History

The last of the 77 executions during the Civil War took place in Ennis 90 years ago in May when William O’Shaughnessy and Christy Quinn were put before a firing squad at Home Barracks on Station Road, just as Patrick O’Mahony had been a  week earlier. All three were convicted of the murder of Private Stephen Canty, writes Joe Ó Muircheartaigh.

Last Civil War Executions in Clare

ALL was relatively quiet in Clare in late April 1923 as the Civil War that had made enemies out of friends overnight was gradually grinding to a halt.

The anti-Treaty leadership were days away from officially laying down their arms – then hostilities in terms of armed combat would be at an end. But it all came too late for four families. Three in Ennis and one in Causeway in north Kerry.

A 22-year-old soldier two weeks away from walking up the aisle, only to be gunned down as he walked around Ennis; three men picked from a crowd of onlookers, put before military tribunals, tried, convicted and taken out in the early morning, placed before firing squads and shot, – in some cases even before their families knew of their fate.

“There was a certain amount of vindictiveness in the execution of those men,” says Clare historian, Pádraig Óg Ó Ruairc. “The reason for that is that the Republican resistance in Clare was largely finished at the time. 

“It’s impossible to know for sure who fired the shot, but that was irrelevant to the Free State authorities at the time. What they would have been concerned about was that a Free State soldier, Private Canty, had been killed and as far as they were concerned somebody had to pay for that.

“They needed to get someone for the killing and they were going to carry out executions as a result. Whether they got the right men or not probably didn’t feature in their thinking – it was a question of putting down the Republicans and putting a stop to this,” adds Ó Ruairc, author of the acclaimed book ‘Blood on the Banner’ which chronicles the War of Independence and Civil war in the county.

The Free State started with Patrick O’Mahony, who was the first to face the firing squad, but who protested his innocence to the end. Christy Quinn and William O’Shaughnessy were next. They were the 75th, 76th and 77th executed by the Free State forces during the Civil War.

“The British officially executed 24 people in Ireland, the Free State executed 77 republicans,” says Ó Ruairc. “People like Kevin O’Higgins genuinely believed this was necessary in the building of the new state,” he adds.

It was Kevin O’Higgins, who two years after the executions concluded with death sentences carried out on O’Mahony, Quinn and O’Shaughnessy said, “I stand by the 77 executions – and 777 more if necessary”.

IT started on Saturday, April 21 when a routine patrol around the streets of Ennis turned to tragedy. The patrol was passing through Carmody Street in extended formation when two shots rang out at 10.30pm, with one of the bullets hitting Kerryman Private Stephen Canty in the head and killing him instantly.

So began a nightmare that would see four people dead within the space of two weeks.

Ten people were arrested by the national troops in the immediate aftermath of the murder: Patrick O’Mahony, Market Street: John O’Leary, Clonroad; Christy Quinn, Turnpike; Michael White, Clonroadmore; William and Michael O’Shaughnessy, Kilrush Road; B O’Regan, Turnpike; J O’Loughlin, Market Street and Thomas Blake, Turnpike.

The following day the inquest opened up at the Home Barracks in Ennis and then concluded in the Town Hall, with coroner and state solicitor, James Lynch, describing the killing of Private Canty as “the most cowardly murder that had ever been committed in this county or anywhere else”.

Patrick O’Mahony and John O’Leary were only two of the ten people who had been arrested brought before the inquest. They appeared guarded by the military armed with rifles, as the events of the night before were recounted before them.

“As we were standing there, the prisoners passed us down. They had a remark about the ‘f****** Civic Guards’,” Sergeant McGillycuddy said in evidence. “Immediately after that I heard two shots. 

“When we heard them making the remark we kept looking after them, and they had gone 20 or 30 yards when we heard shots which were revolver shots. I can swear that those shots were fired from the direction of where the two men were. There was a flash and I saw it. 

“I heard the military picket ordering the two men to half, and heard the military opening fire after halting the two men. I and Guard Hayden went up to where the man had been halted and I searched the men. One of the picket handed me a document, which he said he had found, and I took possession of it,” he added.

The document proved O’Mahony’s commitment to the Republican cause and read: 

“Dear Paddy, Herewith I enclose £2. I received your message regarding the price of petrol for those jobs. The other £1 you may have for personal expenses.

“I was disappointed to learn that ye were unsuccessful in burning up that show the other night. Better luck next time. Try and finish it off as soon as possible again.

“I trust you got those rifles you asked for and expect to hear of something from you in the very near future. I am sure there are many handy jobs in town and many golden opportunities for carrying off same.

“I would be glad if you would intensify the campaign in that town. It needs something in that way, and of course you are the only one we expect anything from in that way. Mise, Sean C.”

However, it didn’t make him the man that fired the fatal shot, with the inquest declaring that both O’Mahony and O’Leary were innocent.

“Stephen Canty, a private in the National Army, was unlawfully shot at Carmody Street, Ennis, on the night of 21st April, 1923 by some person unknown,” was the verdict from the inquest. “From the evidence we further find that neither of the prisoners, Mahoney and O’Leary, could have fired the fatal shot,” it added.

Still it wasn’t enough to save O’Mahony from execution. He was 25 and worked in his father’s shoemaking business in the town – it was enough that he was “implicated” in the attack on Private Canty.

The official report issued from military headquarters in Portobello Barracks in Dublin said:

“Patrick O’Mahony, Market Street Ennis and John O’Leary, the Cottages, Clare Road, Ennis were tried on 23rd day of April, 1923, on a charge of being in possession of partially loaded revolvers at Ennis on 21st April, 1923, and of being implicated in an attack of that date on the troops, in which Private Stephen Canty was killed.

“Both prisoners were found guilty. The finding was confirmed in each case, and the prisoners were sentenced to death. The sentence in this case of John O’Leary was subsequently commuted to ten years penal servitude. The execution in the case of Patrick O’Mahony was duly carried out,” the military report added.

“At 6 o’clock on Thursday morning Patrick O’Mahony was executed at the Ennis Home Barracks, Military Headquarters,” reported The Clare Champion. “There was no official notification issued. He was attended in the last hours by Rev J Considine, C.C. and was attentive to the ministrations of his clerical attendant.

“He was found guilty by a military court in connection with the murder of the soldier, Stephen Canty, it is understood. Another prisoner was found guilty, but, it is said, was reprieved the night previously,” the report added.

“I am to die this morning,” said O’Mahony in a letter to his family hours before his execution. “I am innocent of the death of the poor soldier. I am sorry for his fate, but I forgive my enemies – if I have any – from the depths of my heart. May God bless Ireland and may her sons be united once more in love with one another,” he added.

O’Leary was spared, probably because his brother was a member of the Civic Guards and, according to evidence before the inquest, was a cousin of Dick McKee – the volunteer murdered by the British forces along with Clareman Peadar Clancy while they were imprisoned in the Guardroom of Dublin Castle after the events of Bloody Sunday.

However, others weren’t so lucky. Two days later William O’Shaughnessy and Christy Quinn were brought before a military tribunal in Limerick and separately tried for the murder of Private Canty.

A statement from Army Headquarters said, “While discharging his duty, Private Canty held up the two prisoners. He was searching William O’Shaughnessy and had located a revolver on his person, when Christopher Quinn drew a revolver and fired at the soldier point blank. William O’Shaughnessy then drew the revolver in his possession and fired also at the soldier. Private Canty fell mortally wounded in the head and expired a short time later.

“O’Shaughnessy and Quinn, it was clearly shown, had set out with others on the night in question with the object of carrying out a raid for money on the house of a resident in the district. William O’Shaughnessy was arrested by the troops on the 15th of July, 1922 and release on September 2nd, after signing the form undertaking not to take up arms again against the Government. 

“Both the accused were found guilty on the separate charges made against them. The findings were confirmed in each case and both prisoners were sentenced to death.”

Not even the IRA ceasefire of April 30 could save them – it meant that their executions on May 2 came two days after the official end of hostilities, but fully a week after they had been brought before the military tribunal.

“The IRA had issued a ceasefire and that ceasefire had taken affect before the last two men were executed,” says Ó Ruairc, “but whether the Free State stopped the executions before these three men were executed and the figure stayed at 74 was immaterial. 

“It wasn’t going to change the outcome of the war. They were determined to make people pay for the killing of Private Canty, whether they were the right people or not.

“The local politics within the IRA in Clare. Michael Brennan and the leadership of the East Clare Brigade in the War of Independence did not get on with the Barretts and the leadership of the Mid-Clare Brigade and I think it’s significant that five IRA members from Clare were executed (Con McMahon and Paddy Hennessy had been executed in January at Limerick Jail) by the Free State army and all five were from the Barretts’ Mid-Clare Brigade. In all five cases Michael Brennan would have overseen them,” he adds.

Both O’Shaughnessy and Quinn were only 18 years old – the latter an apprentice tailor and the former being a postman, who never got to deliver his last letter.

“Father, I know it is hard on you, but I am dying for Ireland, the land that I love,” wrote O’Shaughnessy in correspondence with his family. 

“My last letter to you, I know it’s hardly but welcome be the will of God,” said Quinn in his letter. “I am to be executed in the morning. Well father I am taking it great because better men than I ever was fell. You have son you can be proud of, as I think I have done my part for the land I love. Dear father I will now say goodbye. Goodbye until till we meet in heaven.”

All three were buried in the Home Barracks before the bodies were finally released to their families in October 1924 for re-interment in Drumcliffe Cemetery.

“The Ennis United Labour Band and the Newmarket Brass Band  with muffled drums, preceded in close proximity to the hearses, and discoursed appropriate airs, including the Death March,” reported The Saturday Record. 

“Thousands of pedestrians, many of whom had travelled from the remotest part of the county, brought up the rear, the whole forming an imposing and truly sympathetic display.

“All business houses were closed, and in several private houses, blinds were drawn. Republican body guards marches beside the hearses, while hundreds of volunteers in military formation constituted an imposing element in the sad processions,” it added.

Ends.......

On August 15, 1923 Eamon de Valera was sensationally arrested in Ennis when he attended an election rally in the town, an event recalled 90 years on by Joe Ó Muircheartaigh.

When shots rang out over Ennis

THE term spin-doctor wasn’t alive and well in the Ireland of the 1920s, but they were there and at work.

And they came to Ennis on August 15, 1923 as the new Free State prepared for its first General Election since the end of the Civil War a few months previously.

The Sinn Féin TD for Clare, Eamon de Valera, had been on the run since the end of the Civil War and before that even; he was a wanted man; there was a warrant out for his arrest; he was banned from public speaking.

The election was 12 days away and his success topping the poll in the Clare constituency was crucial for the Republican cause – what better way to secure and cement his place in the hearts and minds of the Clare electorate by coming to the county in the run up to the election for a first public appearance in many months.

Whether the spin-doctors of the day in the Republican camp went as far as alerting the media to the de Valera’s impending appearance in Ennis that August 15 afternoon is another thing. 

However, the press were there in force, from photographers to British Pathé News, with a 59 second clip of the event surviving to this day. It’s simply called De Valera, with a subheading reading “Ireland’s stormy petrel reappears from hiding and his promptly arrested in dramatic circumstances at Ennis”.

There’s the vast crowd, numbering up to 3,000, waving their hats in acclamation of de Valera on his arrival on the platform; there’s the sight of ducking spectators as shots ring out and the Free State forces moving in and make their arrest; there are the pictures of an almost smiling de Valera being led away.

There were casualties, but none of them fatal and most of them superficial as 13 people were treated for injuries in the local hospital. The list of injured read as follows: Sean Hogan, Nenagh bruised ribs; Maggie Breen, Riverview, Ennis, contused wound on the face and arms; Patrick Woods, Toonagh, lacerated wound on back of ear; Polly Barrett, O’Connell Street, three wounds to thigh, eyes and leg; Patrick Flannery, Barrack Street, Ennis, bullet wound over shoulder; Michael Kelly, Tubber, contused wound to forehead; Michael Murphy, Inch, contused wound over eye; Pat Keane, Ahern’s Terrace, Ennis, wound over eyelid; Michael Flynn, Tiermaclane, two bad scalp wounds; John Keane, Ennis, flesh wound near the spine; Miss Moloney, Barrack Street, bruised shoulder muscle; Paddy Keane, Ballyvaughan, bullet splinter wound on hip.

And, the man at the centre of all the drama, one Eamon de Valera, was reported to have fainted amidst the tumult of an afternoon, albeit he recovered his composure quickly as he was led away to the Home Barracks.

Mission was accomplished, with The Daily Telegraph noting afterwards “the arrest will probably secure de Valera a seat in the Dáil”.

What the day was about, after all.

THAT morning then 11-year-old Charles Nono sensed that something was up. “There was excitement in the town because of an election rally taking place and as the day went on word started to go around that de Valera would make an appearance,” he recalled.

Nono wasn’t interested in politics then and was just out for a bit of fun with his friends – out to see what all the commotion was about. Living in 41 O’Connell Street he didn’t have far to travel, being sucked up towards the monument by the crowds that converged there from all directions.

He’d seen it all before – war being at his doorstep and being so young he wanted more. His father Joe had gone to fight in the First World War and Charles himself was destined to take the fight to Germany in the Second World War, while war was all around him in Ennis in his youth.

“I remember when the Tans stormed the Old Ground Hotel across the road from our house and ransacked the place. They wrecked the place, throwing furniture out the windows and caused mayhem. 

“It was a reprisal against the Sinn Féiners, because the Old Ground’s owner at the time, James O’Regan was a known Sinn Féiner. The Tans also burned TV Honan’s place on the Square. 

“TV was a great friend of de Valera but the British could never pin anything on him. They wanted to get him and one day a squad arrived and set explosive charges in his premises and set them off.”

TV Honan chaired the gathering at O’Connell Square as the crowd waited for de Valera to arrive. In the preamble he was described as a man who had “withstood the snares and bribes of England and her auxiliaries” and “like Eamon de Valera despised the 30 pieces of silver”.

“Here we are again,” said Honan in his introduction. “I see before me the great enthusiasm with which Mr de Valera’s names is greeted everywhere. He is now a greater man than ever. He has signally stood the most severe acid test of patriotism, where more spineless and selfish men have signally failed. Vote solid for de Valera and show the world that we mean to break the last link in the chain that binds us to England,” he added.

“He arrived in town by motor car,” remembered Charles Nono. “The car was guarded by Sinn Féiners. There were bands about the place and people were piping military tunes.

“I can remember standing near the corner of the Old Ground, near Lilly’s Land, seeing Dev in the car and the crowds following. I can see them now coming around the corner into the main O’Connell Street and I raced down the street after them with a few of my friends,” he added.

“Thousands for Claremen and women, young and old, rallied to the banner of Sinn Féin, and under the shadow of O’Connell eagerly awaited the arrival of their leader. Speculation was rife as to whether or not he would be able to elude the vigilance of the Free State forces, who, it was expected, would endeavour to arrest him,” reported The Clare Champion. 

As it was the forces missed their chance before de Valera reached the platform. Wearing a tweed cap and without his glasses, the car in which he was traveling in with his son and a brother of Frank Barrett was stopped 40 yards from the meeting by two members of the Gardai, who said that they couldn’t interrupt the meeting by driving up the street.

“From the early hours things were astir and it was evident that the meeting would be of immense proportions. Large contingents from districts with bands and flags arrived by motor car and foot prior to and during the progress of the meeting,” reported the Champion.

“At 2pm the dimensions of the crowd had swelled to an enormous extent and punctually on the stroke of 2pm, de Valera arrived. He was dressed in a black overcoat and plain dark suit. He wore a black hat, a white flannel collar and a brown tie.

“Amidst unprecedented scenes of enthusiasm he descended from the car and ascended to the platform. Hats, caps and handkerchiefs were waved and salvoes of cheers rent the air. Some people even cried at the sight of the tall pale faced figure, standing erectly at the edge of the platform,” the Champion correspondent added.

 “Shake hands, my darling that I suffered so much for,” said one woman on the platform.

Then speaker after speaker extolled the virtues of de Valera. “In every crisis in Irish history the voice of Clare rang true and it would do so on this occasion,” said Sean McNamara. 

“It’s not necessary for me to bring you back to the Parnell Split when Ennis stood true to Parnell. The people of Ennis, assisted by the people of Clare always stood in the gap and they stand there today. Today history is repeating itself and our enemies, helped by men of Irish blood are out for the blood of Eamon de Valera.

 “But by heaven. Clare again stands in the gap and today Clare says that, never will our enemies hound to death another Irish patriot,” added Mr McNamara to prolonged cheers.

All the while Dev was on the podium waiting his turn to address the crowd. His time was coming but before he got to his feet, there was time for one more speech. A Miss Chambers from Cooraclare got the crowd going again.

 “We have seen English guns and English money used to destroy the Republic proclaimed by Pearse and his immortal comrades in 1916, and set up by the will of the people in 1918.

“We have heard their catch cry: ‘Destroy the Republic to win the Republic’. But we people of Clare are not blind; we, people of Clare are not knaves. You have stood like a rock in the tempest; the wild wrath of the forces of disruption have left you unshaken, and the spirit of our glorious nation safe in the protection.

 “We welcome you today; tomorrow we give you another mandate in the name of the Irish nation. We always give it to a statesman - just as our forefathers did to Daniel O’Connell and to Charles Stewart Parnell.”

“Eamon de Valera then rose, and taking off his overcoat prepared to address the meeting. He was unable to speak for some time, so great was the outburst of cheers and he was visibly touched by the extraordinary demonstration of enthusiasm,” reported The Clare Champion.

 It was 2.33pm, by which time young Charles Nono had found the vantage point he was looking for. He was looking down and across at de Valera, ready and waiting like thousands of others to hang on Dev’s every word.

 “At that time there were some buildings on the other side of the Square which later became Gerry McMahon’s auctioneers,” he revealed. “Running from O’Connell Street and coming out the back of those buildings at the top of Parnell Street, there was a narrow lane. There was a hoarding around the buildings being demolished, we climbed up and got a great view across the Square. I can still see Dev. He spoke in Irish first, then in English. It was very clear.”

 “Men and women of Clare, when we could not come to you and tell you the truth, they spoke to you and said you were anarchists and that we were out for destruction,” said de Valera.

“I come here as one of you, to tell you that I have never stood for destruction. I have never stood for brother’s hand being raised against brother’s. I have never stood for playing the enemy’s game, and the enemy’s game is to have one part of the nation fighting the other part.

“I have always preached only one gospel and that is the gospel I preach to you here today. That gospel is that if this nation kept together and was united we would achieve independence,” Dev added.

As Dev talked away the multitudes cheered. Then the cheering stopped as it became apparent that something was up – the meeting was in session about 30 minutes and finally the military were moving in.

“Down to our right which would be the top end of O’Connell Street, there was some movement going on. The next thing we saw two or three Free State soldiers coming through and people were running away,” recalled Charles Nono.

 “The soldiers are coming,” went the shouted warning to Dev as the soldiers moved in. “Armed with rifles and bayonets fixed, the soldiers surrounded the platform. They were accompanied by an armoured car on which a Lewis gun was mounted,” reported the Champion.

“The crowd shouted ‘Up de Valera’,” reported the Reuters correspondent. “De Valera made a gesture towards the military, afterwards collapsing on the platform, which was crowded.

“The troops fired in the air. Panic ensued, the crowd believing that de Valera had been shot, but de Valera rose and walked down the steps and surrendered. It appears that de Valera’s collapse on the platform was due to him fainting, as a result of a kick during the stampede,” the Reuters correspondent added.

That officer who moved in was Capt Frank Power of the 2nd Battalion, who had been sent to arrest de Valera on the orders of General Austin Brennan from Meelick – a brother of General Michael Brennan, who was had been the head of the East Clare Brigade during the War of Independence and future Chief of Staff of the Irish Army, while another brother Patrick was then a constituency colleague of Eamon de Valera in Dáil Éireann. 

“Do you want me,” said de Valera. “I do,” said Capt Power . “I want to take you prisoner,” he added. “Very well. I am ready but have consideration for the people,” said Dev. “They are coming for me,” de Valera then told the crowd. “It will be alright. I am going with them but I am glad it was in Clare that I was taken,” he added.

“At that stage we decided to get the hell out of there. We hared off down the same narrow lane, back on to O’Connell Street. The Callanans, who I was with, went up to the Town Hall, where they lived and I went to my house which now lies opposite the entrance to Dunnes Stores,” recalled Nono.

 He was safely home, but wasn’t finished with this remarkable de Valera day just yet. He wanted more an wasn’t content to stay indoors. Minutes later Charles saw de Valera marching by his front door.

“The rumble of the crowd moving down from the Square could be heard louder and louder. We opened the door and could see Dev with a white bandage across his forehead. I can see it now. His hat was being carried by Countess Markievicz and she was holding on to his arm and talking to him. The crowd was following behind.”

“At the Home Barracks gate, Dev was permitted to shake hands with his supporters and bid them farewell. He last words are said to be: ‘Goodbye now boys, whatever about me, maintain the Republic,” reported the Champion.

And elect me in 12 days time, he might well have added.

That’s what happened as de Valera topped the poll with 17,762 votes, which translated into 45 per cent of first preferences, with Eoin MacNéill coming in second with 8,196 votes.

De Valera was in jail for much of the next year, but after being released under the amnesty in 1924 he returned to Ennis a year to the day of his arrest, famously starting his speech by saying: “I’m afraid, I would disappoint a number here were I not to start by saying: ‘Well as I was saying to you when we were interrupted’.........

Above: Free State forces on Bank Place in Ennis on August 15, 1923 as people dive for cover.

Acclaimed historian Ciarán Ó Murchadha doesn’t shy away from calling old Kilrush landlord Colonel Crofton Moore Vandeleur a monster. Joe Ó Muircheartaigh spoke to the Ennisman about his passion for investigating all things Great Famine ahead of the 2013 National Famine Commemoration in Kilrush.

Monsters and exterminators in Kilrush

THE credits begin to roll, the music plays and the magnificence of Highclere Castles comes into view as the camera sweeps down to the house and then goes inside the doors of the empire establishment.

It’s the opening scene from Downton Abbey that’s shot on the Hampshire Estate of Lord Carnarvon. Privilege, pomp and plenty, but it’s a different image of Highclere that flashes before historian Ciarán Ó Murchadha as he opens his mind back to a banquet that took place there some time in the late 1870s or early 1880s.

As host Lord Carnarvon is there, so too Sir Arthur Kennedy, who by then is coming to the end of a glittering career that has seen him serve the Empire with distinction throughout the globe.

Governor of Western Australia; Governor of Vancouver Island; Governor of the Sierra Leone; Governor of Hong Kong; Governor of Queensland.

“Kennedy was a very distinguished man,” says Ó Murchadha, “and in Highclere he was asked about his experiences around the world”.

As for the answer, it wasn’t what Lord Carnarvon or anyone else around the table might have expected, or most of all wanted, to hear.

“There were days in that western county My Lord when I came back from some scene of eviction, so maddened by what I had seen that I felt disposed to take a gun from behind my door and shoot the first landlord I met.”

The western county was Clare; the evictions were in the Kilrush Union and the landlord he wanted to shoot was Colonel Crofton Moore Vandeleur – the man described by Ó Murchadha as a “monster”, the man exposed by Kennedy during his few years as a Poor Law Inspector in Kilrush.

“He was a standard union inspector,” says Ó Murchadha, “and he arrived in west Clare in 1847 when the landlords had just started to evict people and with the Kilrush evictions, there was no place like it in Ireland.

“A quarter of the population was evicted. When Kennedy arrived at the workhouse he found that it was very badly run, people were dying like flies, the master and staff of the workhouse were incompetent and the guardians were terrible. But, there was only one man he admired – Crofton Moore Vandeleur was terribly efficient and he keeps on praising him in his early correspondence.

“Every week, every board day there’s an influx of sick, dying people, some of them in a semi-comatose state and Kennedy wonders about this – he doesn’t connect it, it takes him a while to connect it in the overall union, so he goes out and what he sees astonishes him.

“He becomes aware that the very man who is the chair (Crofton Moore Vandeleur), the controlling hand in the Board of Guardians is the man who is one worst offenders and by example one of the most important landowners in west Clare.

“Kennedy resisted the evidence for a long time. He refused to listen, but then suddenly in about April 1848 the evidence is before his eyes and he starts collecting eviction statistics, very carefully, along with the Poor Law Commissioners in Dublin, who were very, very aware that they were about to pull a tiger by the tail. These were a very, very influential set of landlords, especially Crofton Moore Vandeleur, who knew everybody in Ireland and in Britain.

“He owned the town of Kilrush and had 20,000 acres of land around it. He had very widespread business interests in Britain and the empire and in America. You didn’t go up against the Vandeleurs lightly, but Kennedy went about collecting all the statistics about what was going on.”

Statistics that related to upwards of 20,000 evictions and as many dead.

IT COULD be said that Ó Murchadha started his own Famine log by osmosis. He first visited Old Shanakyle Graveyard with his father Seán – the acclaimed archaeologist and planner – when he was as young as two.

“He spent almost every spare time he had looking famine remains, taking photographs,” says Ó Murchadha. “Old Shanakyle stunned me. It’s the feeling there. You stand there and you realize you’re standing on the remains of between five and six thousand people – very many of them young people who didn’t really have a taste of life in any sense. They were shoveled into the ground. It’s mind blowing.

“I brought Nationwide there on Wednesday and I couldn’t get over it – you are standing in middle of this enormous mass grave that has between five and six thousand people in it. It chokes me up every time I see it.”

Ó Murchadha’s academic journey to Old Shanakyle that has made him one of Ireland’s foremost Famine historians began by chance many years back.

“I was trained as a 17th century historian – the Cromwellian time, which was another holocaust,” he says, “and one of the people I came across while researching 17th century Ireland was Rev Henry Murphy, who the Church of Ireland curate in Ennis.

“I saw an entry for a diary of his. The diary was 1844 to 1847 – it was in the middle of the famine and there’s no mention of it at all. He seemed to living in a different planet.

“What I started to do was look at the newspapers. Then I discovered another character, John Busteed Knox, a Protestant, the editor of The Clare Journal, who would have often been anti-Catholic and bigoted in ways, but during the Famine he did amazing things.

“He was a genuinely honest man. He risked everything. This was a Tory paper. Who were its readers? The landlords! The Protestant gentry! The hangers on of the Protestant gentry, their servants! The professional classes who served them – the doctors, the lawyers.

“He allowed Catholic priests free access to his columns. Fr Moloney, Fr Vaughan, Fr Sheehan, Fr Kelly and Fr Meehan. They wrote letter after letter after letter and he gave them free latitude.

“He savaged his own Tory government for their behaviour in the first half of the Famine. One thing led to another and I had material for a book.”

‘Sable Wings Over the Land’ is a classic study of Famine in Clare; Ó Murchadha’s ‘The Great Famine: Ireland’s Agony 1845-1852’ is another treasure of the genre, while there’s now a book on Captain Kennedy in the pipeline.

“The late great Ignatius Murphy, who was a great friend of mine discovered the great hero of west Clare, Capt Arthur Edward Kennedy,” says Ó Murchadha. “He presents Kennedy without any warts, but he was a much more complex man.

“He never, ever confronted the landlords directly. He just collected the statistics and the Poor Law commissioners published some of Kennedy’s reports and returns, which contained undoubted cases of horrible evictions by Crofton Moore Vandeleur, the infamous Marcus Keane and a host of other smaller landlords.

“The landlords were outraged and do all sorts of things to try and destroy Kennedy and the friendship was over between Kennedy and the landlords.

“However, eventually the landlords shot themselves in the foot, because Marcus Keane was so outraged by the ‘lies’ that Kennedy reports that he demanded a House of Commons select committee.

“Then everything came out about what happened in Kilrush – it was truly horrendous stuff. It came out but it didn’t come out, because the Government delayed on publishing it because it was politically explosive.

“By the time it was published the world had moved on and it was buried, died and nobody looked at it until the likes of Ignatius Murphy came along.”

AT TIMES Ó Murchadha and others might wonder if the myopia towards the Famine is still there, if the whole episode is still buried, despite the efforts of Ignatius Murphy, himself and others.

There’s a plaque on Chapel Lane in Ennis commemorating Marcus Keane, the Vandeleurs have been re-invented in the Walled Garden and the Vandeleur names perpetuated on the streets of Kilrush.

“I still don’t think that people have fully realized what happened in Kilrush,” says Ó Murchadha. “When you ask people in west Clare about Kilrush and evictions, they talk about the evictions of 1887 and 1888 because of the pictures.

“There was only handfuls of families thrown out – it was something like 26 in all. Just think about it. Twenty thousand people were evicted in the Kilrush Union and virtually all of them died because they were too poor to emigrate.

“The Vandeleurs built Kilrush and John Ormsby Vandeleur was not the diabolical individual that his son Crofton Moore Vandeleur  was – indeed Crofton behaved well until 1845 but the Famine sparked off and he became a monster.

“He evicted over a thousand people and these people died, so he committed a horrendous crime. He came out well out of it very well. He went into the Famine with 20,000 acres, by the end of the Famine he bought another estate and has up on 27,000 acres and was elected to parliament.

“He wasn’t under financial pressure of any kind. A lot of landlords said they were under financial pressure – that the only alternative they had was to evict people or else they were ruined themselves. That wasn’t the case with Crofton Moore Vandeleur.

“The colonial elite behaved very, very badly and always have done. A small group of rich people find reasons why they are better than everyone else and why the poor are poor – because they’re idle, because their provident. The elite find all sorts of justifications for doing what they did.

“Crofton Moore Vandeleur, Marcus Keane and others would have said ‘we did this to improve our estates, taking land off the lazy, useless, idle, criminal types who were ruining the land – by evicting them we’ll make life better for everybody’. It’s like the old American way in Vietnam – the idea of ‘in order to save the village we’ll destroy the village’.”

Scorched earth, Clare style.
It’s why Captain Kennedy uttered those words in Highclere.

Kennedy controversy

Kilrush has failed to put the great hero of the Famine in West Clare, Captain Kennedy, on the pedestal he deserves, writes Joe Ó Muircheartaigh.

“WHY is there no monument to this great man (Captain Arthur Kennedy) in the town of Kilrush. If the people want to honour the legacy of the Vandeleurs let them travel to Old Shanakyle where the remains of thousands of their victims lie.”
These were the words of Kilrush native Paddy Naughton published in The Clare Champion in March 2001 as a war of words erupted in the its letters pages over the Vandeleurs’ legacy to Kilrush.
It was all to do with the Kilrush Urban District Council moves to remember the Vandeleurs by naming the Walled Garden in the old grounds of Kilrush House after the landlord family.
“Why ‘official’ Kilrush needs to cradle the Vandeleur legacy defies explanation,” wrote Dr Denis Corbett in letter that had a headline of ‘Why Legitimise Vandeleur Tyrants’.
Former Clare GAA chairman Brendan Vaughan offered a suggestion that genuflecting at the altar of the Vandeleurs was all to do with “the symptoms of post-colonialism, which for many of the oppressed colonised, legitimises and makes acceptable in retrospect the conduct and ways of old ascendancy”.
However, Cllr George Harratt hit back by saying “the reference of the Vandeleurs being tryannical is grossly exaggerated and not true”, while he added that Colonel Vandeleur “was left with little option” and had to evict thousands and send them to their graves because “the estate was almost bankrupt by the affects of the Famine”.
With that the controversy gathered momentum when it was revealed that Kilrush UDC’s rush to honour the Vandeleurs contrasted sharply with their treatment of the great hero of the Famine oppressed – the above mentioned Poor Law Inspector, Captain Arthur Kennedy.
All because a number of years earlier a bust of Captain Kennedy was commissioned by Monsignor Sean O’Shea from Tullaher, Doonbeg who was based Perth and presented to Kilrush Town Council to put on permanent public display in the town.
“I would like to ask what has happened to this bust,” wrote Paddy Naughton in April 2001. “Is it still in existence? Has it been dumped? Or is it gathering dust in some obscure corner of the UDC offices?”
The latter turned out to be true. There was no public display, even after a motion to the UDC tabled by Stephen O’Gorman (FF) in 2006 that “this council would consider mounting the bronze bust in the Millennium Park or at a suitable location in the town” was supported by members.
In tabling the motion, Cllr O’Gorman said Captain Kennedy gave “heroic humanitarian service during the tragic human holocaust in this town and is deserving of the highest civic recognition by this council.”
However, it gathered dust – at first in the Kilrush Town Council office and then in the Vandeleur Centre, with Paddy Waldron of the Kilrush Historical Society saying earlier this year “it’s wrong that the memorial donated by Monsignor O’Shea is being hidden away“.
“It means,” says Paddy Naughton 12 years after raising the case of Captain Kennedy’s missing bust, “the only real public monument to the Famine dead in Kilrush is the one in Old Shanakyle Graveyard erected by Fr Peter Ryan in 1967.
“It says, ‘In enduring memory of the numerous heroes of West Clare who died of hunger rather than pervert in the Great Famine 1847-1849 and who were buried here coffinless in three large pits May they rest in peace’.”
Maybe after this week Captain Kennedy will be given his proper place.

Above: 

Captain Kennedy, who was the great hero of the Famine in West Clare.