How Mrs Brown star came ‘face to face’ with British officer who killed his grandfather
MRS BROWN star Brendan O’Carroll could barely conceal his anger after identifying the Army officer who ‘assassinated’ his grandfather during the Irish War of Independence nearly 100 years ago.
O’Carroll, who plays the foulmouthed matriarch of the Brown family in the hit BBC comedy, had until now believed that Peter O’Carroll was shot by drunken members of the infamous Black and Tans who randomly targeted his hardware shop on October 16, 1920.
But now he has discovered his ancestor was executed by intelligence officer Jocelyn Lee Hardy because two of Peter O’Carroll’s sons were members of the IRA.
The actor pieced together the events of the fateful evening during an edition of the BBC’s Who Do You Think You Are? to be screened later this month. He says: ‘That’s the last face my grandfather saw. Jesus, he’s some bastard. You know, in my case, it’s personal and I would have liked to have seen someone taken to account for it. We are beyond justice, I think, at this stage but at least we have got the truth.’
Hardy, then 26, is identified as the killer in documents known as The Witness Statements compiled by the government of the Irish Republic in the 1950s as a record of the memories of IRA members in the 1920s.
The papers include a 1920 testimony of David Nelligan, who worked for the British authorities in Dublin Castle, then the seat of British rule, but who leaked classified information to Michael Collins, the IRA’s director of intelligence.
Nelligan records that Collins was convinced that Hardy, who worked for an elite intelligence outfit known as the auxiliaries, was responsible for the death of O’Carroll and the shooting of a IRA fundraiser in a Dublin hotel days earlier.
Brendan O’Carroll learns that his grandfather was killed because he refused to reveal the whereabouts of two of his sons who were members of the IRA. When the two men – who would have been the actor’s uncles – failed to turn up at Dublin Castle by an agreed date, their father was shot dead.
O’Carroll, 58, can barely contain his anger when he comes face to face with a photograph of Hardy.
‘This is the man who killed my grandfather. Oh, Jesus. My grandfather is killed because his sons wouldn’t surrender,’ he says. ‘I am not a dreamer. My grandad would have been one of the enemy. It’s just coming home so callously real.
‘People subscribe to the theory that all is fair in love and war. I don’t think [the killing] was fair.’
Hardy, who was nicknamed Hoppy because of his artificial leg, was a celebrated soldier who had seen distinguished service during the First World War.
He was taken captive by the Germans in 1914 and held as a prisoner of war for three-and-a-half years.
But his audacious attempts to escape from POW camps made him a national hero and led to several military promotions. Eventually promoted to major, he arrived in Dublin in April 1920 and quickly established a reputation as a brilliant but brutal intelligence officer.
He was responsible for interrogations at Dublin Castle and is alleged to have threatened prisoners with red-hot pokers and pistols full of blank bullets.
The IRA made several unsuccessful attempts on his life.
Following the establishment of the Irish Republic, Hardy returned to Britain and enjoyed a new life as a banker, author and playwright.
Several of his novels drew upon his experiences in Dublin. Hardy died, aged 63, in May 1958.
Brendan O’Carroll’s edition of Who Do You Think You Are? will be screened on BBC1 on Thursday, August 28 at 9pm.