MY FIGHT FOR IRISH FREEDOM

DAN BREEN.

MY FIGHT FOR
IRISH FREEDOM

By
DAN BREEN

With an Introduction by
JOSEPH McGARRITY
(Philadelphia)

DUBLIN
THE TALBOT PRESS LIMITED
85 TALBOT STREET
1924

First Published, August, 1924.
Second Edition, September, 1924.
Third Edition, October, 1924.

Printed in Ireland at The Talbot Press, Dublin.

TO
SEAN TREACY
J. J. HOGAN
AND
SEUMAS ROBINSON

INTRODUCTION

My Fight for Irish Freedom, by Commandant General Dan Breen, of the Third Tipperary Brigade, is a story written in the plain unaffected language of one of Ireland’s bravest and most devoted sons. Many of Ireland’s great champions passed from this world without leaving any authentic record of the battles in which they took part, save that which tradition handed on from generation to generation.

As time passed, many of the most important phases of the stories thus transmitted were forgotten, and in some cases additions were made which gave certain of the tales a mythical rather than an historical character.

An authentic historical record by Cuchulainn himself, if discovered to-day, would create a greater world interest than has the discovery of the tomb of the Pharaohs.

The author and principal actor in this dramatic story was born and reared in Tipperary. He had no military knowledge whatever until he joined the Irish Volunteers. Gallant young Irishmen of the type of Dan Breen had been, for generations, drifting away from their native land. Their natural military genius and daring found outlet in the armies of France and Spain, where

“On far foreign fields, from Dunkirk to Belgrade

Lie the soldiers and chiefs of the Irish Brigade.”

Washington appreciated in full the valour of his Irish emigrant soldiers, as he afterwards proved by conceding to them equal status with the native-born Americans. He placed unbounded confidence in the patriotism and loyalty of his Irish generals and soldiers who comprised almost one-half of the entire Revolutionary Army.

With the outbreak of the World War in 1914 the manhood of the world was being rolled up into two opposing mighty war machines—preparing to annihilate each other. The catch-cry “to fight in defence of small nations” was broad-casted. Under this, and other specious pretexts, hundreds of Irishmen were induced to join up in England’s Imperial armies, and they endured the horrors of France, Flanders and the Dardanelles.

While these newly-recruited Irish regiments were being drafted to the various war fronts in Europe, great minds were busy at home planning Ireland’s regeneration. For two years the Irish Volunteer movement, directed by Pearse, Connolly, Casement, Clarke and the other leaders, had been spreading like a prairie fire through the country! Alas! because they dared to put forth the claim of their own small nation to be master in its own house the firing squad and the scaffold extinguished the brave lives of sixteen noble Irish leaders.

Dan Breen and his few comrades had definitely reached the conclusion that while a foreign flag floated over public buildings in Ireland, and while a foreign army was garrisoned in the land, there was one place—and one place only—for Irishmen to fight—and that place was Ireland.

He did not wait for an army to grow up, or for some great captain to come from foreign lands to lead his countrymen to victory. As a matter of fact at one time our soldier-author was, with a few comrades, practically the only force in the field engaged in active hostilities against the enemy.

Such a stirring drama has seldom if ever been acted on the stage of Irish life. It is doubtful if any other individual in Irish history received a like number of near-fatal wounds, fighting in defence of his country—and survived to tell the story of the engagements in which the wounds were inflicted.

Fired with a burning love of country and a fixed determination to achieve her independence, Dan Breen with a handful of men declared war on England on their own account, convinced that their countrymen would follow their example. In this he was not disappointed.

The engagements described follow each other in such quick succession, and are of such a thrilling character, that from the opening of the first chapter to the close of the last, the reader is in momentary expectation of the story ending with the dramatic death of the author.

The author’s graphic descriptions of localities, his giving of accurate distances between one location and another, his recording of place-names and family names gives the story a distinct and particular historical value.

Great as was the physical suffering he endured, having been literally riddled by bullets, it was as nothing compared to the mental torture he must have endured later on seeing his former comrades turn their arms against each other after the signing of the “Treaty” in 1921.

In giving to his countrymen this authentic written record of the engagements in which he took part, Dan Breen has rendered a service to Ireland second only to the services rendered to her in the engagements he describes.

Let us hope that some competent Celtic scholar will translate the story into the language of Ireland’s ancient champions whom she had gathered to her bosom centuries before this gallant son of Tipperary was ready to render to his beloved country the splendid services he has so willingly given.

Joseph McGarrity.

Philadelphia.

CONTENTS

MY FIGHT FOR IRISH FREEDOM

CHAPTER I.
A VOLUNTEER’S TRAINING

“A soldier’s life is the life for me,

A soldier’s death, so Ireland’s free.”

—Davis.

It was in 1914 that I first joined the Irish Volunteers in the village of Donohill, some four miles from Tipperary town. At that time I was about twenty years of age. I soon became known to the local police as the “Sinn Feiner,” then a very rare sort of animal. At a later stage in my career the same people, I believe, conferred upon me the still higher title of “Prince of the Assassins”! But I must beg the reader’s patience while I briefly outline the position in Ireland the year the Great War began.

The British Parliament had passed its Home Rule Bill for Ireland. The Orange minority in the North of Ireland declared it would resist any attempt to enforce that Bill or to set up a Parliament in Dublin. Supported financially and morally by the wealthiest section of the English Tory Party, the Orangemen openly organised, drilled and armed a Volunteer Army to defy the British Parliament.

At this time Sinn Fein as a political policy was little known outside of Dublin City. The spokesmen of the great majority of the Irish people were the Parliamentarians led by John Redmond. But a few of the intellectual leaders, such as Pearse and MacNeill, whose political influence then counted for little, saw in the action of the Orange Volunteers an excellent example to the rest of Ireland. They called on the Nationalists to form a Volunteer Army. The tradition of the Fenians still lived. Many who cared little for the Home Rule Bill saw that we now had got the opportunity for which they wished. Ireland answered the call, and when the Great War broke out there were in Ireland three armies, though very different in equipment and in outlook. One was the British Army of Occupation; the other was the Orange Volunteer Army in the North; and the third was the Irish Volunteer Force. Consequently, when the Great War broke out Redmond and his followers threw in their lot with the British, and appealed for recruits for the British Army. The Orange Volunteers, too, were in whole-hearted sympathy with the British cause. The Irish Volunteers for a time were split and disorganised; thousands joined the British Army; but a small number remained doggedly neutral and loyal to Ireland alone. That small number was not deceived by England’s cant of “fighting for small nations,” and “for the sanctity of treaties.” They were those who believed in an Independent Ireland; and as their best speakers were supporters of the political programme of Sinn Fein, they all gradually became known as “Sinn Fein Volunteers.”

Our little band at Donohill was part of this small minority. We did not give much heed to John Redmond’s call to join the British Army. We continued to drill and train openly, in the hope that the time would come when we might get our chance to strike a blow at the only enemy we recognised—England.

As the war developed we were closely watched by the police. We were known as “pro-Germans.” The majority of the people, carried away by the campaign of lies and calumny in the Press, were in favour of England as against Germany in the war. The aristocracy and the wealthiest merchants and farmers generally supported the movements that were started to provide comforts for the British soldiers in the trenches. But we of the Irish Volunteers—henceforth in using that term I must be understood to mean those who declined to take England’s side in the war—stood aloof. It was then that I came into disfavour with the police for my refusal to support their funds for providing comforts for soldiers. I was an employee of the Great Southern and Western Railway, and I have no doubt that they acquainted my superiors with what they regarded as my disloyal tendencies.

It is necessary to explain the nature of this police force. The Royal Irish Constabulary—a body that has now passed into history—was not a police force in the sense understood in other countries. It was a semi-military force, trained to the use of arms, and provided with carbines and rifles. As crime in the ordinary sense was practically unknown in Ireland, the main duty of these men was to spy upon Volunteers and others working for an Independent Ireland. They were known to report even sermons delivered by Irish priests. In all there were then about ten thousand of these police in the country, scattered in small garrisons of two to ten or twenty men, according to the size of the village or town in which they were located. Sprung as they were for the most part from Irish Nationalist families, they were the brain of England’s garrison in Ireland; for they knew the people and they got the information without which England’s 40,000 troops—ignorant alike of the country, its people and its history—would have been of little use.

I now resume my narrative. From the outbreak of the Great War I still continued my daily work, and took no more active part than any ordinary private in the local company of the Irish Volunteers. We met and drilled a few times a week, and tried to pick up a rifle or a revolver now and again; for the Volunteers generally had very few arms at that time.

Thus we continued our routine through 1915, and up to April, 1916. With the Insurrection of 1916 I do not propose to deal here, except to say that owing to the confusion of orders and counter-orders the men of Tipperary got no chance of having their mettle tested. I must, however, remark upon a coincidence in connection with our plans. Part of the duty of the Volunteers of my district was to have been the destroying of an important line of railway communications. For that purpose we were to have seized a quantity of gelignite, then stored by the County Council for blasting purposes in a neighbouring quarry. That quarry was Soloheadbeg, where three years later my comrades and I received our baptism of fire.

The Rising of 1916 changed our whole outlook. The people who had scoffed and sneered at the Sinn Feiners before now swung round to our side. But our military organisation had collapsed. Thousands of our men all over the country were seized and deported to England. The British forces, both police and military, seized what arms they could lay hands upon. We could no longer drill and parade in public; our organisation had been solemnly proclaimed by the British to be an illegal body. For a time we were in confusion and despair. It was only for a very short time, however, for within a few months those who had escaped the meshes of the English military net after the Rising had actually held two secret Conventions in Dublin to re-organise the Volunteers.

After a few months we set to work again. My neighbour and comrade, Sean Treacy, and I decided to make a fresh start, and to put our Volunteer company at work once more. This time, of course, we could not do it openly; we had to work on a secret basis. As it was now considered dangerous to have anything to do with the Irish Volunteers, our numbers were small; but we had better and more determined men. For a while, indeed, there were only three of us.

We met in a little wood after our work twice every week. So we struggled on until May, 1917, when our company had grown to be thirteen strong. Not a man of us possessed any military knowledge, and those in the neighbourhood who could instruct us had either joined the British Army, or could not be trusted to take the risks. Still we got on very well at physical drill, scouting, signalling, revolver practice, close-order drill, and such work. We had to rely mainly on book-work; and by a strange irony the books we found most handy were the official texts supplied to the British troops, the men we were preparing to meet.

Of course, we made mistakes now and again, but our earnestness surmounted many difficulties. Besides, we were often innocent spectators of British drill manœuvres in the locality, and I can assure you we kept our eyes and ears open for tips. If the chance of picking up an odd revolver came our way, we managed to find the money somehow, and added to our little supply of munitions.

The best tribute to our success in the art of military education was paid by the officials of the British Government, who, at a later stage, described our little band as the “crack shots of the I.R.A.” In passing it is well to observe that we ourselves learned that anything in the nature of official statements issued from the British military headquarters at Parkgate Street, Dublin, or from the civil authorities at Dublin Castle, should always be digested with a considerable quantity of salt.

It was in August, 1917, that our little handful of men made its first public parade. By that time the men who had been deported after the Easter Week Insurrection had been released, and all over the country were beginning to do what we had been doing on our own account for nearly a year. In the political arena two bye-elections which had occurred in Roscommon and Longford, resulted in a triumph for candidates standing for the Republican cause. A few months later still Eamon de Valera, on his release from Lewes Jail, had been invited to contest a Parliamentary vacancy in East Clare. Standing for a Republic, and for declining to attend England’s Parliament, he was elected by a huge majority. Shortly after his election he addressed an enormous meeting in Tipperary town, and we, in the dark green uniforms of the Irish Volunteers, acted as a bodyguard of the man who was shortly afterwards elected President of the Irish Republic. Tipperary was then occupied by a garrison of over one thousand British soldiers, and as our meeting was held almost under the shadow of their barracks we did not carry rifles. Instead we carried hurleys. Now, we were thus, to the amazement of all peaceful people, committing a treble act of defiance against England. In the first place, it was a crime to march in military formation; secondly, it was an even more serious offence to wear uniform; and thirdly, it was violating a special proclamation just issued against the carrying of hurleys.

That proclamation came about in this way. A meeting was being held in Beresford Place, Dublin, one Sunday afternoon to protest against the treatment of Irish prisoners detained by England. The meeting was being addressed by Count Plunkett and Cathal Brugha, when Inspector Mills, of the Dublin Metropolitan Police, with some of his men attempted to prevent the holding of this peaceful meeting of citizens. The meeting included many young men going to or returning from a game of hurling—Ireland’s national pastime. In the melee, which followed the attempt to break up the meeting and to arrest the speakers, the Inspector was struck with a hurley, and received injuries from which he died. Thereupon, Sir Bryan Mahon, then Commander-in-Chief of the British troops in Ireland, issued a proclamation making it illegal to carry hurleys in public. To realise the absurdity of this proclamation one has only to imagine a civilised Government declaring it illegal to carry a walking-stick. The result was what anybody knowing Ireland might expect—hurleys for a time were carried in places where their use was scarcely known, and the British Government became a laughing-stock.

This first military display of ours in Tipperary was not a bigger shock to the enemy than it was to the local Sinn Feiners; for you must understand that by this time public opinion had swung round almost completely in favour of Sinn Fein, and we were burdened with thousands of recruits, who were not in their hearts in favour of any stronger weapons than resolutions. On this occasion many of the local Sinn Feiners were shocked by our audacity in taking the step we did without a solemn discussion, a formal proposition to the meeting, and a long-winded resolution. Such poor souls often hampered us later on, but we didn’t mind. The purely political wing of Sinn Fein criticised us severely, I believe, but we kept silent, just listened to all, and judged our men.

CHAPTER II.
PREPARING FOR THE FRAY.

The local police duly informed their headquarters of this open defiance of British law in Tipperary. They were ordered to arrest the culprits. But, as we had no desire to enjoy the hospitality of His Britannic Majesty’s jails, Sean Treacy and I went “on the run,” that is to say, in order to evade our pursuers we had to leave our homes, and keep moving from the house of one trusty friend to another. But on the Friday following our public parade, Sean was arrested by the “Peelers.” Members of the R.I.C. were better known in Ireland for generations as “Peelers,” a term of contempt coined from the name of Sir Robert Peel, who, in the early part of the nineteenth century first organised the force.

Sean was taken to Cork Jail where he first met the brothers Brennan, of Meelick, County Clare, who were also unwilling guests of the British jailers. The three brothers Brennan—Austin, Paddy and Michael—afterwards became famous officers in the Southern Command of the Irish Republican Army, and at present hold high ranks in the Free State Army. In passing I should say that in throwing men into prison at that time England was really giving them an excellent opportunity of exchanging views, discussing plans for the future and generally turning the prison into a “University for Rebels.” Many indeed learned more about drill, and the methods of making explosives, while they were in prison than they had ever before known.

Sean was eventually tried by court-martial, and sentenced to two years imprisonment, but sixteen months of the term were remitted. These trials were, of course, a mere formality, for our men never put up any legal defence, but declined to recognise the right of any British tribunal to try them. Very often in the early stages our men turned the proceedings into a farce by reading a newspaper or singing while the evidence was being taken.

With a number of his comrades Sean went on hunger-strike as a protest against their treatment. It was the first time that Irish political prisoners used this weapon, which later became so common. They were removed to Mountjoy Prison, Dublin, where they continued their hunger-strike until one of their number, Commandant Tom Ashe, who had taken a leading part in one of the most successful exploits in the 1916 Insurrection—died as a result of the attempts made by the prison doctor and officials to feed him forcibly. The tragedy raised the whole Irish nation to fury, and the British Government realised for the first time that our men were in earnest, and ready to die for their principles. An agreement was entered into whereby they were to be treated as prisoners of war, or as political prisoners, and forcible feeding was never again tried.

Meantime I had been busy during my comrade’s imprisonment. I organised sections of Volunteers in all the surrounding parishes, and as similar efforts were being made all over the country our military organisation soon became even more perfect than it had been in 1916. The British Government, true to its traditions, broke the agreement made with the prisoners, and Sean and his fellow Volunteers, who had now been removed to Dundalk Jail, went on hunger-strike again, and secured their release.

All this time the organisation and drilling of the Volunteers had been done secretly. Now and again the British surprised bodies of men here and there, and captured them. But when Sean came home he brought back the word that we were to come out in the open to drill, even if the British Government attempted to arrest every man of us. It was felt that if England carried out the policy of wholesale arrests she would soon have tens of thousands of Irishmen in jail, and would again make herself a laughing-stock to the nations.

This was in the early part of 1918. By this time we had been getting a fair supply of arms and ammunition by channels which may not yet be disclosed. It must be remembered that for several years before this no firearms were allowed into the country, no shops could sell any they had on hands, and even sporting cartridges could only be bought by special permission of the British military authorities. The enemy scented another Insurrection.

They became more alert, and once more Sean Treacy was arrested. From the moment of his capture he again went on hunger-strike, and was joined by Michael Brennan, of Meelick, and by Seumas O’Neill, a teacher in Rockwell College, both of whom had been arrested three days after Sean.

During Sean’s first term of imprisonment I had been elected company captain; and now during his second term I was further promoted to be Commandant of the Battalion, and later still I became Brigade Commandant. At that period each company elected its own captain, each man having a vote, and each man being eligible. The various company officers in a battalion area then met, and in their turn elected the officers for the battalion, and so with the brigade. Truly, it was a democratic army.

This was the time when things were going badly with England in the war. In March, 1918, began the great German offensive, when the British lines were broken through. In their despair the English cried, “Conscript the Irish.” Within a few weeks the necessary Act was passed in the British Parliament, and all preparations made to force Irishmen to fight England’s battle. Sir John French, later Lord French, himself an Irishman by birth, was British Viceroy in Dublin.

The Irish people were roused to action. Never before was there such a fierce determination to resist the British plans. Bishops, priests and political leaders of all shades of opinion met together to face the threat. In the moment of common danger all turned instinctively to the Irish Volunteers. If resistance was to come it would only come from their ranks; for England and Ireland well knew that the Irish Volunteers would be wiped out to the last man before they would allow a single Irishman to be forced into the British Army.

Our trouble was the shortage of arms; of men we now had too many. At that time I was Brigade Commandant, and we decided to make raids for arms. We knew there were plenty of shot-guns, revolvers, bayonets, swords, and an occasional rifle here and there in private houses, especially in the houses of the element loyal to England.

We had very little trouble in collecting the arms. Our men in every district had compiled exact information regarding every house in which there was a weapon. We generally went at night and asked for the arms. Those who would have liked to refuse knew they dare not. Many others gave them willingly, and some even sent us word to call for them. In no case had we to fire a shot during the few weeks we were on this job. We had to do the thing as quickly as possible, for as soon as the British got wind of it they immediately issued an order that all arms should be handed to them for safe keeping. We generally got there first, and more than once our visit to a house was only a few minutes before that of the peelers.

SEAN TREACY.

CHAPTER III.
OUR FIRST MUNITION FACTORY.

During the summer of 1918 the threat of Conscription hung over the land, and young and old flocked to the ranks of the Volunteers. It is safe to estimate that at that time nine-tenths of all able-bodied Irishmen between the ages of sixteen and fifty were Volunteers of a kind; while the women had their association—Cumann na mBan—and the boys had theirs, the Fianna or Boy Scouts, all preparing to be our auxiliaries. As most of our officers were in jail on one charge or another, we who were out were kept working day and night. All the time I felt enthusiastic, for I saw in Conscription a glorious chance of uniting our own people. Though poorly armed we were determined to fight; and I believed that if the fight came the survivors would be united in their purpose, and to me a united Ireland of two million people would be preferable to an Ireland of four and a half million divided into three or four different factions.

Meantime, though the Conscription Act had become law, England, realising our determination, postponed its enforcement for a few months, in order to give us an opportunity of enlisting voluntarily. We went on with our preparations, and became all the more daring. Sometimes it was both bewildering and amusing to the public to witness our manœuvres.

More than once, for example, in sham battles we attacked or defended Tipperary town, and actually proclaimed certain roads or streets as “military areas,” where British soldiers or police, as well as civilians were forbidden to enter during the “operations.” These operations were carried out by a few hundred Volunteers, while the town was occupied by a garrison of over a thousand British soldiers. On such occasions we had no display of arms, though a few of our number might for special reasons have their revolvers in their pockets.

It soon became evident that England was wiser than to try conscripting us. The threat gradually faded away, and so too did our great army! But the small number that remained was of more use. They meant to fight for Independence. The others had been only thinking of saving themselves from the trenches of France, and believed with the old political leaders that Ireland’s freedom was not worth the shedding of a drop of blood. As my subsequent actions showed, I held a different view.

At this time, as I have already explained, Sean Treacy was enjoying the luxury of a hunger-strike in Dundalk Jail. He had been thirteen days without food, and we feared they intended to let him die. We who were outside felt that we should do something without delay. I got a brain wave. Why not capture a Peeler, bring him off to a safe hiding-place, and put him on forcible hunger-strike, and keep him as a hostage for Sean’s safety? I discussed the plan with some of the others: they were favourably disposed; and as we knew that a few policemen regularly patrolled the railway line near the Limerick Junction every evening, we decided they should be our hostages. All preparations were made, and our hiding-place up in the mountainous district on the Limerick-Tipperary border was selected. Forty men were mobilised to carry out the job; but for once the policemen failed to patrol the line. Later I found out that the scheme had been turned down by the Irish Republican Brotherhood, a secret organisation which included the most reliable of the Volunteers, and which practically controlled the Volunteer Army. After that I severed my connection with the I.R.B.

Sean Treacy was released in July, 1918. When he came home he was full of plans for organising. I had had an overdose of it in the months that he was away, and from my experience I was more in favour of starting a fight at once than of trifling further with organising. Sean would have his way, and we agreed to differ. I at once started a “munition factory” in partnership with my friend Patrick Keogh. Many a lively dispute we had on various points, some important, some otherwise, but as soon as Sean appeared he always poured oil on the troubled waters.

I must give you a description of our factory, lest the reader be picturing an Irish replica of the Krupp works at Essen. The building itself was a small rural cottage owned by Tom O’Dwyer, of the Boghole. Three rooms were let to Denis O’Dwyer, of Dervice. Both he and the owner were well-known characters in Tipperary. Our equipment was of the crudest kind, for we had no machinery. But it was a simple matter to make ordinary black gunpowder. We also turned out crude hand grenades, which, by the way, had to be ignited by a match before being thrown, so you can imagine the risks if these had to be brought into action on a windy or a rainy night. At this time, too, we collected every available cartridge, including sporting cartridges for shot guns, and these were refilled with buckshot. Keogh and I always quarrelled as to whether it was better to put four or eight grains of lead to the cartridge. The reader can easily imagine the effect on a poor devil who might get the full charge of one of these refilled sporting cartridges.

Though most of our raids for arms had been carried out by this time, we still found occasion for an expedition of the kind from time to time. My first encounter with the enemy was one night while I was returning from a raid.

A small number of us, including Sean Treacy, were cycling home from Tipperary, when my bicycle went flat, and I had to dismount to pump it up. I ordered the others to go ahead, saying I would overtake them. On their way they passed the police barrack on the outskirts of the town. It would seem that the police heard them passing the barrack, and came out to have a look round; or else they were actually on the road when the men passed, and, with their usual courage, were afraid to confront the six Volunteers. Anyhow, I neither heard nor saw anybody when I had pumped up my bicycle, until I was suddenly pulled off by a burly Peeler. In my left hand I carried a small iron bar for forcing locks, so I tried its effect on his head. The bar got the better of the argument. I then drew my revolver, and covered the group of peelers. “Surrender, or I shoot,” shouted their officer. “Put up your hands, or I’ll shoot the lot of you,” I replied. They complied with my order.

I then stepped backwards, rolling my bicycle, and still keeping my gun levelled at the peelers, until I reached a laneway. I dashed up the lane, mounted my bicycle, and escaped from the town not a moment too soon. The alarm was quickly raised, and the whole town was surrounded, and every street and lane searched. But I was safe in my factory with my comrades.

CHAPTER IV.
OUR FACTORY BLOWN UP.

My most exciting experience was to see our munition factory blown into the sky. I had a narrow escape, for I was within fifty yards of the door; but my partner, Paddy Keogh, had an even more wonderful escape, for he was actually on the premises when the explosion occurred.

We never knew what brought about the havoc. I had gone out to a well to fetch a can of water, for necessity compelled us to do all our own cooking and cleaning. As I was returning to the cottage, I saw the roof leaving it, and simultaneously came the roar of the bursting grenades. In a moment the house was in flames. It was a desperate situation. My one thought was to save my comrade, if indeed he was not already beyond human aid.

I dropped the can of water and rushed to the house. I dashed up the stairs and found Paddy lying in the room either dead or unconscious. I raised him in my arms and carried him with a heavy heart through the rain of shrapnel down the stairs and out of the house, and away to the banks of the Multeen, a little stream not far away from the house. My heart was wrung with anguish as I laid him by the stream and rushed for my can to throw some of the fresh clean water over his pale countenance. Before I had time to try the effects of a second supply, Paddy was on his feet and rushing for me—very much alive!

“You damn fool, do you want to drown me?” he shouted. And then he added a lot more that I prefer not to repeat.

The destruction of our house was a heavy blow, and for a while we mourned the loss of our little factory and its contents.

My little capital was gone now, and the O’Dwyers had to be compensated for the loss of their home. I thought out my plans, and gathered together all the tradesmen in our little army, and put them to work. In a few days the cottage was repaired, and looked none the worse.

By the way, the Black and Tans, at a later stage wreaked vengeance on it more effectively than the explosion of the grenades.

O’Dwyer’s house was now out of bounds for my work, but in a very short time I got another house from a good typical Tipperary man, Jer. O’Connell. Here I was more successful, because I took greater precautions with my work. I guarded against another explosion; but other circumstances compelled us to evacuate it within a few months.

During our stay in this house our condition was far from happy. Of bodily comforts we had none. We had neither bed nor bed coverings, and worse still, we had no money wherewith to buy them. We got a loan of a couple of blankets from neighbours, and we commandeered some straw from the nearest farmer. First we spread out the straw on the ground and covered it over with one blanket. We then spread over us a lot of old newspapers (which we carefully collected every day), and over these we placed our second blanket. The paper was excellent for keeping us warm, and by not turning out of one position we usually got about three hours’ sleep. As soon as we moved, the paper tore and the cold quickly worked its way through. Still greater discomfort than our bed was caused by the presence of mice! The little beggars were very numerous and very daring. Many a night we were wakened by their nibbling at our hair. Whenever I protested, in action as well as in words, Sean Treacy would plead—“Ah, the poor little creatures! They might as well be happy when we can’t. Don’t be vexed with them, Dan, even if they take a little of your black hair.” I argued that it was enough to have the peelers after us, and that if the mice had any decency they ought to leave us alone.

For some time things went on smoothly, and our work progressed pleasantly. Then my partner, Keogh, left me, and I was joined by Sean Hogan—whose life for the next five years was to be very closely linked up with mine.

The two Seans and myself seemed to have but one mind—I have never had any difference with Hogan up to the present day, and never had an angry word with my dear old comrade—Sean Treacy—up to the day of his death.

It was during our sojourn in O’Connell’s house that we were joined by Seumas Robinson, later elected Deputy for East Tipperary and Waterford. Robinson, who had lived a good part of his life in Glasgow, at once became a fast friend. The four of us—Treacy, Hogan, Robinson and I—seemed perfectly balanced in temperament, age, outlook and hopes. Many an ambitious plan we made, and many a dream we dreamed of the Free Ireland for which alone we now lived and worked.

After a few months Jer. O’Connell gave us notice to quit. We had no tenant’s rights, no protecting Act of Parliament, and no alternative but to depart. Being “on the run” we dare not go looking for lodgings in the ordinary way, even if we had money to pay. The peelers knew every hole and corner in their district, and were ever on the prowl for Irishmen known to have little love for English rule.

But good luck came to our rescue.

Some cousins of Sean Hogan’s had a little dairy or outhouse, which they generally placed at our disposal. Here we enjoyed the luxury of bed, clothing and other little comforts, but our meals were few and far between. I myself lived for two weeks in the “Dairy” on rice boiled in water, without either sugar or milk. This abstemious life was not new to me. For months while I was organising I used to fast from breakfast to breakfast, and many a night I walked twenty miles for a bed, or even a shake-down.

The “Dairy” did not escape the attention of the enemy, who subsequently gave it the name of “The Tin House.”

We were terribly handicapped for want of money; not indeed for personal comforts, which seldom troubled us, but to get round.

On one occasion Sean Treacy and I cycled to Dublin to get some arms. We had no money for train fares, and it was essential that we should reach Dublin by 6 o’clock on a particular Monday evening. There was a Brigade Council meeting fixed for Sunday night—at which we were bound to attend. That meant that we could not leave Tipperary till about 8 o’clock on Monday morning. We covered the 110 miles, and we reached Dublin in good time. Of course we were very hungry, but once we reached the house of our good friend Phil Shanahan—himself a Tipperary man, and later a Republican Deputy for Dublin—all our troubles disappeared. Then and after we never wanted for anything while Phil was about.

We had to remain in Dublin until the following Saturday before we could conclude our business. Here another difficulty arose. We were due back in Tipperary at an officers’ meeting the same Saturday at 6 p.m. We left Phil Shanahan’s house at 8.30 in the morning. We carried six revolvers, five hundred rounds of .303 (rifle) ammunition, and half a dozen grenades, and we were the only two who were punctual at the meeting.

CHAPTER V.
THE POLITICAL LANDSLIDE.

In December, 1918, came the event which gave the Irish Volunteers the moral sanction for their subsequent activities—the General Election.

It is important to bear in mind the position at that time. No General Election had been held in Ireland for seven years. In that interval the vast majority of the people had completely changed their views. They no longer had any faith in England, or in the efficacy of sending their hundred representatives to the British Parliament, where they were in a helpless minority, and where their voices were scarcely heard. England’s treachery on the Home Rule question and her threat of Conscription had cost her dearly. But the greatest force of all in the awakening was the Rising of 1916. That episode had put new life and heart into the people. The bye-elections, to which I have already referred had given the people their only opportunity, so far, to indicate the growing desire for liberty, complete and untrammelled.

On November 11th, 1918, the Great War virtually ended with the Armistice. A week later it was announced that the long delayed General Election was fixed for the 14th December. Sinn Fein got its opportunity, for that election was to be the first ever held under the British Constitution on the basis of manhood suffrage, and we knew well that the young men of Ireland would vote overwhelmingly for our cause.

But we had to educate and organise. The name and policy of Sinn Fein were still grossly misunderstood. The public did not clearly realise the difference between the political body, Sinn Fein, and the military organisation—the Irish Volunteers. The Insurrection of 1916 was commonly called the “Sinn Fein Rising,” and our Volunteers were spoken of as the “Sinn Fein Volunteers.” Even the Republican Tricolour—the Green, White and Orange of the Young Ireland Party of 1848, and of the Fenians of the next generation—was called the “Sinn Fein Flag.” But misnomers did not trouble us very much, for the Sinn Fein body had been adjusting its programme to suit Republican ideals. And now when Sinn Fein clubs were springing up in every parish, it was quite usual to find that the President or the Secretary of the club was also captain of the local Volunteer corps. The majority of the younger men in the Sinn Fein Political Organisation were also Volunteers; and the Volunteers were also members of the Sinn Fein club.

During the period of the Election the people went Sinn Fein mad. We had most of the clergy with us, and the earnestness and enthusiasm of our speakers and organisers swept the country. The political wing of the Republican cause spread like wild-fire; but our army was gradually dwindling. While we lamented this decay on the military side, we saw the necessity of making an enormous success of the elections, hoping to restore our army to its proper strength when the election was over. So we threw ourselves heart and soul into the contest, and worked night and day for the Republican candidates. We didn’t leave a dead wall or a cross-roads in the country that we did not decorate with appeals to “Rally to Sinn Fein,” “Vote for the Republic,” “Stand by the men of 1916.” Such were the rallying calls addressed to the people during those few critical weeks. No secret was made of our policy. Every Republican was pledged never to take his seat in the British Parliament, but to work at home in Ireland for the establishment and recognition of the Republic.

We knocked plenty of fun out of the election. Alas! many of those who worked hardest in those days have passed under the sod since. Our workers in Tipperary included Dinny Lacy, killed during the Civil War in his native county; Sean Duffy and Paddy Maloney (whose father was our successful candidate), later killed in an encounter with the British not far from Soloheadbeg; Sean Allen, who was executed by the British in Cork Jail; “Sparkie” Breen, also killed in the Civil War. But these memories only serve to remind one of the fine fellows we have lost. Anyhow we won every seat in Munster, except Waterford City. Leinster and Connaught did equally well, and in Ulster we won several seats. The net result was that of the one hundred and five constituencies, seventy-three had repudiated British rule and plumped for an Irish Republic.

A month later, on January 21st, 1919, these elected representatives of the vast majority of the Irish people met in public session in Dublin; formally proclaimed the Republic, and established a Government. The same day, and almost at the same hour, our little handful of Volunteers were striking the first blow since the formal repudiation of British authority by the people. But let me explain how it came about.

SCENE OF SOLOHEADBEG AMBUSH.

After the election we had more time to review our position. The results had cleared the air; the people had by an overwhelming verdict given us moral sanction to drive the British forces out of Ireland. But the election work had had a serious effect on our army. Many had ceased to be soldiers and had become politicians. There was danger of disintegration, a danger which had been growing since the threat of Conscription disappeared a few months earlier. I was convinced that some sort of action was absolutely necessary. Over and over again I discussed the matter with Sean Treacy. I knew that if we once showed them the way, there were plenty of fine fellows on whom we could rely. Sooner than we expected the opportunity came.

Let me introduce my readers to the first authentic account of the affair known as “The Soloheadbeg Outbreak,” or, as the hostile Press persistently titled it, “The Soloheadbeg Murders”; for those who read the newspaper versions of our struggle with England must bear in mind that every newspaper in Ireland was hostile to our policy, and so remained to the end, though a few of them lost their bitterness towards us as the campaign progressed. It must also be remembered that even when the “Great War” ended the British Press Censorship was continued in Ireland for over a year.

CHAPTER VI.
SOLOHEADBEG.

At the beginning of January, 1919, we received information to the effect that a quantity of explosives was to be conveyed to Soloheadbeg Quarry for blasting purposes. The consignment, we knew, would be guarded by armed policemen, as was always the rule at that time.

I spoke to Sean about it. “Here is our chance,” I said, “let us start the war soon, or the army will lose heart.” I knew we had but a very small number of men with determination enough for such a job, but I knew too that the number would increase with time; and, in any case, it is quality, not quantity, that counts in guerilla warfare.

We discussed the proposal for a long time. Finally we decided to disarm the guard and seize the explosives, for, as Sean said, there was nothing we needed more at that time than guns and explosives. We made a careful survey of the locality. We selected the spot for our first ambush. We knew every inch of the ground, we had been born and reared in the vicinity, and Sean’s own farmhouse was not a stone’s throw from the quarry.

Soloheadbeg is a small townland about two and a half miles from Tipperary town, and less than a mile from the Limerick Junction. The quarry stands on an eminence on a little by-road. Farmhouses and cottages are dotted here and there in the neighbourhood, though there is no village nearer than Donohill, a mile and a half distant. It was in this plain, overshadowed by the gigantic figure of Galteemore away to the south, that Brian Boru and his brother Mahon fought their first great battle with the Danes in 968, when Brian with his gallant army of Tipperary men and Clare men routed the invaders, and never ceased from the pursuit till he reached Limerick twenty miles away and burned the town over their heads. The right wing of his army swept across the hills where the quarry now stands, as the defeated Danes fled to their stronghold.

The quarry itself stands on the right, down the little by-road. There is a high ditch on each side of the road by which it is approached from Tipperary, and here and there is the further cover afforded by thick whitethorn bushes. I should explain that what we call a “ditch” in Tipperary is really a bank, or dike.

Unfortunately our information regarding the date of the arrival of the explosives was not quite correct. We expected it on January 16th, but it did not come till five days later. During these five days we waited in readiness for the attempt. Our men had left their homes without giving any indication of their plans. After three days I had to send all home except eight. We had neither provisions to feed them nor money to purchase the provisions.

And so the nine of us who remained were watching and waiting. The men who were with me were—Sean Treacy, Seumas Robinson, Sean Hogan, Tim Crowe, Patrick O’Dwyer, of Hollyford; Michael Ryan, of Grange (Donohill); Patrick McCormick, and Jack O’Meara, Tipperary.

Our chief concern during these days of waiting was to avoid attracting attention. We did not want to be seen by any of the people in the locality. Those were nearly all employed at the quarry, and as the times were then disturbed enough any report that strangers were hanging around the neighbourhood might have completely upset our plans. Every morning before daybreak we went as noiselessly as possible to our hiding place, there to remain under cover, but ever on the alert, while one of our number acted as scout from the by-road to the main road from Tipperary, along which the peelers were bound to approach. There we waited in silence until 2 o’clock in the afternoon, and then we abandoned our position, knowing they would not come later, as they liked to be back in town before darkness set in. We spent the night at my own home, where my mother prepared breakfast each morning about 4 o’clock. On the fifth morning she declared, “If you don’t do something to-day you can get your own breakfast to-morrow.”

At last came the fateful morning of January 21st, 1919, the day that was to see our country rejoice at the first meeting of the Parliament of Ireland, the first Dail Eireann setting up the Government of the Republic, and sending its message to the free nations of the earth.

We had taken our place behind the ditch, and had spent many weary hours waiting and watching. We were quietly discussing the great event that was to take place in Dublin that day. Our scout was away with his eyes fixed on the Tipperary road. Suddenly our conversation was interrupted by our scout. Dashing towards us from his look-out, his eyes sparkling with the light of battle, and a grim smile on his countenance, he whispered the word of warning—“They’re coming, they’re coming!”

Every man knew his post. For days we had thought of nothing but the position we were now in. If any of our number felt nervous or excited he showed little outward sign of it. Like a flash every soldier manned his post. Our hour of trial was at hand; we were to face the enemy, with life or death in the balance. And incidentally we were to open another phase in the long fight for the freedom of our country.

Our scout was again on the alert, and again he returned to report. This time he gave us the actual distance, and he told us their number.

Nearer and nearer they come. In the still clear air we hear the sound of the horses’ hoofs, and the rumbling of a heavy cart over the rough hilly road.

That day I did not feel the same coolness that I afterwards strove to develop. My nerves were highly strung; I realised what we were doing, and I foresaw the consequences whether our plans succeeded or failed.

We were facing men trained to the use of firearms, especially disciplined for such emergencies as this. In all probability they had but just completed the special course in bomb-throwing, which had lately been added to the accomplishments of the R.I.C. My little squad had little experience in the practical use of firearms. We had never been in a position to fire one round of ball-cartridge for the sake of practice. We had often chaffed one another about this want of experience, and jokingly referred to the probable consequences if our nerves got jumpy when the real time came. But we always brushed aside these idle fears, and maintained a calm and cheerful exterior, consoling ourselves with the thought, “We’re Irish anyhow, and all Irishmen are fighters by nature.”

But now the hour had come. From my point of vantage I shot a hurried glance down the road as the party approached. The driver and the County Council employee who was to take over the explosives walked beside the horses. Two policemen in their black uniforms were also on foot carrying rifles in their hands. They were a little distance behind the cart.

Only a moment before the blood was rushing madly through my veins; now when I saw them actually at hand all my nervousness disappeared, and I felt cool and strong again. I believed I could fight a dozen of these enemy forces all by myself. For the men who were now approaching had deserted their country, and were the spies and hirelings of her enemy. Nearer still they come. They talk in low tones. They are almost under the shadow of our revolvers.

“Hands up!” The cry comes from our men as with one voice. “Hands up!” But no! They seize their rifles, and with the best military movement bring them to the ready. They were Irishmen, too, and would rather die than surrender.

Again and again we called upon them to put up their hands. We would have preferred that they should surrender without bloodshed, but they were dogged and stubborn, and now ’twas our lives or theirs.

Their fingers were on the triggers. Another appeal on our side would be useless—perhaps too late for ourselves.

Quick and sure our volleys rang out. The aim was true. The two policemen were dead.

CHAPTER VII.
OUR ESCAPE.

Now began our career of real excitement. If we had disarmed the police without firing a shot the thing would not have been so serious. But the shots had alarmed the countryside. In a moment men and women would appear at every doorway. On the roadside were the two terrified civilians, James Godfrey, the driver of the cart, and Patrick Flynn, the County Council employee. Within an hour hundreds of police and military would be scouring the countryside for us. Henceforth I realised we were to be outlawed rapparees with a price on our heads.

But it was a time for action. We seized the rifles and equipment of the police, mounted the cart, and drove away with our booty. The cart contained more than a hundred-weight of gelignite, but thirty electric detonators which Flynn had in his pocket escaped us, as we learned a week later.

Never was a poor horse called upon to give such gallant service in a dash for life and liberty. Sean Hogan held the reins; Sean Treacy and I sat behind. The others of the party had been ordered to escape in different directions, and all got clear away.

On we sped, urging our poor horse to greater speed, while school children and farmworkers watched us in amazement as we went by.

We were heading for Donaskeigh. For a great part of our journey not a word was spoken. Treacy was the first to break the silence. He spoke in the same cool tones that he might have used if he were sitting round a fire discussing a game of cards.

“Do you remember, Dan, when we were reading about explosives? The book says that they are dangerous if frozen, or if they get jolted?”

This reminder did not add to our peace of mind, for if ever explosives got a jolting ours did. The road was rough and uneven; heaps of loose stones were scattered along the way; the cart was one of the ordinary farmyard type, heavily and roughly built, and without springs.

But on we had to go until we reached the spot where we had decided to hide our booty. There we quickly deposited the gelignite, all except two sticks which I kept for a decoy. These I threw on the roadside at the spot where we eventually abandoned the horse. For months later, day after day, police and soldiers actually walked over our dug-out, but never discovered it. They had been deceived by the two loose sticks, and kept themselves warm by digging trenches all over the country, but their search was in vain.

When we had hidden the booty our trouble began. The poor old horse could go no further. Besides we had no desire to keep him much longer, for he would only furnish the enemy with a clue to getting on our track later. We left him on the roadside and went our way. A few hours later that district was spotted with khaki figures, for the horse was found that evening at Aileen Bridge, about four miles from Tipperary town on the main road to Thurles.

Difficulties were now looming up before our eyes. Tipperary was no longer safe. The weather was against us. We were tired with the excitement of the day, and the suspense of the days before, but we could not think of rest for a long while yet. The weather was intensely cold, and, to make things worse, it started to snow. That not only added to our difficulties, but there was the danger that if the snow lodged we might easily be traced.

At Ryan’s Cross, near Aileen Bridge, we abandoned the horse. Then we turned to the right. Previously we had been going north, but now we went south-east, and gradually south towards where the Galtee mountains towered above us. We walked forty miles over these mountains and valleys, for like many before us we felt that they would give us hope and shelter. All through the ages since Geoffrey Keating penned his famous History when there was a price on his head, the Galtee mountains and the Glen of Aherlow have been the first refuge of the Tipperary felon.

We had travelled four miles after leaving the horse when we took our first rest at Mrs. Fitzgerald’s, of Rathclogheen, near Thomastown. There we had our first square meal since my mother gave us breakfast early that morning, and right heartily we enjoyed the ham and eggs and tea our hostess set before us. It was in that house that our famous countryman, Father Mathew, was born.

But we could spare no time for lingering; we had yet to put many more miles between us and Soloheadbeg. We resumed our journey towards the mountains. At Keville’s Cross we crossed the Cahir and Tipperary Road. The cold was bitter, and the wind was piercing. The only other living things we saw out in the open were two mountain goats, spancelled together near the cross-roads. Several times we lost our way after that. We dare not call to a strange wayside farmhouse, for at that time the people had not learned to keep a shut mouth. At one point Sean Treacy fell into a drain about twenty feet deep, and we thought he was killed. When we got him out we found he was little the worse for his fall, and he assured us he would fire another shot before handing in his gun. We continued our journey towards the summit. Once when we had traversed the Glen and climbed Galteemore’s rugged slopes from the Tipperary side, we lost our bearings on the top. In the height of the summer you will find it chilly enough on Galteemore. You can imagine how we felt that evening in the heart of winter. It had taken us three hours to climb, but after all our exertions we wandered back to the two goats—back to our starting-point. In despair we abandoned all hope of crossing the mountain. As Sean Hogan said then, “’tis all very well for poets sitting in easy chairs at the fireside to write about the beauties of mountains, but if they had to climb them as we had, hungry and cold, they would be in no mood to appreciate the beauties of nature.”

When we returned to Keville’s Cross we decided on a new plan. We crossed on to the railway line, and determined to face for Cahir. It was lucky we did so. We had not gone many miles along the line when we saw the lights of the military lorries that were scouring the roads in search of us. Had we been down on the road we could never have avoided them.

A railway is a tiresome road to travel, even at ordinary times. For us in our condition that night it was cruel. Yet we had to keep on. Once in the thick darkness I saw a black figure a few paces ahead. I was walking in front and promptly levelled my revolver, with the order “hands up!” The figure remained motionless, having apparently halted at my command. I advanced, with my gun still levelled, and walked into a railway signpost with the warning, “Trespassers will be prosecuted.” Unhappy though our plight was, the boys laughed at my mistake, and I had to laugh myself with them.

A little farther on Sean Hogan asked us to stop for a moment, as his boot was feeling loose. Sean Treacy tied the lace, but he did not travel much farther till he again complained that it was loose. Sean stopped to examine it, and found that the whole boot was practically worn away by the rocks and boulders. Only a bit of a sole and the laced portion of the upper remained.

All the time Sean Treacy tried to keep our spirits from drooping. Several times we asked him how far more was it to Cahir, and always got the reply, “the next turn of the road.” He was right, of course; but as the road and the railway which runs parallel to it are an almost perfect straight line for three miles, the next turn was a long way off. Now and again we were so exhausted that we used to stand and rest our heads against the ditch by the railway side to take a sleep—or what we persuaded ourselves was a sleep—for five minutes.

At last we reached Cahir. We were now as near to absolute collapse as men could be. We were becoming desperate. For the first time we had to assume that outward coolness, and take that risk which later became almost part of our daily routine. We walked right through the town of Cahir, a garrison town on the main road from Limerick to Clonmel and Waterford, and only fifteen miles from Soloheadbeg. But we had to take the risk. Our blood was almost congealed with cold, we were ravenously hungry, and there was little life left in us. But we knew one good friend on whom we could rely for a night’s shelter. That friend was Mrs. Tobin, of Tincurry House, near Cahir. I shall never forget her kindness to us that night and to others of the boys later. The British afterwards bombed and destroyed the house in daylight as an “official reprisal” for the shooting of District-Inspector Potter, an incident to which I shall refer in a later chapter.

We got to bed the first time for a week. The three of us were in the same plight. Excitement, cold and exhaustion all combined to make sleep impossible for us. But we lay limp for four hours, and in this way we got some rest for our weary limbs.

We got up full of anxiety to hear the news. Since we left Soloheadbeg we had spoken to nobody and had not seen a newspaper. Sure enough, there were the big splash headings, just as we anticipated, announcing this “Tipperary Outrage,” “Fearful Crime,” “Murder of Two Policemen,” and such like. We saw, too, an account of the inquest on the dead men, Constable McDonnell and O’Connell. Most of the news of the incident was absolutely wrong, as it often was later on. We learned, too, that two young men had been arrested on suspicion, but neither had anything to do with the affair, and they were released in a few days. Two schoolboys from the locality, Matthew Hogan, aged fifteen, a brother of Sean’s; and Timothy Connors, aged eleven, were also arrested by the British, as they were supposed to have seen us. The father of the boy Connors had been a workman employed on the farm of Sean Treacy’s mother. Both boys were detained for months in an effort to get them to give information, and, in the case of Connors, a great legal action ensued, which resulted in a verdict against the Commandant of the R.I.C. Headquarters for illegal detention.

POLICE NOTICE.

£1000 REWARD

WANTED FOR MURDER IN IRELAND.

DANIEL BREEN

(calls himself Commandant of the Third Tipperary Brigade).

Age 27, 5 feet 7 inches in height, bronzed complexion, dark hair (long in front), grey eyes, short cocked nose, stout build, weight about 12 stone, clean shaven; sulky bulldog appearance; looks rather like a blacksmith coming from work; wears cap pulled well down over face.

The above reward will be paid by the Irish Authorities, to any person not in the Public Service who may give information resulting in his arrest.

Information to be given at any Police Station.

S.O. 14591. (G. 40). 5,000. 11.20.—A. T. & Co., Ltd.

Meantime our episode at Soloheadbeg had had its first effects. South Tipperary, that is half the county, had been proclaimed a “military area.” That, for all practical purposes, meant martial law. Fairs, markets and meetings were prohibited; military reinforcements were rushed into the district and garrisons were established at villages which had never before sheltered a British soldier. Night and day they patrolled the roads and scoured the fields. Our little band had unmasked England. She had now to come out in the open and let the world see that she held Ireland by naked force, and by force alone.

We also learned that a reward of £1,000 was offered for any information that would lead to our capture. A few months later this offer was increased to £10,000. Nobody earned it nor indeed tried to earn it, except a few members of the R.I.C. They failed, and most of them never tried a second time.

These are the plain, unvarnished facts concerning the first shots fired after the Insurrection of 1916. These shots were the first of a series that were to bring Ireland’s name once more before the world, and to make the nations look on in admiration at Ireland’s fight for freedom.

CHAPTER VIII.
HELPED BY THE BRITISH.

We spent two nights in Mrs. Tobin’s house. Then we went to Ned McGrath’s, of Tincurry, and from there we were taken by Ned to Gorman’s, of Burncourt Castle. We then arranged to go to Ryan’s of Tubrid, and sent on word that they might expect us. But after sending word we changed our minds and did not go to Tubrid; and lucky it was for us—or for somebody else. Just at the time we had expected to be there the house was surrounded by eight peelers, and Ryan himself was arrested.

We decided to go on to Mitchelstown in County Cork, at the other end of the Galtees. We spent a night in O’Brien’s, of Ballagh, and while we were there a strange thing occurred. We were sleeping upstairs when strange voices aroused us. We looked out and saw several peelers just entering the house. We at once got ready for a fight, expecting to see them mounting the stairs at any moment. But they never came. In a few minutes they took their departure. Then we learned that the object of their visit was to ascertain if the owner of the house had paid the licence for his dogs.

Finally we reached Mitchelstown where we met Christie Ryan, who welcomed us and gave us the shelter of his house. While we were there we saw eight armed policemen pass the door. They were guarding a little packet of blasting powder. Evidently the Soloheadbeg affair had taught them to take no chances, and now they had quadrupled the escort.

Later we came across into East Limerick, where Ned O’Brien, of Galbally, put us up, and then we travelled farther to the Maloneys, of Lackelly, the scene of a great battle with the British two years later. At Lackelly we stayed about a week.

But you must understand our position all this time since the affair at Soloheadbeg. We were still within a radius of ten miles of the scene. Police and military were scouring the countryside for us, searching houses, ditches and woods. The clergy, the public and the press had all condemned our action. Our only consoling thought was that so were the men of ’98, and the Fenians of ’67, and then the men of 1916 condemned in their day, and we knew that as the cause of these men had been vindicated, so too would our cause when the scales fell from the people’s eyes. At this time, however, scarce a word would be heard in our defence. Our point of view was not even to be listened to. The people had voted for a Republic, but now they seemed to have abandoned us who tried to bring that Republic nearer, and who had taken them at their word.

Our former friends shunned us. They preferred the drawing-room as their battle ground, and the political resolution rather than the gun as their weapon. We had heard the gospel of freedom preached to us; we believed in it, we wanted to be free, and we were prepared to give our lives as proof of the faith that was in us. But those who preached the gospel were not prepared to practise it.

Even from the Irish Volunteers or the Irish Republican Army, as it has now come to be called, we got no support. Ned O’Brien and James Scanlan of Galbally, Paddy Ryan of Doon, and Davy Burke of Emly, certainly stood by us; but they were the exceptions.

When the news of the Soloheadbeg affair became public, a meeting was actually summoned in Tipperary town by a man who should have been our friend. His purpose was to dissociate Sinn Fein from the incident, and to denounce us for our action. The meeting was, however, called off by another prominent man. A local clergyman in a sermon, in which he denounced us as murderers, said that it used to be the custom to say, “Where Tipperary leads Ireland follows,” but he hoped this would not be so in the case of Soloheadbeg, the men responsible for which would, he said, go to their graves with the brand of Cain on their foreheads. Such were the things said about us, but we kept on our course.

In many places we were refused shelter on a night that one would not put out a dog. I remember on one occasion we were sitting in a farmhouse by the fireside when a loud knock was made at the door. It was dark, and the farmer did not care to open without knowing who was outside.

“Who’s there?” he demanded.

“Police!” came the prompt reply.

Simultaneously we drew our revolvers. The door was opened, and a young neighbouring farmer entered, laughing heartily at his attempted joke. Before we could put away our guns the owner of the house observed them. At once his attitude towards us changed. He informed us point blank that he would not permit men with guns to stay under his roof. It was bitterly cold, but we had to go out into one of the outhouses for the night. So chilled were we there that we had to drive in some of the cows to keep us warm.

We had to keep tramping from parish to parish without a penny in our pockets. Our clothes and boots were almost worn out, and we had no changes. Many whom we thought we could trust would not let us sleep even in their cattle byres.

When we reached the village of Dono, in County Limerick—still only seven miles from Soloheadbeg—we again met with Seumas Robinson, and I need hardly say that our joy at the reunion was unbounded. Although it was only a few weeks since we parted after the fight at Soloheadbeg, we all felt like brothers meeting after years of separation. When we met we continued our night’s march linked arm in arm.

While we were in this neighbourhood Paddy Ryan, a well-known local merchant and an old worker in the cause of freedom, proved a staunch friend to us. With Seumas again one of our band we discussed the outlook and the chances of winning over the people to engage in “one good stand-up fight” against the old enemy. We then drafted a proclamation ordering all the enemy forces out of South Tipperary. We sent it on to Dublin, but both An Dail and General Headquarters refused their consent to let us go ahead. We never found out their reason for doing so. Ours was the only logical position.

Withholding their support was a bad blow enough—but what was our horror when we found that someone had actually worked up a plan to ship us away to America! We were not consulted at all, but calmly told to be ready to sail in a couple of days. It was surely a sugar-coated pill! A deportation order in disguise, issued from the very source that should, if consistent, get behind us in the war. We refused to leave Ireland. We told them that we were not afraid to die, but would prefer to live for Ireland. To leave Ireland would be like an admission that we were criminals, or that we were cowards. Now, more than ever we declared that our place was in Ireland, and Ireland’s fight would have to be made by Irishmen on the hills and at the cross-roads in Ireland, not with printer’s ink in America, or in any other country. This was apparently regarded as a breach of discipline. We were members of an organised body and should obey our superior officers. They persisted in their plan of sending us away, and we, just as obstinately, refused to leave. At length we won, but only on condition that we should remain away in some remote part of the country. We felt that we could very soon overcome that difficulty too.

While these little quibbles were going on between G.H.Q. and ourselves we were suffering intensely. The cold weather and the weary, aimless travelling around were very trying on us. We could not get a horse to carry us even a journey of a few miles. We had to trudge from field to field, sometimes in one direction, sometimes in another. At last human nature began to assert itself. Why should we be treated so? Was not the sky as fair in one place as in another?

From Doon we went to Upperchurch, in the north of Tipperary. There we spent a few days with Patrick Kinnane, one of a family of famous Irish athletes; our next resting-place we decided would be Meagher’s of Annfield. We sent on word that they might expect us to arrive at half-past seven in the evening, when it would be quite dark. The four of us, accompanied by Patrick Kinnane, walked along the road, chatting and enjoying the cool spring air. We must have taken our time along the way, for Treacy looked at his watch and reminded us that we were overdue, as it was now nearly eight o’clock. Suddenly in the distance we saw something white fluttering in the darkness. We halted. It was a signal by a girl who was trying to attract our attention.

The four of us dropped into a place of concealment behind a thick hedge. The girl saw us and approached along the road. As she passed the spot in which she had seen us hide she whispered the words:—

“The peelers are inside, raiding!”

She was one of the Misses Meagher who had slipped out unnoticed by the police to give warning, knowing the road by which we would come.

From our point of vantage we waited until we saw the forces of the British law depart to their barracks. Then we proceeded on our way, and entered the house they had been raiding, where we enjoyed a pleasant tea.

From Meagher’s we came south again to Leahy’s of Boherlahan, the famous family of Tipperary hurlers. After that we went to Donnelly’s, of Nodstown, in the same district, where we held a meeting of our Brigade Council on a Sunday evening. With our colleagues we discussed plans for more active operations, and produced the proclamation we had drawn up ordering all British armed forces to leave South Tipperary under penalty of death. Although Headquarters had refused their sanction we decided to publish it. About the end of February it was posted up in several parts of the county. The newspapers published it with mocking headlines. It seemed a tall order no doubt at the time, but subsequent events showed that we saw further ahead than either the newspapers or our own Headquarters gave us credit for.

After that meeting we decided to return northwards towards Creany, sending word ahead as we always did. We sent a message to Patrick Kinnane to meet us with a car, and started our long tramp in the dismal night.

At Upperchurch we were met by Kinnane, Doherty and Patrick Dwyer, and we headed for Murphy’s house at Creany. It was three o’clock in the morning when we reached our destination. Seldom did we suffer more than that night from cold and exposure. The weather was harsh, even for February, and the district was wild and mountainous.

When we arrived at Murphy’s house we were ravenously hungry. Murphy was a great character. He was locally known as “the Stationmaster”—why, I don’t know, for the nearest railway station was fifteen miles from his house. He was preparing a great meal of smoked ham and eggs for us. So hungry was Hogan that instinctively, and half unconsciously, he began to eat the raw ham as it was being put on the frying pan. In a few minutes he was seriously ill, and we thought he was going to die. He soon revived, but for weeks afterwards he was far from well. His illness at this time was very unfortunate for us, because we had made up our minds, in spite of Headquarters’ orders, that we would try to get to Dublin, as we could no longer endure the misery of our existence.

With that purpose we went from Creany to the Falls of Donass, that most glorious and picturesque spot on the Shannon just across the Limerick border from North Tipperary. Then we parted with Robinson and Treacy, who started on their perilous journey to Dublin, while I remained behind with Hogan until he would be himself again. They arrived in Dublin safely, and were welcomed by a few sympathetic friends. A full and accurate description of each one of us, with the reward offered for information that might lead to our capture, appeared every week in the Hue and Cry, the official police gazette, and so it was no easy thing for them either to travel to the city, or to get about when they had arrived there.

Meantime Hogan and I could not stay long in the district round the Keeper Mountains. But Tommy McInerney came out from Limerick with a motor car, accompanied by Tim Ryan. McInerney was the man who drove the ill-fated motor car which went to meet Roger Casement on Good Friday of 1916, when the car ran over a cliff in Kerry, and two of the occupants were drowned, McInerney himself escaping.

Tim Ryan knew of a friendly priest in West Limerick who would give us shelter, and we started on our journey to meet one of the truest friends we ever made—a certain sagairt whose praises I should like to sound here, but who does not wish his name to be made known. Sean Hogan sat in front with McInerney, who was driving, Ryan and I being in the back.

For a time our journey was uneventful until we approached Limerick City. We were suddenly confronted by lorry loads of soldiers dashing along in the direction of Tipperary. We knew they were on some big round up. We did not know then, though we found out later, that they had received information that we were lying in a certain hiding place, and scores of troops with armoured cars were being rushed to the scene.

Never since we left Soloheadbeg did we feel in such a tight corner. One flash of suspicion on the part of a single officer of the party would have ruined us. At that time we knew that more than one British soldier, even privates, had fond hopes of earning the reward for our capture, and many of them had been at great pains to study our descriptions. Besides, it was comparatively easy for them then, in the spring of 1919, for we were then the only “much wanted men,” as the newspapers described us.

An apparently endless line of lorries approached us—every soldier armed to the teeth, every lorry equipped with a machine gun. The smallest show of concern on our part meant our death warrant: the slightest sign of fear or anxiety would betray us. And there was no turning back. To attempt such a thing would be an open challenge by three men to several hundred soldiers. Coolness and bluff were our only hope.

We passed the first twenty lorries without turning a hair. We just looked at the troops with that gaze of curiosity mingled with admiration that one might expect from any loyal citizen watching his gallant protectors go by. We had passed the greater part of the convoy, and were beginning to feel more at our ease, when suddenly rounding a corner we were confronted by a sentry with rifle upraised and called on to “’alt.” Our driver at once put on the brakes and pulled up.

We now realised why the other braves had allowed us to pass unchallenged. We had been led into an ambush—permitted to get right into the middle of the convoy, so that we had not a dog’s chance of escaping. It was a cunning trap, but we would show them how Irishmen can die rather than surrender. It was all up with us, but we would sell our lives as dearly as we could.

I pulled my gun. For a fraction of a second I fingered it fondly under the rug rapidly deciding where I should send my bullets with best effect. I had my finger on the trigger ready to raise my arm to fire when an officer dashed up.

“Sorry for delaying you, gentlemen,” he shouted.

This did not look like an ambush. I gently lowered my gun from view, and waited for his next words.

He was the captain in charge of the party. “Two of the ‘beastly’ cars, you know, have broken down,” he explained, “and ’twas awfully unfortunate, don’t you know, but the traffic was almost completely blocked.” He apologised profusely for the delay, but he feared there was not enough room for our car to pass. “’twas jolly rotten,” but he thought we should have to get out and walk.

By this time I had quite recovered my composure. I told him politely but firmly that we had an important business appointment to keep, and that any further delay might mean serious loss to us. Besides, I said, we had travelled far, and a long motor journey was not good for rheumatics, and we were far too tired to walk.

I think he was really impressed by my protest. At that stage British officers regarded an Irishman who could travel in a motor car as a person of importance who might get a “question raised in the House,” if treated rudely. A year or two later I know what he would have said to any Irishman met on the road.

He suddenly turned to his men, ordered three or four of them to drop their rifles and push us in our car for about two hundred yards till we had passed the broken-down lorries, and could take the middle of the road again.

Never did I feel more inclined to laugh. Here was a section of the British Army actually going out of its way to save us the trouble of walking, while the same army was day and night searching the countryside for us. What a pretty heading it would have been for the Morning Post—“Wanted Gunmen aided and abetted by the British Army!”

We were more profuse in our thanks to the soldiers, assured them they need not push our car any further, and were very sorry to have them put to so much trouble. A moment later we waved them good-bye, and were dashing along the road to Foynes. I can assure you that the speed of our car was tested for the next quarter of an hour in case by any chance the obliging soldiers might get suspicious, and come after us to make enquiries. But Sean and I laughed heartily when we had left them behind. It was the first time since we had become outlaws that the British helped us to escape; it was not the last, for more than once I had reason to feel grateful to their stupidity in helping me out of difficulties when they little knew who I was.

CHAPTER IX.
OUR RETURN TO SOLOHEADBEG.

That evening we reached our destination—the house of the priest to whom I have already referred. Here we got a right hearty welcome. No trouble was spared to make us feel happy and cheerful. The housekeeper—Molly—was like a mother to us. She was a bit of a dictator, too, where dictation was for our good. When she had given us a good hearty meal she ordered both of us to bed, where we remained for two whole days. Can you wonder that we felt loth to leave the blankets, with memories of newspapers, dirty straw and damp hay still fresh in our minds?

After two days’ rest I felt fit and active again, but Hogan was still far from well. We can never forget Molly’s kindness during this time. No trouble was too great for her to make us comfortable. I believe it was her kindness and good cookery that really brought us to. And she was always good-humoured and cheerful. It was a tonic to hear her merry laugh, her banter and her bright homely talk. It was all so different to what we had been accustomed to for months. Up to this the people who spoke to us at all never raised their voices above a whisper. Sometimes we had to laugh when we saw the caution they exercised before giving any sign that they recognised us. Whenever we met an acquaintance on the road he looked behind, to the right and to the left, before saluting us. Many of them, I suppose, were afraid that if we were caught soon after meeting them they might lie under suspicion, and there is nothing an Irishman fears more than to be thought an informer.

It was amusing to observe the frightened look that came into people’s eyes when they recognised us. Of course, there was often a good reason for their fright, for we were often several weeks without making the acquaintance of a razor. But one is not particular about personal beauty when there is an army at one’s heels, and ten thousand pounds on one’s head.

No wonder then that Molly’s good nature and good humour were such a tonic to us. And she was brave as well as kind. She would inspire us with hope when everything looked black. She was unshaken in her conviction that no harm would come to us; that God, as she said, would save us from our enemies. She always kept a lamp burning before the image of the Sacred Heart, in intercession for our welfare, and I am sure that many a decade of her beads she said for us too.

But if Molly was a brick the priest was a thousand bricks. Like Molly, he never counted the cost of “harbouring outlaws.” We were welcome to his roof and to his table as long as we cared to stay, and everything that his house held, or that he could command, was at our service. We certainly enjoyed our stay at ⸺, and would have liked to prolong it, but it was not safe to stay over-long in the same district, and we felt it was not fair to our host. Moreover, we wanted to be on the move to try what we could be doing to put more life into the cause. After a stay of a few weeks in this place we went on to Rathkeale.

Here for the first time I met Sean Finn—as fine a type of brave and chivalrous Irishman as ever lived. He was then but a mere youth, but he had been elected Commandant of his Battalion. Imbued with a passionate desire to strike a blow for the old land he was brave almost to rashness. But, alas! for Ireland, he fell in his first battle with the enemy about a year and a half later. My highest tribute to the memory of this gallant soldier of Ireland!

We did not stay long in Rathkeale. We were restless, and longing for action. We were anxious, too, to know how Sean Treacy and Seumas Robinson were faring in Dublin. At this time we saw the newspapers every day, and we knew that they had so far escaped. At last, we got into communication with them and arranged to meet them again. We felt that the fates would have the four of us joined hands again, and stand or fall together. So Sean Hogan and I worked our way from West Limerick back towards the eastern end of the county, to the borders of South Tipperary. Once more we found ourselves in a place where we had already received shelter and hospitality—at Lackelly, near Emly. We were thus within six or seven miles of Soloheadbeg again, and within a few miles of the spot where a few weeks later we were to have our next most exciting and dramatic adventure—Knocklong.

At Lackelly we met Treacy and Robinson once more. We felt like a group of schoolboys on a holiday. Somehow when the four of us were together all the dark clouds seemed to scatter. We forgot we were hunted outlaws with a heavy price on our heads, and when we met we talked and joked long into the night, and exchanged our experiences and our adventures since we had parted. Treacy and Robinson had gone about Dublin freely and openly, and had quite a pleasant time. We, on our part, tried to make them jealous by telling them of our great time at the priest’s house, and were able to boast of being helped by the British soldiers on our way to that place.

Seumas was able to retort with an equally amusing experience. It seems that on their way from Tipperary to Dublin the car broke down just at Maryboro’ Jail, and immediately several soldiers rushed to their assistance to get it started again. In Dublin, too, they had many adventures, but these I cannot go into.

Meantime, the police and military were still busy searching the whole county of Tipperary for us, and digging up gardens and bogs in search of the missing explosives. They watched our haunts, and raided every place we were ever known to frequent. In spite of the difficulties this state of things created, the four of us determined that it was useless to remain inactive. The encounter at Soloheadbeg stirred the country, and showed the Volunteers what could be done, but our absence might nullify these effects. The three months that had passed since then seemed to us to have been wasted. The I.R.A. was still only a name. In theory there was a fairly good organisation. Every county had its Brigade and its Battalions, and arms were not altogether lacking, but of what use, we asked ourselves, are men who are soldiers only in name, and of guns that are oiled and cleaned but never fired? The men were not wanting in courage, but they needed more initiative. At that time all they could do was go to jail. All over the country men were allowing themselves to be arrested and imprisoned for drilling or carrying arms, but they never seemed to think of using the arms rather than go to jail.

We made up our minds when we met at Lackelly that this business of going to jail and becoming cheap heroes must stop. We wanted a real army, not a hollow mockery. Even if such an army numbered a few score only, it would be far better than the present organisation. We thought Soloheadbeg would have been followed by active operations all over the country, but now it was becoming a mere memory.

In this frame of mind, and with these resolutions we procured four bicycles and headed straight for Donohill—back to the very scene of our first battle, back into the middle of the military net that martial law had drawn round the whole county. Donohill is about two miles north of the Soloheadbeg quarry, and our route took us by the very road where we waited so long for the enemy, and where we at last met them. It was our first journey past the scene since January 21st, and you can picture our feelings as we saw the familiar hill once more and the turn of the road where the peelers appeared. We dismounted and lingered for a while in the neighbourhood. I am sure many of the people around never expected to lay eyes on us again, for in the old days the usual thing for men in our position to do was to clear away to America. But our work was in Ireland, and we were going to see it through to the end.

At Donohill we appeared to the Horan family like men who had come back from the grave. When they realised we were not ghosts, they gave us a typical Irish welcome, and we joked and laughed long into the night. They didn’t forget to keep somebody on the look-out by the road to make sure we would not be surprised. With the Horans we stayed till the following night.

My own house was only half a mile away, and, needless to remark, I took the opportunity to see my mother. It was a great surprise for her, but a very welcome one. During my period on the run I dare not even send her a card, for it would bring her endless annoyance from the enemy, and probably give them useful information, for they never scrupled to open letters going through the post. Poor woman! She was very brave and in the best of spirits, in spite of the fact that her little home was often raided and ransacked three times in twenty-four hours, in the early dawn, and in the dead of night. It gave me great courage to see her and to talk to her again. But I should not delay long, and I bade her good-bye again, taking with me her warm blessing as I left.

The dear old soul has suffered much for the crime of having taught her sons their duty to their country. Even the house over her head was looted and burned, and her hens and chickens had to pay the price of English hate, for they were bayoneted by the Black and Tans. Through all her trials she never lost heart, and would always have her jibe at the enemy. Once when the British came and asked if her son was in, she sarcastically asked them if they would venture under the same roof with him. On another occasion in reply to the same question she told them I was upstairs, and invited them to enter. Their response to the invitation was a precipitate retreat to seek cover.

CHAPTER X.
SEAN HOGAN CAPTURED.

From Donohill we went to Rossmore, and then on to Rosegreen, and finally into Clonmel—the Headquarters of the R.I.C. for South Tipperary, and a large garrison town. We spent several days in that district, and were not idle. We met the local officers of the I.R.A.—they belonged to our brigade—and found out what plans they had. We did our best to induce them to get things moving more rapidly, and to get on with the real serious work.

One morning while in Clonmel district I had an unusual adventure, not very exciting in its own way, but one that I feared was going to prove more than exciting for me. As I was cycling up Mockler’s Hill at 2 o’clock in the morning, when it was still pitch dark, a cyclist coming in the opposite direction rode right into me. I got the full force of his handle-bars over the heart. I was thrown helplessly to the ground, and vomited a quantity of blood. I thought I was going to die. The prospect of such an inglorious end did not improve me, nor hasten my recovery. To be killed in action by an enemy bullet was a fate I did not at all dread; but I strongly objected to being killed by the handle-bars of an ordinary, inoffensive push-bicycle, and, to make things worse, I pictured myself being identified by the R.I.C. and kicked into an even worse condition than that in which the cyclist left me. However, my recovery was more rapid than I hoped for. I have always had a bad habit of pulling myself together very quickly. In a short time I was able to mount my bicycle again, and ride to my destination.

On the 10th of May, 1919, we retraced our steps to the village of Rossmore. It was now almost four months since the affair at Soloheadbeg. During that time we had been sleeping where and when we got the chance; sometimes in a barn, sometimes in a cattle-shed, and very seldom in bed. Our health was not any the worse of our hardships. I suppose with time one grows hardened. Even this night when we got to Rossmore we were feeling fit and game, although we had been four nights without any rest. Still, we could do with a few hours’ sleep. Somebody we met mentioned casually to us that there was a dance that night in Eamon O’Duibhir’s house in Ballagh, only a short distance away. We forgot about our weariness; we forgot about our danger. We were young, and had grown accustomed by now to taking risks, and it was long since we had had the pleasure of a dance or a ceilidhe.

Without a second thought we faced for Ballagh. Soon we were in the thick of the night’s fun. It felt glorious to be back again, even for one night, in the atmosphere of light-hearted gaiety. For nearly two years I had not mingled with a crowd, and here I was now in the midst of a typical Tipperary party. The music was great, and the supper and refreshments were even better. For once we forgot the dark clouds over us; we laughed and talked and danced in the reels and in the sets with the lads and the lassies—in the middle of the Martial Law area, and at a time when probably a dozen British raiding parties were breaking in doors in cottages and farmhouses looking for us.

Of course, the boys and girls all knew us. They, like so many others before and after, had only to slip out, any one of them, go to the nearest police barracks, not two miles away, and earn a thousand pounds by saying where we were. But they never dreamed of such a thing. Neither did we ever dream of suspecting any one in the party, or in any other party of Irish-Irelanders. Every one of them would cut off his hand before he would touch that Saxon gold. Irishmen have many faults, but very, very few informers are bred amongst them.

We danced all through the night, and in the early hours of the morning I returned with a few of the boys to Rossmore. The other three did not come with me; they stayed on for a few more dances, but we had arranged to meet at O’Keeffe’s, of Glenough, where we would have a right good sleep. Shortly after I arrived there Sean Treacy and Seamus Robinson put in an appearance. Sean Hogan did not come with them, but none of us felt a bit uneasy. He had two days to go before he reached his eighteenth birthday, but we knew he was well able to look after himself.

The three of us were about as tired as we could be. What with our five nights without sleep, and the fatigue of a night’s dancing, we could have slept, as Sean said, on a bed of briars. The sight of the cosy bed that had been made ready for us almost made us sleep before we turned into it.

I think Sean Treacy had not finished his rosary before I fell asleep. The next sound I heard was the voice of Patrick Kinnane. It seemed very far off. He was speaking to me I knew, but my eyes refused to open. Then I was brought to my senses. His words lifted me clean out of the bed; I realised the full meaning of his early intrusion: Hogan had been captured by the Peelers!

It would have been very easy for us to believe that “J.J.,” as we called him—his name was John Joseph—had been shot. But to think he was arrested! I would not believe it. Was Kinnane joking? I turned to Sean Treacy, for he too was on his feet by now, and I read the truth in his face.

I would have given a fortune for a few hours more of sleep. I never felt so tired and weary in my life. Robinson and Treacy were just as bad. But the thought of “J.J.” in the enemy’s clutches brought us quickly to our senses. Without a moment’s hesitation we made our decision. Our faces rather than our words conveyed to one another what was in our minds. We must rescue Hogan, or die in the attempt, and we knew that had any one of us been in Hogan’s position his decision would have been the same.

Quickly we got what information there was of his capture. He left the dance soon after us. Before he had gone far he was surrounded by ten stalwart policemen. He carried his gun, of course, as we all did, but he never got a chance to use it. It was not until a year later that the British invented the happy trick of shooting prisoners “while attempting to escape.” If that fashion had then existed “J.J.” would not be with us to-day, nor would there have been much use in planning to rescue him that night.

Our first trouble was to locate him. At that time murders of innocent people had not yet come into fashion, but Martial Law made people more careful, and few ventured out late at night or early in the morning because of the certainty of being held up and questioned and probably arrested by the British, who patrolled the roads at all hours of the night and day. Hence we found on our first enquiry that no one had seen whither Hogan’s escort had departed. They might have faced for any one of half a dozen garrisons—Thurles, Tipperary, or Cashel, for instance. To be thus left in ignorance of where to lay our plans was almost maddening, and we knew that every hour that passed made the danger greater, and that he would soon be removed to a place beyond our reach. Gladly, I believe, would any one of the three of us have taken the place of our youngest comrade. Now that he was gone from us we suddenly discovered all his excellent points of character, though we were never in the habit of paying him compliments while he was with us.

We searched and enquired everywhere. We sent messengers on bicycles in all likely directions to endeavour to pick up a trail. But his captors had got too big a start. We were almost in despair when at last we got on the scent: we traced him to Thurles police barracks.

To attempt to rescue him from that place would have been worse than madness. It would have been as easy to storm the gates of hell. Thurles is a fairly large town, and had a big garrison of both police and military. The barrack was strongly fortified, and the peelers were always on the alert. Their positions made alertness essential. They were in the middle of an area that was soon to become the centre of active warfare, and they were on the main road from Dublin to Cork. There was never the slightest hope of rushing the barracks or of effecting an entrance by a ruse, and besides, we knew that the presence of Sean Hogan in their stronghold would make them all the more careful, for they knew he was one of the four men wanted for the attack at Soloheadbeg. The bits of information they had picked up, and our disappearance from the locality made it certain to them from the first day that we were in that adventure.

But there was one gleam of hope. We knew he would not be kept long in Thurles. Prisoners were only kept in these local stations for a day or two while the preliminary enquiries and remands were being gone through. Then they were transferred to one of the largest prisons—Mountjoy, Cork, Maryboro’, Dundalk or Belfast. In the case of Tipperary men, and indeed men from all over Munster, Cork was generally the destination. The odds were ten to one that in a day or two Sean Hogan would be taken by train from Thurles to Cork.

Our plans were quickly completed. We would go to Emly, intercept the escort, hold up the train and rescue our comrade. We chose Emly for many reasons. It was a small station, and there were no soldiers convenient; the police we did not particularly mind. It was in the heart of a district with which we were familiar, and in which we had many friends. It almost touched the borders of three counties, and consequently increased our chances of evading pursuit, since the enemy would not easily discover whether we retreated to the mountains, to North Cork, to South Tipperary, or to East Limerick. Above all, we had faith in many of the boys from the neighbouring village of Galbally.

But holding up a train and making arrangements for the removal of our rescued companion, and for our own escape, are not operations that can be carried out by three men. We needed help; we must get reinforcements. We at once secured the services of a special Volunteer despatch-rider; for, naturally, neither telegrams nor telephones were to be thought of. To trust these means of communication would be the same as to send the British word of our plans. Our first care was to send full details of our plans to the Acting Commandant of the Tipperary town Battalion, with orders to send us the reinforcements. Emly would be only seven miles, less than an hour’s cycle run, from Tipperary town.

Hurriedly we decided on our course of action, and made our preparations. Ned Reilly and the O’Keeffe brothers gave us every help in laying our plans before we left Thurles.

Having completed these arrangements we left the town of Thurles at 11 o’clock on the morning of May 12th, 1919. Our hearts were sad, but we still had hopes, and our blood was boiling with anger, anxiety and excitement.

J. J. HOGAN.

Mounted on our bicycles the three of us faced for Emly. Except for the hour’s sleep after the dance we had now been five nights without a rest. In the ordinary course Emly would have been only some thirty miles from us, but for obvious reasons we had to avoid the main roads, and could not pass near Tipperary town. We covered nearly fifty miles on that journey, over rough and uneven roads. It was one of the toughest rides we ever did. The journeys that Sean Treacy and I had done to and from Dublin were less wearisome. As we approached Donohill, Seumas Robinson’s bicycle was put out of action. We had neither the time nor the means to try to repair it on the roadside, but we had faithful friends. Patrick O’Dwyer, of Donohill, whose wife was a first cousin of Sean Hogan’s, put a new bicycle at our disposal, and we resumed our journey. Our fatigue was telling on us. We could have fallen off the bicycles and slept by the roadside, but the excitement and our sense of loyalty to our comrade kept up our strength. At Oola we actually fell asleep on our bicycles, but again we bestirred ourselves, and on we went doggedly, up hill and down dale with our teeth set and our minds fixed on rescue or death. We made a detour to the right, through the Martial Law area, and over the border into County Limerick, through the historic village of Cullen, and on to Ballyneety, past the ruins of the old castle, on the very same road that Patrick Sarsfield took on that moonlight night three hundred and thirty years before, when his sabre brought terror to Dutch William’s troops. It was a strange coincidence that we who now rode on a similar errand of death or glory were Tipperary outlaws, just as was Galloping Hogan, the man who made Sarsfield’s exploit possible that night. And we were going to rescue another Tipperary outlaw of the same name and clan.

While Sean Treacy was reminding us of these pages of history—for he loved his Irish history—we were interrupted by a dull thud, and looking round we saw that poor Robinson had fallen off his bicycle and was fast asleep by the roadside. We had to keep moving, time was precious, and the three of us mounted again and reached Emly at half-past three on the morning of May 13th. On the way we had stopped once or twice to complete our plans, and to perfect our intelligence arrangements. Once we got a rude shock when a bomb dropped from Robinson’s pocket, and for a moment we thought we were being attacked.

At Lackelly we called upon our old friends, the Maloneys, and right heartily we were welcomed. When we were discussing our plans, while enjoying a warm and much needed breakfast, May Maloney offered her services in any way she could help, and gladly we accepted her offer. She became our despatch rider for the occasion, and I do not know how we could have got along without her help. It was she who went to Thurles that morning, and sent us word that Hogan was still there. The Maloneys’ house, by the way, was later destroyed by the Black and Tans, and both May Maloney and her brother Dan were imprisoned during the recent war.

By 10 o’clock on the morning of May 13th, we had completed all arrangements for the rescue of Sean Hogan.

CHAPTER XI.
THE RESCUE AT KNOCKLONG.

As I have said, we arrived at Emly at 3.30 a.m. The first train on which the prisoner might come was not due till noon. When all was in readiness a few hours before noon we waited eagerly for the arrival of the men from Tipperary town in response to our request. As the hour approached we grew anxious and restive. The minutes grew into hours. Eagerly our eyes scanned the road from Tipperary, but no cyclist appeared. What had happened? We could not let ourselves believe that the help we needed so badly was not at hand. Eleven o’clock—still no reinforcements. The minutes travelled all too fast now. Half-past eleven came, and still no sign. And the train was due at 12!

But we were not going to let Sean Hogan be taken away without a fight. We knew that the escort, armed with rifles, bayonets and revolvers, would consist of four to eight policemen, but it was possible that other policemen or soldiers would be on the same train. We could only fail. At 12 o’clock the three of us rushed up to the station just as the engine steamed into the platform.

In my hurry I dashed right into an old woman at the entrance. To save her I had to throw my arms around her. The two of us were swung round and round by the force of the collision, and I finished what must have looked like a dance by falling heavily to the ground. Unfortunately, there was no time for explanations or apologies, and I don’t know whether the poor woman ever heard yet the explanation of the collision. Before she could even see my face, I was up again and racing along the platform with my finger all the time on the trigger of the revolver.

But there was no prisoner! We were sadly disappointed. In a sense, too, we felt a little relieved for there would be still time to seek help before the next train was due. But waiting is always the hardest part of any fight; suspense is more severe than action.

As we returned crestfallen to our resting-place, after scanning every carriage, our pill was made more bitter by the thought that the Tipperary men had failed us. Our minds searched for other help. We thought of the old Galtee Battalion, the boys from the mountain districts, from Galbally and Ballylanders. Their Battalion we knew had lately been suspended by Headquarters. But we knew, too, that their hearts were right, and their hands strong and daring. They would not turn a deaf ear to a call like ours.

The next train was not due from Thurles till 7 o’clock in the evening. We sent word to the boys of the Galtee Battalion, told them our errand and the danger of the work that was to be tackled. Within an hour the reply came. Five of their men would join us at 5 o’clock. Never before had we got such a heartening message.

The men were as good as their word, and they came before their time. At 4.45 p.m. they arrived, Eamon (Ned) O’Brien, James Scanlon, J. J. O’Brien, Sean Lynch, and poor Martin Foley, who was hanged in Mountjoy Jail exactly two years later for his part in the rescue. With him was hanged poor Maher, who knew nothing in the world about the incident for which he was hanged. But they gave their lives gladly for Ireland, and the brave words of their last message from the foot of the gallows will keep their memory for ever fresh in the hearts of Irish patriots. May they rest in peace!