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Birth of Ernie O’Malley, Republican Revolutionary & Writer

Ernest Bernard (Ernie) O’Malley, Irish republican revolutionary and writer, is born on May 26, 1897, in Ellison Street, Castlebar, County Mayo, the second child among nine sons and two daughters of Luke Malley, solicitor’s clerk, of County Mayo, and Marion Malley (née Kearney) of County Roscommon. Christened Ernest Bernard Malley, his adoption of variations on this name reflects his enthusiasm for a distinctively Irish identity – an enthusiasm that lay at the heart of his republican career and outlook.

In 1906, O’Malley’s family moves to Dublin, where he attends the Christian Brothers‘ School, North Richmond Street. In 1915, he begins to study medicine at University College Dublin (UCD). Having initially intended to follow his older brother into the British Army, he rather joins the Irish Volunteers in the wake of the 1916 Easter Rising, as a member of F Company, 1st Battalion, Dublin Brigade. He becomes a leading figure in the Irish Republican Army (IRA) during the Irish War of Independence which the Easter Rising helps to occasion. In 1918, having twice failed his second-year university examination, he leaves home to commit himself to the republican cause. He is initially a Volunteer organiser with the rank of second lieutenant, under the instruction of Richard Mulcahy, operating in Counties Tyrone, Offaly, Roscommon, and Donegal. His work in 1918 involves the reorganisation, or new establishment, of Volunteer groups in the localities.

In August 1918, O’Malley is sent to London by Michael Collins to buy arms. During 1919 he works as an IRA staff captain attached to General Headquarters (GHQ) in Dublin, and also trains and organises Volunteers in Counties Clare, Tipperary, and Dublin. He has a notable military record with the IRA during the Irish War of Independence and is a leading figure in attacks on Hollyford barracks in County Tipperary (May 1920), Drangan barracks in County Kilkenny (June 1920), and Rearcross barracks in County Tipperary (July 1920). His IRA days thus involve him with comrades such as Dan Breen, Séumas Robinson, and Seán Treacy. In December 1920, he is captured in County Kilkenny by Crown forces. He escapes from Dublin’s Kilmainham Gaol in February 1921, to take command of the IRA’s 2nd Southern Division, holding the rank of commandant-general.

O’Malley’s republican commitment has political roots in his conviction that Ireland should properly be fully independent of Britain, and that violence is a necessary means to achieve this end. But the causes underlying his revolutionism are layered. Family expectations of respectable, professional employment combined with a religious background and an enthusiasm for soldiering provide some of the foundations for his IRA career. As an IRA officer he enjoys professional, military expression for a visceral Catholic Irish nationalism. He also finds excitement, liberation from the frequent dullness of his life at home, defiant rebellion against his non-republican parents, an alternative to his stalled undergraduate career, and, in political and cultural Irish separatism, a decisive resolution of the profound tension between his anglocentrism and his anglophobia.

O’Malley rejects the 1921 Anglo–Irish Treaty as an unacceptable compromise. He spends the 1921 truce period training IRA officers in his divisional area, in preparation for a possible renewal of fighting. He is, in the event, to be a leading anti-treatyite in the 1922–23 Irish Civil War. In the Four Courts in 1922, at the start of the latter conflict, he is captured on the republicans’ capitulation on June 30 but then manages to escape from captivity. Subsequently he is appointed assistant Chief of Staff of the anti-Treaty IRA and also becomes part of a five-man anti-Treaty army council, along with Liam Lynch, Liam Deasy, Frank Aiken and Thomas Derrig.

O’Malley is dramatically captured and badly wounded by Free State forces in Dublin in November 1922. Imprisoned until July 1924, he is during the period of his incarceration elected as a TD for Dublin North in the 1923 Irish general election and is also a forty-one-day participant in the republican hunger strike later that year. Following release from prison, he returns home to live with his parents in Dublin. He decides not to focus his post-revolutionary energy on a political career. During 1926–28 and 1935–37 he unsuccessfully tries to complete his medical degree at UCD, but increasingly his post-1924 efforts are directed toward life as a Bohemian traveler and writer. He spends much of 1924–26 on a recuperative journey through France, Spain, and Italy; and 1928–35 traveling widely in North America. During 1929–32 he spends time in New Mexico and Mexico City. In Taos, New Mexico, he mixes with, and is influenced by, writers and artists as he works on what are to become classic autobiographies of the Irish revolution: On Another Man’s Wound (1936) and The Singing Flame (1978).

O’Malley meets Helen Hooker, daughter of Elon and Blanche Hooker, in Connecticut in 1933. They marry in London in 1935, each rejecting something of their prior lives in the process: he, his Irish republicanism, through marriage to somebody entirely unconnected with that world; she, her wealthy and respectable upbringing, through liaison with a Catholic, Irish, unemployed, bohemian ex-revolutionary. They settle first in Dublin then, from 1938 onward, primarily in County Mayo. Burrishoole Lodge, near Newport, is his main base until 1954, when he moves to Dublin. Three children are born to the O’Malleys: Cahal (1936), Etáin (1940), and Cormac (1942). Sharing enthusiasm for the arts, he and Helen enjoy several years of intimacy. However, by the mid-1940s their relationship has frayed. In 1950, Helen kidnaps (the word is used by both parents and by all three children) the couple’s elder two children and takes them to the United States. From there she divorces O’Malley in 1952. Cormac remains with his father.

O’Malley’s post-American years are devoted to a number of projects. He writes extensively, including work for The Bell and Horizon. He is involved with the film director John Ford in the making of his Irish films, including The Quiet Man (1952). He gives radio broadcasts on Mexican painting for BBC Third Programme (1947), and on his IRA adventures for Radio Éireann (1953). In the latter year he suffers a heart attack, and his remaining years are scarred by ill health. He dies of heart failure on March 25, 1957, in Howth, County Dublin, at the house of his sister Kathleen. Two days later he is given a state funeral with full military honours. He is buried in the Malley family plot in Glasnevin Cemetery, Dublin.

O’Malley exemplifies some important themes in modern Irish political and intellectual history. His powerful memoirs form part of a tradition of writing absorbedly about Ireland, while under idiosyncratic emigrant influences which lend the writing much of its distinctiveness. His aggressive republicanism exemplifies a persistent but ultimately unrealisable tradition of uncompromising IRA politics. His unflinching single-mindedness is the condition for much courageous and striking activity, but also lay behind his infliction and his suffering of much pain. Literary, intellectual, and defiantly dissident, he is the classic bohemian revolutionary. His historical significance lies in his having been both a leading Irish revolutionary and the author of compelling autobiographical accounts of those years. His memoirs are distinguished from their rivals on the shelf by subtlety, self-consciousness, and literary ambition. In particular, his preparedness to identify motives for Irish revolutionary action, beyond the terms of ostensible republican purpose, renders his writing of great value to historians. Similarly, the large body of archival material left in his name (especially, perhaps, the papers held in UCD archives, and those in the private possession of his children) leaves scholars in his debt. The most striking and evocative visual images of O’Malley are, arguably, the set of photographic portraits taken in 1929 by Edward Weston and held at the University of Arizona‘s Center for Creative Photography (CCP). These capture with precision his reflective concentration, his piercing earnestness, and his troubled intensity.

(From: “O’Malley, Ernest Bernard (‘Ernie’)” by Richard English, Dictionary of Irish Biography, http://www.dib.ie, October 2009 | Pictured: Photograph of Ernie O’Malley taken by Helen Hooker, New York City, 1934)


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The Occupation and Burning of the Custom House

The Custom House in Dublin is occupied and then burned in an operation by the Irish Republican Army (IRA) on May 25, 1921, during the Irish War of Independence. At the time, the Custom House is the headquarters of the Local Government Board for Ireland, an agency of the British administration in Ireland, against which the IRA is fighting in the name of the self-proclaimed Irish Republic. The operation, involving over 100 IRA volunteers, is a propaganda coup for the republicans but a military disaster for the IRA in the Irish capital. A force of British Auxiliaries quickly arrives, and a gun battle erupts. Five IRA volunteers, John Doyle, Edward Dorins, Daniel Head, Captain Patrick and Lieutenant Stephen O’Reilly, are killed, along with three civilians. Approximately 80 volunteers are captured.

The operation is the largest action in Dublin by rebels since the Easter Rising of April 1916.

The Irish War of Independence is a guerrilla campaign by the IRA in support of the Irish Republic. The conflict enters its bloodiest phase in the first six months of 1921. In Dublin, a total of 309 people are killed in the conflict and several hundred more wounded.

Dublin is garrisoned by over 10,000 British troops and 1,600 police including 400 men of the Royal Irish Constabulary (RIC) Auxiliary Division. Most IRA actions in the city consist either of assassinations of selected police, military or administration figures by the Squad, or ambushes on British forces by one of the four Active Service Units (ASU) of the IRA’s Dublin Brigade, together comprising about 100 men. These are usually rapid and fleeting attacks using grenades and handguns, followed by a quick getaway. There are strict orders given to IRA units to avoid prolonged engagements with the better-armed British forces.

However, this policy is reversed after a meeting of the Ministry of Dáil Éireann in May 1921 where the President of the Republic, Éamon de Valera, calls for a spectacular public show of force by the IRA, to reinforce the idea that it is an army representing an Irish government. For this reason, it is decided to attack and burn the Custom House, which, although an important government building, is not defended by the British military. Michael Collins is against the attack but is overruled.

Michael O’Kelly, Lieutenant E Company, 2nd Battalion, Dublin Brigade, recalls plans to “deliver a smashing blow to England.” Two large scale operations – to capture Beggars Bush Barracks, or to destroy the Customs House are initially considered. The Custom House is eventually chosen. IRA member Vincent Byrne says that the operation is “one of many under review.”

In the early afternoon of May 25, 1921, roughly 120 non-uniformed IRA Volunteers begin to gather around the Custom House in groups of two or three. Three quarter of those involved belonged to the 2nd Battalion of the Dublin Brigade under Tom Ennis. Only a minority of them are experienced guerrilla fighters and they are armed only with pistols and a limited amount of ammunition. At 1:00 p.m., they rush the Custom House and overpower the police guard. A lorry pulls up outside the building with tins of petrol and bales of cotton, which are then sprinkled throughout the building. The IRA Volunteers herd all the staff into the main hall. The caretaker of the building, Francis Davis, is shot dead when he tries to call the police.

However, at about 1:10 p.m., a watching policeman notifies British forces and 60 Auxiliaries in three lorries and an armored car quickly arrive on the scene. IRA Volunteers from the 1st, 3rd and 4th battalions are positioned outside the building to stop the enemy from approaching.

Four Auxiliaries are wounded in a gun battle with one of these IRA protection teams outside the building. Other Auxiliaries fire into the building with rifles and Lewis machine guns, exchanging fire with the IRA fighters inside. A number of IRA Volunteers and civilians are killed or wounded by the Auxiliaries. As fighting rages outside, IRA Volunteers inside the building are ordered to set it alight.

The ammunition of the IRA Volunteers quickly runs out and the firefight ends within 30 minutes. Some Volunteers are shot as they try to run away. Tom Ennis, in command of the operation, escapes but is hit twice in the leg. Many others are arrested along with civilians as they come out of the now burning Custom House with their hands up. The Fire Brigade, which had been delayed from responding by other IRA companies in the city, arrives too late to put out the fire.

British military forces composed of units from the Wiltshire Regiment arrive and take over the operation from the Auxiliaries at this point. A total of 111 people are arrested, of whom 70–80 are IRA volunteers.

The Custom House burns for five days and is all but completely destroyed by the fire. With it are destroyed many centuries of local government records. The Irish Bulletin, official gazette of the Irish Republic, reports:

“A detachment of the Dublin Brigade of the Irish Army was ordered to carry out the destruction of the Custom House in accordance with a decision arrived at after due deliberation of the ministry of Dáil Éireann. We in common with the rest of the nation regret the destruction of historical buildings. But the lives of four million people are a more cherished charge than any architectural masterpiece. The Custom House was the seat of an alien tyranny.”

From the republican point of view, the operation is successful for its propaganda value, but it is a heavy blow in terms of the numbers lost, both killed and arrested. Following the operation, the Dublin Brigade and The Squad are amalgamated into the Dublin Guard. However, the operation does not totally impede the IRA’s campaign in Dublin. The Dublin Brigade carries out 107 attacks in the city in May and 93 in June, showing a decline but not a dramatic one.

The memoir of Harry Colley, Adjutant of the Dublin IRA, estimates the numbers in the five Dublin battalions at 1,400 in early 1921.

The armed conflict is brought to an end on July 11, 1921, and negotiations are opened which produces the Anglo-Irish Treaty in December of that year. The Custom House is re-built after the end of the war.

Irish local government records from the 1600s had been brought from rural parts of Ireland to the Custom House for safekeeping, and these are lost in the blaze. At the time, The New York Times subtitles their report on the fire as “Priceless Records Lost.” Some genealogists still lament the loss of these historical records.

(Pictured: The Custom House in flames, taken on May 25, 1921)


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The “German Plot”

On Friday, May 17, 1918, the British government orders the arrest and imprisonment of all leading members of Sinn Féin, claiming they were involved in a plan to import arms from Germany. The British cover for these arrests is a bogus “German Plot,” which has since been thoroughly discredited.

The “German Plot” is a spurious conspiracy that the Dublin Castle administration in Ireland claims to exist between the Sinn Féin movement and the German Empire in May 1918. Allegedly, the two factions conspire to start an armed insurrection in Ireland during World War I, which would divert the British war effort. The administration uses these claims to justify the internment of Sinn Féin leaders, who are actively opposing attempts to introduce conscription in Ireland and more Irishmen being used as cannon fodder in service to their oppressors.

The “plot” originates on April 12 when the British arrest Joseph Dowling after he is put ashore in County Clare by a German U-boat. Dowling is a member of the Irish Brigade, one of several schemes by Roger Casement to get German assistance for the 1916 Easter Rising. Dowling now claims that the Germans are planning a military expedition to Ireland. William Reginald Hall and Basil Thomson believe him and convince the authorities to intern all Sinn Féin leaders. One hundred fifty are arrested on the night of May 17–18 and taken to prisons in England, including Éamon de Valera, Arthur Griffith, Constance Markievicz and W. T. Cosgrave. The introduction of internment and conscription reflects a decision of the British cabinet to take a harder line on the Irish Question following the failure of the Irish Convention.

Historian Paul McMahon characterises the “Plot” as “a striking illustration of the apparent manipulation of intelligence in order to prod the Irish authorities into more forceful action.” Republicans are tipped off about the impending arrests, allowing some to escape capture while others choose to be taken in order to secure a propaganda victory. The internment is counterproductive for the British, imprisoning the more accommodating Sinn Féin leadership while failing to capture members of the Irish Republican Brotherhood who are more committed to physical force republicanism.

The British live to regret one man who slips through their fingers that spring. Michael Collins uses the months he might have spent in an English prison assembling and consolidating his control of an intelligence organisation and putting it on a more focused military footing that soon makes the Empire squeal.

Even at the time, the proposition that the Sinn Féin leadership are directly planning with the German authorities to open another military front in Ireland is largely seen as spurious. Irish nationalists generally view the “German Plot” not as an intelligence failure but as a black propaganda project to discredit the Sinn Féin movement, particularly to an uninformed public in the United States. McMahon comments that this belief is mistaken, and that the authorities acted honestly but on the basis of faulty intelligence. It is still a matter of study and conjecture what impact it had on U.S. foreign policy regarding the 1919 bid for international recognition of the Irish Republic.

(Pictured: Dublin Castle, Dame Street, Dublin)


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Birth of Brendan Gleeson, Actor & Film Director

Brendan Gleeson, Irish actor and film director, is born in Dublin on March 29, 1955. He is the recipient of three Irish Film & Television Academy (IFTA) Awards, two British Independent Film Awards (BIFA), and a Primetime Emmy Award and has been nominated twice for a BAFTA Award, five times for a Golden Globe Award and once for an Academy Award. In 2020, he is listed at number 18 on The Irish Times list of Ireland’s greatest film actors. He is the father of actors Domhnall Gleeson and Brian Gleeson.

Gleeson is the son of Frank and Pat Gleeson. He has described himself as having been an avid reader as a child. He receives his second-level education at St. Joseph’s CBS in Fairview, Dublin, where he is a member of the school drama group. He receives his Bachelor of Arts at University College Dublin (UCD), majoring in English and Irish. After training as an actor, he works for several years as a secondary school teacher of Irish and English at the now defunct Catholic Belcamp College in north County Dublin. He works simultaneously as an actor while teaching, doing semi-professional and professional productions in Dublin and surrounding areas. He leaves the teaching profession to commit full-time to acting in 1991. In an NPR interview to promote Calvary in 2014, he states he was molested as a child by a Christian Brother in primary school but was in “no way traumatised by the incident.”

As a member of the Dublin-based Passion Machine Theatre company, Gleeson appears in several of the theatre company’s early and highly successful plays such as Brownbread (1987), written by Roddy Doyle and directed by Paul Mercier, Wasters (1985) and Home (1988), written and directed by Paul Mercier. He also writes three plays for Passion Machine: The Birdtable (1987) and Breaking Up (1988), both of which he directs, and Babies and Bathwater (1994) in which he acts. Among his other Dublin theatre work are Patrick Süskind‘s one-man play The Double Bass and John B. Keane‘s The Year of the Hiker.

Gleeson starts his film career at the age of 34. He first comes to prominence in Ireland for his role as Michael Collins in The Treaty, a television film broadcast on RTÉ One, and for which he wins a Jacob’s Award in 1992. He acts in such films as Braveheart, I Went Down, Michael Collins, Gangs of New York, Cold Mountain, 28 Days Later, Troy, Kingdom of Heaven, Lake Placid, A.I. Artificial Intelligence, Mission: Impossible 2, and The Village. He wins critical acclaim for his performance as Irish gangster Martin Cahill in John Boorman‘s 1998 film The General.

In 2003, Gleeson is the voice of Hugh the Miller in an episode of the Channel 4 animated series Wilde Stories. While he portrays Irish statesman Michael Collins in The Treaty, he later portrays Collins’ close collaborator Liam Tobin in the film Michael Collins with Liam Neeson taking the role of Collins. He later goes on to portray Winston Churchill in Into the Storm, winning a Primetime Emmy Award for his performance. He plays Barty Crouch, Jr. impersonating Hogwarts professor Alastor “Mad-Eye” Moody in the fourth, and Alastor Moody himself in fifth and seventh Harry Potter films. His son Domhnall plays Bill Weasley in the seventh and eighth films.

Gleeson provides the voice of Abbot Cellach in The Secret of Kells, an animated film co-directed by Tomm Moore and Nora Twomey of Cartoon Saloon, which premieres in February 2009 at the Jameson Dublin International Film Festival. He stars in the short film Six Shooter in 2006, written and directed by Martin McDonagh, which wins an Academy Award for Best Live Action Short Film. In 2008, he stars in the comedy crime film In Bruges, also written and directed by McDonagh. The film, and his performance, enjoy huge critical acclaim, earning him several award nominations, including his first Golden Globe nomination. In the movie, he plays a mentor-like figure for Colin Farrell‘s hitman. In his review of In Bruges, Roger Ebert describes the elder Gleeson as having a “noble shambles of a face and the heft of a boxer gone to seed.”

In July 2012, Gleeson starts filming The Grand Seduction, with Taylor Kitsch, a remake of Jean-François Pouliot‘s French-Canadian La Grande Séduction (2003) directed by Don McKellar. The film is released in 2013. In 2016, he appears in the video game adaptation Assassin’s Creed and Ben Affleck‘s crime drama Live by Night. In 2017, he finishes Psychic, a short in which he directs and stars. From 2017 to 2019 he stars in the crime series Mr. Mercedes. He receives a Golden Globe Award nomination for his performance as Donald Trump in the Showtime series The Comey Rule (2020). In 2022, he reunites with Martin McDonagh in the tragic comedy The Banshees of Inisherin starring opposite Colin Farrell. For his performance as Colm Doherty, he receives numerous awards nominations, including the Academy Award, Golden Globe, and Critics’ Choice Movie Award for Best Supporting Actor. He receives an Emmy Award nomination for Stephen Frears‘s Sundance TV series State of the Union (2022).

Gleeson is a fiddle and mandolin player, with an interest in Irish folklore. He plays the fiddle during his roles in Cold Mountain, Michael Collins, The Grand Seduction, and The Banshees of Inisherin, and also features on Altan‘s 2009 live album. In the Coen brothers‘ The Ballad of Buster Scruggs (2018), he sings “The Unfortunate Rake.” He also makes a contribution in 2019 to the album by Irish folk group Dervish with a version of “Rocky Road to Dublin.”

Gleeson has been married to Mary Weldon since 1982. They have four sons: Domhnall, Fergus, Brían, and Rory. Domhnall and Brían are also actors. He speaks fluent Irish and is an advocate of the promotion of the Irish language. He is a fan of the English football club Aston Villa, as is his son Domhnall.


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Death of Kathleen Napoli McKenna, Nationalist Activist & Journalist

Kathleen Napoli McKenna, Irish nationalist activist and journalist closely associated with Arthur Griffith, dies in Rome, Italy, on March 22, 1988.

McKenna is born Kathleen Maria Kenna on September 9, 1897, in Oldcastle, County Meath. Her parents are William, a draper and hardware merchant, and Mary Kenna (née Hanley). She is the eldest child of seven, with three sisters and three brothers. She and her siblings add “Mc” to their surname as teenagers. Her maternal grandfather, a Fenian, miller and land agitator, is a strong influence on her. Agnes O’Farrelly is her paternal great aunt. She attends the Oldcastle Endowed School and goes on to pass the National University of Ireland (NUI) matriculation examination. She attends University College Dublin (UCD) briefly, but the family’s circumstances prevent her from completing her course.

McKenna’s father had been an active member of the Irish National Land League and the Meath Labour Union. He is one of the organisers of a short-lived local newspaper, Sinn Féin – Oldcastle Monthly Review, in 1902. Both her parents are members of Conradh na Gaielge. Arthur Griffith and Brian O’Higgins frequently visit the family home. Denounced by the local parish priest, Fr. Robert Barry, her father’s business goes into decline. The family leaves Oldcastle and moves to Dundalk in August 1915, and to Rugby, Warwickshire, England, in March 1916. In Rugby, her father teaches typing and shorthand, and her mother works in an ammunition factory. She works as a secretary for an engineering firm. Members of the family return to Ireland from 1919 to 1922, and by the time of her father’s death in 1939, he is living back in Oldcastle.

McKenna spends some holidays in Ireland and, during a visit to Dublin in the summer of 1919, she presents herself to the Sinn Féin offices in Harcourt Street. She has a letter of introduction from her father to Griffith, which emphasises her willingness to work for Irish independence. For her holidays, she works in the Sinn Féin press bureau and is employed as one of the first “Dáil girls” of the clandestine government. She is informed that if a planned news bulletin comes through, she will be summoned back to Dublin. In October 1919, she receives that summons and, after a typing test on November 11, she joins the Irish Bulletin under Minister for Publicity, Desmond FitzGerald, and director of publicity, Robert Brennan. She also becomes a member of the Conradh na Gaielge Parnell branch.

The Irish Bulletin is published five times a week, circulating the misdeeds of the British government in Ireland. McKenna edits and mimeographs a summary of “acts of aggression” from British forces in Ireland weekly, compiled by Anna Kelly. Frank Gallagher does most of the writing, edited by FitzGerald, and later Erskine Childers. Though she is sometimes described as the Bulletin‘s editor, she is more akin to an editorial assistant. R. M. Smyllie later recalls that she was in regular contact with the media. She types out each issue on a wax stencil in a typewriter which is used to create mimeograph copies, and then circulated to England. In the beginning, about 30 recipients, mostly London journalists, receive the Bulletin but by October 1920 it has grown to 600, and by July 1921 over 1,200. She also keeps the accounts, takes dictation of statements, and at times works up articles from notes given to her by Griffith or others. She also acts as a confidential messenger, couriering between Dáil departments and Irish Republican Army (IRA) leaders such as Michael Collins. Through this, she meets Moya Llewelyn Davies.

The Bulletin becomes a symbol of the underground government and a target for British forces. This necessitates the frequent moving of the operation from one Dublin hideout to another. She fears that if she were captured, she would break under interrogation. When FitzGerald is arrested, he is asked about “the girl wearing a green tam” in reference to McKenna’s tam-o’-shanter hat which prompts her to change her choice of hat. Despite the capture of a number of the Bulletin staff, as well as the capture of the office files and equipment on March 26, 1921, it never misses an issue.

McKenna’s sister Winifred also works as a secretary to the clandestine government. Her brother, Tadhg (Timothy), is a member of Sinn Féin and in Greenore, County Louth, is involved in trade union affairs. He is detained, beaten, and interned in March 1921. He is later an activist with the Irish Labour Party. Her brother William is a messenger for the Irish government during this period and during the Irish Civil War serves in the Free State Army.

After the truce in 1921, McKenna is assigned to the Dáil cabinet secretarial staff at the Mansion House, where she continues to work in the publicity department. She travels as Griffith’s private secretary to London as part of the Irish delegation to the treaty negotiations in October 1921. She is an admirer of both Griffith and Collins and is a firm supporter of the Anglo-Irish Treaty. She works as Griffith’s secretary until just before his death and also does some secretarial work for Collins during the negotiations. One of her sisters is anti-Treaty, and she later recalls that she lost friends due to her support of the treaty.

When the Irish Free State government is established, McKenna becomes a private secretary to a number of Ministers for External Affairs, including FitzGerald, Kevin O’Higgins and W. T. Cosgrave. In 1924, she is a private secretary to the Boundary Commission, as well as one of a pair of secretaries who travels with the Irish delegation to the London Imperial Conference in 1924. From 1927 to 1931 she is James Dolan‘s secretary and parliamentary secretary to the Minister for Industry and Commerce. Before its closure in 1924, she writes a number of articles for the Freeman’s Journal.

McKenna marries Vittorio Napoli in 1931. He is a captain, and later a general, in the Italian royal grenadier guards. They meet when she is on holiday in Italy in 1927. For the first five years of their marriage, they live in the port of Derna in Cyrenaica, Libya, while her husband is stationed there. A son and daughter are born there. From September 1939 to June 1940, the family lives in Albania, but after Italy enters World War II, she and the children move to Viterbo. Her husband is taken prisoner in Greece in September 1943, and is detained in Germany and Poland. He returns to Italy in September 1945. Viterbo had been heavily bombed, and after Allied troops arrive, McKenna works as a translator and gives English language lessons to support her family. Her husband remains in the army, and they remain in Viterbo until 1956, later moving to Rome.

After the war, McKenna writes articles for the Irish Independent and other publications from Ireland, the United States and New Zealand, including The Irish Press, Irish Travel, Standard, Word, and Writer’s Digest. Sometimes she writes under her own name, as well as her pen name Kayn or Kayen MacKay. As the wives of Italian officers do not traditionally work, the money she earns from this is kept for travel and other leisure activities. This money allows her to visit her family in Ireland in 1947 for the first time since 1932. After their retirement, she and her husband visit Ireland regularly, and travel around Italy.

McKenna applies for an Irish military pension in 1950/51 and 1970, receiving references in support of her claim from Gallagher. As she had not served in a military organisation, her claims are rejected. As an Irish War of Independence veteran, she is awarded free travel in 1972, which is later extended to her husband. In her later years, she becomes concerned about the inaccuracies in the history around the Irish War of Independence and the Irish Civil War. She gives two talks to Radio Éireann in 1951, speaking about her time with the Irish Bulletin. Copies of these recordings are now held by the Bureau of Military History. During her lifetime, extracts of her memoir are published in the Capuchin Annual and The Irish Times. She drafted and redrafted these memoirs from the late 1940s to the early 1980s. A version edited by her daughter and niece is published in 2014 as A Dáil girl’s revolutionary recollections.

McKenna dies on March 22, 1988, in Rome. She is buried with an Irish flag which she had kept with her. A large collection of her papers is held in the National Library of Ireland (NLI). In 2010, 2011 and 2016, some of her memorabilia is sold in Dublin.


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Birth of Seán O’Hegarty, Member of the IRA’s Cork No. 1 Brigade

Seán O’Hegarty, a prominent member of the Irish Republican Army (IRA) in County Cork during the Irish War of Independence, is born on March 21, 1881, in Cork, County Cork. He serves as OC of the Cork No. 1 Brigade of the IRA after the deaths of Tomás Mac Curtain and Terence MacSwiney.

O’Hegarty comes from a family with strong nationalist roots. His parents are John, a plasterer and stucco worker, and Katherine (née Hallahan) Hegarty. His elder brother is Patrick Sarsfield O’Hegarty, the writer. His parents’ families emigrated to the United States after the Great Famine, and his parents married in Boston. His father is a member of the Irish Republican Brotherhood (IRB). In 1888, his father dies of tuberculosis at the age of 42, and his mother has to work to support the family.

O’Hegarty is educated at the Christian Brothers North Monastery school in Cork. By 1902, he has left school to work as a sorter in the local post office, rising to post office clerk. He is a supporter of the Gaelic revival, Irish traditional music, and Gaelic games. A committed sportsman, in his twenties he is captain of the Post Office HQ’s hurling team. He follows his brother Patrick into Conradh na Gaeilge and eventually the Irish Volunteers and the Irish Republican Brotherhood. He is a member of the Celtic Literary Society by 1905 and founds the Growney branch of Conradh na Gaeilge in 1907. A puritanical character by nature, he is a non-smoker and never drinks.

O’Hegarty is a founder of the local branch of the Irish Volunteers in Cork in December 1913. In June of the following year, he is appointed to the Cork section of the Volunteer Executive, and then to the Military Council. In October, the Dublin government discovers his illegal activities, and he is dismissed. Excluded from Cork under the Defence of the Realm Act (DORA) regulations, he moves to Ballingeary, where he works as a labourer. From there he moves to Enniscorthy, County Wexford, where he lives with Larry de Lacy. On February 24, 1915, he is arrested and tried under the Defence of the Realm Act for putting up seditious posters. But for this and a second charge of “possession of explosives” he is discharged. The explosives belonged to de Lacy.

The Volunteers appoint O’Hegarty as Commandant of Ballingeary and Bandon. During the Easter Rising, he is stationed in Ballingeary when visited by Michael McCarthy of Dunmanway to propose an attack on a Royal Irish Constabulary (RIC) post at Macroom. But their strength is fatally weakened and, having no reserves, they call off the attempt. In 1917, he becomes Vice-commandant of No.1 Cork Brigade. He works as a storekeeper at the workhouse but is intimidating, and clashes with the Poor Law Guardians.

During the Irish War of Independence, O’Hegarty is one of the most active in County Cork. Like others, he is exasperated with Tomás Mac Curtain’s inactivity and refusal to be more bellicose. One such is battalion commander Richard Langford, who joins with O’Hegarty’s unit to make an unauthorized raid on the RIC post at Macroom. Langford is court-martialed, but O’Hegarty continues to rise in the ranks. When a RIC Inspector is murdered, Mac Curtain condemns the shootings and calls for their end. On March 19, 1920, Mac Curtain is shot and killed in his home in Cork. The coroner blames the British establishment in Dublin, but the police never make any attempt to investigate the killings. Shortly after these events General Hugh Tudor begins the policy of official reprisals.

In January 1920, an inquiry is held into corruption alleged against “Hegarty’s Mob” or “Hegarty’s Crowd” running Cork City. O’Hegarty blames the former mayors for the charges of incompetence but remains on good terms with them.

In a raid on Cork City Hall on August 12, 1920, the British manage to net all the top brass of the IRA in Cork. In an incredible failure of intelligence, they do not identify the leadership as their prisoners. They are all released, including Liam Lynch, and O’Hegarty. Only Terence MacSwiney, the new Lord Mayor of Cork, is kept in custody and sent to England.

On February 25, 1921, the Coolavokig ambush is carried out by the 1st Cork Brigade under O’Hegarty at Ballyvourney village, on the road between Macroom and Ballyvourney. The IRA suffers no casualties; however, the number of British casualties has been disputed to this day.

The brigade commanders in the southern division retain a residual lingering resentment of Dublin GHQ’s lack of leadership and supplies. Seán Moylan, commandant of No. 2 Cork Brigade, thinks good communications with No.1 Brigade are to be vital, but little of this is seen via the organizer, Ernie O’Malley, at GHQ. At a meeting set up for April 26, 1921, when the manual of Infantry Training 1914 is produced, the document raises great anger. The meeting ends in uproar when O’Hegarty, who is “a master of invective, tore the communication and its authors to ribbons.”

O’Malley and Liam Lynch, the general, meet with O’Hegarty in the mountains of West Cork, near a deserted farmhouse, just off the main road. In the retreat that follows, the Irish take heavy casualties and leave their wounded to the good care of the British. These are the “Round-ups” in which the Irish sleep outside in order to avoid being at home when the Army calls. They are told by the Brigade to learn the national anthem of England to avoid arrest.

In East Cork brigade, O’Hegarty uncovers a spy ring. He is ruthless in the treatment of Georgina Lindsay and her chauffeur, who give away information to the Catholic clergy, but is remarkably lenient on brigade traitors within. He is allegedly not too bothered about evidence but is reminded that all executions of a traitor have to be approved by Dublin first.

O’Hegarty becomes more and more aggressive toward the establishment, using tough language to impose his will over the area. He attempts to force the civilian Teachtai Dála (TDs) for Cork to stand down, to give way to military candidates, telling the Dáil in December 1921, that any TD voting for the treaty will be guilty of treason. But Éamon de Valera is decided and overrules any interference with the Civil Government. Like the commanders, de Valera rejects the treaty but has already been defeated in the Dáil on a vote by W. T. Cosgrave‘s majority.

On February 1, 1922, O’Hegarty marries Maghdalen Ni Laoghaire, a prominent member of Cumann na mBan.

O’Hegarty is on the IRA’s Executive Council, but when there is a meeting on April 9, 1922, it is proposed that the Army should oppose the elections by force. As a result, Florence O’Donoghue and Tom Hales join him in resigning. In May, he and Dan Breen enter into negotiations with Free Stater Richard Mulcahy. A statement is published in the press asking for unity and acceptance of the Treaty. During this time, the republicans become very demoralized and ill-disciplined, but they have to gain strength before announcing independence from Dublin. The debate amongst the anti-Treaty IRA command is increasingly rancorous.

The bitter divisions split the anti-treatyites into two camps. Two motions are debated at the Army Convention on June 18, 1922. At first, the motion to oppose the treaty by force is passed. These men include Tom Barry, Liam Mellows, and Rory O’Connor, who are all in favour of continuing the fight until the British are driven out of Ireland altogether. However, one brigade’s votes have to be recounted, and then the motion is narrowly defeated. Joe McKelvey is appointed the new chief of staff, but the IRA is in chaos. While he strongly opposes the Anglo-Irish Treaty, O’Hegarty takes a neutral role in the Irish Civil War and tries to avert hostilities breaking out into full-scale civil war. He emerges as a leader of the “Neutral IRA” with O’Donoghue. This is a “loose” confederation of 20,000 men who have taken part in the pre-truce wars but have remained neutral during the Civil War from January 1923. Over 150 persons attend its convention in Dublin on February 4, 1923. By April 1923, O’Malley is imprisoned in Mountjoy Prison. In a letter to Seamus O’Donovan on April 7, he blames Hegarty for all this compromise and “peace talk.”

It has been alleged by the author Gerard Murphy that O’Hegarty had a role in the assassination of the Commander-in-Chief, Michael Collins, in August 1922, along with Florrie O’Donoghue and Joe O’Connor. It is alleged that as members of the 1st Southern Division Cork, they are actually feigning claims of neutrality but remain part of the IRB in order to set up talks towards peace and the cessation of hostilities at the start of the Irish Civil War.

Although probably an atheist during the Irish War of Independence, O’Hegarty returns to the Catholic church later in life. On forming the Neutral Group of the IRA in December 1922, he tries to unify differences in the volunteers between Republicans and the Free Staters. He communicates with the Papal Nuncio during the inter-war years in an attempt to have Bishop of Cork Daniel Cohalan‘s excommunication bill lifted. Instead, he turns to commemoration as a way to earn favour in Rome, with the dedication of a Catholic church at St. Finbarr’s Cemetery. After his wife’s passing, he becomes a close friend with Florence O’Donoghue until his own death.

O’Hegarty dies on May 31, 1963, at Bon Secours Hospital, Cork.


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The Irish Army Mutiny

The Army Mutiny is an Irish Army crisis that begins on March 7, 1924, provoked by a proposed reduction in army numbers in the immediate post-Civil War period. A second grievance concerns the handling of the Northern Boundary problem. As the prelude to a coup d’état, the decisions made by influential politicians and soldiers at the time have continuing significance for the Government of Ireland.

In the early weeks of the Irish Civil War, the National Army is comprised of 7,000 men. These come mainly from pro-Treaty Irish Republican Army (IRA) brigades, especially the Dublin Guard, whose members have personal ties to Michael Collins. They face around 15,000 anti-Treaty IRA men and Collins recruits experienced soldiers from wherever he can. The army’s size mushrooms to 55,000 men, many of whom are Irishmen with combat experience in World War I – 20,000 National Volunteers had joined the British Army on the urgings of Nationalist leader John Redmond.

Likewise, Irishmen who had served in the British forces account for over half of the 3,500 officers. W. R. E. Murphy, second-in-command (January–May 1923), had been a lieutenant colonel in the British Army, as had Emmet Dalton. Two more of the senior generals, John T. Prout and J. J. “Ginger” O’Connell, had served in the United States Army. Collins promotes fellow members of the Irish Republican Brotherhood (IRB) but is slow to put Squad members in high positions.

In December 1922, following Collins’s death, Liam Tobin forms the Irish Republican Army Organisation (IRAO), taking in Dublin Guard and other Irish Army officers who share his view that “higher command…was not sufficiently patriotic.” President of the Executive Council of the Irish Free State W. T. Cosgrave, head of the government, attempts to appease the IRAO. He meets with them several times before the 1923 Irish general election and persuades the opposing IRB faction of generals under Richard Mulcahy to keep quiet.

With the election over, Mulcahy now ignores the IRAO as he starts the process of demobilising 37,000 men. In November, sixty IRA officers mutiny and are dismissed without pay. The IRAO now pressures the Government into establishing a committee to supervise future demobilisation. The committee, consisting of Eoin MacNeill, Ernest Blythe, and IRAO sympathiser Joseph McGrath, effectively undermines the authority of the Army Council.

On March 7, 1924, a representative of the IRAO hands a demand to end demobilisation to W. T. Cosgrave. The ultimatum is signed by senior Army officers, Major-General Liam Tobin and Colonel Charles Dalton. Tobin knows his own position is to be scrapped in the demobilisation. Frank Thornton and Tom Cullen are also involved. That morning 35 men of the 36th Infantry Battalion refuse to parade, and the preceding week officers had absconded with arms from the McCan Barracks in Templemore, Gormanston Camp in County Meath, Baldonnel Aerodrome in Baldonnel, Dublin, and Roscommon. The immediate response is an order for the arrest of the two men on a charge of mutiny. This causes alarm throughout Dublin when announced.

On March 8, General Mulcahy makes an announcement to the Army:

“Two Army officers have attempted to involve the Army in a challenge to the authority of the Government. This is an outrageous departure from the spirit of the Army. It will not be tolerated…officers and men…will stand over their posts and do their duty today in this new threat of danger in the same wonderful, determined spirit that has always been the spirit of the Army.”

Leader of the Opposition, Thomas Johnson, issues a statement of support for the Government. In contrast, Minister for Industry and Commerce, Joseph McGrath, whose home Mulcahy orders to be searched, resigns because of dissatisfaction with the government’s attitude to the IRAO officers and support for their perception that the Irish Army treats former British officers better than former IRA officers. Fearing an incendiary speech by McGrath, Cosgrave first offers the IRAO an inquiry and an amnesty before then taking sick leave thus making Minister for Justice, Kevin O’Higgins, de facto head of the Government.

(Pictured: Major General Liam Tobin, a leading figure in the Army Mutiny)


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Birth of Tom Hales, IRA Volunteer & Fianna Fáil Politician

Thomas Hales, Irish Republican Army (IRA) volunteer and Fianna Fáil politician, is born in Knocknacurra House, Ballinadee, near Bandon, County Cork, on March 5, 1892.

Hales is born on a family farm owned by his father, Robert Hales, an activist in the Irish Land War and a reputed member of the Irish Republican Brotherhood (IRB) and his wife, Margaret (née Fitzgerald). He is the sixth of nine children (five sons and four daughters). He is educated at Ballinadee national school and Warner’s Lane school, Bandon. After leaving school he works at Harte’s timber yard, Bandon.

Hales joins and is involved with the Irish Volunteers movement from its inception in November 1913. Elected a delegate at the Volunteer national convention in the Abbey Theatre in 1915, he is among the majority who vote for the election of the national executive.

Hales is a part of a group of volunteers who are mobilised and plan to rise up in Cork during the 1916 Easter Rising. He sends a number of dispatches to Cork requesting further instructions. However, they receive last minute orders to stand down and there is no uprising in Cork to match that in Dublin. The Volunteers give up their arms and are later arrested.

By May 1916, Hales and his brothers, Seán, Bob, and William, are fighting with the IRA in west Cork during the Irish War of Independence. Terence MacSwiney is arrested in Hales’ home on May 3, 1916, and Hales himself escapes and goes on the run. He states that he was listed as “wanted” in the Hue and Cry police gazette.

In 1918, Hales takes part in a raid on a British gunboat and holds 25 armed Royal Irish Constabulary (RIC) members prisoner at Snugmore Castle. He takes part in a decoy in assisting his elder brother, Seán, to escape after his arrest in connection with the German Plot. He is elected Battalion Commandant of the 1st (Bandon) Battalion (1917–19), and Brigade Commandant of Cork 3rd Brigade, IRA, in January 1919.

In December 1919, Hales takes part in an ambush against the RIC at Kilbrittain and Bandon and is involved in the manufacture of gunpowder for IRA munitions. By this point he is the commander of the Third Cork Brigade of the IRA. In July 1920, he along with Harte is arrested by soldiers from the Essex Regiment.

The pair are taken to a nearby military barracks, where they are severely beaten while being interrogated by officers of the regiment. Hales has his fingernails pulled out, an event that later inspires a scene in the film The Wind That Shakes the Barley. However, neither Hales nor Harte give up any information and are eventually sent to a military hospital to recuperate. Hales is tried and is eventually sentenced to two years’ penal servitude, which he serves in Pentonville and Dartmoor prisons in England. He is commander of the Irish prisoners at Pentonville, but is released following a general amnesty after the Anglo-Irish Treaty in December 1921. According to Tom Barry, Harte suffers brain damage and goes insane before dying in Broadmoor Hospital.

A fifth Hales brother, Donal, settles in Genoa from 1913, and is appointed Irish Consular and Commercial Agent for Italy in February 1919. In this capacity he plays a leading propaganda role. Several letters from Michael Collins to Donal Hales still exist which are used by Hales to promote international awareness of the Irish conflict in Italian publications. Donal oversees a failed attempt to import a substantial number of Austrian weapons and ammunition captured from World War I, from Genoa in the spring of 1921, through the person of Gabriele D’Annunzio.

During the Irish Civil War, Tom and Seán Hales fight on opposite sides, with Hales fighting against the Anglo-Irish Treaty with the Anti-Treaty IRA while Seán joins the newly formed National Army of the Irish Free State. While the bothers end up on opposite sides of the war, they never openly criticise one another for their rival political stances.

Hales is elected to the anti-Treaty IRA executive in March 1922, but resigns in June over a proposal to prevent the Free State’s first general election in June 1922. He resumes his old rank during the Irish Civil War as commander of Cork 3 Brigade.

During the Irish Civil War in July 1922, Hales takes part in the raid and capture of Skibbereen Barracks and Ballineen by anti-Treaty forces. He is also involved in a skirmish with Free State troops at Newcestown. He is arrested in November 1922 and imprisoned first in Cork and then at the Curragh. He is released in December 1923, having taken part in a hunger strike for fourteen days. He mentions in his application for a military pension that he was a member of the Supreme Council of the IRB at this time.

In December 1922, Hales’s brother Seán is assassinated by the anti-Treaty IRA in Dublin, in reprisal for the Free State government’s execution of IRA prisoners. Hales later applies to the Irish government for a service pension under the Military Service Pensions Act, 1934 and is awarded nine years’ service in 1935 at Grade B for his service with the Irish Volunteers and the IRA between April 1, 1917, and September 30, 1923.

Hales is elected to Dáil Éireann as a Fianna Fáil Teachta Dála (TD) for the Cork West constituency at the 1933 Irish general election. He resigns from Fianna Fáil in June 1936 stating he cannot support their policy on interning IRA members. He fails to retain his seat as an independent candidate at the 1937 Irish general election. He also unsuccessfully contests the 1944 Irish general election as an independent candidate and the 1948 Irish general election as a candidate for Clann na Poblachta, receiving 2,287 votes (7.93%).

Hales makes his living as farmer. A member of the Mallow area board of the beet growers’ association from 1934 to 1942, he is also connected with other farming organisations. He marries Ann Lehane from Tirelton, Macroom, on April 30, 1927. They have five children, Seán, Robert, Thomas, Eileen, and Margaret.

Hales dies on April 29, 1966, at St. Finbarr’s Hospital, Cork, and is buried at St. Patrick’s Cemetery, Bandon.


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The Founding of Córas na Poblachta

Córas na Poblachta (English: Republican System), a minor Irish republican political party, is founded on February 21, 1940.

The idea for a new party is discussed at a meeting in Dublin on February 21, 1940, attended by 104 former officers of the pro- and anti-Treaty wings of the Irish Republican Army (IRA). The inaugural meeting of the new party takes place on March 2, 1940. Simon Donnelly, who had fought in Boland’s Mill under Éamon de Valera in the 1916 Easter Rising, the former leader of the Dublin section of the IRA, and former chief of the Irish Republican Police (IRP), is elected as president of a central committee of fifteen members. Other leaders are Seán Fitzpatrick, another Irish War of Independence veteran; Con Lehane, who had recently left the IRA; Séamus Gibbons; Tom O’Rourke; Seán Dowling, one of Rory O’Connor‘s principal lieutenants in the Irish Civil War; Colonel Roger McCorley, one of the principal IRA leaders in Belfast during the Irish War of Independence who had taken the Irish Free State side in the Irish Civil War; Frank Thornton, one of Michael Collins‘ top intelligence officers; Roger McHugh, a lecturer in English at University College Dublin (UCD) and later professor; Captain Martin Bell and Peter O’Connor.

Also in attendance at the first meeting is Seamus O’Donovan, Director of Chemicals on IRA Headquarters Staff in 1921 and architect of the IRA Sabotage Campaign in England by the IRA in 1939–40. Indeed, O’Donovan proposes several of the basic resolutions. Additionally, the meeting is attended by Eoin O’Duffy and several former leaders of the Irish Christian Front.

Many members of the Irish far-right join Córas na Poblachta including Gearóid Ó Cuinneagáin, who becomes the leader of the party’s youth wing Aicéin and goes on to found Ailtirí na hAiséirghe, Alexander McCabe, Maurice O’Connor and Reginald Eager from the Irish Friends of Germany, George Griffin, Patrick Moylett, his brother John and Joseph Andrews of the People’s National Party, Dermot Brennan of Saoirse Gaedheal, and Hugh O’Neill and Alexander Carey of Córas Gaedhealach. As a result, the party assumes a pro-German and antisemitic attitude which is frequently expressed in party functions, and Gardaí suspects Córas na Poblachta members of daubing the walls of Trinity College Dublin in antisemitic slogans following the visit of British politician Leslie Hore-Belisha to Ireland in 1941.

Socialist republicans Nora Connolly O’Brien and Helena Molony take an interest in the group. Reflecting divisions within the IRA, a minority of the party’s leaders sympathise with communism rather than fascism.

The main aim of Córas na Poblachta is the formal declaration of a Republic. It also demands that the Irish language be given greater prominence in street names, shop signs, and government documents and bank notes. It proposes to introduce national service in order that male citizens understand their responsibilities. The party’s economic policy is the statutory right to employment and a living wage. It proposes breaking the link with the British pound, the nationalisation of banks and the making of bank officials into civil servants. In the area of education, the party espouses free education for all children over primary age as a right, and university education when feasible. It also calls for the introduction of children’s allowances. In addition, Córas na Poblachta advocates for “the destruction of the Masonic Order in Ireland” and during its founding meeting reporters are told that the party will be ready to take over the government of Ireland “on either a corporate or fascist basis.”

The party has close ties with the Irish nationalist and pro-fascist party Ailtirí na hAiséirghe, whose leader, Gearóid Ó Cuinneagáin, had led Córas na Poblachta’s youth wing Aicéin until its independence is terminated in 1942. There is talk of a merger, however, while the majority of the party’s executive committee, noted by G2 to be made up of “four ex-Army men, old IRA, ex-Blueshirts and a number of IRA who had been active up until comparatively recently”, desires a combination of Ireland’s extreme nationalist movements, the three most prominent leaders, Simon Donnelly, Sean Dowling and Roger McCorley, oppose one due to the fear that the party will be submerged in a joint organisation. Ó Cuinneagáin is dismissive of Córas na Poblachta’s prospects and discussions between him and the party’s leaders reinforce their fears that Ó Cuinneagáin seeks an outright takeover by Ailtirí na hAiséirghe. Proposals for a merging of the two parties are dropped though they continue to maintain cordial relations and co-operate in the 1943 Irish general election.

The party is not successful and fails to take a seat in a by-election held shortly after the party’s foundation. The party slowly falls apart, and Tim Pat Coogan notes that: “Dissolution occurred because people tended to discuss the party rather than join it.” Importantly, the party is not supported by the hardcore of republican legitimatists, such as Brian O’Higgins, who views the IRA Army Council as the legitimate government of an existing Irish Republic. Indeed, in March 1940, O’Higgins publishes a pamphlet entitled Declare the Republic lambasting the new party as making what he regards as false promises that will be compromised on following the party’s election to the Oireachtas.

Córas na Poblachta fields candidates in the 1943 Irish General Election but none are elected, receiving a total of 3,892 votes between them.

Although a failure, Tim Pat Coogan argues Córas na Poblachta was the “nucleus” of the Clann na Poblachta party which emerges to help take power from Fianna Fáil in 1948.

(Pictured: IRA veteran Simon Donnelly who serves as President of Córas na Poblachta)


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Death of Paddy Daly, IRA Volunteer & National Army Officer

Paddy Daly, sometimes referred to as Paddy O’Daly, dies at his home in County Dublin on January 16, 1957. He serves in the Irish Republican Army (IRA) during the Irish War of Independence (1919–1921) and subsequently holds the rank of major general in the Irish National Army from 1922 to 1924.

Daly is born in Dublin in 1888. He fights in the 1916 Easter Rising under the command of his namesake Edward Daly, leading the unsuccessful attempt to destroy the Magazine Fort in the Phoenix Park. He is later wounded in the particularly vicious fighting near the Linenhall. He is subsequently interned in Frongoch internment camp for his part in the rebellion until 1918, when he is released as part of a general amnesty for Irish prisoners.

During the Irish War of Independence, Daly serves as leader of the “Squad,” Michael Collins‘ assassination unit.

On December 19, 1919, Daly along with Dan Breen lead an abortive ambush, at Ashtown railway station near the Phoenix Park, on the British Viceroy, Lord Lieutenant of Ireland and Supreme Commander of the British Army in Ireland, Lord French, as he returns from a private party which he had hosted the previous evening at his country residence in Frenchpark, County Roscommon. Lord French escapes the ambush, but Martin Savage is shot dead.

Daly and the men under his command are responsible for the killing of many British intelligence officers, in particular District Inspector Redmond, who had been putting increasing pressure on the Squad. Daly himself personally kills several people, including Frank Brooke, director of Great Southern and Eastern Railway, who serves on an advisory council to the British military, in June 1920. He does not directly lead any of the attacks on Bloody Sunday but is on standby in one of the Squad’s safe houses. In the aftermath, November 23, 1920, he is arrested and interned in Abercorn Barracks in Ballykinler, County Down.

Daly is released on parole from Ballykinler in March 1921, the British apparently being unaware of his senior position within the Dublin Brigade of the IRA. After his release, he, along with Emmet Dalton, is also involved in the attempt to free Seán Mac Eoin from Mountjoy Prison on May 14, 1921. He and his men hijack a British Army Peerless armoured car in Clontarf at the corporation abattoir, while it is escorting a consignment of meat to a barracks and shoot dead two soldiers in the process. The plan involves Dalton and Joe Leonard impersonating two British army officers and using forged documents to “transfer” MacEoin to Dublin Castle. They gain entry to Mountjoy but are discovered before they can free MacEoin and have to shoot their way out. They later abandon the armoured car after removing the Hotchkiss machine guns and setting fire to what they can. Toward the end of the war, in May 1921, the two principal fighting units of the IRA’s Dublin Brigade, the “Squad” and the “Active Service Unit” are amalgamated after losses suffered in the burning of the Custom House. Daly is named Officer Commanding (OC) of this new unit, which is named the Dublin Guard.

Daly’s own account of his activities during the Irish War of Independence is held at the Bureau of Military History in Cathal Brugha Barracks.

After the Anglo-Irish Treaty splits the IRA, Daly and most of his men side with the pro-treaty party, who go on to found the Irish Free State. He is appointed to the rank of brigadier in the newly created Irish National Army, which is inaugurated in January 1922. When the Irish Civil War breaks out in June 1922, he commands the Free State’s troops who secure Dublin, after a week of fighting.

In August 1922, during the Irish Free State offensive that re-takes most of the major towns in Ireland, Daly commands a landing of 450 troops of the Dublin Guard at Fenit, County Kerry, which goes on to capture Tralee from the anti-treaty forces. Acting with severe brutality in Kerry, he comments that, “nobody had asked me to take kid-gloves to Kerry, so I didn’t.” As the Civil War develops into a vicious guerrilla conflict, he and his men are implicated in a series of atrocities against anti-treaty prisoners, culminating in a series of killings with land mines in March 1923. Daly, and others under his command, claim that those killed were accidentally blown up by their own mines. Statements by the Garda Síochána, two Free State lieutenants on duty, W. McCarthy and Niall Harrington, and one survivor, Stephen Fuller, maintain the claims are fabricated.

Daly resigns from the Free State army in 1924 after an incident in Kenmare, County Kerry, concerning the daughters of a doctor. A court martial is held but collapses as no one is prepared to give evidence. He volunteers his services for the Irish Army again in 1940 and is appointed as a Captain to the non-combatant Construction Corps.

Daly is a carpenter by trade. He marries Daisy Gillies in 1910. His brother James (Seamus) marries Daisy’s sister Nora, a Cumann na mBan activist, in a joint wedding ceremony. After Daisy’s death in 1919, Daly marries Bridget Murtagh, also a Cumann na mBan activist, in 1921. Murtagh and Nora O’Daly carry out intelligence gathering for the planned attack on the Magazine Fort in 1916. She is a sister of Elizabeth Murtagh, the first wife of Commandant Michael Love who serves with Daly in the Collins Squad of the IRA, in the Irish Free State Army of the 1920s and during the Emergency period. Murtagh dies in childbirth in 1930. Daly subsequently marries Norah Gillies, his first wife’s niece.

On his death on January 16, 1957, Daly is buried with full military honours in Mount Jerome Cemetery. He is survived by his brothers, Comdt Seamus O’Daly and Capt Frank O’Daly, his sons Patrick and Colbert, and his daughters Brede and Philomena.