The Patriot Game
Part Two – On Active Service
by Brendan Gisby
Genre: Drama
Swearwords: Some strong ones.
Description: It is 1961, forty years after the end of Ireland’s War of Independence. In a village in the north of County Longford, Eire, an elderly man recalls the part he played in that War.
Swearwords: Some strong ones.
Description: It is 1961, forty years after the end of Ireland’s War of Independence. In a village in the north of County Longford, Eire, an elderly man recalls the part he played in that War.
When I look back now, I think the years between me joining the IRA in ’17 and the Truce in ’21 were probably the best years of my life. Everything since those years has been a blur. It’s been like a life without a purpose, a wasted life. Ach, for Jesus’ sake, will you listen to me now, all maudlin again?
Anyway, ’17 to ’21. Those were exciting and dangerous times, for sure. Young as I was, I was a part of it, a part of the struggle, with my own role to play. And the details of that role are very clear to me, even forty years later. That’s mostly because not so long ago I had to remember all the details and write them down. Bear with me and I’ll explain why.
About a half-dozen years back, I was in a pretty poor way. I was well into my fifties and doing the odd labouring job here and there to keep me in food – and drink, of course. Then one day I found that I couldn’t labour any more. My ould body was past it. Which meant that I had no money coming in at all. Now, the boys down at McCloskey’s kept saying to me that I should be applying for one of those Military Service Pensions on account of my IRA service during the Black and Tan War. Well, you know me: I can’t abide authority – even if it is our own Irish boys running the authority – and I can’t be doing with paperwork, so naturally I didn’t do anything about it. But by that time I had no choice in the matter and I went ahead and applied. Jeez, though, what a rigmarole that was. Apart from having to put down every detail in the application form, I had to go and ask some of the senior men I served with to testify on my behalf. The whole thing took years, but I got the pension in the end – and a medal into the bargain. Not that it’s of much use to man nor beast, but the medal is around here somewhere – a medal with bar for rendering active service during the period of the War.
Aye, for rendering active service. Continuous active service, it was. You know, for the best part of four years I was on duty during every single military operation by our Company. That fact only hit home to me after I had filled the form in.
And that form. Well, for each of the four years it wanted to know things like the Districts I operated in and who the commanding officer was in each District. Then it asked for actual particulars of the military operations I took part in and the services I provided each time. Those “services” were manifold, I can tell you, so much so that I was after writing “other duties too numerous to mention” all over the form. It also only struck me afterwards about the sheer amount of work I did during those four years.
It wasn’t like that to begin with, of course, when the Army network was still being put together. In that first year or so, my principal duty was as a rider, a messenger. Aye, me and my motorcycle travelling all over the Three Counties at all hours, delivering messages from Company to Brigade HQ and from Company to Company. That was how I met the Commander-in-chief, the great man himself, Michael Collins. Mick was up in this neck of the woods a lot in the early years, helping to organise things. Most of the time, he stayed at the Longford Arms down in Granard. I took many messages to him and delivered as many for him, and we became good friends. He used to say to me, “Your my right-hand man up here, Pat, you know.” But I knew that wasn’t the case. It was only Mick’s way of encouraging us young fellas.
Now, a lot of people – not just the Brits and Ulstermen; that Anti-Treaty crowd as well – they used to call The Big Fella a thug and a murderer. But I swear to you a kinder and more gentle giant you couldn’t hope to meet. As for being a murderer, I don’t think he ever killed anybody or even shot a gun in anger. Then the Republican morons had to go and murder him in an ambush down in Cork in ’22, the greatest leader of a free Ireland that ever drew breath. And what did we get in his place, eh? De Valera. The Long Fella, all right. The long streak of putrid shite that we call our noble President…
But, sure, I’m getting ahead of myself there. I was talking about my duties during the War. After a while, it wasn’t just my motorcycle the Company wanted. There was also the business of the guns. As Jim McNamee said on my first day, “He knows about guns, all types of guns.” And so I did – how to fire them, maintain them, keep them clean and repair them. Sure ’n’ what lad from a smallholding out here in the country didn’t know about guns back then? Not if he wanted to put food in the family’s larder with a bit of hunting and poaching.
Next thing I’m being asked to repair some guns. Then it’s to clean some others and hide them. In no time at all, I’m in charge of storing and maintaining the Company’s whole arsenal of guns and ammunition and explosives. Not only that, but I’ve become the official arms instructor – and not just for Moyne Company; for Dromard Company as well. Sure ’n’ by the time I turn twenty, I’m holding the rank of lieutenant colonel. And on top of all that I’m the rider for both Companies, delivering messages all over the place.
So you’ll see what I mean now when I said I was on duty for every military operation. I had to be. It was my job to issue the guns and explosives for each engagement. And to collect them afterwards. I also needed to be there to collect and store any guns that were captured. It was exhausting work, I can tell you. But it was all worth it. Up here in the Three Corners, it seemed like we were winning the War. I was there in ’20 when the 5th Battalion captured the Barracks at Arva just up the road in County Cavan. And it was only months later a few miles south of here when the bold boys of the North Longford Flying Column drove the British Army out of Ballinalee and stopped the bastards from burning down the village. Three hundred IRA men up against a force of nine hundred soldiers. What a momentous victory that was!
Now, I don’t know if I had grown too cocky by then or if I was just plain tired and wanted to get home, but one night in the Spring of ’21, I slipped up badly. I was on my way to one of my arms caches to return some guns that had been used in an engagement earlier in the night. Not thinking properly, I decided against riding along one of the back lanes and took the main road instead, which was quicker. And of course I ran straight into a bunch of Auxiliaries in an armoured car, with a truckload of Black and Tans in tow. I was done for.
Continue to Part Three.
Anyway, ’17 to ’21. Those were exciting and dangerous times, for sure. Young as I was, I was a part of it, a part of the struggle, with my own role to play. And the details of that role are very clear to me, even forty years later. That’s mostly because not so long ago I had to remember all the details and write them down. Bear with me and I’ll explain why.
About a half-dozen years back, I was in a pretty poor way. I was well into my fifties and doing the odd labouring job here and there to keep me in food – and drink, of course. Then one day I found that I couldn’t labour any more. My ould body was past it. Which meant that I had no money coming in at all. Now, the boys down at McCloskey’s kept saying to me that I should be applying for one of those Military Service Pensions on account of my IRA service during the Black and Tan War. Well, you know me: I can’t abide authority – even if it is our own Irish boys running the authority – and I can’t be doing with paperwork, so naturally I didn’t do anything about it. But by that time I had no choice in the matter and I went ahead and applied. Jeez, though, what a rigmarole that was. Apart from having to put down every detail in the application form, I had to go and ask some of the senior men I served with to testify on my behalf. The whole thing took years, but I got the pension in the end – and a medal into the bargain. Not that it’s of much use to man nor beast, but the medal is around here somewhere – a medal with bar for rendering active service during the period of the War.
Aye, for rendering active service. Continuous active service, it was. You know, for the best part of four years I was on duty during every single military operation by our Company. That fact only hit home to me after I had filled the form in.
And that form. Well, for each of the four years it wanted to know things like the Districts I operated in and who the commanding officer was in each District. Then it asked for actual particulars of the military operations I took part in and the services I provided each time. Those “services” were manifold, I can tell you, so much so that I was after writing “other duties too numerous to mention” all over the form. It also only struck me afterwards about the sheer amount of work I did during those four years.
It wasn’t like that to begin with, of course, when the Army network was still being put together. In that first year or so, my principal duty was as a rider, a messenger. Aye, me and my motorcycle travelling all over the Three Counties at all hours, delivering messages from Company to Brigade HQ and from Company to Company. That was how I met the Commander-in-chief, the great man himself, Michael Collins. Mick was up in this neck of the woods a lot in the early years, helping to organise things. Most of the time, he stayed at the Longford Arms down in Granard. I took many messages to him and delivered as many for him, and we became good friends. He used to say to me, “Your my right-hand man up here, Pat, you know.” But I knew that wasn’t the case. It was only Mick’s way of encouraging us young fellas.
Now, a lot of people – not just the Brits and Ulstermen; that Anti-Treaty crowd as well – they used to call The Big Fella a thug and a murderer. But I swear to you a kinder and more gentle giant you couldn’t hope to meet. As for being a murderer, I don’t think he ever killed anybody or even shot a gun in anger. Then the Republican morons had to go and murder him in an ambush down in Cork in ’22, the greatest leader of a free Ireland that ever drew breath. And what did we get in his place, eh? De Valera. The Long Fella, all right. The long streak of putrid shite that we call our noble President…
But, sure, I’m getting ahead of myself there. I was talking about my duties during the War. After a while, it wasn’t just my motorcycle the Company wanted. There was also the business of the guns. As Jim McNamee said on my first day, “He knows about guns, all types of guns.” And so I did – how to fire them, maintain them, keep them clean and repair them. Sure ’n’ what lad from a smallholding out here in the country didn’t know about guns back then? Not if he wanted to put food in the family’s larder with a bit of hunting and poaching.
Next thing I’m being asked to repair some guns. Then it’s to clean some others and hide them. In no time at all, I’m in charge of storing and maintaining the Company’s whole arsenal of guns and ammunition and explosives. Not only that, but I’ve become the official arms instructor – and not just for Moyne Company; for Dromard Company as well. Sure ’n’ by the time I turn twenty, I’m holding the rank of lieutenant colonel. And on top of all that I’m the rider for both Companies, delivering messages all over the place.
So you’ll see what I mean now when I said I was on duty for every military operation. I had to be. It was my job to issue the guns and explosives for each engagement. And to collect them afterwards. I also needed to be there to collect and store any guns that were captured. It was exhausting work, I can tell you. But it was all worth it. Up here in the Three Corners, it seemed like we were winning the War. I was there in ’20 when the 5th Battalion captured the Barracks at Arva just up the road in County Cavan. And it was only months later a few miles south of here when the bold boys of the North Longford Flying Column drove the British Army out of Ballinalee and stopped the bastards from burning down the village. Three hundred IRA men up against a force of nine hundred soldiers. What a momentous victory that was!
Now, I don’t know if I had grown too cocky by then or if I was just plain tired and wanted to get home, but one night in the Spring of ’21, I slipped up badly. I was on my way to one of my arms caches to return some guns that had been used in an engagement earlier in the night. Not thinking properly, I decided against riding along one of the back lanes and took the main road instead, which was quicker. And of course I ran straight into a bunch of Auxiliaries in an armoured car, with a truckload of Black and Tans in tow. I was done for.
Continue to Part Three.
About the Author
Brendan Gisby is McStoryteller-in-Residence. He's the author of three novels, three biographies and several short story collections.
His official author's website is Blazes Boylan's Book Bazaar at http://the4bs.weebly.com.
And his books are displayed at these links on Amazon.co.uk and Amazon.com.
His official author's website is Blazes Boylan's Book Bazaar at http://the4bs.weebly.com.
And his books are displayed at these links on Amazon.co.uk and Amazon.com.