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Donnelly’s Bar and Kay’s Tavern Attacks

During the evening of December 19, 1975, two coordinated attacks are carried out by the Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF) in pubs on either side of the Irish border. The first attack, a car bombing, takes place outside Kay’s Tavern, a pub along Crowe Street in Dundalk, County Louth, Republic of Ireland – close to the border. The second, a gun and bomb attack, takes place at Donnelly’s Bar & Filling Station in Silverbridge, County Armagh, just across the border inside Northern Ireland.

The attacks are linked to the Glenanne gang, a group of loyalist militants who are either members of the UVF, the Ulster Defence Regiment (UDR), the Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC) and the closely linked UVF paramilitary the Red Hand Commando (RHC). Some of the Glenanne gang are members of two of these organisations at the same time, such as gang leaders Billy Hanna, who is in both the UVF and the UDR and who fights for the British Army during the Korean War, and John Weir from County Monaghan, who is in the UVF and is a sergeant in the RUC. At least 25 UDR men and police officers are named as members of the gang. The Red Hand Commando claim to have carried out both attacks.

According to journalist Joe Tiernan, the attacks are planned and led by Robert McConnell and Robin “The Jackal” Jackson who are both alleged to have carried out dozens of sectarian murders during The Troubles, mainly from 1974 to 1977, mostly in south County Armagh – which in 1975 is virtually lawless. Loyalist paramilitaries and the Provisional Irish Republican Army roam the streets and countryside and can set up bogus military checkpoints freely.

The attacks are planned at the Glenanne farm of RUC reserve officer James Mitchell which is where most terrorist acts are planned by the gang and the farm also acts as a UVF arms dump and bomb-making site. After the attacks are finished everyone involved in both attacks is to meet at Mitchell’s farm. Then if there is any heat, Mitchell can claim the bombers and shooters were with him when the attacks happened.

The first phase of the plan starts at around 6:15 p.m. along Crowe Street in Dundalk when a 100-pound no-warning bomb explodes in a Ford sports car just outside Kay’s Tavern. The blast kills Hugh Watters, who is a tailor and has just dropped into the pub to deliver some clothes he has altered for the pub’s owner, almost instantly. Jack Rooney, who is walking past the town hall on the opposite side of the street, is struck in the head by flying shrapnel and dies three days later. A further 20 people are injured in the explosion, several of them very seriously. The car bomb is fitted with fake southern registration plates and placed in one of the busiest streets in Dundalk in the hope of causing maximum death and injury. According to Joe Tiernan, UVF commander Robin Jackson plants the bomb and along with other members of his unit escapes across the border in a blue Hillman Hunter around the time the bomb goes off.

At around 9:00 p.m., about three hours after the Dundalk bombing, the second phase of the coordinated plan begins. It is led by McConnell and takes place at Donnelly’s Bar & Filling Station in the small Armagh village Silverbridge, close to Crossmaglen.

The unit arrives in two cars and come unusually fast toward the pub. The publican’s son, Michael Donnelly (14), is serving petrol to a customer. He notices the strange speed of the cars. He tries to run toward the pub, but McConnell jumps out of one of the cars and shoots the teenage boy dead with a Sten gun. McConnell then shoots the man Michael Donnelly had been serving petrol to in the head. Although the man survives the shooting, he is maimed for life.

Then a second gunman, believed to be Billy McCaughey, a UVF volunteer and member of the RUC Special Patrol Group, shoots dead a second person, local man Patrick Donnelly (no relation to the pub owner’s family) who has been waiting for petrol. McConnell then goes inside the pub and sprays the bar with his Sten SMG, killing a third man, Trevor Bracknell, and seriously injuring three more people.

As McConnell withdraws to his car, two other members of the unit carry a 25-pound cylinder bomb inside the pub. As McConnell’s unit flees back to Mitchell’s farm, the bomb detonates inside the pub. However, by this time most of the people have already fled.

(Pictured: Photograph of the destruction at Kay’s Tavern after the loyalist car bomb explosion on December 19, 1975. Members of the Garda and Dundalk fire service are seen in the foreground. Also present are a number of visiting government ministers from Dublin.)


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The Second Battle of Sabine Pass

A small Confederate force commanded by Lieutenant Richard W. Dowling, a red-headed 25-year-old native of Knockballyvishteal, Milltown, County Galway, and Houston saloon owner, wins one of the most remarkable victories of the American Civil War on September 8, 1863. The Second Battle of Sabine Pass is a failed Union Army attempt to invade the Confederate state of Texas. The Union Navy supports the effort and loses three gunboats during the battle, two captured and one destroyed. It is often credited as the war’s most one-sided Confederate victory. Confederate President Jefferson Davis writes in 1876 that he “considered the [second] battle of Sabine pass the most remarkable in military history.”

On the afternoon of September 8, 1863, Union Navy Lieutenant Frederick Crocker (“Acting Captain”) is in command of the advance squadron composed of four gunboats. Crocker is a veteran officer of considerable recent experience in Union river-gunboat actions and blockade duty. His ship is the USS Clifton, a steam-powered side-wheeler. Besides the USS Clifton, Crocker’s advance squadron includes USS Granite City, USS Sachem, and USS Arizona, all recently commissioned ironclad warships. Less than three miles southeast downriver, well out of range of the Confederate fort’s cannons, are anchored seven U.S. Navy transports carrying most of the Union Army soldiers of the landing force. The USS Suffolk, hosting invasion force commander Union Army Major General William B. Franklin and his staff, heads the seven-vessel squadron. Outside the principal Gulf shore sandbar, an additional two miles downstream of this squadron, lay at anchor the remaining ships of the 22-vessel invasion fleet. The total number of Union infantry assault troops in the landing force is given as 5,000 infantrymen, which includes 500 listed as aboard the USS Granite City, those aboard the six troop transports in the seven-ship squadron headed by USS Suffolk, plus an artillery company somewhere among them. The first wave of 500 men aboard USS Granite City, which steams as close behind USS Clifton as possible but out of range of the fort’s guns, are to land in the open space adjacent to and downstream of the fort. This is a flat, often muddy area already cleared of brush by the Confederate garrison as a clear field of fire for the canister and grapeshot of the fort’s artillery. The Union Army’s invasion plan, therefore, absolutely requires that the Confederate guns be silenced before any troops are debarked. This engagement is to be the largest amphibious assault on enemy territory in the history of the U.S. military to date.

Confederate Captain Leon Smith, who is at Beaumont, Texas, immediately orders all Confederate troops in Beaumont, some eighty men, aboard the steamer Roebuck and sends them down the river to reinforce Fort Griffin. Smith and a Captain Good ride to the fort on horseback, reaching the fort some three hours before the steamer, arriving just as the Union gunboats USS Clifton and USS Sachem come within range, and assist in the defense of the fort.

Dowling’s well practiced Irish-Texan artillerymen, whose chosen and officially approved unit name is “Jefferson Davis Guards,” had placed range-stakes in the two narrow and shallow river channels. These are the “Texas channel” near the southwest shore and the “Louisiana channel” against the Louisiana shore. The white-painted stakes are for determining accurate range of the fort’s six old smooth-bore cannons. Each “Davis Guards” gun crew during gunnery practice thereby works to predetermine the approximate amount of gunpowder needed for each type of projectile (ball, canister, or grapeshot) available for their specific gun and which specific guns, charges, and loads have the best potential to hit each range-stake.

Crocker’s squadron has no local river pilots, only general knowledge of the river’s channels, no assurance of locations of the constantly varying depths especially of large oystershell “reefs” or “banks” between the river’s two channels. There is no mention in official U.S. Navy reports of whether Union sailors were making observations and taking depth soundings from the gunboats now dangerous top decks, while the Confederate cannon shots pounded and shook their ships. The few maps to which they have access are old and outdated and cannot account for recent changes in river-bottom conditions. On Captain Crocker’s signal the USS Sachem, followed by USS Arizona, advance up the right channel (Louisiana side) as fast as they dare, firing their port-side guns at the fort. USS Clifton approaches in the lead, ascending the Texas channel at full speed. USS Granite City hovers out of range behind USS Clifton, having orders not to risk debarking the 500 assault troops until the fort surrenders or its guns are silenced. As USS Sachem enters among the range-stakes, the Confederates open fire. Then USS Clifton comes into range, followed by USS Arizona. Despite their old smoothbore cannon, one of which has just become inoperable, after only a few rounds it is obvious the Confederate artillerymen’s months of training and target practice is an astounding success as their aim is deadly accurate.

The Confederates capture USS Clifton and USS Sachem with a total of 13 heavy cannon, including at least two new potent Parrott rifles, which are handed over to Leon Smith’s Texas Marine Department. The Union casualties amount to two dozen killed and badly wounded, about 37 missing, and 315 Navy men captured. The combined Union Army and Navy invasion force withdraw and return to New Orleans. The Confederates have no casualties.

In recognition of the victory, the Confederate States Congress passes a resolution of special thanks to the officers and men of the Davis Guard. In addition, Houston residents raise funds to provide medals to the Guard. The Davis Guards Medals are made from silver Mexican pesos by smoothing off the coins, then hand-stamping and hand-engraving on one side the battle name and date and on the other side the initials “D G” and a cross pattée. The medals are hung on green ribbons and presented to the members of the Davis Guard. The official Confederate silver medals are presented in a public ceremony a year later and are the only such medal ever awarded by that government.

The Battle of Sabine Pass is of moderate tactical or strategic significance to the American Civil War. It is successful in ensuring that the anticipated overland Union invasion of Texas is delayed indefinitely. A Confederate supply line from Mexico to Texas had existed out of the Port of Bagdad since the outbreak of the war but is held by the increasingly isolated Mexican Republicans. By the time Imperial French and Mexican forces capture Baghdad in 1864, a supply line to anywhere in the Confederacy east of the Mississippi River is no longer feasible on account of the Union victory at Vicksburg in July 1863. The Confederacy is therefore forced to continue its reliance on blockade running to import valuable materials and resources.

In 1937 a statue of Dowling is unveiled on the site of the fort. In 1998 a bronze plaque honoring Dowling is unveiled at the Tuam Town Hall in County Galway.

(Pictured: Richard William “Dick” Dowling, circa 1865)