Victoria Cross - RIC Barracks

 

The Royal Irish Constabulary Barracks at Victoria Cross formed part of the Cork City South District Policing. It sat in a prime position at Victoria Cross which served as the main entry point into the city from the west.

Then and now: Victoria Cross in the 1920s and what it looks like today. 

The site of the RIC barracks is the yellow building on the left. 

A lot of incidents occured right under the nose of the Victoria Cross RIC. An arms dump was discovered in a quarry close by and the IRA brothers Owen and Robert Jackson lived near the barracks. They were both active members of the IRA Cork No.1 Brigade and both served time in Ballykinlar Prisoner Camp. 

Dennehys Cross and the witness statement of Sean Healy. 

In 1920 members of H Company 2nd Battalion Cork No. 1 Brigade ambushed two British military lorries at Dennehys Cross which is just a stones throw up the road from the Victoria Cross RIC Barracks! 

St Finbarrs Cemetery, grave of H Company member James Prendergast

One of the lorries had broken down and it was being towed by another when the IRA pounced just as the vehicles slowed down on the approach to Dennehys Cross. 

The IRA Volunteers jumped on the leading lorry and let the British Soldiers run off into nearby fields. They then set fire to the two lorries and made off before the constables in the barracks down the road noticed what was going on!

           Witness statement of Edward Horgan.

In March 1921 the Victoria Cross RIC Barracks was put out of business by the Cork IRA when seven Volunteers from G Company petrol bombed it. The "peelers" never returned to Victoria Cross after that. 

4 Merchants Quay

 

Merchants Quay today is just one long red brick shopping centre but over 100 years ago the quayside was adorned with a varied selection of businesses, shops, pubs, and at No. 4 Merchants Quay - the HQ for the Cork branch of The Irish Citizen Army.

What Merchants Quay looked like in the 19th and early 20th Century

Labour leader Jim Larkin often stated that the roots of the Irish Citizen Army stemmed from Cork City. It was during the 1908/09 coal porters and dockers strike that the labour movement militarised when a workers defence force was established to protect the strikers from the batons of the peelers. 

Uniform of the Irish Citizen Army

The business men affected by the strike established the Employers Federation and set about locking out the striking workers. This lock out which lasted from 1909 to 1908 was the first lock out, (before the more infamous one in 1913 Dublin) and some call it "D'real Lockout!"

Newspaper of the Citizen Army, edited by Cathal O'Shannon who lodged upstairs at the Wallace Sisters Shop, Cork City.

The Irish Citizen Army first fully organised a Cork branch in 1914. From its roots in 1909 as a simple workers defence group armed with just sticks, it was now a force to be reckoned with as seen in the advertisment in the Irish Worker newspaper: 

REBELCORK!

YOUR COUNTRY NEEDS YOU!!

JOIN THE IRISH CITIZEN ARMY, CAPTAIN MACKEY SECTION.

4 MERCHANTS QUAY CORK.

LIVE & DIE IN IRELAND.

LEARN TO SHOOT STRAIGHT, THE CAPTAIN MACKEY RIFLE RANGE IS NOW OPEN AT ABOVE ADDRESS WHERE MEN ARE TRAINED FOR IRELAND AND IRELAND ONLY!

The Cork branch of the Irish Citizen Army was named after the Fenian Captain Mackey who led a daring raid on a British military martello tower in Cork harbour in 1867, and later died in an explosion on the River Thames London.

Drilling and rifle practise took place at No.4 Merchants Quay on Tuesdays and Friday nights and Sunday afternoons. 

Merchants Quay today.

Thomas "Corkie" Walsh was one famous Cork member of the Irish Citizen Army. He was a stonemanson by trade and brother in law of Thomas MacCurtain, the Sinn Fein Lord Mayor of Cork murdered by the RIC in 1920. 

"Corkie" Walsh.

During Easter Week 1916 Walsh was part of the Dublin City Hall garrison. Following the Easter Rising, "Corkie" was sent to Frongoch with the other arrested rebels but while he was there his health declined. 

The grave of Walsh in St Finbarrs Cemetery.

Walsh was released in 1917 but in poor health. He died from pneumonia in March 1918 at the age of just 36. 

The Wallace sisters , Shelia and Nora, were well known Republicans and Labour activists on Leeside. They were also memebers of the Irish Citizen Army. They ran a small newsagents shop at St. Augustine Street where the likes of James Connolly and Countess Markievicz would pay a visit to anytime they were in Cork.  They sold labour and republican pamplets and newspapers. They also organised parades and rallies such as May Day workers day. 

The Wallace sisters organised the womens and youth section of the Cork Irish Citizen Army until 1921 when they, and other Cork Citizen Army members joined the IRA's fight against imperial rule. 

The Wallce Sisters shop.

In 1922 the Cork labour movement moved into the old soldiers home at Kings Terrace on the Lower Glanmire Road. It became the first soldiers home in Ireland when it opened in 1877 but, following the Anglo-Irish treaty in 1921 it went up for sale and it was snapped up by the expanding Labour movement who needed a bigger premises.

The old Connolly Hall, (the large red brick building)

The large red brick building on the Lower Glanmire Road was named Connolly Hall and remained the HQ for the Cork Labour movement for over 50 years.

In May 1923 Jim Larkin, freshly released from New York's Sing Sing Prison, made a welcoming return to Cork with an event held in his honur at Connolly Hall. When he arrived at the train station (Kent Station) he was met by a number of bands and many supporters who walked him the short distance to Connolly Hall. Because the crowd was so large, not everyone could fit inside the buidling so, Big Jim Larkin did what he did best - he gave a rousing speech from a top floor window to those gathered on the Lower Glanmire road. 

64 Oliver Plunkett Street - Turners Hotel

 

Before it became Turners Hotel it was known as Lloyds Hotel on Georges Street. The name changed to Turners Hotel in the early 1900s with Edmund Turner proprietor in 1904.  The street name, Georges Street, later changed to Oliver Plunkett Street post Independence. 

Conways Yard at the back of the hotel.

Turners Hotel sat at the Grand Parade end of Oliver Plunkett Street from number 64-65. Behind the hotel was the spacious Conways Yard with stables for horses and later, room for motorcars. 

The proprietors of the hotel, the Turners, were a family with strong links to the revolutionary movement on Leeside and so, their hotel became a hotbed of Republican activity during the War of Independence with several famous names from that era passing through its doors.

In 1913 the Cork branch of the Irish Volunteers was established in Cork City Hall and those who oversaw the historic occasion stayed at Turners Hotel, such as Eoin MacNeil and Sir Roger Casement who were escorted to their lodgings that night by a throng of supporters singing songs and carrying banners.

Jenny Turner was involved with the local Cumann na mBan and married JJ Walsh, a key figure in the establishment of the Irish Volunteers in Cork. Walsh was also chairman of the GAA Cork County Board and a veteran of Easter 1916 where he fought in the GPO and in 1918 was elected Sinn Fein MP for Cork. 

During the Irish Civil War Walsh supported the Treaty and became the Irish Free State Postmaster General (Minister for Posts & Telegraphs). During a bitter post office workers strike in 1922, Walsh sacked the strikers and replaced them with new recruits. 

Cork Public Museum

 He left politics by the end of the 1920s and made a fortune in the 1930s through a number of investments and business ventures in Dublin. 

Liam de Roiste & JJ Walsh. de Roiste would become a figure in the fascist blueshirt movement in the 1930s.

A well travelled man, (including a trip on the infamous Hidenburg), JJ Walsh became a supporter of the Nazi's in the 1940s and returned to politics through his patronage of the extreme right-wing Ailtiri Aiseirghe. His support for the Nazis even drew the attention of the Irish Army Intelligence. In 1944 Walsh wrote his memoir 'Recollections of a Rebel' which is full of Anti-Semitism. He died in 1948.

Croke Park 1921, JJ Walsh, Mrs Griffth, Jenny Turner Walsh, Arthur Griffith. 

Jenny's brother Tom was a member of A Comany (commonly known as the College Company) 2nd Battalion Cork No.1 Brigade IRA. He was a medical student in UCC but found himself arrested in Britain when he went there to act as guard of honour to bring home the remains of Lord Mayor MacSwiney in October 1920. His crime was wearing an outlawed uniform and he was sentenced to two years hard labour. He was released like other Republican prisoners as part of the truce in the Summer of 1921. 

Military Witness Statement of Vol. Edward Horgan.

Turners Hotel served as the IRA Truce Liasion HQ in the latter months of 1921. General Tom Barry also made it his offcial HQ in the city. 

During the truce in the Summer of 1921, a group of armed RIC Auxilieries paraded up and down the street outside the hotel taunting Tom Barry and his men who were inside the hotel looking out. They seized two of the cars Barry and his men had parked in the yard at the rear of the hotel. 

Michael Collins was also a regular at Turners Hotel and he made a speech in favour of the Anglo Irish Treaty inside the hotel to a small crowd and later had to repeat the same speech from a top floor window to a larger crowd gathered on the street below!

Military Witness Statement of Col. Eamonn Morkan.

Today a new bar has opened on the site of the Turners Hotel, called J.J Walsh's. 

St Paul's Avenue - March 20 1921

 

It was Sunday night just after 9 o'clock when 22 year old Jer Mullane was shot dead at St Paul's Avenue, just off the Coal Quay. His killers were part of a British army curfew patrol. 

St Paul's Avenue from Lavitts Quay/Coal Quay

Jer was not far from home when he was shot dead. He lived with his parents at No. 17 St Paul's Avenue and as he turned the corner from the quay to head down the narrow lane leading to his home a military lorry approached from behind. Calls from the lorry to "halt" and "show your hands" were ignored by Jer who continued to walk the few steps to the safety of his home. 

St Paul's Avenue from Paul Street. 

Shots rang out and Jer fell with bullets in his back. He was just a few more steps away from his front door. The soldiers flung his body on the back of their truck and drove to the nearby Mercy Hospital where he was pronounced dead on arrival. 

A familiar notice in Cork by the Crown authorities.

O'Connell Street - May 14 1921

 

Just after 5pm, on a bright Saturday evening in May, seven RIC men from Shandon Street Barracks went on a foot patrol towards Blackpool. The five constables and two sergeants made their way up Great William O'Brien Street (then known as Great Britain Street) and turned onto O'Connell Street to head over to Watercourse Road. 

The junction of Great William O'Brien Street and O'Connell Street, Blackpool. 

Volunteers from the First Cork Brigade lay in wait for the RIC patrol on O'Connell Street. As their quarry came into sight a Volunteer hurled a bomb in their direction while others unleashed gunfire. In what became known as The Blackpool Ambush, four RIC men were injured and three were killed.

Constable Peter Coughlan was a 48year old  Kerryman. His legs were blown off in the explosion and he died from severe blood loss. He was buried in his native Church town, outside Killarney where his headstone is inscribed in Irish.

Constable John Ryle was also a Kerry native and the 46 year old was injured in the bomb blast. He was taken to the North Infirmary where his leg had to be amputated but, he died the following day. He buried in his native town of Tralee.

Constable Patrick Hayes was a Corkman who had 25 years service with the Royal Irish Constabulary. The 49 year old was killed instantly by the bomb blast.

The IRA volunteers managed to get away but, the crown forces carried out brutal reprisals that night in Blackpool by burning two pubs near the scene of the ambush and a number of houses on O'Connell street. 

The junction of O'Connell Street and Watercourse Road. On the right is the former workshop of famed sculptor Seamus Murphy. He set up his studio here in 1934 and one of his first commissions was the Clonmult IRA memorial in Midleton.

White Street - November 17 1920

Just after 6pm on the evening of November 17th 1920 Sergeant James O'Donoghue left his home on Tower Street and proceeded to walk to his barracks on Tuckey Street. 

As he walked down White Street three men hiding in the gateway of Desmond's Builders Yard emerged with pistols drawn. Shots rang out and Sergeant O'Donoghue fell dead with two bullets in his back and one in his head. 

Today - White Street, off Douglas Street.

Sergeant O'Donoghue was 46 years old and married with four children. Originally from Cahirsiveen Co. Kerry, he had 22 years service in the RIC. 

Tuckey Street RIC Barracks, across from the Freemasons Hall, today it is the Society of St Vincent de Paul. 

Sergeant O'Donoghue was not initially a target of the Cork IRA, in fact he had been well liked in the locality and was known to rebuke Tans in his barracks who acted like thugs. When news of his killing spread across the city many people thought it was the Tans who killed him.

White Street, early 20th Century. 

O'Donoghue's killing was carried out by IRA Volunteers Charlie O'Brien and brothers William and Justin O'Connor. Senior officers in the First Cork Brigade were furious with them. It was not sanctioned and they sent a letter of apology to O'Donoghue's widow.

Sergeant O'Donoghue and his wife.

Sergeant O'Donoghue was buried in his native Cahirsiveen. His heartbroken wife never recovered from the shock of his killing, she died three years later. 

The killing of O'Donoghue later sparked off a reprisal when a number of RIC and Tans terrorised the tenements of Broad Lane where a number of IRA members lived. They killed and maimed in the name of their dead colleague but, it was a reprisal O'Donoghue certainly would not have wanted and his was a killing that should not have happened.