Spies & Informers – Clare

Spies and  Informers in Clare during the War of Independence

By Padraig Og O Ruairc

Introduction.

Most Irish people today will have heard tales in their youth of the ‘Old I.R.A.’, the Black & Tans, ambushes, and barracks attacks and so on. Linked to these stories tough often told in more hushed tones were the deeds of spies and informers who had betrayed the rebel heroes of popular folk history. Spies, traitors and double agents are as old as war itself. Patrick Kerin who was born in Knocklisgrane, Milltown Malbay in 1896 heard similar stories of the Fenians, spies, and informers when he was a young lad a century ago:

“On my mothers side I had Fenian blood. Her uncle and first cousins were members of the Fenian Brotherhood; two of her cousins named O Leary, were sentenced to penal servitude for their part in what is still known in North Clare as the ‘Ballygaston Affair’[sic. Ballygasteel] where the local Fenians were led into a trap by a British spy, named Cullinane, a native of West Cork.”

The ‘Ballygaston Affair’ as Kerin called it happened at Ballygasteel, about two miles outside Lisdoonvarna in September 1887. The Head Constable of the R.I.C. in Ennis – Whelan (29264) who was seeking promotion, hired a paid police spy named Jeremiah Patrick Callinan, a native of Kerry who lived in the area and had infiltrated the local circle of the Fenians, to organise an attack on a man named Thomas Sexton, who was unpopular at the time because of his involvement in a land dispute. On the night of  11^th of September 1887 Callinan led the unsuspecting Fenians into a trap, and as they approached Sexton’s house they were surprised by Head Constable Whelean and a large group of R.I.C. men. A struggle ensued, three of the R.I.C. constables were wounded and Head Constable Whelean was killed in the affray. Eight of the Fenians were arrested and sentenced to four years penal servitude each.  Cullinane appeared as a Crown witness – and disappeared afterwards into a presumably well paid retirement afterwards. Needless to say Head Constable Whelean never got the promotion he had been seeking!.

Spies and Informers during the War Of Independence

It could be said that the most effective force that the British ever had in Ireland was “St. Georges Cavalry” ie - the gold sovereigns paid to spies and informers.

There are a number of reasons who someone could have become an informer during the war of independence, the most popular suggestion is that people became spies or informers for money or other rewards, but others gave information as the result of a personal grudge, to get revenge on a member of the I.R.A., and some gave information because they were loyalists and saw it as their duty to do so believing they were serving King and Country.

It is also clear that different categories of suspected spies were treated differently by the I.R.A. in terms of the punishment inflicted. Women for example usually had their heads shaved by the IRA as an act of public humiliation – since the execution of a woman even if she was suspected of spying would have resulted in a lot of anti IRA propaganda. Likewise clergymen of any denomination were unlikely to be shot as spies because of the propaganda coup it would hand to the British in such a fervently religious society. Members or former members of the I.R.A. who were found guilty of spying were often exiled rather than shot, former British army soldiers and active Unionists were more likely to be shot once suspected. Whether a suspected spy was sentenced to death, and executed or punished in some other way often depended on the value of the information they had given and whether it resulted in the capture of I.R.A. arms and the deaths of I.R.A. Volunteers.

iven the potential threat posed by spies and informers, the execution of British Intelligence agents, spies and informers was a logical and necessary one from a republican perspective

During the war of Independence most estimates suggest that around 100 people were executed buy the I.R.A. as suspected spies and informers. This figure seems to be a great underestimation and the real figure may be twice that number. However it is obvious that far more people were suspected of acting as British spies by the IRA and were never executed. Most often suspected spies who were executed were when the I.R.A. carried out raids on the mails and captured letters apparently written by the suspect giving information to the British authorities.

Others were exposed by loose tongued members of the British Forces who had been plied with free drinks by undercover I.R.A. intelligence officers. On a number of occasions spies accidentally unmasked themselves when they approached members of the I.R.A. mistakenly believing them to be members of the British forces and began to impart detailed and sensitive information.

There is no conclusive documentation still in existence which can confirm the guilt or innocence of suspected spies 100%. The letters which provided information to the British and were captured by the I.R.A. are no longer existent. Official British documents at the time did not list, for security reasons, their informers – and the British Forces neither confirmed nor denied the alleged role of those who had been executed as suspected spies by the I.R.A.

Since very few members of the British Forces who served in Ireland during the war of Independence were ever willing to talk about the war, let alone publish their memoirs we are overly reliant on the accounts of I.R.A. Veterans for information about spies and informers. Most of the quotes and information I cite here comes from statements made by I.R.A. Veterans in Clare to the Bureau of Military History in the 1950’s. These statements were collected twenty five to thirty five years after the events and that there are often contradictions and mistakes in them, and they must be treated with caution, however they are often the only documentary evidence explaining the supposed guilt or innocence of a suspected spy from the I.R.A. members involved.

I.R.A. Counter-Intelligence

However republicans were not idle while the R.I.C. and British Army gathered information on them many I.R.A. leaders had moles inside the British forces who were passing them intelligence information and were able to reveal the identities of suspected spies. A British soldier – Sergeant Martin Doyle who was stationed in Ennis Barracks, who had won the Victoria Cross during the First World War was providing the I.R.A. in Ennis with intelligence information. R.I.C. Constable Tom Healy, who was clerk to the R.I.C. County Inspector in Ennis was also passing highly important intelligence information to Michael Brennan in East Clare. At least two other members of the R.I.C. in Clare Constable Carroll, Ruan and Constable Buckley, New Market On Fergus were giving information to the I.R.A. Major Reynolds a member of F. Company of the Auxiliaries originally stationed in Dublin Castle before his transfer to Clare was supplying detailed and accurate intelligence information to I.R.A. Headquarters in Dublin in return for payment.

During the War of Independence Richard Mulcahy’s brother Patrick an ex-British soldier worked as a clerk in Ennis Post Office was kept busy monitoring R.I.C. and British Army communications and passing information to the Mid Clare Brigade of the I.R.A.

“Another form of assistance was the taking of important police letters passing through the post. The bulky official envelopes were seldom important, but I became familiar with the handwriting of R.I.C. confidential clerk, D.I.‘s and C.I. letters in their handwriting were always of interest. I could also recognise disguised handwriting on envelopes addressed to the police and invariably took such letters They usually contained information of volunteer activity from some local spy or, sometimes, a disgruntled Volunteer. One such capture resulted in the banishment of one man from Clare. Usually however, such letters were unsigned, but contained correct information.”

Secterianism ???

Recent investigation of the subject some historians as Peter Hart, media commentators namely Eoghan Harris, and television documentaries including RTÉ’s “The Killings At Coolacrease” have claimed that the I.R.A. in West Cork and throughout Ireland used the issue of spies and informers during the War Of Independence to mask a sectarian campaign of ethnic cleansing against Protestants. This theory often does not withstand close scrutiny. Tom Barry’s 3^rd West Cork Brigade of the I.R.A. executed 15 suspected spies during the War of Independence, of whom a majority of nine were Catholic and a minority of six were Protestant. The three suspected spies executed by the I.R.A. during the War of Independence in Galway were all Catholics as were the seven suspected spies executed by the I.R.A. in Limerick. So even if it could be proved conclusively that the I.R.A. in Cork had engaged in a sectarian campaign against Protestants – the above figures show the dangers of assuming that the experience of one county during the war was reflective of the country as a whole.

It is interesting to note that the three suspected spies executed by the I.R.A. during the War of Independence in Clare were all Catholics. This seems to rule out any possibility that the I.R.A. in Clare used the question of spies as a cloak for sectarian or ethnic cleansing against Clare Protestants.

1916 – Mc Inerney the spy?

The first case of the I.R.A. unearthing a suspected British spy in Clare actually comes well before the War of Independence during the 1916 Rising. Relatively little happened in the county during Easter Week 1916 because the plan for the Rising in Clare was reliant on the arrival of the German arms shipment that were captured on the Aud.

However republican’s had mobilised through out Clare but were confused by the number of contradictory orders they had received between Good Friday and Easter Monday. The Cloonagh Company of the Irish Volunteers had mobilised for action outside Kilfenora when a schoolteacher from Cahersherkin National School named Mc Inerney came to Andrew O’Donoghue claiming he had received a written order from the veteran Fenian Thomas O’Loughlin ordering them to attack Ennistymon RIC barracks. Andrew O Donoghue and the other republicans were immediately suspicious.

“The authenticity of this message was suspected. And it was decided to ignore it. It occurred to some of us , however that the incident might, with profit be further investigated as this teacher could be an ‘agent provocateur’ of which North Clare had some bitter experiences in the Fenian days.”

Presumably this again is referring to the ‘Ballygesteel Affair’. A number of Volunteers believed Mc Inerney was a spy and should be executed immediately, but since he had a large family, this action was postponed. The matter could not be investigated fully for over a month because O’Loughlin had been arrested and imprisoned after the rising. During this period members of the Kilfenora company who were convinced Mc Inerney was a British agent organized a boycott against him, and fired a number of shots at his home. Upon his release from prison O Loughlin confirmed that he had never issued the teacher with any orders, he also became convinced that Mc Inerney was a spy but refused to sanction his execution saying:

“Obviously a British agent has been unearthed. We know him. If he is shot or removed he will be replaced and we will never find out his successor.”

A few of the Cloonagh Volunteers including Seamus Conneally remained unconvinced of the school teacher’s guilt:

“Undoubtedly he had not received any message from O Loughlin but I believe he acted under foolish patriotic motives. Though he lived in the area throughout the later ‘Black and Tan’ war he never came under suspicion and he was bound to have heard and seen many things which the British authorities would like very much to learn.”

O Donoghue who had received the message from Mc Inerney seemed to agree with Conneally’s analysis:

“In fairness I should add that though he lived through very exciting times later on, he never again came under unfavourable notice”

So it would seem that Mc Inerney was not actually a spy but rather a misguided patriot whose actions nearly got him shot!.

Anti-Spy Proclomation

The leader of the I.R.A.’s East Clare Brigade, Michael Brennan, issued a proclamation against spies which was distributed throughout East Clare in August 1919. This warned:

Whereas – It has come to our notice that certain persons  have been acting as spies for the enemy and giving information to enemy police … Any person found guilty of infringing this order will be tried by courts-martial and shot at sight.”

The fact that no suspected spies were executed by the East Clare Brigade of the I.R.A. for a full fourteen months after this proclamation was issued and that a total of only two civilians, suspected of being spies were executed by the East Clare Brigade during the war shows that despite the harsh and direct tone of the proclamation, the I.R.A.’s East Clare Brigade were not ‘trigger happy’ when it came to executing suspected spies.

A spy in the leadership of the IRA’s Mid Clare Brigade???

The next supposed incident where the I.R.A. became suspicious that a British spy was operating in Clare came after the death, during a failed ambush of Martin Devitt on the 23^rd February 1920. After the attack Devitt’s body was deliberately hidden by his I.R.A. comrades to keep his death a secret from the British Forces. Martin Devitt’s brother Patrick was strongly opposed to this and wanted Martin buried in the family plot but eventually he relented. I.R.A. Volunteers from all over the Mid Clare Brigade assembled at Inagh and marched behind Devitt’s coffin to Cloonagh where the parade was dismissed. Patrick Devitt and twelve other senior members of the I.R.A.’s Mid Clare Brigade stayed behind bury the coffin in a bog a short distance away at Russia in the Cloonagh area. Every I.R.A. member present was warned to keep the details and location of Devitt’s body strictly secret.

A week later the R.I.C. made a search of the bog, and started to dig almost exactly where Devitt’s body was buried. The capture of Devitt’s body by the British forces started a great deal of speculation in the area. Years later Patrick Devitt and other I.R. A. Veterans believed there had been a spy at work:

“It is still the subject of much discussion among the people who were members of the I.R.A. at that time. I remain convinced that among the thirteen men who were present at Russia when the Coffin was placed in the turf stack there was a spy.”

However it seems more likely that careless talk reached the ears of the R.I.C. or else that one of the I.R.A. members, or a member of the Devitt family objected to Devitt’s covert burial for religious reasons and wanted to see his remains given a formal burial in consecrated ground and thus passed the information on to the British. Surely if a genuine spy had been operating in the area they would have revealed the whereabouts of living I.R.A. leaders and arms dumps rather than Devitt’s body?

Richard Copithorne

In March of 1920 – The I.R.A in Whitegate suspected that the phone in village’s post office was being used to send information about republican activities to the R.I.C. possibly by the postmaster, Richard Copithorne, a Protestant Unionist from Cork. In response two I.R.A. Volunteers Paddy Mc Inerny and Thomas Mc Namara were sent to raid the post office to dismantle its phone:

“As neither Mc Inerny nor myself knew anything about the mechanisms of telephones we requested the postmaster to remove the vital parts of the switchboard for us. He refused and then Mc Inerny produced the revolver. This did the trick.  The Postmaster did the dismantling and handed us over the parts, which we wanted and gave us an assurance that the installation was rendered ineffective.”

Captain Donald Mc Lean

In September 1920 the Mid Clare brigade of the I.R.A. captured two British spies who had been operating in the Ennistymon area.  In the early autumn a British Army officer dressed in civilian clothes came to the garage where I.R.A. Volunteer Thomas Mc Donough worked in Ennistymon and hired a car and a driver for that evening:

“I recognised him at once as a Captain [Donald] Mc Clean who had been stationed in Lahinch with a detachment of Scottish Horse a year previously. He did not, of course, give his name or say what business he was on. I was detailed to drive him. Before going out with him I consulted  [John Joe] ‘Tosser’ Neylon who said ‘By all means go with him, keep an eye on what he is doing and report back.’ For three days I drove him to various parts of county Clare including Kilfenora, Ballyvaughan and Lisdoonvarna. On one day he was alone with me; on the other two he had a companion with him also in civilian clothes. … I gathered that Mc Lean was trying to give me the impression that he was a commercial traveller, for he made calls at shops and hotels He asked me various questions such as the names of places we drove through and the names of people living in certain houses. My answers were vague, either telling him that I did not know or giving him incorrect information, but I noticed that the routes chosen by him brought us to the vicinity of the homes of active volunteers including that of Sean Mc Namara, commandant of the 6^th Battalion, and then a ‘much wanted’ man by the British forces. Often on the tops of hills or on high ground he, Mc Lean, would ask me to stop and he would get out and view the countryside. Each night he returned to Ennistymon and each night I reported the days proceedings to Neylon.”

It was now obvious that Captain Mc Lean and his companion Captain Collis were gathering information to plan a ‘round up’ of leading I.R.A. members in the area and the I.R.A. decided to capture and interrogate the two British officers. They were disarmed and arrested by I.R.A. Volunteers as they left a dance at at the Spa Hotel in Lisdoonvarna on the night of 19^th-20^th September, and were taken to Ballinalacken Castle for interrogation. Mc Lean and Collins were held and interrogated for a short time and released after giving an assurance that they would leave Ireland immediately. The Mid Clare Brigade passed all the information they had gathered from them on to I.R.A. intelligence. The pair were exceptionally lucky not to have been executed by the I.R.A. Had they been captured just forty eight hours later in the wake of the Rineen Ambush and the widespread British reprisals that followed they would almost certainly have been executed by the I.R.A.

Though the British Intelligence officers had escaped with their lives on this occasion – one of the pair did not heed the I.R.A.’s order to leave the country and  was not to survive for long.  Between nine and ten o clock on Sunday morning the 21^st of November (known afterwards as ‘Bloody Sunday’) members of ‘The Squad’, a group of I.R.A. Volunteers managed by Michael Collins and trained to assassinate leading members of the British forces, executed eleven British Secret Service agents working in Dublin and two members of the Auxiliaries, in a coordinated operation which devastated the British Intelligence network in Ireland.

The Mid Clare Brigade had supplied intelligence information to I.R.A. headquarters which led to the assassination of Captain Mc Lean who had been captured by the I.R.A. in Ennistymon, interrogated and released on the undertaking that he would leave Ireland immediately. Mc Clean ignored this instruction and was shot dead at 117 Morehampton Road on Bloody Sunday. It is not known what became of Captain Collins who had been captured and interrogated with Mc Lean in Ennistymon and whether or not he kept his promise to the I.R.A. to leave Ireland immediately.

Note: Captain John Fitzgerald RIC Number 71614 From Cappawhite, Co. Tipperary was assassinated by the I.R.A. on Bloody Sunday in his lodgings at Earlsford Terrace had been stationed in Clare as an R.I.C. Barracks Defence Sergeant. Fitzgerald had been captured and interrogated by the I.R.A., was court-martialled and sentenced to death. He was taken to a field and placed against a wall for execution. At the last moment clambered over the wall and though wounded made good his escape. After recovering from his wounds he was transferred from Clare to Dublin for his own safety.

Alan Cane Lendrum ???

A short time before the Rinneen ambush a group of I.R.A. Volunteers had shot dead Alan Cane Lendrum at Caherfeenick railway crossing, near Doonbeg in West Clare. Lendrum and ex-British army captain was the serving resident magistrate for Kilkee. According to Liam Haugh O/C of the West Clare Brigades Active Service Unit of the I.R.A. the aim of the operation was to commandeer Lendrums car not to kill him.

“The car was a Ford two seater and looked good in the eyes of some [I.R.A.] Volunteer officers. The tacit consent of the brigade commander was given for its seizure when opportunity favoured – with the understanding that its owner was not to be injured.”

When ambushed Lendrum had drawn an automatic pistol to defend himself and was shot dead. His lifeless body was hidden in a temporary watery grave near Doughmore Strand. Some published accounts have claimed that Lendrum was acting as a British spy most notably the ‘Banner Annual 1962’ which claimed that Lendrum was: “head of the British Secret Service in West Clare.” There is little evidence to suggest that Lendrum had an active intelligence roll as a spy or intelligence agent. Haugh was the only I.R.A. veteran to give a detailed account of the incident and he does not claim that Lendrum was a spy. Haugh’s account must be taken as the most authoritative version of events as he would have known those involved and was a senior I.R.A. leader in the area. If Lendrum had been suspected of spying by the I.R.A. surely Haugh would have mentioned this as justification for Lendrum’s killing? Apart from the seizure of Lendrum’s car the only other possible reason for Lendrum’s ambush comes from D.I. George Noblett of the R.I.C., a personal friend of Lendrum’s, who later commented

“They had orders to kidnap Lendrum not to shoot him.”

If Noblett was correct then presumably the I.R.A. planned to kidnap Lendrum and exchange him for I.R.A. prisoners in British custody. However it is clear from both accounts that the intention was not to assassinate Lendrum and it seems unlikely that he was acting as a spy.

There are a number of errors in my account of Lendrum’s death published in “Blood On The Banner” I apologise for these, they have been noted and will be corrected in any and all future editions of the book.

Fr. Michael Hayes & Johanna Slattery

On the 5^th of October 1920 the I.R.A. ambushed an R.I.C. patrol at Feakle post office, killing two members of the R.I.C. The ambush was immediately condemned by the local local Catholic Priest Fr. Michael Hayes, a firm political opponent of republicanism according to I.R.A. Veteran Thomas Tuohy:

“After the Feackle ambush the local Parish Priest, Fr. Hayes, a violent imperialist who regularly entertained members of the enemy forces, strongly denounced the I.R.A. from the pulpit. He referred to us as a murder gang, and declared that any information, which he could get, would be readily passed on to the British authorities and that he would not desist until the last of the murders was strung by the neck. This denunciation led to unpleasant consequences and for some time services at which he officiated were boycotted by most of the congregation.”

After Fr. Hayes having publicly exposed his willingness to give information to the British, and his boycott by local republican sympathisers, his housekeeper Johanna Slattery a native of Tipperary came under suspicion. Miss Slattery was kept under close observation by the members of Cumann Na mBann in the village until she was abducted by the I.R.A. on the 23^rd of October  and taken against her will first to Tipperary where she was issued with a warning not to return to Clare. Ignoring this she returned to Feakle two weeks later with an escort  of R.I.C. and British Soldiers as a bodyguard. However she seems to have taken some notice of the danger posed by continuing her activities and from then on she gave the I.R.A. little cause for concern and was not interfered with.

Miss. Slattery was extremely fortunate not to have been executed. A female spy Mrs. Lindsey was later captured and executed as a suspected spy by the I.R.A. in Cork. The East Clare Brigade of the I.R.A. apparently decided it would make for bad propaganda if they executed a woman, similarly if  Fr. Hayes had not been a Catholic priest he would almost certainly have been abducted. He was eventually removed from Feakle and posted as the parish priest of Sixmilebridge in 1921

Martin Counihan

In late October 1920 Thomas Tuohy and members of the East Clare Brigade’s 6^th Battalion arrested Martin Counihan a Process Server, from Feackle who they had been monitoring since the ambush of the R.I.C. patrol at the village Post Office.

Counihan had come to the attention of the I.R.A. when he passed comment in public naming I.R.A. Volunteers he had seen leaving the ambush site that morning. He began frequenting areas where wanted I.R.A. Volunteers were on the run and wandering the roads outside Feackle village after the R.I.C. had abandoned their patrols. Counihan was a close friend of Fr. Hayes, and was one of only two men in the area who had attemded the funeral of one of the R.I.C. men killed in Feakle.

Counihan was seen twice watching groups of I.R.A. Volunteers who were digging trenches across roads to hinder British motor patrols and was seen visiting the R.I.C. barracks the evening of each incident. The following mornings the areas Counihan had been to were surrounded and searched by the British Forces.

Counihan’s activities and status as a suspected spy were raised at a Brigade Council meeting of the East Clare Brigade held in Laccaroe and his arrest was ordered as soon as possible. On the 26^th of October Counihan was arrested about a mile from his home at Annagh, Feackle, by four masked I.R.A. volunteers who took him to Coolreag, where an I.R.A. courts-martial headed by Thomas Tuohy was arranged. According to Tuohy:

“He admitted having give information to the R.I.C. about the I.R.A., adopted a defiant attitude and said he would  whenever he got the chance again notify the police of anything he heard or saw concerning the I.R.A. He was sentenced to be shot and the sentence was carried out that night. I was in charge of the firing party. Though he  received the contents of two shotgun cartridges and five .45 revolver bullets, two of which through the head, he managed to make his way to Bodyke three miles away, where he died.”

Incredibly after being shot by the I.R.A. firing squad, Counihan had managed to make his way to a pub in Bodyke, where he struggled inside and asked the occupants for a drink before collapsing a couch, the R.I.C. were sent for but Counihan had died before District Inspector Mc Mahon arrived at the pub. On inspecting the body D.I. Mc Mahon noted there was

“a bullet wound in the back, also a gunshot wound: there was a pool of blood on the floor underneath.”

Scarrif Martyrs

After a republican attack on Scariff R.I.C barracks, its R.I.C. garrison had been evacuated to Killaloe. The former commander of the R.I.C. at Scariff Sergeant Brennan was bitter about this turn of events and was eager for revenge. When the Auxiliaries arrived at Killaloe that November Sergeant Brennan found willing accomplices and he used his local knowledge to lead them on raids and searches for those he believed had been involved in the attack. The locations of the raids and the specific questioning by Sergeant Brennan and Auxiliary officers made it clear they had received information revealing which I.R.A. Volunteers had been involved in the attack. Joseph Clancy had been sent to warn three I.R.A. Volunteers who were hiding in a disused building close to the canal dock on the shore of Lough Derg and Williamstown house:

“These men – Michael Mc Mahon, Alfred Rodgers and Martin Gildea belonged to the Scariff Company and had been on the run after the attack on the Scariff barracks. They were all very young and after going on the run did not take any precautions to conceal their haunts. The sleeping quarters which they had selected was in an old store in Whitegate, which they entered and left at all times of the day. It soon became common knowledge that they were staying there and I was sent by Michael Brennan  to warn them to leave the place and be more careful about their movements. Though other I.R.A. officers gave them similar advice, the unfortunate men paid no heed.”

On Tuesday the 16^th of November members of G. Company of the Auxialiaries led by Lieutenant Colonel Andrews surrounded Williamstown House and arrested the caretaker Michael Egan who lived  alone in a house in the yard. The three I.R.A. Volunteers , Mahon, Rodgers and Gildea were captured while sleeping in the disused store. All four were taken back to Killaloe where they were beaten and interrogated for a few hours before the four men were taken from the Lakeside Hotel onto the bridge crossing the river Shannon between Killaloe and Ballina.

Here they were ordered out of the trucks by Sergeant Brennan and the Auxiliaries who began torturing them and beating them with fists and rifle butts. This continued for seven or eight minutes, during which time the prisoners screams were so loud that they woke a number of people in the nearby houses. The men could be heard crying and appealing to be allowed see a priest before they were tied together in the centre of the bridge. The R.I.C. and Auxiliaries then murdered the men by raking their four prisoner’s bodies with gunfire at point blank range.

Thomas Mc Namara and other members of the East Clare Brigade were convinced that the three I.R.A. Volunteers had been betrayed by an informer.

“There is no doubt whatever that these unfortunate men were betrayed to the enemy by someone living in the locality. Because of another happening I am convinced that there was a spy or spies there at the time, though it baffled our intelligence staff to find out the source of the leakage of such information.”

However given the fact that the three I.R.A. men’s whereabouts were so widely known – the list of potential suspects would have been huge and it is not surprising that any spy involved was never exposed.

Ex-Sergeant Blennerhassett

The Auxialiaries stationed at Killaloe also made repeated raids using accurate information supplied by a spy to try and capture Michael Brennan leader of the I.R.A.’s East Clare Brigade. Brennan had several narrow escapes from capture at Gleeson’s in Bodyke, Paddy Mc Donald’s and P.J. Hogans in Kiltea and Duggan’s in Scarriff. According to Brennan:

“It was obvious that the Auxiliaries were well informed as to my local haunts and detailed investigation pointed to a local R.I.C. pensioner as a probable spy. The local volunteers were absolutely certain this man was a British Intelligence agent and they were insistent he should be shot. I had very little doubt that they were right, but as we had no direct proof I wouldn’t permit his execution, so they contented themselves with raiding his house and warning him. After the Truce I made the Auxiliary intelligence officer from Killaloe drunk in the Kilrush hotel and I learned from him that our suspect was in fact a spy. He went to Killaloe once a week for his pension and gave his reports to the R.I.C. After the Treaty I had the spy arrested as a suspected ‘Irregular’ and we kept him interned for about two years –just to get my own back.”

The ex-R.I.C. man that Brennan is most likely referring to was a retired R.I.C. Sergeant named Blennerhassett who was named on a list of suspected spies compiled by the East Clare Brigade and sent to I.R.A. General Headquarters in Dublin during the Truce.

Privates D.J. Williams, W.S. Walker and H. Morgan O.B.L.I.

In mid Febuary 1921 three British soldiers dressed in civilian clothes were captured by a group of I.R.A. Volunteers near Feackle. The three men, Private D.J. Williams, Private W.S. Walker and Private  H. Morgan, who were members of the Oxford and Buckinghamshire Light Infantry claimed that they were deserters from the British army. The three were were tried as spies by an I.R.A. court-martial. According to I.R.A. Veteran Sean Moroney:

“During the trial it was proved that they had tried to, and did, in fact keep in contact with their own forces. The result was that they were found guilty of being spies and sentenced to death. The sentence was duly carried out.”

The bodies of the three soldiers were found on  a public road, near the Clare – Galway border on the 21^st of Febuary 1921.

R.I.C. Constable Daniel Murphy (Black and Tan)

On the 12^th of March members of the East Clare Brigade, captured and executed Daniel Murphy, a Black and Tan intelligence officer from Cork, who was on an intelligence mission in the Sixmilebridge area:. According to Clancy:

“After the Glenwood ambush it was noticed by the local Volunteers that an R.I.C. man named Murphy had started to make visits to houses around Oatfield, Belvoir and Broadford dressed as an agricultural labourer, and that in the same disguise he frequently took despatches between the R.I.C. barracks in Broadford and in Sixmilebridge. During the course of his visits to houses in the locality he was always asking questions about the I.R.A. Two of the I.R.A. men ‘on the run’ Martin Mc Namara and John Curley were told about Constable Murphy’s movements and decided to waylay him in the vicinity of the scene of the Glenwood ambush. He came cycling from Broadford in the middle of the day … and was held up. On being searched he was found to be unarmed and, as far as I now can recollect, the only things of interest found were a number of snapshots of police in Broadford barracks, including himself. He was taken to Enagh wood and shot that night by Mc Namara and Curley. His body was buried in the vicinity.”

John Reilly

By April of 1921 the military situation in the West Clare Brigade area was still relatively quiet and the Mid and East Clare Brigades bore the brunt of the fighting in the county. Sean Liddy, the Commandant of the West Clare Brigade, made a request to Michael Brennan and the East Clare Brigade to help mount attacks on British forces stationed in the area. Before departing for the West Clare Brigade area, Michael Brennan had given an order to Pat Reidy the Adjutant of the 1^st Battalion of the East Clare Brigade to execute John Reilly, an ex-British soldier living in the New Market on Fergus area.

“The Brigade O/C Michael Brennan, before going into the waiting boat, sent for the two of us and said that John Reilly, Newmarket, was to be executed as a spy and that he wanted the execution to be carried out before his return from Kilrush. He further told us to try and arrange to get a priest to attend John Reilly before the execution, and when it was completed to have a notice pinned or tied to the body worded as followed:- ‘SPY – EXECUTED BY THE I.R.A. GETTING THEM AT LAST. BEWARE.’”

Reilly, an ex-soldier who worked for Lord Inchiquin at Dromoland Castle, drank a good deal and had ignored repeated warnings from the I.R.A. to stop associating with Black and Tans and members of the R.I.C. in the local pubs. Reilly came to the I.R.A.’s attention again after the murder of I.R.A. Volunteers Henry and Patrick Loughnane in Gort, County Galway on the 26^th November 1920. Reilly knew members of their family, and had enquired as to Henry and Patrick’s wellbeing and whereabouts a short time before their killings. Following Henry and Patrick Loughnane’s murder the I.R.A. investigated the incident and Reilly surfaced as a possible spy. His guilt was seemingly further confirmed when the I.R.A. raided the mails on the Limerick to Ennis train and discovered correspondence between Reilly and the R.I.C.

After receiving Michael Brennan’s order to execute Reilly, James Quinn was one of the I.R.A. Volunteers who arrested him on the 20^th of April 1921,

“About five or six of us …went to Reilly’ s house and knocked at the door. We were all armed with revolvers. The knock was answered by Mrs. Reilly and when she opened the door we entered the house and went directly to the bedroom where Reilly was in bed. He was ordered to dress and did so without demur. He was then taken under guard about a mile out the Ballycarr and led into a by-road, which runs to Monafola. About three hundred yards or so down this by-road Fr. William Kennedy C.C., Newmarket on Fergus was waiting to hear our prisoner’s confession. Guards were posted around the spot while he was receiving spiritual attention, which lasted fifteen or twenty minutes. When this was over a bandage was placed over the prisoner’s eyes and he was ordered on his knees. The firing party, which, so far as I can remember, were all, armed with revolvers and consisted of Jack Brennan – Clonmoney, Florence O Neill – Rathfoland and myself. We stood about three yards away from our target and on orders from Paddy Maher, I think; we fired about three rounds per man. Reilly fell back dead and he was then anointed by the priest who witnessed the execution. A label bearing the words ‘Spy. Executed by the I.R.A.’ was then tied on his body which was left on the spot where he was shot until it was removed next day by the R.I.C. and Tans. I was not present at the court-martial of this man Reilly and I never learned anything afterwards that would enable me to tell now, with authority, on what proof he was convicted as a spy. My part in his execution was simply in compliance with instructions issued by my superior officer, the Brigade O/C. He made no confession of his guilt to any of his captors and I would like to add that he met his death in a brave and dignified manner. I really felt very sorry for him.”

At the British inquest into his death O Reilly’s widow Mary  reputed the allegation that Reilly had been a spy and stated  and that he was shot for no reason “except that he used to salute the R.I.C. when they met, and a few times had a drink with them, when he met them casually in some of the public houses in Newmarket.”

IRA Volunteer Seamus Conneally, a member of the IRA raiding party that captured the correspondence between the RIC and  Reilly later expressed doubt about Reilly’s Guilt. “The mails seized at Cratloe were taken to Punch’s Castle near Cratloe and there examined. Among the letters was one addressed to a man named John O Reilly, Newmarket, County Clare, an ex-British soldier, from the R.I.C. authorithies, the contents of which made it appear that O Reilly was a British spy. I believe this incident took place early in 1921. O Reilly was tried by an I.R.A. courtmartial immediately afterwards and sentenced to death. A party from the column took him from his house at Newmarket and when he had been given the last rites of the Catholic Church, carried out the sentence by executing him. Though I have a distinct recollection of the finding of the letter I was not present at either the courtmartial or the execution, but in the weeks which followed his shooting I was frequently in the company of some of the firing squad. Their remarks convinced me that he died as a brave man should. I mention the happening simply because I believe that he was the victim of an unscrupulous villian who was then employed as a postman in Newmarket and who was the actual spy himself. He used O Reilly’s name as a cover to shield his own identity. I am not able to think of the name of the postman.”

Note: There are some errors in my account of Reilly’s case published in “Blood On The Banner” These have been noted and will be corrected in any and all future editions of the book.

A spy in Cratloe?

On June 15th 1921 the members of the East Clare Brigade under the command of Captain John Mc Cormack  planned to  raid the mid day Limerick to Ennis train. Mc Cormack  hoped that the captured the mails would again reveal the identity of a spy . “At that particular period I had a very strong suspicion that some person in the Cratloe district was acting as a spy for the British forces and it was because of this that I decided to raid the mails in the hope that we might find something which would help to identify the spy. I selected Woodcockhill, about half a mile from Cratloe railway station as the venue for this operation…” Unfortunately there was a large body of British troops from the Royal scots on Board the train and a fight ensued during which IRA Lieutennant Michael Gleeson was killed. IRA Captain Christopher Mc Carthy who went to his aid was captured and summarily executed by the British Soldiers. The identity of the Cratloe spy was seemingly never confirmed however it is interesting to note that on the East Clare Brigades List of Suspected spies compiled during the truce only one suspect is listed for Cratloe; John Setright. It is uncertain whether Setright was the suspect Mc Cormack was referring to, but given the absence of other suspected spies from Cratloe on the list this seems likely. The presence of Setrights name on the list does not of course confirm his guilt or innocence but rather that he was a suspect.

Patrick Darcy

The first definite evidence that the British were getting detailed information from a spy in west Clare came in August of 1920 when an I.R.A. training camp at Simon O Donnells house in Tullycrine was raided by a large combined force of R.I.C and British soldiers. Although the location of the training camp in his fathers house was a poor one since it was likely to be raided any way, the incident brought Art O Donnell to the conclusion that the R.I.C. had an informer in the district.

“Up to this time, all activities enjoyed immunity from enemy intelligence. The Volunteers as a whole would not, or could not, conceive the possibility of the enemy inducing anybody to set the spy. The known pro-British element within the area were few and scattered; they were besides kept at more than an arms length and were known to be inactive.”

Then, four days the British forces recovered Alan Lendrum’s body the R.I.C. raided the carpentry & joinery workshop where I.R.A. Volunteer Johnny Mc Carthy had made Lendrum’s coffin.

On the 6^th of December five lorries of R.I.C and Black and Tans raided a republican court being held at Cragganock near Kilkee. William Shanahan, who was attending the court, managed to escape with all the courts papers, just before the British troops burst and opened fire on the unarmed civilians attending the court shooting dead Thomas Curtin.

On the morning of the 18^th of December the Black and Tans surrounded Denis Reidy’s house at Newtown, Doonbeg and captured William Shanahan and another I.R.A. Volunteer, Michael Mc Namara. Again the Black and Tans seemed to have been acting on definite information since no other houses in the vicinity were searched. An R.I.C. man named Meelin, a native of Naas in Kildare identified Shanahan and Mc Namara as members of the I.R.A. and they were taken to the R.I.C. Barracks in Kilrush where they were beaten, tortured and interrogated. On December 24^th, William Shanahan and Michael Mc Namara were driven with a large guard of British soldiers and Black and Tans toward Ennis. Michael Mc Namara was taken off the lorry he was travelling in and bayoneted and shot dead on the roadside.

William Shanahan was taken to Ennis jail where he was shot in the head at point blank range by Provost Sergeant David Finlay of the Royal Scot’s Regiment.

Since the autumn of 1920 the I.R.A. in West Clare were aware of the definite existence of at least one spy who was supplying information to the British forces in the Kilrush area.

.Initially the I.R.A.’s suspicions centred on a retired R.I.C. man named Sheehan who ran a pub in Kilrush. According to Michael Russell.

“I remember the circumstances under which Shanahan who was in charge of the [Republican] police and Mc Namara who was a Captain [in the I.R.A.] were captured by the British Forces . It was a general comment at the time that information had been given by somebody who had inside information. I do know, however, that suspicion was aroused about an ex-R.I.C. man named Sheehan who had a public house in Kilrush. This suspicion was due to the fact that R.I.C. and Tan’s were accustomed to drinking in Sheehan’s public house,”

Although fingers were being pointed at Sheehan and rumours were being widely circulated that he was the spy, the question of his involvement in the affair is complicated by the fact, not commonly known at the time, that Sheehan was selling guns to the I.R.A. in West Clare. According to Martin Chambers on one occasion William Shanahan had gone with him to Sheehan’s pub in Kilrush and collected a number of revolvers from Sheehan for the I.R.A., even though there were a group of Black and Tan’s drinking there at the time!

Sheehan was not the only person in the area suspected of being the spy, the other potential candidate was Patrick D’Arcy a native of Cooraclare, who worked as a school teacher in Doonbeg. Two of Patrick D’Arcy’s brothers were active I.R.A. Volunteers, one of them Michael had drowned during an I.R.A. operation following an attack on the R.I.C. at Cooraclare in January of 1920. Because of his family’s involvement in the republican struggle he knew members of the local I.R.A. units and according to Michael Russell; D’arcy was actually a member of the I.R.A. at one time. Immediately after the capture and murder of Shanahan and Mc Namara, Patrick D’arcy had called to Chambers house. According to Commandant Power who interviewed Chambers about the incident in 1945;

[Darcy was] “very worried and sorry about the shootings, actually hysterical about the incident. At the same time he inquired where Bill Haugh and Chambers were staying, an inquiry for which there was no reason or explanation and which led to comment by Chambers sister. At this time there was no suspicion of D’Arcy.”

Michael Russell recalled that the possibility that D’Arcy was a spy became more likely possibility given his behavure:

“A number of wanted I.R.A. men who were on the run stayed most of their time around the Cooraclare and Doonbeg areas where D‘Arcy resided and taught. It became obvious from police raids that information regarding the whereabouts of these wanted men was being given to the British authorities. Any man at the time who was known to be keeping company of R.I.C. or any member of the British garrison naturally came under suspicion, and Darcy  who was the only one from his side of the country who was ever seen in this type of company, came to be regarded by the local I.R.A. as a dangerous man and a potential spy.

… As the year 1921 wore on Darcy’s name was a byword amongst all the I.R.A. in West Clare as a British spy. He continued to frequent Sheehan’s public house and to mix in the company of the enemy forces. Every decent person in West Clare strongly condemned the Shanahan and Mc Namara murders and even people who were not in sympathy with Sinn Féin movement shunned the company of the British garrison in Kilrush after these happenings. But Darcy was seen to come into frequent contact with the enemy as time went on. He also drank more. “

In May of 1921the East Limerick Brigade of the I.R.A. captured a number of British intelligence documents from a plane that crashed near Kilfinnane in County Limerick. Amongst these papers was a secret document entitled “Weekly Intelligence Summary” and dated 17^th May. There were a number of entries in the document relating to West Clare including the following;

“Willie Haugh and 20 others had been living in a dug out in the Moyasta – Shragh district.”

The adjutant of the East Limerick Brigade immediately made copies of these and forwarded them to Haugh. On the 27^th May following the shooting of a Black and Tan at Cooga a large group of British forces traveling by train to Kilrush halted en-route at Shragh bog. The British troops immediately began searching the area and uncovered the I.R.A. dugout mentioned in the Weekly intelligence Summary.

About this time Darcy was alleged to have asked his pupils if they knew the whereabouts wanted I.R.A. members, in particular Liam Haugh and this allegation took on considerable importance after the reference to Haugh and the I.R.A. dug-out “Weekly Intelligence Summary” and the dugouts discovery ten days later. This series of events seems to have pinpointed D’Arcy as a spy in the minds of the local I.R.A. Further suspicion had also fallen upon D’Arcy because of a remark made about him by a British Army officer stationed in Kilrush.

On the 21^st of June the I.R.A. in West Clare moved against Patrick Darcy and Sheehan. Sheehan was visiting a farm he owned in Kilmihill when he was held up at gunpoint and arrested by Séan Liddy Michael Russell and four other I.R.A. volunteers. He was taken into one of his farm buildings, interrogated and accused of spying. Michael Russell entered the building in time to witness the end of Sheehans’s interrogation:

“On being threatened with execution by the Brigade O/C Sheehan began to cry and said, ‘It was not me who gave the information about Shanahan and Mc Namara, but it was Patrick D‘Arcy who gave it to the police in my house’. The Brigade O/C then released him and Sheehan proceeded home in his pony and trap, which he had brought with him from Kilrush. I have a very distinct recollection of having heard Sheehan  make this accusation against Darcy … I only got inside towards the end of it, so I cannot say what else he disclosed to any superior officer prior to my arrival.”

Later that night Liam Haugh, Michael Russell and John Cunningham finally arrested D’Arcy at his home. According to Russell:

“Cunningham and myself cycled on to Darcy’s house and as we entered it we saw him leaving by the back door. We followed and overtook him in the yard. I told him that Bill Haugh wished to interview him. His reply was; ‘What would Bill Haugh or any one else want with me?’. I told him to come along and that Haugh was only a short distance away. He did so and meeting Haugh about six hundred yards from Cooraclare we delivered the prisoner to him. Addressing me Haugh said; ‘You take my bike Micky’, and turning to Darcy, he said ‘You come with me. I want to have a few words with you.’ The two of them went across the fields towards Cree, while John Cunningham and myself cycled on to that village. In Cree we learned that the Brigade Staff were holding a court martial on Darcy in an outhouse owned by Tim O Donnell. There was a guard of I.R.A. men thrown around the village. Cunningham and myself waited outside O Donnell’s place. Half an hour later Darcy and the members of the court which comprised of the Brigade O/C, Séan Liddy, Bill Haugh, Connor Wheelan, Tom Marrinan and Tom Martin came out of the building. D’Arcy sat on a seat and called John Cunningham, with whom he had a brief conversation. The latter then returned to me and said; ‘D’Arcy is after telling me that he is going to be shot and he asked me to intercede on his behalf with Séan Liddy’. We both went to Liddy and suggested that before doing anything with D’Arcy that the latter should be confronted with Sheehan the Kilrush publican. Candidly, I felt that Sheehan was as much guilty as D’Arcy and that the latter when faced with the former might be able to incriminate him also, and that between the pair of them a lot of useful information might be obtained. We volunteered to go right into Kilrush and arrest Sheehan. Liddy told us that he was now finished with the case and Darcy was in the hands of Bill Haugh.”

Patrick Darcy was taken to Doonbeg and Liam Haugh intended executing him in front of Michael McNamara’s home to make a clear link between Darcy’s activities as a spy and Mc Namara’s murder by the British forces. At the last moment after protests from the commander of the local republican police, Haugh relented and Darcy was taken to the opposite end of the village where he was executed. Michael Russell witnessed the execution:

“After being blindfolded and bound, he was shot by a firing party comprised of two members of the brigade staff Bill Haugh and Tom Marrinan. I was standing near Darcy as he was being blindfolded and I distinctly heard him say; ‘I forgive ye boys. Ye are shooting me in the wrong’. After being shot, a label was pinned to the dead man’s breast bearing the words ‘Spies beware.’ His body was left on the street, where it remained until the next day when British troops from Kilrush removed it in a lorry to the R.I.C. barracks in that town. Widespread raids throughout West Clare were made by British forces followed the execution of this man.”

Searches and raids by the British forces which were becoming frequent in the West Clare Brigade area ceased with D’Arcy’s execution – although it is unclear whether this was because D’Arcy was a spy,  or because informers in the district took stock of D’Arcy’s fate.

D’Arcy’s execution as a suspected British spy has remained controversial ever since. In April of 1922, during the Truce and shortly before the out break of the Civil War an official I.R.A. investigation was undertaken into D’Arcy’s court-martial led by General Eoin O Duffy. Unfortunately the evidence and records compiled by O Duffy during this inquiry have not survived. However according to Commandant Thomas Marrinan, Commandant Joe Barrett and Commandant Liam Haugh who all discussed the matter with him afterwards, O Duffy’s investigation confirmed that the guilty verdict and sentence of execution passed by D’Arcy’s courtsmartial were justified. O Duffy commented to Haugh that based on the evidence he had seen D’Arcy should “be shot half a dozen times over.” Given the Monoghan I.R.A.’s record of dealing with suspected spies under O Duffy’s command this comment should be treated with a good deal of caution.

Ernie O Malley interviewed John Burke a former member of the I.R.A.’s Mid Clare Brigade in the late 1940’s, who told him  ”A teacher D’Arc y in that area who was suspected of having given information … was shot by the I.R.A. but later they found that he was innocent.” – unfortunately Burke did not expand on this claim that D’Arcy had been found innocent some time after his  execution.  This claim that D’Arcy was innocent was not borne out by a  second investigation into the circumstances of D’Arcy’s trial and execution were undertaken by Colonel Dan Bryan of the Irish Army’s G2 Intelligence division in the 1940’s. As part of this final investigation the senior I.R.A. veterans  involved in the case; Michael Russell, Thomas Marrinan, Major C. Whelan and Joe Barrett all stated that in the two and a half decades since D’Arcy’s execution they had not heard or received any information which they believed could clear D’Arcy’s name or prove his innocence.