Tom Barry (48 page)

An IRA action squad arrived at Castletownsend-Skibbereen, the home of Vice-Admiral Henry Boyle Somerville, on 24 March 1936 at 9.30 p.m. The 72 year old admiral was well known in the area for giving references to any of the local lads who wanted to enlist in the British navy – an activity the IRA disliked.

Barry, the OC of Cork, annoyed with De Valera's policy of ‘filling the jails with committed Republicans', had given the order ‘to get' him. Barry, who could be ruthless enough to have given the order to kill him, told me his intention was a kidnapping to be used in a type of deal with the government; he did not elaborate. If Barry had intended having Somerville shot, as happened, he would have admitted it. It is almost certain that Barry anticipated that if pressure was forced, Dev would relent on his steel-type policy-grip, which he had secured on the IRA. However, the plan backfired and Barry had to go ‘on the run' again.
[1]

A month later another killing, this time sanctioned by GHQ, was carried out in Waterford. The country was shocked when John Egan ‘dubbed a police spy' was shot. Fianna Fáil patience was sapped and the ties, which existed, snapped. Plans were prepared to end the IRA's repeated disruptions of normal life, so on 18 June it was declared an unlawful organisation.
[2]

Moss Twomey CS was arrested on the 21 May and Seán MacBride was co-opted by the army council as CS. Meanwhile, conflict arose between Seán Russell and Seán MacBride as the routine of politics played second fiddle to Russell's desire to set off bombs in Britain. Barry, who totally disagreed with Russell's suggestion from the outset, was annoyed over ‘the loss of two Thompson machine-guns' and wanted ‘Russell court-martialled' over the incident.
[3]

Though meticulous in other ways, Russell was careless in his account keeping. MacBride, as chief-of-staff, insisted on proper records. Backed by Barry he held a court-martial in the early summer of 1936. The case for misappropriation of funds was proved against Russell ‘although everybody knew Russell had never kept a penny for himself but spent it on the IRA.'
[4]
This incident helped to create further divisions between Russell and the Barry/MacBride faction.

In July the Irish newspapers were reporting disturbances in Spain. By August, Frank Ryan had begun organising Republican Congress people and anybody else interested to fight on the Re-publican, or ‘left' side in Spain. The Blueshirt movement, already split over leadership, found Eoin O'Duffy, looking on the Spanish Civil War as a crusade against Communism, deciding to organise men to fight for the Spanish Nationalists.

Seán Russell, had since 1929, been in touch with Joseph McGarrity in New York, and both were now, 1936, all set for a military action. The Russell plan involved the use of ‘explosives with high destructive content (which) if let off in busy English cities would be the best method of freeing “occupied Ireland”.'
[5]

When the army convention met in Dublin the IRA had two action calls: Russell's British campaign, and Ryan's volunteers for the Spanish Republic.

After a few brief words from a speaker, Tom Barry jumped up on the rostrum and in a fiery speech insisted that the army leadership must act, and act soon. He had a plan of action: move in on a northern town and seize it, occupying buildings as had been done in 1916; move on and take another town. ‘Barry, always kept that ultimate goal of a free united Ireland in view'. It could be done, he charged. Russell insisted that they would be destroying Irish property; far better to destroy England and get them on their knees. No. Barry would have none of this. ‘That would be like what the Black and Tans did to us here. Why should we kill and maim English citizens? We'll fight them on our own ground. We'll take back our country.'
[6]

To appease the fiery men the new army council offered the post of chief-of-staff to Tom Barry, who had been ‘on the run' since the spring; if Barry wanted to invade the north, then let him shoulder the responsibility.

‘Barry was a good choice. He was well-known and popular in the IRA and outside of it, one of the outstanding soldiers of the Black and Tan War and, as the
a
rmy
e
xecutive knew, far shrewder than his simple soldier image and far too practical to involve the IRA in any wild northern campaign of the scope proposed for England by Russell's advocates.'
[7]

As for Frank Ryan's aid for the Spanish Republic, Barry would not agree. There would be no wild geese. The Volunteers were wanted for action at home, he insisted. Despite this decision, many Volunteers resigned and signed on for Spain. Eventually 400 Irishmen, most of them old IRA, went to Spain: 42 were killed, 12 captured (including Frank Ryan) and 114 were wounded – ‘valuable men who could have been deployed in a more lasting, far-reaching service here at home' was how Barry viewed the situation, as he looked back over the space of forty years.
[8]

Meanwhile in Ireland, the IRA had turned its attention to Tom Barry's northern campaign. In the north the movement was enthusiastic that at last the discussions and a form of action now centred on the prime enemy, Britain, rather than on antagonising De Valera and his government.

Barry outlined his policy to Joe McGarrity, the Clan na Gael leader in America. He hoped that internal IRA squabbling would be eliminated. ‘When that new situation [northern campaign] is created there will be no room in our ranks for disunity or intrigues. With regard to Russell's proposed visit to you, the
a
rmy
c
ouncil has decided that no speaker will be sent to the United States.' Reports by a messenger who returned with news of American help is ‘not very encouraging … We can and intend to start without awaiting arrival from your side, but please remember there can be no sustained effort unless you succeed,' Barry wrote. He considered ‘the
t
wenty-
s
ix
c
ounty people' (
g
overnment) as ‘the first obstacle to the restoration of the Republic', and wanted McGarrity to tell his
c
lan members that the ‘developments here' regarding the Russell plan, envisage no ‘Swan Song'. In this letter Barry makes it quite clear that he would act as a soldier and would not involve the IRA in a bombing campaign in Britain.
[9]

In the north of Ireland ‘Loyalist extremism had re-emerged in the shape of the Ulster Protestant League' from 1931 onwards. Peadar O'Donnell in an address to the Orange Order in 1934, had appealed to Protestant workers and small farmers to co-operate with Catholics in the struggle for ‘the transfer of power over production, distribution and exchange to the mass of the people'.
[10]
During the July 1935 disturbances, ‘more than 2,000 driven from their homes', were Catholics.
s
ectarian outbreaks developed, and serious clashes erupted. ‘While the violence ebbed in intensity after about a week, large numbers of Catholics were forced from their workplaces over the next fortnight.'
[11]

Tom Barry and his IRA comrades believed that something should be done to eleviate the plight of their northern counterparts, and that if a 32 county Ireland was established, there would be greater harmony and equality. Back in Cork, ‘on the run' and avoiding capture by staying in selected houses, Barry continued to train his men. Having advocated for years that IRA activists should ‘engage' the British establishment in the north, Barry, now as chief-of-staff set out to do this. He was picking Cork men for the first round of this northern campaign. Mick McCarthy, Jerh Cronin, Jack (Doheny) Lynch, Den Carey, Jim O'Neill and others remember the intensity with which Barry trained his men. He was training a few hundred in all, coming from a wide radius. Sometimes outside Dunmanway, or on the grassy slopes of Belrose, or out in the Kerrypike, camps were in progress.

The Barry plan incorporated a raid on Armagh Military Barracks with an initial 26 man active service unit with Tadhg Lynch as his adjutant general. Take Gough barracks first and move on to the next ‘earmarked' barracks. ‘He had us drilled, thoroughly drilled. We had guns. We had ammunition. We'd fight!' Den Carey insisted.
[12]

Jack Doheny Lynch, OC, Britain, was brought back from England on Barry's instructions, and sent up north to get the barracks' location, distance from houses and so on. He also had to carry out some military training, and with a nucleus of northern IRA supporters, had secured billets and depots. Barry went north to visit Jack Doheny and he met some local IRA units, visited locations, and sized-up positions for attack. Upon returning, the two, with other officers, discussed the plan.

The Cork men had imported over 500 Thompson guns, so a second group of men were armed, drilled and had full instructions to follow on.
[13]

‘There were about 100 of us out in Ballinscarthy training in preparation to attack the north which would begin with the taking of Armagh Barracks. We would have been the follow-up group,' said Dr Ned Barrett. ‘We were under an intensive course and were told that 10% of us would be casualties; at least 10% of us would not return. We were never called; the raid never came off. I was prepared to die, actually. I didn't want to die, but when Barry told us to be ready, we had to be prepared.'
[14]

‘With Barry you had great courage, you had no fear. He'd build up your enthusiasm so that you'd feel brave and you'd follow him to the death.'
[15]

The Cork Active Service men of the first group were mobilised. They had been to confession, were dressed as civilians and were ready to move on the initial leg of their journey to Dundalk and would be ‘ferried northwards from there'. Barry had already organised that ‘a large consignment of guns would go ahead of them. Russell was to secure that end of the plan.' For ‘security reasons northerners were not involved' in this initial attack.

As the men in Cork waited for starting orders, a message arrived from GHQ to cancel the entire operation. A representative from Cumann na mBan brought the order. GHQ had assumed that outside of headquarters, only an intimate group in Cork and in the north knew of the forthcoming attack. However, they discovered that word had seeped through, and that it was been openly debated in the Belfast headquarters and among Cumann na mBan in Dublin.
[16]

Instantly the Armagh raid was cancelled. The great northern campaign was over without a gun having been drawn or a shot having been fired. ‘By God, we'd have pushed the British bastards out for good!' said Barry aggressively. ‘We'd have taken it if things hadn't gone wrong', Den Carey was adamant.
[17]

Jim O'Neill was critical, later, and believed that they should have gone ahead with the plans, regardless.

‘It was to be a southern job. This was an effort on Barry's part to show that the south was not forgetting the north. He wanted it done as a spectacular well-timed effort, a psychological blow of strength for the northerners.' This was ‘to set a flame throughout the six counties' based on the 1916 GPO strategy, but with better planning.
[18]

In the north over the months ahead, spies, informers and others were ‘eliminated'. There were an estimated 18 unsolved murders in Belfast between the Black and Tan war and the end of 1936, ‘although the IRA' was not ‘responsible for all of them.' In addition, disturbances along the border, the burning of Custom Houses on the ‘occasion of King George V1's coronation visit to Belfast in July 1937', went ahead.
[19]

A sizeable urban base of radical Republicanism in pockets of Derry, Belfast and South Armagh were ready to fight whenever the southern IRA would begin an offensive. These northern activists feared after this ‘Armagh fiasco' that the Dublin GHQ ‘was willing to leave the north to the mercies of the RUC.'
[20]
They ‘were furious' with the ‘calling off' and it swung ‘them firmly behind' the Russell plan.
[21]

Jack Doheny Lynch and Barry were in the MacCurtain Hall, Cork, one evening discussing IRA duties. Suddenly someone shouted ‘A raid!' Men ‘skirted' into a room and were trapped. But Lynch and Barry climbed out the back window, swung on to the roof edge and then up, as the special branch scoured the building. Leading a precarious life at this time, ducking in and out of places, around corners, avoiding arrest, Barry, at times escaped almost by the tips of his fingers.
[22]

Russell, feeling bitterness towards MacBride and Barry, left for America and in August 1936 he issued a strong propaganda statement containing forcible language about bombing England, using planes, explosives and other ammunition. Moreover, he wanted to whip up American support for his campaign. Meanwhile, Barry ran into trouble with the Russell followers at GHQ. In the hope of achieving harmony, as IRA chief-of-staff, he had made what he hoped were wise appointments. Peadar O'Flaherty (Dublin quartermaster general) did not get on with MacBride (intelligence officer) and refused to obey orders from the army council. Barry had to get O'Flaherty out, and rely on Tadhg Lynch and Tomás MacCurtain of Cork. But O'Flaherty went down the country seeking support for Russell. Unknown to Barry, Russell had reached an agreement with McGarrity in New York in 1936 on the bombing campaign.
[23]
Barry was ‘shocked' by ‘the depths of hatreds which existed between various members of GHQ.'
[24]
When Russell left for America without army council approval, he failed to tell Barry ‘where the army's equipment was dumped'. Barry only knew of ‘the Kildare dump' of ‘12 Thompsons still in US packing cases' when ‘the police seized it'. With no resources Barry ‘had to borrow £5 from Peadar O'Donnell to send a GHQ officer to Galway' to view dumps there.
[25]
This added to Barry's frustration.