What followed a month of reprisal and intimidation in September 1920 was an upsurge in attacks on the RIC and the military. Aided by the cover of darkness that the autumn evenings provided, the IRA once more upped the ante on the military and met them head on. October 1920 was a month of ambush and shooting recorded in the pages of the Irish Newspaper Archive & the Radical Newspaper Archive.   Some crimes comm...

As already highlighted in this month’s posts civilians became a target as the War of Independence dragged on. In September a man named Patrick Gill was murdered by the military as he walked along a public road near Drumsna, county Leitrim. Accompanied by his sister and woman named Netley, Gill was bayonetted after he had fallen to the ground. A coroners jury subsequently found that Gill had been murdered without provocati...

In the midst of the political turmoil and ongoing war being fought in every town and village in the country, the cause of labour continued to dominate Ireland in September 1920 as people looked for both security in their employment but also better wages. The radical newspaper, The Watchword of Labour, continued to be at the forefront of publicizing union activity across the country. In Dublin, in September 1920, those emplo...

One hundred years ago this month the ITGWU and other unions publicised the fact that their numbers were swelling and across nearly every sector of Irish industry they could claim members.   In fact, reports from September 1920 suggested that the their membership was well in excess of 100,000 people. Newspapers such as The Watchword of Labour (available through the Irish Newspaper Archive) reveal this growing interes...

  There were a number of outrages perpetrated against civilians during the month of September 1920. In county Sligo, an attempt was made to burn the protestant church in Tubbercurry.   The Volunteers subsequently arrested three men who pleaded guilty of the attack and who were forced to pay fines of £5 and £1 each. The money was handed to the rector of the church. In the same month, an attempt was made to bu...

While the Republican movement and Sinn Fein could count on many newspapers for friendly coverage of their activities and goals (not to mention the host of radical newspapers which they promoted) there were others who were not so receptive to their ideals. One such newspaper who continued to be a vocal critic of the Sinn Fein party and so by extension the activities of the IRA was the Belfast Newsletter. In September 1920 in...

In the popular memory of the War of independence in county Meath there were few events which caused such outrage as an event towards the end of September 1920 which became known as ‘The Sack of Trim’. The Evening Echo newspaper described the carnage which the military inflicted on the town. Following an attack on Head Constable White who was badly wounded, military lorries entered Trim on Sunday afternoon. Some shots we...

The sinister nature of the War of Independence was evident in Limerick in the summer of 1920 with the execution of a spy at Drumcollogher, near Newcastle West. Remarkably, it took several weeks to identify the man as Patrick Daly, a farm labourer as described by the Belfast Newsletter in September. However, the report on the identification of Daly on 18 September highlights the need to check multiple sources when examining ...

By September 1920 the military were well adept at retaliation and reprisal. In Ardrahan, county Galway the ambush of six police officers resulted in the burning of a number of house by the military who responded in a terrifying manner. Describing themselves as ‘Black and Tans’, the men arrived on four motor lorries and burst into the home of a man named Patrick Joyce and burned it to the ground. Joyce and his son were a...

Between the 20 and 30th of September 1920 the IRA continued to inflict heavy casualties on the RIC and the military. The death of two RIC officers took place in county Tipperary, near Templemore. Two Constables, Flood and Noonan were shot dead in an ambush which also saw their colleague Constable Ferris severely wounded. On the same day another daring attack was made on at Drimoleague, county Cork where Sergeant Dee was hit...