Tag: IRA

#OTD in 1921 – Scramogue Ambush: An IRA ambush is mounted on Strokestown-Longford road by south Co Roscommon IRA.

.Reading time 7 minutes.

Roscommon was not one of the more violent areas of Ireland during the conflict. The local IRA argued to their GHQ that it was very difficult to conduct guerrilla warfare in the flat open countryside there. Prior to the action at Scramogue, the biggest previous incident had been in October 1920, when four RIC policemen […]

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#OTD in 1921 – Clogheen Ambush: Six IRA men from the 1st Battalion, Cork No.1 Brigade are killed when they are surrounded in a barn in Clogheen by the British Army.

.Reading time 4 minutes.

Six IRA men from the 1st Battalion, Cork No. 1 Brigade are massacred when they are surrounded in a barn in Clogheen by the British Army. Their whereabouts may have been provided to army intelligence by a fellow IRA member who broke under questioning. In April 1922, the IRA shot a Patrick O’Connor in New […]

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#OTD in 1922 – The seeds continue to be sown for an Irish civil war.

.Reading time 3 minutes.

Rory O’Connor holds what was to become an infamous press conference at the headquarters of the republican party (Cumann na Poblachta) in Suffolk Street, Dublin. He declares that the army is ‘in a dilemma, having the choice of supporting its oath to the Republic or still giving allegiance to the Dáil, which, it considers, has […]

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#OTD in 1921 – Irish War of Independence: A number of attacks take place in Co Kerry.

.Reading time 4 minutes.

Headford Ambush The Kerry No.2 Brigade Flying Column organised the Headford Ambush who, while billeted in the vicinity of Headford on 21 March 1921, learned that a detachment of British troops were due to return by train from Kenmare to Tralee later that day, and decided to ambush them. The attack was led by Dan […]

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#OTD in 2017 – Death of Martin McGuinness, a former IRA commander and Sinn Fein political leader who helped negotiate peace in Northern Ireland after decades of sectarian violence, and became a senior official in its power-sharing government.

.Reading time 8 minutes.

Martin McGuinness, former IRA chief of staff and a key figure in the Northern Ireland peace process, died just two months after stepping down as deputy first minister. The 66-year-old Irish republican died after a short illness in Derry’s Altnagelvin hospital surrounded by his family. He had a rare genetic disease caused by deposits of […]

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#OTD in 1964 – Death of Brendan Behan, an Irish poet, short story writer, novelist, and playwright who wrote in both Irish and English.

.Reading time 3 minutes.

He was also a committed Irish Republican and a volunteer in the Irish Republican Army. He died in Meath hospital after reportedly telling a nun looking after him: ‘Ah, bless you, Sister, may all your sons be bishops’. Brendan Behan was born in Dublin into a republican family, and became a member of the IRA’s youth […]

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#OTD in 1921 – Tom Barry and the West Cork Flying Column routs a superior force from the Essex Regiment at Crossbarry.

.Reading time 2 minutes.

A force of 100 IRA members under the leadership of Tom Barry are involved in a major skirmish with up to 1,000 British troops at Crossbarry, Co Cork. English intelligence had determined that Barry’s West Cork Brigade was based near Crossbarry and planned a major encirclement and assault. Poor planning and timing ensured the 1,000 […]

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#OTD in 1921 – 18–19: Burgery Ambush | West Waterford IRA under Pax Whelan, George Lennon and George Plunkett from Dublin HQ, ambushed a convoy of Black and Tans returning to Dungarvan via the Burgery.

.Reading time 4 minutes.

‘Comeragh’s Rugged Hills’ (Pat Keating) It’s long years since I bade farewell For it is my sad fate Our land oppressed by tyrant laws I had to emigrate… When on my pillow I recline On a foreign land to rest The thoughts of my dear native home Still throbs within my heart When silence overcomes […]

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#OTD in 1988 – At Milltown Cemetery in west Belfast, a gunman kills three mourners and injures at least 50 people attending a funeral for IRA members Maireád Farrell, Daniel McCann, and Sean Savage executed in Gibraltar.

.Reading time 4 minutes.

Loyalist gunman Michael Stone kills three people at a funeral for IRA members (Maireád Farrell, 31, Daniel McCann, 30, and Sean Savage, 23,) who were executed in Gibraltar by SAS troops. Stone wanted to kill Sinn Féin leader Gerry Adams and others whom he believed to be members of the IRA. He claimed the attack […]

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#OTD in 1981 – Day 16 | Bobby Sands recorded his diary for the first seventeen days of his hunger strike in which he detailed his thoughts and feelings on the momentous task that lay ahead of him.

.Reading time 4 minutes.

I had a wonderful visit today with my mother, father and Marcella. Wonderful, considering the circumstances and the strain which indeed they are surely under. As I expected, I received a lot of verbal flak from Screws going and coming from the actual visit. Their warped sense of humour was evident in their childish taunts, […]

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