IRA INVOLVEMENT
IN
the late 1940s, a young lady visited her brother to announce her engagement to an eligible young man from Glanworth. An elderly relative, on hearing his name, replied “there are only three families in Glanworth worth marrying – the Burkes, the Barrys and the Fouhys”. She was a descendant of one of those families herself.
For many years I thought that story was about Victorian snobbery over land ownership or social position. Now I think it may be a result of the side taken by different families on the national question in the early years of the twentieth century.
There is no doubt that a number of Barry families in Ballylegan and String played a major part in Ireland’s independence movement.
TOM BARRY (BALLYLEGAN)
I will start with Tom Barry of Ballylegan. He was born in 1879. He emigrated to London in 1895 where he joined a number of national organisations including the GAA and the IRB. He and his brother James, along with seven other Cork men, were on the London hurling team of 1901 which won the All-Ireland final against Cork, played in 1903, at Jones’ Road.
But Tom Barry was much more than a hurler. He was a revolutionary leader who helped set up branches of the IRB throughout Ireland and Britain. The IRB endeavoured to get their members involved in national and cultural societies, including the GAA. In London these societies were very adept at recruiting and developing young men for the republican cause.
Tom returned to Ireland in 1911. He joined the Volunteers in 1913 and was later elected to their executive committee. He was involved in the aborted 1916 Rising in Cork, but was not actively involved after that.
The great Michael Collins, who arrived in London in 1906, followed a similar path, and we know where that ended. Tom later set up an auctioneering firm in Cork and died in 1969, being the last surviving member of the London All-Ireland winning hurling team.
The three Barry families from String, namely the Barrys of Parclough; the Barrys of the boreen and the Barrys at the turn of the road, were very involved in the IRA between 1918 and 1921.
Patrick, David and Timothy, three of the Parclough family, were heavily involved and Barry Park in Glanworth is named after Comd’t David Barry. He spent a term in Wormwood Scrubs prison in 1920-1921. He died rather young in the mid 1940s.
Tom Barry from ‘the boreen’, who also ended up a Comd’t, was the leading IRA man in the Glanworth area and successfully led the Labbycally ambush on November 23rd, 1920. Later he joined the Broy Harriers, a division of the Garda Siochana set up by the government to suppress the Blueshirts and the republicans in the 1930s. He made a comprehensive contribution to the Bureau of Military History in 1950 about republican activity in north east Cork in the 1920s.
Willie Barry, of ‘the turn’, was a very skilled operator and was selected for engagements in other areas of north Cork/
Limerick. The late Arthur Wilson, the carpenter, used to regale to my late mother in the 1940s about hearing Willie’s military step as he returned home at night.
HIGH RISK STRATEGY
A major meeting of the Southern Command of the IRA was held at Barry’s, Ballylegan on January 5th and 6th of 1921. This was the homestead of Tom Barry the hurler and a member of the Irish Volunteers executive committee.
The brigades represented were: Cork No 1, Comd’t Sean Hegarty and Brigade Adjutant Florence O’Donoghue; Cork No 2, Comd’t Liam Lynch; Cork No 3, Comd’t Charlie Hurley and Comd’t Dick Barrett; Tipperary No 2, Comd’t James Leahy and Vice Comd’t Matt Barlow; Tipperary No 3, Comd’t Seamus Robinson and Brigade Adjutant Con Moloney; and East Limerick, Comd’t Donnacha Hannigan and Thomas Malone (“Sean Forde”).
The meeting was guarded by the Glanworth and Ballindangan Companies under the direction of Tom Barry (the boreen). The purpose of the meeting was to coordinate the activities of the fighting forces in the Southern Command so that engagement with the British forces could be spread more evenly throughout Munster. With so many of the leadership in attendance at the staging of the meeting in Glanworth, less than seven miles from the British military barracks in Fermoy, was a high risk strategy. If they had been surprised and overcome by the enemy it could have changed the course of the war.
Charlie Hurley was wounded in the Upton ambush and while recovering, was surprised in a house and shot dead by British forces on the morning of the Crossbarry ambush on March 19th, 1921.
Dick Barrett was shot by the Free State on December 8th, 1922 in reprisal for the shooting of Sean Hales TD.
Seamus Robinson was a cousin of Robert Barton and Erskine Childers, who were members of the treaty negotiating team a few months later.
Thomas Malone, with the nickname “Sean Forde”, was a native of Nenagh, a veteran of the 1916 Rising and a particularly brave and daring soldier. He was sent to East Limerick by Michael Collins to turn up the heat of battle. This he certainly achieved.
Four of the above, Sean Hegarty, Florence O’Donoghue, Liam Lynch and Seamus Robinson, were elected at the army convention in April 1922 to the sixteen man executive which eventually directed the anti-treaty forces during the civil war.
Tom Barry, of Kilmichael fame (November 28th, 1920), did not approve of such meetings as he considered the risk too great. After the death of Charlie Hurley, this same Tom Barry proposed to his mourning girlfriend, Leslie Price, a Cumann na mBan organiser, and they were married in Dublin on August 22nd, 1921. The wedding was attended by Michael Collins, Éamon de Valera, Richard Mulcahy, Liam Tobin, Liam Lynch, Dick Barrett, Sean Hales and Liam Deasy. It certainly was the calm before the storm.
Tom Barry (hurler) made a detailed contribution to the Bureau of Military History in February 1947, outlining his work and experiences with the IRB between 1908 and 1916. One significant encounter he recalled was meeting Sean Hegarty (Cork), Austin Stack (Tralee) and Liam Barrett (Glanworth) after a match at the Athletic Grounds as early as 1908. Clearly the movement had a long gestation. During that period he claims to have encountered many of the signatories of the 1916 Proclamation. I am led to believe that Tom’s wife was a Fouhy from Glanworth, which would be in keeping with the sentiments of the old lady above.
Many other young men around Glanworth were also active in the IRA, including the Fenton brothers, Gerry