ELIZABETH O'FARRELL ......

..... a protest meeting had been arranged for College Green, in Dublin, in early January 1957, to condemn the British for the deaths of Sean Sabhat and Feargal O'Hanlon ; Elizabeth O'Farrell , now in her mid-60's, addressed the crowd of thousands and praised the men and women that were carrying on the struggle to remove the British presence .....


Elizabeth O'Farrell died within months of making that speech ; on the 25th June, 1957, in her 60's, she passed away at Fatima House , in Bray, County Wicklow, leaving behind a legacy of forty-four years work in the Republican Movement. Without people of that calibre , the Movement could not have survived .



THE TRAGEDIES OF KERRY , by Dorothy Macardle - first published in 1924 :

FRANK GRADY OF GLENBEIGH -

.... pulled out from a line of IRA prisoners, Frank Grady was shot dead by Free Stater 'Tiny' Lyons ; he was buried among wild violets and gorze , in the corner of a windy field .....

" In spite of spies and soldiers on every road , the people came down from the glens and mountains to his funeral and followed like a chieftain's host . In spite of a menacing aeroplane dipping and circling overhead , three of his hunted comrades came down from Coomasalarn , waded through a river carrying their rifles , and fired the last post over his grave .

There are few, now, in those glens who will make friends with the army that murdered Frank Grady ; the road he walked in , unswerving, is the road they will follow now . In death as in life he is "a great leader of men."



du CANN CAN DO .....

.... in 'The Sunday Business Post' of 29th December 1996 ('Last Post' Column, page 36), it was reported that American journalist Maureen Orth had interviewed Sir Edward du Cann , former Chairperson of the British Conservative Party , during which he said -

" We English are very badly equipped to deal with the Irish , because we are not poets . The Irish are all poets . The English find them impossible to understand - why they fight each other , why they're so dogmatic , why they speak with such a total lack of logic , wholly ignoring the point of view of the Unionists . There's no reality in Ireland . It's a land of fairies , pixies and leprechauns . "


.....well begosh and begorrah Sirr , and ya do be findin' it hard ta understand us ; sure are'nt we dogmatic , not logical and we do fight with each other don't we not ?

And is'nt it only after takin' ya over 800 years ta find that out ?

Ya must be slower than us , Sirr , seen as yur still here an' all ......

------------ -------------- ------------------ ---------------- ---------------- --------------------- -------------------- ----------------- --------------------- ----------------------- -------------------- ----------------------------- --------------------- --------------------------- ----------------------------- ---------------------- ---------------


AND ON THAT NOTE -

'1169 ....' has the bags packed , the sambos wrapped and the milk cancelled ; should be back on Tuesday 29th July (or before then , if the few bob runs out ....) - 'till then , Slan Anois .

( And we'll be sayin' that to you too, Sirr , someday .....).

ELIZABETH O'FARRELL .....

....within days of the shooting dead of Sean Sabhat and Feargal O'Hanlon on 1st January , 1957, Elizabeth O'Farrell and her friend and comrade Sighle Grenan addressed a crowd of thousands in College Green in Dublin .....

To deafening cheers from the crowd , Elizabeth O'Farrell spoke of her support and admiration for fighters like Sabhat and o'Hanlon , and told the crowd that Padraig Pearse and James Connolly , whom she herself had fought beside, would be proud of the men and women that were carrying on the struggle .

(Tomorrow [Saturday July 19th] - the death of Elizabeth O'Farrell : due to holidays , it will be the 'Last Post' from '1169...' until Tuesday July 29th ; our HQ is being abandoned and the staff de-camping to Waterford for a week or so . Normal service will resume thereafter .....).



THE TRAGEDIES OF KERRY , by Dorothy Macardle , first published in 1924 -

FRANK GRADY OF GLENBEIGH -

....Frank Grady's body had been found in a cowshed ; local women had strewn clean hay over the blood-soaked ground and lit a candle and said litanies for his soul .....


" The father came with a cart for his dead son , his daughter with him . The priest turned the girl back . "She would have fainted," he said, "if she had seen what I saw." The mother waited below in the house , not believing at all what she had been told . "I never would believe he was dead," she moaned, "till I saw him lying on the floor."

He was buried in a little, unfenced patch of consecrated ground where grey boulders and gravestones lean against one another, among wild violets and gorze, in the corner of a windy field . " (MORE LATER)>



I'M RIGHT(wing),THE WORLD IS WRONG.....

" 'Bloody Sunday' was orchestrated confrontation and the ensuing tragedy has been shamelessly exploited by evil men ."

----Andrew Hunter MP, then Chairperson of the British Conservative 'Northern Ireland'(sic) Committee , January 1997.

.....maybe they really ARE out to get ya, Andrew - and, if not, they should be !


WELL,eh, LET'S NOT BE TO HASTY 'BOUT THAT .....

Also in January 1997, the 'W.T.P.A.N' Party in the Six Counties (that's the 'Where The Provos Are Now' Party- ie the SDLP) issued a challenge to the Provos to drop abstentionism at Westminster , and received the following reply from Francie Molloy : " Irish politicians should not exaggerate the value of attendance in the London Parliament . The refusal of (Provisional) Sinn Fein representatives to take an oath of allegiance to the English queen has not prevented us from representing our electorate . "

HOWEVER.... in like a speeding bullet with his own reply was Provisional Sinn Fein Leinster House employee Micheal MacDonncha , who stated : "The challenge to republicans themselves remains also- the challenge to adapt all their strategies and tactics to take full advantage of every political opportunity for the advancement of the republican cause ."

--- that , by the way, is political shorthand for "If we can advance our careers in Leinster House, why not Westminster ? "

(Above details from AP/RN, January 9th, 1997, page 9 .)

ELIZABETH O'FARRELL......

......speaking vehemently against the 1921 'Treaty of Surrender' , Elizabeth O'Farrell (then only in her late 20's) urged Republicans to continue the fight ....

When the Treaty was signed, she carried on with her work on behalf of those still fighting for the 32-County Republic and was one of the many steadfast Republican's that ensured the Movement lived on . For the next thirty-odd years she continued her work , usually in the background - fund-raising , organising meetings, transport , and safe-houses for those 'on-the-run' , gathering information and recruiting new members .

On 1st January , 1957, an IRA operation at Brookeborough Barracks went wrong , and two IRA men died - Sean Sabhat and Feargal O'Hanlon ; within days , a protest meeting was called for College Green in Dublin and a stage was erected. Nurse Elizabeth O'Farrell, now in her mid-60's , and her life-long friend and comrade Sighle (Sile) Grenan (they first met each other at the Cumann na mBan meeting forty-four years earlier, and had become like sisters since then) addressed the crowd of thousands in College Green ...... (MORE LATER)>



THE TRAGEDIES OF KERRY , by Dorothy Macardle - first published in 1924 :

FRANK GRADY OF GLENBEIGH -

....after being shot twice by Free Stater 'Tiny' Lyons at point-blank range, Frank Grady fell back on the road, his arms flung out .....

" Conn Crimmin , one of the prisoners from Cahirciveen, sprang forward . He was a first-aid man. He was kept back until Frank was dead , then Lyons said "Do what you can for him now" . He was pushing his gun into the faces of the other prisoners and seemed eager to kill more , but Captain Foley held him back . "You'll do for the mines," Lyons said to the rest ; and to Denis Daly he said, "You'll fit well to lay over a mine." Conn Crimmin and four soldiers had taken a door from a shed and would have carried Frank's body into a house. "Bring him in to me here," a widow was calling from her door. Lyons said there was no time to waste and made the soldiers throw the body into a cowshed by the wayside. He ordered the soldiers to take off the boots, but not one would obey. He went on with the prisoners then to Killorglin.

Father O'Reilly met a boy on the road ; he was crying ; he said, "Frank Grady is dead" . Father O'Reilly found his body in the cowshed ; women had strewn clean hay over the blood-soaked ground and lit a candle and said litanies for his soul ". (MORE LATER)>



MEET EDDIE's BROTHER ~ ALSO A JOKER ......


Writing in 'The Sunday Independent' on 26th January , 1997, John A Murphy, Professor of Irish History in University College, Cork, stated -

" Only the politically retarded and the ideological malcontents refuse to recognise the state. They nurture fantasies about restoring an all-Ireland republic . Is it not time in this 75th anniversary year of independence (sic) to rid ourselves of this fantasy ? ".

---- it's a "fantasy" that has lived with people for more than 800 years , Mr Murphy , and it has been "fantised" about by those that are still being commemorated to this day .

When was the last time anyone marched in your honour, 'spud' ? .

ELIZABETH O'FARRELL.....

... on Saturday 30th April 1916 , under orders from Padraig Pearse, Elizabeth O'Farrell met with British Brigadier-General Lowe and conveyed to him Pearse's decision to surrender .....

At 3.30pm that same day (Saturday, 30th April, 1916) she accompanied Pearse to the corner of Parnell Street (then known as 'Great Britain Street') and Moore Street and was present when Padraig Pearse surrendered to Lowe. She spent the rest of that day and most of the following day delivering the order of surrender to the various Republican garrisons throughout Dublin city.

Still a young woman (in her early 20's) but marked by the British as 'a danger to society' , Elizabeth O'Farrell went 'underground' and did tremendous work for the Movement , all in a 'behind-the-scenes' capacity ; she vehemently opposed the 'Treaty of Surrender' in 1921 and urged Republicans to continue the fight ...... (MORE LATER)>



THE TRAGEDIES OF KERRY , by Dorothy Macardle - first published in 1924 :

FRANK GRADY OF GLENBEIGH .....

.... on the morning of Sunday, the eleventh of March (1923) , prisoners from Cahirciveen were brought as far as Mountain Stage, to be handed over there to an escort from Killarney, under 'Tiny' Lyons .....

".....when Lyons arrived his Lieutenant , McGuinness, carried out a round-up in the Glen . They brought a number of captured men up to the road near the station-masters house, and a crowd of people gathered to see who had been taken.There was a tall, fair man who, when questioned, said that his name was Shea . McGuinness asked boys on the road if that was his name , and everyone answered "I don't know" . Kicks and blows failed to make anyone tell .

The prisoners were lined up on the side of the road along with those from Cahirciveen . The young fair man was at the end ; he was dressed ready for Mass; no arms had been found with him . He was laughing in the faces of his captors, unperturbed. Lyons was passing up the file of prisoners , asking each his name, and came to the last . Among the soldiers were men from Glenbeigh and a whisper "Tis Frank Grady", went round. Some hundred and fifty people witnessed what happened then . Lyons put out his hand, saying "Hello Frank" and Frank gave it a friendly grasp. Lyons had a 'peter-the-painter' (revolver) in his left hand. He changed it to his right, holding it by the barrel, when he said "You made a good job of Carragh Bridge".

Then the gun, swung powerfully, crashed into Frank's face. While Frank put his hand up to his head and stood swaying, Lyons reversed the gun and fired . The shot went through Frank's wrist and head . He fired again , and Frank fell back on the road, his arms flung out ...... " (MORE LATER)>



HOLD THE FRONT PAGE ! STOP PRESS ! -
- FREE STATE AIR CORPS TO AID IRAQ !!

Speaking at the RACO conference in 1994 , the then Free State Air Corps Commandant , Dermot Donnelly stated , re a European role in any Gulf War -

" Do we want to be part of the genocide ? Do we want to be responsible for children in Iraq at present having operations without anaesthetics and dying for want of cheap and readily available drugs ? Had we been in a European Army we would share some of the responsibility for these obscenities " .

And here we are , nine years on and, thanks to Bertie and that spineless lot in Leinster House , handing Shannon and Baldonnel over to the U S Army : we "share some of the responsibility for the obscenities " committed by Bush and Blair in their recent adventure .

Tell them that , Dermot .....


WHATEVER YOU SAY , SAY NOTHING - part two ....

RE yesterdays 'BLOODY SUNDAY' post :

.... a Conor , in Limerick, left a message in the guestbook reminding me that the then 'Irish Transport and General Workers Union' (now 'SIPTU') described the event as " One more in the long list of savage and inhuman acts perpetrated on the people of Ireland by the forces and agents of the British Crown " .

...and fair play to them for doing so , Conor : BUT... the very same "forces and agents of the British Crown" are still here , and SIPTU are very quiet .......

ELIZABETH O'FARRELL .......

.....she joined Cumann na mBan at its inaugural meeting in November 1913 , when she was just twenty-years young.....

In April 1916 , Elizabeth O'Farrell travelled the country carrying the mobilisation order from Padraig Pearse to the various Volunteer units - this document contained details of the planned manoeuvres for Easter Sunday , 23rd April 1916, and it was a measure of the esteem with which she was regarded that she was chosen for that mission .

A nurse by profession, Elizabeth O'Farrell was one of the Cumann na mBan contingent who attended the wounded and dying inside the GPO , and was one of the last rebels to leave that building on 29th April . The following day (Saturday 30th April, 1916) , under orders from Padraig Pearse, she met with British Brigadier-General Lowe, at 12 noon, and conveyed to him Pearse's decision to surrender ..... (MORE LATER)>



THE TRAGEDIES OF KERRY , by Dorothy Macardle - first published in 1924 :


FRANK GRADY OF GLENBEIGH -

" Frank Grady was well known since 1916 among the glens of West Kerry as "a great leader of men" . His home was in Glenbeigh , but it was unsafe for him to go there ; he could only visit it, watchfully, now and then. In March 1923, he had been ill and was resting not very far from Glenbeigh. Three times in one week Free State troops raided his fathers cottage and found no trace of him . Their manner was menacing , and the old man knew that murder had been done in the last few days at Gleesk and Ballyseedy and at Killarney and at Glencar.

He went out and found his son and warned him to be minding himself well. He was their only boy, loved with the deep, vehement love given in Ireland to a kind son of whom his people are proud. On the morning of Sunday, the eleventh of March (1923) , prisoners from Cahirciveen were brought as far as Mountain Stage, to be handed over there to an escort from Killarney, under 'Tiny' Lyons....... (MORE LATER)>



WHATEVER YOU SAY , SAY NOTHING...

.... in the days after 'BLOODY SUNDAY' (30th January 1972 , Derry) when fourteen unarmed Irish civilians were shot dead by British soldiers , the following was said -

" Even if they (the marchers) were in technical breach of the recently-imposed ban on demonstrations, this act by British troops was unbelievably and savagely inhuman " - Jack Lynch , Free State 'Taoiseach' at the time.

" (we demand) a political solution that will get the British Army out of this country forever " - Fine Gael leader Liam Cosgrave .

" (We condemn) the brutal and barbarous killings by the British Army " - Free State Labour Party leader at the time, Brendan Corish .

A meeting of staff and students in St Patricks College , Maynooth, called for the total withdrawal of British troops from Ireland ; they also made a point of regretting the College's "own inactivity and the apathy of the (Free State) government and people which has contributed to the continuation of injustice and oppression " .

----- why does it take the deaths of Irish people , by the British forces of occupation, before other Irish people speak out ?

ELIZABETH O'FARRELL :

29th April , 1916 - the GPO, surrounded by British troops, is in ruins ; the Irish Republicans inside the crumbling building know they have to evacuate - they fight their way out and make it as far as Moore Street , where they establish a new Headquarters at number 16 : amongst the bunch of 'terrorists, criminals and dissidents' (who, incidentally, had no mandate from the people) was a young Dublin woman , in her early 20's , whose work for Irish freedom has been all but overshadowed by those she worked with .....

Elizabeth O'Farrell was born in Dublin during the early 1890's and dedicated over forty years of her life to the Republican cause ; as a teenager she joined 'Inghinidhe na hEireann' and, at about the age of twenty-years young (in November 1913),she joined Cumann na mBan at its inaugural meeting . (MORE LATER)>



THE TRAGEDIES OF KERRY, by Dorothy Macardle, first published in 1924 -

Joe and Seumas Taylor of Glencar :

.... Seumas Taylor , a Prisoner Of War, was taken out by the Free Staters and shot dead on the roadside - when his people went to Tralee they were given a broken, shot-riddled body in a rough wooden case. They could not recognise their son ....

" He was buried beside his brother in Glencar , on the fourteenth of March (1923) when FRANK GRADY was buried in Glenbeigh . A group of Free State Officers , under Colonel Bishop, all heavily armed, were recognised in the neighbourhood that day. They had hidden their uniforms and dressed in the weather-stained trench coats of the IRA. If any Republican soldier should be so reckless, it was thought, as to come down from the mountains now, he would meet Seumas Taylor's fate .

The Volunteers came down a hundred strong , and marched to their dead comrade's grave . The Empire's weapon of murder was to fail again " .



KETTLE KALLING .....

... " I think those who are begging should be hosed down and the disgrace of cardboard city should be broken up . Most of the others (beggars) are scum " .

----- so said British Tory MP Terry Dicks , on Friday 10th January 1997 .

Yeah , take them off the streets , Terry - maybe you and Edwina could give them counting lessons before you brand them on the forehead with an 'X' .....

Tom Doyle , Free State Civil Servant , Free State Department of Defence employee .... and IRA activist.

......at the 1951 Sinn Fein Ard Fheis , Tom Doyle was elected Vice-President and, during the early 1950's , he served as President of the organisation for two years -then from 1956 to 1962 he again held the position of Vice-President.....

In March 1957 he contested a general election for Sinn Fein , in the Dublin constituency of North Central, but was not elected. Tom Doyle was a powerful orator and had learned from his nine years as a Civil Servant how to 'work a room' ; he had been travelling from one end of the country to the other speaking at public meetings and commemorations for about ten years , a workload which physically hurt the man - in 1961 , he took ill and was admitted to St Lukes Hospital in Rathgar , Dublin . Tom Doyle died in that hospital on 12th March , 1962 , aged 45 - he was buried in the Republican Plot in Glasnevin Cemetery , and thousands of Irish Republicans attended the funeral.

Morally, Tom Doyle was a giant of a man who carried the Movement and inspired others to keep going . He deserves to be remembered by those who knew him ; his name , actions and deeds should be told to those who don't know of him and those that know of him but would rather forget must not be allowed to .



THE TRAGEDIES OF KERRY , by Dorothy Macardle , first published in 1924 -

Joe and Seumas Taylor of Glencar :

.....the Free State guards had filled Seumas Taylor's coat-pockets with ammunition ; when it fell out on the ground he was beaten by his captors .....

"There were some of the guards who disliked it (the beating Seumas got and the reason for it) and they sent for a priest. Seumas made his confession and prepared himself for death , then he lay down and slept. The prisoners saw the guards who had beaten Seumas come in again . This time they had a green uniform coat, and they tried to force him to put it on. He resisted until they had beaten him almost to unconsciousness ; he could no longer put up his hands to defend himself - then they put the coat on him and took him away.

He was killed on the roadside near Ballyseedy Wood and his body was taken to Tralee . Word was sent to his father that Seumas had been "killed in an ambush" . But there was no ambush that night. One of the soldiers who had taken him out returned to the barracks with his arm in a sling. But in an hour the sling was discarded : there was nothing wrong with the arm. When his people went to Tralee they were given a broken shot-riddled body in a rough wooden case. They could not recognise their son " . (MORE LATER)>



PADDY IRISHMAN, PADDY ENGLISHMAN AND........

.... the Irishman in charge of the Punjab for Britain, Sir Michael O'Dwyer , son of a large land-owner and a Catholic, gave the order for Brigadier-General Reginald Dyer to open fire on unarmed demonstrators at Amritsar on 13th April , 1919 : 379 people died. The shooting caused an international outrage but the two men (O'Dwyer and Dyer) were defended by their British bosses and , in the 'House of Commons' , Edward Carson himself actually praised the two of them !

In 1940 , O'Dwyer was assassinated in London by a young sikh whose relatives had been killed at Amritsar.

....don't know what happened , if anything, to Brigadier-General Reginald Dyer , but I bet he lived the rest of his life looking over his shoulder .....