On the 5th November, 1920 (listed in some sources as the 8th November), 21-year-old IRA Volunteer Michael Maguire, from Ardfert, in County Kerry, who earned his living as a shopkeeper, was 'arrested' by the Black and Tans and taken to the British Army barracks in the town of Causeway, a distance of about 14 miles (12 km) from the shop he worked in, in Ardfert.
Volunteer Maguire was then shot dead in that barracks.
No doubt in celebratory mood, the Tans took to the streets again and came across a mother and daughter - Teresa Ann O'Connell, 15 years young, and Ellen (née Landers), from the North Commons area.
It was said later that the Tans were of the opinion that young Teresa Ann was a member of Cumann na mBan, so they shot her - she died in the arms of her mother.
Days afterwards, another version of the murder was being whispered in the area - that two of the Tans were in dispute over which one was the best shot and, it seems, the 15-year-old child was just target practice...
(It should be noted that the murder of Teresa Ann O'Connell was never 'officially registered' with the 'British National Archives' in Kew, London, and the British military file on the poor girl was sealed until 1949, after which it was deemed to be an 'Open Document, Open Description, Public Record'. 29 years after the murder...)
RIP Volunteer Michael Maguire and Teresa Ann O'Connell.
On the same date that the Tans were practicing their shooting skills in Kerry, down the road and about 70 miles (101 km) across the country, in County Cork, the British Army's Hampshire Regiment, 2nd Battalion, was, it later claimed, out in force (between twenty and thirty of them) in the town of Youghal "investigating an attack on the police (sic) barracks..."
But there was no such attack.
The 'Hampshire Tigers', as that regiment called themselves, had been in the town earlier and had attempted to bully and intimidate the locals, who fought back as best they could ; now those armed thugs were back to, they later claimed, look into reports that an armed man had been seen in the vicinity of a barber shop in the town.
'The Cork Examiner' newspaper (which was a genuine newspaper then) reported that...
"..a party of twenty or thirty troops, fully armed, left the barracks for the town, where they started firing indiscriminately with rifles and revolvers and the letting-off of hand-grenades, with Verey lights and bombs adding to the pandemonium.
One soldier was killed, more than probably by the wild firing of a comrade.
On their way back to the barracks, they seriously wounded a poor man named Casey, the father of four young children, one an infant..."
During their first incursion into Youghal, the 'Tigers' had smashed the windows of Bransfield Barbers as part of the general mayhem they inflicted on the town, and were now back with bigger numbers, allegedly "searching for an armed man".
During their indiscriminate shooting and bombing, one of their own - a Mr William George King (22), from Liss, in East Hampshire, in England - was shot dead by, they claimed...
'...a bullet fired from across the street or from the barber shop's backyard. Private King was part of a group of soldiers who entered Bransfield's Barber Shop in Youghal to search for a reported armed man.
While inside the shop, King was shot. Accounts differ slightly, but suggest he was hit either as he was breaking into the backyard or by a civilian with a revolver who disappeared out the back.
Other soldiers testified that they were fired upon by IRA men from shops across the street, which is likely how King was killed - by a revolver bullet fired at close range from the yard of a house from which fire was opened on the troops...'
Whether shot dead by his own during the disruption they were causing or by an IRA Volunteer, Mr King is buried in England, his own country, in Saint Mary's Churchyard in Liss, East Hampshire.
At the same time that Mr King was 'visiting' a barber shop in the town of Youghal, some of his Crown Force comrades (from the 'Royal Marine Artillery 8th Battalion') were in the coastguard station in the village of Union Hall, in Cork.
Three rifle shots rang out in the building, and three 'Royal Marine' soldiers fell to the floor, wounded.
One of them, or one of their other colleagues had, it was later claimed, accidentally (!) fired three rounds from his rifle, all of which hit a fellow soldier.
Two of them recovered, but the third man - a Mr Percy Victor Starling (26), 'Service Number 13560' (with seven years 'service') from Brierly Hill in the 'Ceremonial County' of Staffordshire, in England - died three days later from his wound.
Mr Starling is buried in the Old Church Cemetery, on the outskirts of the town of Cobh, in Cork.
Incidentally, that graveyard contains three mass graves and several individual graves, including the remains of 193 victims of the passenger ship 'RMS Lusitania', which was sunk by a German torpedo off the Old Head of Kinsale in May 1915 with the loss of more than 1,100 lives.
Also, there are about 130 'Commonwealth' burials of the 1914-1918 period commemorated in that cemetery, 14 non-'World War' service burials are located there, and one Belgian Foreign National is buried in that graveyard.
Mr Starling (who had only got married three weeks before he was shot) joined them there on the 8th October 1920.
==========================
GAS LADS...
The massive finds of oil and gas on our western seaboard could ensure Ireland's financial security for generations.
Wealth approximating that of the Arab countries is within our grasp, but the Irish government seems content to sell off our birthright for a handful of votes and a few dollars.
In a special 'Magill' report, Sandra Mara investigates just what we are giving away, and why.
From 'Magill' magazine, March 2002.
The business and commercial assets of INPC, the State-owned oil company, were sold off in another disposal of the family silver to the American oil company 'Tosco', raising concerns in the EU at the time.
In the Dáil (sic), Joe Higgins opposed the deal, saying that "the safety record of Tosco in the US was appalling".
At the time of the sale, Tosco was in the process of being taken over by Phillips, the American oil multinational ; the deal was clearly a good one for Tosco and Phillips, who now have not alone the product, but the markets and distribution facilities within Ireland.
Fergus Cahill of Phillips was a former head of INPC many years ago and, when INPC was brought to the marklet, Tosco made a successful bid for it...
(MORE LATER.)
ON THIS DATE (5TH NOVEMBER) 24 YEARS AGO : OFFICIAL CONFIRMATION THAT BRITISH PARAMILITARIES HAD A CHANGE OF NAME AND UNIFORM.
The RUC name was given to the then-existing RIC force on the 1st June 1922 in an attempted sleight-of-hand manoeuvre to present an existing pro-British paramilitary force as a 'new entity' and that 'new entity' - the RUC - was, in turn, amalgamated into the 'new' PSNI on the 4th November 2001 - 24 years ago - and announced, in the media, as 'progress', on the 5th.
This was another tweaking of the name and uniform of a paramilitary outfit (and they've done it again!), as the 'police force' in that part of Ireland are still administered by Westminster and are as anti-republican as they were when they bore the 'RIC' name, and maintain the same structure and objective as when they were known by that latter name.
The more gullible in Leinster House and elsewhere among us (although they are well salaried to be so or, at least, to give the impression that they are that gullible) profess themselves convinced that a new day has dawned, ignoring the fact that the shadow in the room is caused by an elephant that they themselves have encouraged.
A UVF GUNRUNNER ON BEHALF OF THE SETTLERS : COLONEL FREDERICK HUGH CRAWFORD CBE, DIED ON THIS DATE (5TH NOVEMBER) 73 YEARS AGO.
His father, James, was a factory owner in Belfast (manufacturing starch) but Frederick struck out on his own, becoming an engineer with a shipping firm before taking to a military life, which brought him into the Boer War.
"From these settlers sprang a people, the Ulster-Scot, who have made themselves felt in the history of the British Empire and, in no small measure, in that of the United States of America....I am ashamed to call myself an Irishman.
Thank God I am not one. I am an Ulsterman, a very different breed..."
- Mr Crawford, describing himself, echoing the misguided feelings of his friends in the UUC, UVF and the URC.
On the night of the 24th April, 1914, Frederick Crawford, the 'Director of Ordnance HQ Staff UVF' (who was cooperating re acquiring arms with, and for, the 'Ulster Unionist Council') and the main instigator in an operation in which over 25,000 guns were successfully smuggled into Ireland, witnessed his plans come to fruition - for at least the previous four years, he and some other members of the 'Ulster Reform Club' had been making serious inquiries about obtaining arms and ammunition to be used, as they saw it, for 'the protection of fellow Ulstermen'.
Advertisements had been placed in newspapers in France, Belgium, Germany and Austrian newspapers seeking to purchase '10,000 second-hand rifles and two million rounds of ammunition...' and, indeed, between August 1913 and September 1914, it is known that Crawford and his colleagues in the UVF/URC/UUC obtained at least three million rounds of .303 ammunition and 500 rifles, including Martini Enfield carbines, Lee Metford rifles, Vetterlis and BSA .22 miniature rifles, all accompanied by their respective bayonets, and six Maxim machine guns (from the Vickers Company in London for £300 each).
The ads were placed and paid for by a 'H.Matthews, Ulster Reform Club' (Crawford's middle name was Hugh and his mother's maiden name was Matthews) an action which some members of the Club objected to, leading to Crawford resigning from that group (and describing the objectors as "a hindrance"): he described that period in his life as being "...so crowded with excitement and incidents that I can only remember some of them, and not always in the order in which they happened.."
Mr Crawford and his UVF/URC/UUC colleagues had ordered some munitions from a company in Hamburg, in Germany, and had paid a hefty deposit up front but, months later, as they had not heard from the company, Crawford was sent there to see what the delay was and discovered that the German boss, who was in Austria while Crawford was in Germany, had informed Westminster about the order and was asked by that institution not to proceed with same - the deposit would not be returned and the deal was off, as far as the company was concerned.
Crawford tracked him down, in Austria, and called him and his company "swindlers" and was then told of a similar 'deal' involving that arms company regarding Mexican purchasers who also got swindled but, on that occasion, words and bullets were exchanged, the latter from gun barrels!
At 60 years of age (in 1921) he was named in the British 'Royal Honours List' as a 'CBE' (' Commander of the Order of the British Empire') and he wrote his memoirs in 1934 at 73 years of age.
He died, in his 92nd year, in 1952, on the 5th November - 73 years ago on this date - and is buried in the City Cemetery in the Falls Road in Belfast.
The then British PM, 'Sir' Basil Brooke, described him as "...a fearless fighter in the historic fight to keep Ulster British.."
Whatever about his 'successes on the battlefield', he was apparently less successful in his family life -
"What sort of man was my Father ? .....as a boy and as a man he was never very intelligent.
He was an unconscious bully and for that reason unloved by his children.
Each in turn left the home as soon as we became adults and were able to do so. The U.V.F rifles - I think about 15,000 were stored and kept in good condition in a shed in the grounds of Harland and Wolff where I once saw them. For legal reasons they were in my father’s name.
After the retreat from Dunkirk, Britain was desperately short of arms and wanted to purchase the U.V.F rifles. As you are now aware my father was not a very intelligent person and a hopeless business man. My father’s chartered accountant sent word to him to say that Sir Dawson Bates wanted to meet him about something important.
Accordingly my father went to the accountant’s office where his old friend Sir Dawson Bates was waiting for him, “Ah Fred, so glad you’ve come”. The three, my father, the accountant and Sir Dawson Bates sat down at a table.
There Sir Dawson carefully explained the desperate need Britain had for arms and asked my father, for patriotic reasons, to release the rifles – it would only be a simple matter of signing a prepared document.
My father, in the presence of the Accountant and Sir Dawson Bates, for patriotic reasons, signed the document without reading it.
It conveyed ownership of the rifles from my father to Sir Dawson Bates who sold them to the British Government for I believe £2 a barrel - an unholy trio had been cheating him for years ; his estate agent who collected all revenues due to my father was keeping most of it.
His Chartered Accountant was presenting false figures for income tax purposes and all this skulduggery was made legal by the co-operation of his trusted friend, his solicitor..." (from here.)
Colonel Frederick Crawford CBE proudly worked for, and aided and abetted, British imperialism only to be used, abused and cheated by that same system.
A lesson (which will no doubt go unheeded) to be learned, even at this late stage, by those who, today, work that imperialist system in this country, north and south.
On the 5th November, 1921, a Mr David Lloyd George ('1st Earl Lloyd-George of Dwyfo'), the then British Prime Minister, and a Mr James Craig ('1st Viscount Craigavon PC, PCNI, DL' ETC!), the then 'Stormont Prime Minister' in the then (and now!) nine-county Province of Ulster, had a chat between themselves in Downing Street, London.
Mr George was strongly considering placing the new Stormont 'parliament' in a subordinate political position to an All-Ireland 'parliament' (a 'peace-offering on paper' to the Irish rebels?) in what was to become the so-called 'Free State', and must have been so happy (!) when he found that Mr Craig was luke-warm about the suggestion, and didn't completely dismiss it out of hand.
Or was Mr Craig simply buying time for himself, and intending to get one over on his colleague, Mr George?
For t'was on the 6th November (1921) - the following day - that Mr Craig took himself off to the office of the then British 'Secretary of State for War', a Mr 'Sir' Laming Worthington-Evans ('1st Baronet', pictured, above), and he also had a chat with British Field Marshal Mr 'Sir' Henry Hughes Wilson (also a '1st Baronet'!), who was the then 'British Chief of the Imperial Staff', don't ya know...
It apparently didn't take much convincing for the pair of '1st Baronets' (...pair of wha', Shar...?!) to come to the conclusion that Mr Craig himself should, essentially, be placed in command of two of the pro-British paramilitary forces in Ireland - the RIC and the 'A,B,C Special Constabulary'- which he was.
With this newly-acquired authority under his belt, Mr Craig went back to Downing Street and advised Mr George (and anyone else that would listen to him!) that he would not be in favour of the 'subordinate parliament' idea, and a Mr 'Sir' Edward Carson (top pic, on the left, sitting, the 'Attorney General and Solicitor General for England, Wales and Ireland') supported him in saying that, as did a Mr Andrew Bonar Law, a well-got British politician (top pic, on the right, standing and, at that time, the soon-to-be British Prime Minister himself).
"Bonar Law is rampaging. He is seeing red on the subject of Ulster..."
- Mr Neville Chamberlain, who was British PM from May 28th 1937, to May 10th 1940.
Mr Chamberlain also voiced concern that other political 'big wigs' - such as Mr George Nathaniel Curzon, the 'Right Honourable Sir' Laming Worthington-Evans ('Bt GBE' ETC!) and a Mr Stanley Baldwin (another soon-to-be British PM) who were known to be supporters of the Bonar Law fella, would use the opportunity to assist in outing Mr George from office.
"A despairing Llyod George, more depressed than at any time since the conference had begun, finally accepted that Craig would 'not budge an inch'; he told Thomas Jones (British civil servant) to prepare (Arthur) Griffith and (Michael) Collins for the break-up of the conference..."
- Historian Ronan Fanning.
Westminster's main man in the North of Ireland, Mr James Craig, had pulled a quick one on his boss in London!
==========================
ON THIS DATE (5TH NOVEMBER) 51 YEARS AGO : DAY ONE OF 18 YEARS - JUDITH THERESA WARD 'CONVICTED ON ALL COUNTS'.
She pleaded "not guilty" to all counts but, on the 4th November 1974, she was convicted on all counts, by a majority of ten to two on Count 1 and unanimously on all the others.
She was sentenced to five years' imprisonment on Count 1, 20 years' imprisonment concurrently on Count 2, life imprisonment for the murder Counts 3-14 and to 10 years on Count 15, to be served consecutively to the 20 years on Count 2, making a determinate sentence of 30 years.
It took eighteen years of campaigning to have her conviction quashed, which it was on the 11th May 1992 and it transpired that she had changed her 'confession' several times and that the police and the prosecution selected various parts of each 'confession' to assemble a version which they felt comfortable with!
One of the main pieces of forensic evidence against her was the alleged presence of traces of nitroglycerine on her hands, in her caravan and in her bag. Thin layer chromatography and the Griess test were used to establish the presence of nitroglycerine but later evidence showed that positive results using these methods could be obtained with materials innocently picked up from, for instance, shoe polish, and that several of the forensic scientists involved had either withheld evidence or exaggerated its importance.
Anne Maguire, a mother of 5 children, was menstruating heavily and denied all toiletries for a week, and was beaten senseless and Carol Richardson, who didn't even know she was pregnant, miscarried in Brixton Prison days after her arrest.
Pat O'Neill, who had minutes before entered the Maguires house to arrange for a baby-sitter when the police arrived, was told by a cop to swear that he saw a big cardboard box on Maguires table or else he would be done, but he refused to lie - he served eleven years. On his release, he found his marriage was broken beyond repair and that his six children had left the family home.
How many more Irish children will have to 'leave the family home' before the British eventually give a date for their political and military withdrawal from Ireland, because the situation as it now (and still) exists here is that their very presence continues to be objected to by Irish republicans and continues to give rise to unrest.
And, if our history is to be used as a yardstick, that will always be the case, regardless of where the outsider comes from.
WILLIAM JEFFERSON CLINTON...
Had the electoral rules entitled him to run again for the White House in 2000, few are in any doubt that Bill Clinton would be at this present moment in time relaxing in the Oval House, toying with a fat cuban and possibly smoking a cigar...
From 'Magill' Annual, 2002.
As Beckett once said -
"When you're up to your neck in shit, all you can do is sing..."
And what better blustering tenor to hear emanating from the Park in a few years than that of Wild Bill?
Harangued by unresolved court cases, heavily in debt, at the mercy of continually prying journalists and still smiling, his essential indomitable insouciance could be a lesson to us all in these times of coming hardship.
True, Bill's side of the deal would bring him about the same level of real power as wielded by the average president of an American high school class, but a man of his wiles could easily use the country (sic) to establish a world-wide power base opposed to George Bush's America, and few would be opposed to renaming the Presidential abode something a bit more fiesty, such as 'Kandahar'.
In terms of our next President, 'Magill' suggests William Jefferson Clinton ; if he has taught us anything, it is that anything is possible if you can manage to bend the rules and just keep smiling.
(END of 'William Jefferson Clinton' ; NEXT - 'Unspun : The Stories That Hit The Headlines', from 2002.)
NOVEMBER, 71 YEARS AGO : 'ISSUED BY THE ARMY COUNCIL, ÓGLAIGH NA hÉIREANN, NOVEMBER 1954...'
From 'The United Irishman' newspaper, December 1954.
"The people of Ireland have a decision to make ; let them think well on it, because they will stand at the bar of history to answer for it and let it not be said of this generation that they failed those who once again have hurled defiance at the crumbling ramparts of that imperial and blood-stained power which for so long has kept our country under the iron heel of oppression.
England still holds part of our land by force and, in the eight hundred years of occupation, never once has she given the slightest measure of amelioration except under force or the threat of force.
The dispassionate logical conclusion to be drawn from the history of the two countries is that Ireland can only achieve unity and freedom when the whole people of Ireland tell the British Army to get out or be driven out..."
Today, British politicians continue to claim jurisdictional control over six Irish counties and they militarily enforce that control. There are an acknowledged ('officially admitted') 1,830 British military personnel in that part of Ireland ('1,740 BA, 80 RAF, 10 'Royal' Navy') and then there are the other intruders, armed with knives and machetes.
They, too, need to be removed...
On the 5th November, 1922, the newspapers covered an FSA attack the previous day in which the IRA Commandant of the Northern, Eastern and Western Commands (and the Assistant Chief of Staff of the Republican Army), Earnán Ó Máille (Ernest Bernard Malley, pictured), was in his temporary Headquarters in Ailesbury Road in Dublin (Sighle Humphreys's home) when armed Free Staters broke down the door and rushed in.
A gunfight ensued, during which Commandant Ó Máille was seriously wounded, as was M/s Eileen Flanagan, the housekeeper, and a Stater soldier, a Mr Peter McCartney (from County Leitrim) was shot dead.
Commandant Ó Máille was 'arrested' by the Staters, and taken prisoner.
Within weeks he undertook a hunger-strike (which he endured for forty-one days) and, in July 1924, was the last POW to be released from internment, in very poor health.
He went to Europe and then North Africa to gather his strength and returned to Ireland after two years, tried to take up from where he left off in his medical studies but for various reasons couldn't do so, went to America to meet exiled Irish republicans for discussions about launching a pro-Irish newspaper, a fund-raising venture which also took him to Mexico.
Nothing came of the newspaper attempt, but he did begin to write about his experiences in the war in Ireland, returned home and, on the 27th September, 1935, in London, married his sweetheart, Helen Huntington Hooker (pictured).
Commandant Ernie O'Malley died, at 59 years of age, in Howth, County Dublin, on the 25th March, 1957.
RIP Volunteer Earnán Ó Máille.
On the same date that the newspapers reported on the IRA HQ raid (5th November 1922), about 165km (105 miles) up the road in Belfast, a Mr 'Sir' Richard Dawson Bates ('1st Baronet OBE PC JP DL' ETC ETC!), the Stormont 'Minister of Home Affairs', acknowledged to himself and to his political crony buddies that the sectarian nature of their Six-County 'Statelet' needed a gloss of white-washing.
He issued internment orders against four 'Ulster Protestant Association' (UPA) anti-republican paramilitaries in Belfast and, in the following six weeks, another 12 'UPA' members had been interned and still others jailed for firearm offences.
However, his placed cloak didn't cover all the misdeeds of the failed political entity he sought to control -
"There can be no denying that this (temporary removal of the UPA threat) could have been achieved earlier and lives saved had the Stormont government been willing to use its powers as fully against loyalists as it did against nationalists..."
- author Patrick Buckland.
No matter how you try to dress-up a rotten tooth, it's still a rotten tooth...
As Master Bates (!) was showing his cloak to the media, Volunteers attached to the No. 4 Brigade of the 3rd Western Division of the IRA, acting under orders from their Commanding Officer, Volunteer Francis Joseph Carty (a republican gamekeeper-turned-Free State-poacher), were approaching two men in the village of Tubbercurry, in the county of Sligo.
Those two men were shot dead.
Four days previous to those shootings, eight Volunteers from that IRA Division had been 'arrested' by the Staters, on foot of information supplied to them by those two men.
IRA Chief of Staff, Volunteer Liam Lynch, heard of the shootings and issued an order that the IRA Officers responsible for that operation should be suspended from operational duties, as they were in direct contravention of IRA General Order No.6, which stipulated that those accused of spying will be tried in an IRA court, not shot dead without trial.
The COS order was issued and received...but not enforced.
As the two spies were falling to the ground in Sligo, about 240km (150 miles) down the country in Kilkenny, an IRA POW, Volunteer Robert Kenny (mentioned here), was escaping from Kilkenny Jail, rumoured later to have done so with the assistance of an FSA sentry, proving that not all spies are bad...
==========================
DEATH IN THE MEDITERRANEAN...
Desmond Boomer, a Belfast engineer working in the Libyan oil-fields, disappeared seven years ago.
Officially, the plane on which he was a passenger crashed as a result of mechanical failure and pilot error.
But is that the real story?
Or were the Irishman and his fellow passengers unwitting victims of the shady war between Islamic fundamentalism and Mossad, Israel's intelligence network?
A special 'Magill' investigation by Don Mullan, author of 'Eyewitness Bloody Sunday'.
From 'Magill' magazine, January 2003.
The Tunisian report states that at 3.58am Captain Bartolo told Djerba ATC that his estimated time of arrival at the Maltese boundary would be 4.10am and that following this communication all efforts to contact the Captain failed, but it is claimed that, at 4.10am, "the Djerba controller switches onto emergency equipment and calls aircraft 9H-ABU."
The Tunisian report states that the pilot relayed the position of the aircraft and acknowledged Djerba ATC's request to contact Maltese Control.
Presumably, by then, with a depleted battery, Captain Bartolo would have realised he was in very serious trouble, but the Tunisian report clearly states "the pilot had not indicated any anomalies during his flight in Tunisian airspace..."
(MORE LATER.)
On the 5th November, 1924, newspapers in the State announced that, the previous day, the Leinster House administration "had declared an amnesty by discontinuing criminal proceedings for crimes committed during the Civil War* (*the war in defence of the All-Ireland Republic, June 1922 - May 1923 ; 'officially', that is...)..."
The (on-going) republican struggle was not then, and is not now, a "criminal proceeding", nor is it a "crime" to fight for an Ireland for the Irish!
The historian William Kissane greeted the Leinster House declaration by stating that it "marked the real end of the Irish civil war..." ; as we said above - 'officially', that is...
On the same day that those newspapers assisted Stater politicians in demeaning the republican struggle, other politicians, local to the area, in Naas No. 1 Rural District Council, discussed and passed a motion expressing sympathy to the parents and relatives of seven IRA Volunteers who were executed by Leinster House operatives in 1922 and who were re-interred, in 1924, in Grey Abbey Graveyard in Kildare.
Those local politicians also condemned "the disrespectful attitude of the Free State military at the graveside..."
The seven executed Volunteers were placed (dumped) in holes in the ground in the Curragh Detention Barracks "after being found guilty of various acts against the State during the Irish Civil War..." : in 1924, their remains were exhumed, placed in state, and were re-buried in Grey Abbey with a new gravestone erected over their graves.
RIP Commandant Brian Moore, Volunteer Patrick Nolan, Volunteer Patrick Mangan, Volunteer Patrick Bagnall, Volunteer Jackie Johnston, Volunteer Stephen White and Volunteer James O'Connor (who was later re-interred in his native Tipperary).
==========================
ON THIS DATE (5TH NOVEMBER) 376 YEARS AGO : LAST DAY ALIVE ON EARTH FOR A BRAVE IRISH REBEL...
Eoghan Ruadh O'Neill (Owen Roe O'Neill), a seventeenth-century Irish soldier, son of Art O'Neill and younger brother of Hugh O'Neill, died on 6th November 1649 in Cloughoughter Castle in County Cavan, at the age of 59.
His mother was born into the O'Raghallaigh clan in that county.
Eoghan Ruadh was considered by Charles I of England to be a loyal subject and soldier but, at 37 years of age, he petitioned the Spanish monarchy to invade Ireland and called for Ireland to be placed under Spanish protection, but nothing came of his endeavours.
However, he maintained his opposition to the English presence in Ireland and, in 1642, at the age of 52, he arrived back in Ireland with 300 soldiers to play his part in the Rising that was then one year old.
He sought to overturn the 'Ulster Plantation' and return the lands to those that had been evicted by the English.
In August 1649, Oliver Cromwell landed in Ireland, supported by at least 20,000 armed men, prompting O'Neill to join forces with the Earl of Ormond to fight for Irish ways but O'Neill died shortly afterwards, apparently poisoned.
Thomas Davis wrote the following Lament for Eoghan Ruadh O'Neill :
Did they dare, did they dare, to slay Eoghan Ruadh O’Neill?
Yes, they slew with poison him they feared to meet with steel.
May God wither up their hearts! May their blood cease to flow,
May they walk in living death, who poisoned Eoghan Ruadh.
Though it break my heart to hear, say again the bitter words.
From Derry, against Cromwell, he marched to measure swords:
But the weapon of the Sassanach met him on his way.
And he died at Cloch Uachtar, upon St. Leonard’s day.
Wail, wail ye for the Mighty One. Wail, wail ye for the Dead,
Quench the hearth, and hold the breath—with ashes strew the head.
How tenderly we loved him. How deeply we deplore!
Holy Saviour! but to think we shall never see him more!
Sagest in the council was he, kindest in the hall,
Sure we never won a battle—’twas Eoghan won them all.
Had he lived—had he lived—our dear country had been free:
But he’s dead, but he’s dead, and ’tis slaves we’ll ever be.
O’Farrell and Clanricarde, Preston and Red Hugh,
Audley and MacMahon—ye valiant, wise and true:
But—what are ye all to our darling who is gone?
The Rudder of our Ship was he, our Castle’s corner stone.
Wail, wail him through the Island! Weep, weep for our pride!
Would that on the battlefield our gallant chief had died!
Weep the Victor of Beinn Burb—weep him, young and old:
Weep for him, ye women—your beautiful lies cold!
We thought you would not die—we were sure you would not go,
And leave us in our utmost need to Cromwell’s cruel blow—
Sheep without a shepherd, when the snow shuts out the sky—
O! why did you leave us, Eoghan? Why did you die?
Soft as woman’s was your voice, O’Neill! bright was your eye,
O! why did you leave us, Eoghan? Why did you die?
Your troubles are all over, you’re at rest with God on high,
But we’re slaves, and we’re orphans, Eoghan! — why did you die?
It is from that spirit that traditional Irish republicans take heart - knowing that even though we have lost 'fights' in the past, the 'battle' itself is not yet over...
Thanks for the visit, and for reading - appreciated.
Sharon and the team.
(We'll be back on Wednesday, 19th November, 2025.)