War of Independence deaths in Kildare or of Kildare men elsewhere in Ireland [3]

The truce which came into effect on 11th July 1921 came approximately four months after the execution by the I.R.A. of Mrs. Mary Lindsey and her driver. The intervening four months saw 14 violent deaths in or about Co. Kildare. Nine days after St. Patrick’s Day Edward Leslie, an R.I.C. man died in the Military Hospital on the Curragh of gunshot wounds sustained in an IRA ambush at Scramogue, Roscommon three days earlier. On 29th March members of the Monaghan IRA Brigade were responsible for shooting dead, during the course of a raid for arms, 60-year-old William Fleming and his 24 year old son, both of whom farmed a small holding of 20 acres. It was one of the many indefensible actions by the I.R.A. during the War of Independence. There is no record of violent deaths in Co. Kildare during April 1921, but in the rest of the country 140 persons were killed on both sides of the armed conflict. Included in that number was Arthur Vicars, the first honorary secretary of the Co. Kildare Archaeological Society who was shot by the I.R.A. at his home at Kilmorna House, Listowel on 14th April. Vicars, who had served as the Ulster King of Arms from 1893 to 1907, had resigned that position following the theft from Dublin Castle of the Irish Crown jewels. It is now believed that the thief was Frank Shackleton, brother of the polar explorer, Ernest Shackleton. It was claimed by the Kerry No. 1 I.R.A. Brigade that Vicars was a spy, thereby seeking to justify his killing and the burning of his house. Included amongst the five women who suffered violent deaths in April 1921 was Catherine Carroll, a 36-year-old single woman who lived in a rural part of north Co. Monaghan with her disabled brother and her elderly mother. Eoin O’Duffy who would later serve as Commissioner of the Garda Siochana until sacked by Éamon de Valera, ordered her execution for alleged spying. On 3rd May Jack O’Sullivan who lived in Kill died while a prisoner in Ballykilner internment camp. He was a member of Kill Company Kildare I.R.A. Brigade and had been arrested following the ambush at Kill the previous August. He was buried in St. Corbans, Naas. Two days after O’Sullivan’s death John Hickey, a 44-year-old farmer of Newtown, Kildare, was found dead on the far side of a trench dug on the road near Newtown. He had suffered a fractured skull, how it was not known. On 16th May 1921 the War of Independence found its first two victims in the Athy area. James Lacey and William Connor, both 26 years of age and from Shanganaghmore, Barrowhouse, were shot and killed during an ambush at Barrowhouse. Both were members of the B. Company 5th Battalion Carlow Kildare Brigade which was based in Athy. With six other Volunteers they prepared to ambush R.I.C. men cycling from Ballylinan R.I.C. Barracks to the nearby R.I.C. Barracks in Grangemellon. I have written previously of the Barrowhouse ambush and most recently in Eye on the Past No. 1371 published on 9th April 2019. The five R.I.C. constables lead by Sergeant John McKale apparently saw a man with a gun in his hand running across a field towards a ditch near the road on which they were cycling. The R.I.C. men took cover and when shots rang out, they returned fire. When the ambush party retreated the R.I.C. found the bodies of the two I.R.A. Volunteers. As was a common feature following attacks on the R.I.C. or the Crown Forces there were reprisals in the Barrowhouse area that night resulting in the burning of Patrick Lynch’s home and workshop and the house of Mary Malone. The neighbouring farm of Martin Lyons was also attacked, resulting in the destruction of a threshing machine and a large quantity of straw and hay. The following day Albert Carter from Carbery who joined the R.I.C. just four months earlier was killed when ambushed in Letterkenny. That same day several R.I.C. constables on cycle patrol were attacked in Kinnity, Co. Offaly. One constable was killed outright and a second wounded. The wounded R.I.C. man was Edward Doran of Cardenton, Athy who died on 19th May. Four further violent deaths were recorded in Co. Kildare between 5th and 17th June. Just four days before the truce Bridget Doran, aged 34 years and her stepson, aged 11 years were burned to death after two men, believed to be I.R.A. Volunteers, during a robbery sprinkled paraffin around the store over which the Doran family lived. No one ever admitted involvement in the shameful and horrendous deaths which occurred at Moorefield, Newbridge. The final Co. Kildare related killing occurred on 8th July when Jack Rossiter, a 57-year-old groom who worked at Maddenstown Lodge, was shot and killed during an I.R.A. attack on the Dublin Cork train in which he was travelling. I understand that Connor and Lacy, both of whom were killed at the Barrowhouse ambush, will be commemorated when covid restrictions are lifted. The information for this and the two previous articles on this subject mainly comes from the superb publication ‘The Dead of the Irish Revolution’ by Eunan O’Halpin and Daithí Ó Corráin. A copy of this remarkable book should be in every Irish home.

War of Independence deaths in Kildare or of Kildare men elsewhere in Ireland [1]

The first deaths of participants in the Irish War of Independence occurred three days before the start of the Easter Rising. On 21st April a car on the way to Tralee drove off the pier at Ballykissane, Killorglin. The driver, Tom McInerny, was the only survivor of the four Irish Volunteers who had been on their way to set up a radio transmitter to keep Tralee Volunteers in contact with the German arms ship, Aud. Twenty year old Cornelius Keating, 37 year old Charles Monaghan and 30 year old Daniel Sheehan were drowned. Theirs were the first of the almost 2,350 deaths recorded during the period April 1916 to December 1921 –commonly known as the War of Independence period. In the week which commenced with the deaths at Ballykissane a further 238 deaths were recorded. This of course was the week of the Easter Rising. Amongst the early deaths was that of James Duffy, a County Kildare man, a private in the Royal Irish Regiment. He was shot and killed while marching from Richmond barracks to Dublin Castle via Kilmainham. The troops were fired on by Volunteers led by Eamon Ceannt who had taken over the South Dublin Union. Amongst Ceannt’s men was W.T. Cosgrove, the future Taoiseach, whose father Thomas was a native of Castledermot. Another casualty of the South Dublin Union battle was nurse Margaret Kehoe from Leighlinbridge, Co. Carlow who was shot and killed on the same day as Duffy. A day later Denis Kelly from County Kildare, a 43 year old ticket checker with the Great Southern and Western Railway Company was shot and killed while working at the North Wall. Another Kildare man, 42 year old Edward Murphy, the Court crier for Judge Lenihan, also died on 25th April having been shot the previous day in the vicinity of St. Stephen’s Green. On 26th April, George Geoghegan, a Kildare native and a member of the Irish Citizen Army was shot and killed as an I.C.A. contingent led by Captain Sean Connolly took over the City Hall. He is commemorated with three other victims, Sean Connolly, Sean O’Reilly and Louis Byrne in a plaque erected at City Hall by the National Graves Association. As the first week of the revolution came to an end it was marked by the death of yet another County Kildare native. Francis Salmon, a native of Straffan, was just 17 years of age when he was shot dead while standing at the door of his employer’s house at 50 Sir John Rogerson’s Quay in Dublin. The young sales assistant was the youngest Kildare county native to die during the 1916 Rising. On the same day as the first of the Easter Rising leaders, Padraig Pearse, Thomas Clarke and Thomas McDonagh were executed in Kilmainham jail, a 50 year old labourer’s widow died in mysterious circumstances. County Kildare born Margaret McGuinness, a widow, lived at 27 Pembroke Cottages, Dublin and her death is generally accepted to have been as a result of political violence. There is no question surrounding the killing of Prosperous born Michael Kavanagh, a 35 year old carter who was married with 7 children. He was bringing luggage to the Shelbourne Hotel on the first day of the Rising when his cart was seized by members of the Irish Citizens Army to make a barricade. Kavanagh was trying to retrieve the cart when he was shot in the head. He died on 17th May. Almost three years were to pass before the next County Kildare casualty of the Irish War of Independence. On the 13th of February 1919 Patrick Gavin, a 45 year old labourer from Maddenstown, was driving cattle to the Newbridge fair when he was challenged by an English soldier on sentry duty at Brownstown pumping station. It was claimed he was challenged by the sentry and reacted by threatening the sentry who shot him. The soldier was subsequently court martialled but escaped any punishment. One of the rare incidences of armed conflict within the county of Kildare during the War of Independence resulted in the killing of R.I.C. constable Patrick Haverty, a 40 year old Galway man. He was killed during the ambush at Greenhills, Kill on 21st August 1920. The ambush led by Tom Harris, the future Fianna Fáil T.D. was the first such action in County Kildare and resulted also in the death of R.I.C. sergeant Patrick O’Reilly who succumbed to his injuries ten days later. Further R.I.C. casualties in the county occurred on 19th February 1921 when Thomas Bradshaw, a 24 year old policeman from Tipperary, shot himself in Monasterevin R.I.C. Barracks. Just over two weeks later Harold Stiff, a Londoner who had joined the R.I.C. a few months earlier, committed suicide in the Maynooth R.I.C. barracks. On 21st February 1921 R.I.C. sergeant Joseph Hughes, a 35 year old former postman from Wolfhill, was shot while patrolling in Maynooth. He died the following day and the local press reported that his funeral was attended by an immense crowd while passing through Athy where all shops were closed with ‘police with reversed arms marched behind the coffin.’ Information for this article has been extracted mainly from ‘The Dead of the Irish Revolution’ by Eunan O’Halpin and Daithí Ó Corráin. ……. TO BE CONTINUED