother Tommy until her death on July 4, 1976. She is buried at St. Paul’s plot in Glasnevin Cemetery next to her mother and stepfather. At her burial, she is honoured with a military salute and her coffin is covered with the Irish flag. After her passing, her legacy is remembered in the union’s newspaper, a tale of the strife of Hackett together with the rest of Dublin’s working class, for which she fought to change.

In May 2014, the Rosie Hackett Bridge is officially opened by the Lord Mayor of Dublin. The Hackett Bridge Campaign began in October 2012, led by three women Angelina Cox, an active member of Labour Youth, Jeni Gartland and Lisa Connell. The final shortlist of contending names for the new bridge were Rosie Hackett, Kathleen Mills, Willie Bermingham, Bram Stoker and Frank Duff.

In April 2015, a plaque is unveiled on Foley Street by the North Inner City Folklore Project to commemorate the women of the Irish Citizen Army. The plaque lists Hackett as a member of the St. Stephens Green/College of Surgeons garrison during the 1916 Easter Rising.


by Leave a comment

IRA Issues Apology for Killing Non-Combatants

On July 16, 2002, An Phoblacht (English: “The Republic”) receives a statement from Irish Republican Army (IRA) leadership which includes an apology for the killing of “non-combatants.” Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, John Reid, welcomes the gesture as one of unprecedented strength.

The full text of the IRA’s statement of apology:

“Sunday 21 July marks the 30th anniversary of an IRA operation in Belfast in 1972 which resulted in nine people being killed and many more injured.

While it was not our intention to injure or kill non-combatants, the reality is that on this and on a number of other occasions, that was the consequence of our actions.

It is therefore appropriate on the anniversary of this tragic event, that we address all of the deaths and injuries of non-combatants caused by us.

We offer our sincere apologies and condolences to their families.

There have been fatalities amongst combatants on all sides. We also acknowledge the grief and pain of their relatives.

The future will not be found in denying collective failures and mistakes or closing minds and hearts to the plight of those who have been hurt. That includes all of the victims of the conflict, combatants and non-combatants.

It will not be achieved by creating a hierarchy of victims in which some are deemed more or less worthy than others.

The process of conflict resolution requires the equal acknowledgement of the grief and loss of others. On this anniversary, we are endeavouring to fulfil this responsibility to those we have hurt.

The IRA is committed unequivocally to the search for freedom, justice and peace in Ireland.

We remain totally committed to the peace process and to dealing with the challenges and difficulties which this presents. This includes the acceptance of past mistakes and of the hurt and pain we have caused to others.”

P O’Neill, Irish Republican Publicity Bureau, Dublin.

Note: The Provisional IRA issues all its public statements under the pseudonym “P. O’Neill” of the “Irish Republican Publicity Bureau, Dublin.” Dáithí Ó Conaill, the IRA’s director of publicity, came up with the name. According to Danny Morrison, the pseudonym “S. O’Neill” was used during the 1940s.


by Leave a comment

Birth of Denis “Denny” Barry, Irish Volunteer & Trade Unionist

Denis “Denny” Barry, Irish Volunteer, commandant of the Cork No. 1 Brigade and trade unionist, is born into a farming family on July 15, 1883, in Riverstick, Cullen, County Cork.

Barry learns Irish from a young age. He attends Ballymartle National School but is unable to attend secondary school due to a lack of facilities in the area. He begins work on the family farm after primary school. In 1903, he moves to Cork to work as a draper‘s apprentice with the firm O’Sullivan and Howard, where he becomes involved in the Gaelic League and the Ancient Order of Hibernians. A successful athlete, he also plays for the Blackrock National Hurling Club and wins four senior county hurling championships between 1910–13.

In 1913, Barry joins the newly formed Irish Volunteers. In 1915, he moves to Kilkenny to take up employment there, where he continues his volunteer activities. Shortly after the 1916 Easter Rising, he is arrested in Kilkenny in a British Government crackdown, and sent to Frongoch internment camp in North Wales. In 1919, he returns to Cork, where he is Commandant of the Irish Republican Police (IRP) in Cork during the Irish War of Independence. In the Cork No. 1 Brigade of the Irish Republican Army (IRA), he helps with prisoner escapes and returning looted goods after the burning of Cork by Black and Tans. After the Anglo-Irish Treaty and the split that follows, he chooses the anti-Treaty branch of the IRA. He is captured by Irish Free State troops and is sent to Newbridge internment camp on October 6, 1922. He is not charged or convicted of any crime.

Irish Republican prisoners in Mountjoy Prison begin the 1923 Irish hunger strikes, protesting being interned without charges or trial and poor prison conditions. The strike quickly spreads to other camps and prisons, and Barry takes part starting on October 16. He dies 35 days later on November 20, 1923, at the hospital at Curragh Camp. IRA Volunteers Joseph Whitty from Newbawn, County Wexford, dies on September 2, 1923 and Andy O’Sullivan from Denbawn, County Cavan, dies as a result of hunger on November 22, 1923, in Mountjoy Prison. The 41-day hunger strike is called off the following day, November 23. Whitty, Barry and O’Sullivan are three of the 22 Irish Republicans who die on hunger-strike during the twentieth century. Barry is initially buried by the Free State army in the Curragh, but three days later, following a court order, his remains are disinterred. He is buried in the Republican plot at St. Finbarr’s Cemetery, Cork.

Prior to Barry’s body arriving in County Cork, the Bishop of Cork, Daniel Cohalan, issues a letter to the Catholic churches which forbids them to open their doors to his body. Bishop Cohalan expresses far different opinions on the 1920 death, also by hunger strike, of the Lord Mayor of Cork Terence MacSwiney. “Terence MacSwiney takes his place among the martyrs in the sacred cause of the Freedom of Ireland. We bow in respect before his heroic sacrifice. We pray that God may have mercy on his soul.”

In Barry’s hometown of Riverstick there stands a stone memorial, unveiled in 1966, in his honor and he is remembered with a wreath-laying commemoration every November.