Spies, intelligience ,counter intelligience & informers in pre Independence Ireland.

MarchDub wrote: »

It was the fact that betrayal and treachery were so endemic to Irish history and Irish insurrections that Michael Collins knew - and stated - that the only way to win the War of Independence was to break the spy system at Dublin Castle, which he did.

Collins knew that Irish spies in the pay of the British were always willing to give the game away. There was a long history of precedent for this. And 1798 was no exception.

slowburner wrote: »

Were there no Irish spying on the British over the course of 1798? Counter intelligence, I suppose you could call it.

HellsAngel wrote: »

Well a bit of topic but my 2 cents. The spy system was and still is one of the main weapons in the hands of the occupier. Collins would have had the Fenians in mind and the secret society's such as the Whiteboys, Defenders and Molly Maguires who were all destroyed by spies.

Spies, Informers, and the 'Anti-Sinn Féin Society': The Intelligence War in Cork City, 1920-1921


Author's Response


Book:
Spies, Informers, and the 'Anti-Sinn Féin Society': The Intelligence War in Cork City, 1920-1921

John Borgonovo
Dublin, Irish Academic Press, 2007, ISBN: 978071652833-3; 192pp.; Price: £19.95;


Reviewer:
David LeesonLaurentian University, Canada

Citation:
David Leeson, review of Spies, Informers, and the 'Anti-Sinn Féin Society': The Intelligence War in Cork City, 1920-1921, (review no. 631)URL: http://www.history.ac.uk/reviews/review/631
Date accessed: Fri 19 August 2011 11:43:16 BST




On 15 February 1921, in the city of Cork, Ireland, a military court consisting of three British Army officers assembled for the purpose of inquiring into the death of a local man the previous evening. (Such courts had been held in lieu of coroner's inquests since the passage of the Restoration of Order in Ireland Act the previous summer.) Having assembled and viewed the body, the court proceeded to take evidence from three witnesses, including Fireman Dennis Murphy, who made the following statement. 'I belong to the Cork Fire Brigade', it says:

At 20.15 hours last night on receipt of a telephone message an ambulance was sent from Sullivan's Quay Fire Station to Tory Top Lane. I accompanied the driver. There we found lying in the road the body of the man now in the South Infirmary Mortuary. His cap was off and also his overcoat which was lying by his side. This card (produced, marked A) was lying on the overcoat. (The card about 6" by 4" has on it
CONVICTED SPY.
Penalty Death.
Let all spies and traitors beware.)

---

There were no signs of life in the body. We put him in the Ambulance and brought him to the South Infirmary. It was dark and I noticed no wounds on the spot. There was no one by the body when we reached it. I noticed no one and nothing to indicate what had happened. I do not know who sent the telephone message. The clothing of the deceased was not searched in my presence.

Having considered the evidence, the court found:

(1) that the deceased was William SULLIVAN, Aged 34, Single, an Army Pensioner residing in South Douglas Road, CORK.
(2) that the deceased died in Top Tory Lane [sic], CORK on the night of 14th February 1921 from the effect of gunshot wounds ...
(3) that the wounds were inflicted by persons unknown against whom the court finds a verdict of wilful murder.

Despite this verdict, there is no record of any subsequent investigation into the killing of William Sullivan.(1)
Sullivan was just one of at least 26 Cork citizens executed for 'spying' by the insurgent Irish Republican Army during the Irish War of Independence (1920-1).(2) These executions, and their justification, are at the heart of John Borgonovo's new book, Spies, Informers, and the 'Anti-Sinn Féin Society'. As Borgonovo explains:

This study attempts to answer four essential questions about those events. (1) Who were the Cork city civilians shot by the IRA in 1920-21? (2) Were they informers? (3) What was the context of the killings? (4) Was the IRA intelligence network capable of identifying civilian spies operating in city? (p. 1)

After consulting a wide variety of both published and unpublished Irish (and British) sources, and examining each case in some detail, Borgonovo has come to conclusions that are tentative, but still persuasive. At least some of these people, he argues, really were informers: while some others were genuinely under suspicion of informing; either way, in a majority of cases, there is a clear connection between their deaths and the intelligence war in Cork City.
This is an important point because, as Borgonovo explains, some recent revisionist histories of the War of Independence have suggested that the IRA's accusations of spying often served as a mere pretext for the persecution and murder of ex-soldiers and Protestants. Borgonovo denies this revisionist thesis, and his denial is based in part on a detailed examination of the IRA's intelligence service in Cork. This, he demonstrates, was much more effective than its British counterpart, and fully capable of rooting out spies and informers in its midst. What is more, according to Borgonovo, the IRA's Cork No. 1 Brigade did not shoot first and ask questions later, as many believe: their Brigade Intelligence Officer, Florence (Florrie) O'Donoghue, took his responsibilities very seriously, and insisted on accusations of spying being proved beyond a reasonable doubt before sanctioning an execution.

Spies, traitors and double agents are as old as war itself. Patrick Kerin who was born in Knocklisgrane, Milltown Malbay in 1896 heard similar stories of the Fenians, spies, and informers when he was a young lad a century ago: “On my mothers side I had Fenian blood. Her uncle and first cousins were members of the Fenian Brotherhood; two of her cousins named O Leary, were sentenced to penal servitude for their part in what is still known in North Clare as the ‘Ballygaston Affair’[sic. Ballygasteel] where the local Fenians were led into a trap by a British spy, named Cullinane, a native of West Cork.”
The ‘Ballygaston Affair’ as Kerin called it happened at Ballygasteel, about two miles outside Lisdoonvarna in September 1887. The Head Constable of the R.I.C. in Ennis – Whelan (29264) who was seeking promotion, hired a paid police spy named Jeremiah Patrick Callinan, a native of Kerry who lived in the area and had infiltrated the local circle of the Fenians, to organise an attack on a man named Thomas Sexton, who was unpopular at the time because of his involvement in a land dispute. On the night of 11th of September 1887 Callinan led the unsuspecting Fenians into a trap, and as they approached Sexton’s house they were surprised by Head Constable Whelean and a large group of R.I.C. men. A struggle ensued, three of the R.I.C. constables were wounded and Head Constable Whelean was killed in the affray. Eight of the Fenians were arrested and sentenced to four years penal servitude each. Cullinane appeared as a Crown witness – and disappeared afterwards into a presumably well paid retirement afterwards. Needless to say Head Constable Whelean never got the promotion he had been seeking!.

I.R.A. Counter-Intelligence

However republicans were not idle while the R.I.C. and British Army gathered information on them many I.R.A. leaders had moles inside the British forces who were passing them intelligence information and were able to reveal the identities of suspected spies. A British soldier – Sergeant Martin Doyle who was stationed in Ennis Barracks, who had won the Victoria Cross during the First World War was providing the I.R.A. in Ennis with intelligence information. R.I.C. Constable Tom Healy, who was clerk to the R.I.C. County Inspector in Ennis was also passing highly important intelligence information to Michael Brennan in East Clare. At least two other members of the R.I.C. in Clare Constable Carroll, Ruan and Constable Buckley, New Market On Fergus were giving information to the I.R.A. Major Reynolds a member of F. Company of the Auxiliaries originally stationed in Dublin Castle before his transfer to Clare was supplying detailed and accurate intelligence information to I.R.A. Headquarters in Dublin in return for payment.
During the War of Independence Richard Mulcahy’s brother Patrick an ex-British soldier worked as a clerk in Ennis Post Office was kept busy monitoring R.I.C. and British Army communications and passing information to the Mid Clare Brigade of the I.R.A.
“Another form of assistance was the taking of important police letters passing through the post. The bulky official envelopes were seldom important, but I became familiar with the handwriting of R.I.C. confidential clerk, D.I.‘s and C.I. letters in their handwriting were always of interest. I could also recognise disguised handwriting on envelopes addressed to the police and invariably took such letters They usually contained information of volunteer activity from some local spy or, sometimes, a disgruntled Volunteer. One such capture resulted in the banishment of one man from Clare. Usually however, such letters were unsigned, but contained correct information.”

Fr. Michael Hayes & Johanna Slattery

On the 5th of October 1920 the I.R.A. ambushed an R.I.C. patrol at Feakle post office, killing two members of the R.I.C. The ambush was immediately condemned by the local local Catholic Priest Fr. Michael Hayes, a firm political opponent of republicanism according to I.R.A. Veteran Thomas Tuohy:

“After the Feackle ambush the local Parish Priest, Fr. Hayes, a violent imperialist who regularly entertained members of the enemy forces, strongly denounced the I.R.A. from the pulpit. He referred to us as a murder gang, and declared that any information, which he could get, would be readily passed on to the British authorities and that he would not desist until the last of the murders was strung by the neck. This denunciation led to unpleasant consequences and for some time services at which he officiated were boycotted by most of the congregation.”

After Fr. Hayes having publicly exposed his willingness to give information to the British, and his boycott by local republican sympathisers, his housekeeper Johanna Slattery a native of Tipperary came under suspicion. Miss Slattery was kept under close observation by the members of Cumann Na mBann in the village until she was abducted by the I.R.A. on the 23rd of October and taken against her will first to Tipperary where she was issued with a warning not to return to Clare. Ignoring this she returned to Feakle two weeks later with an escort of R.I.C. and British Soldiers as a bodyguard. However she seems to have taken some notice of the danger posed by continuing her activities and from then on she gave the I.R.A. little cause for concern and was not interfered with.
Miss. Slattery was extremely fortunate not to have been executed.

A female spy Mrs. Lindsey was later captured and executed as a suspected spy by the I.R.A. in Cork. The East Clare Brigade of the I.R.A. apparently decided it would make for bad propaganda if they executed a woman, similarly if Fr. Hayes had not been a Catholic priest he would almost certainly have been abducted. He was eventually removed from Feakle and posted as the parish priest of Sixmilebridge in 1921

Óg Ó Ruairc, Pádraig

Pádraig Óg Ó Ruairc is originally from Co. Clare but now lives in Cork. He works seasonally for the Irish Heritage Service at Fort Charles in Kinsale and is currently researching the Anglo-Irish Truce for a PhD in the University of Limerick. He is the administrator for the website www.warofindependence.net a resource page dedicated to making public new research about the War of Independence in Clare and Galway.

To visit Pádraig's website, please click the underlined link: Pádraig Óg Ó'Ruairc.

http://www.mercierpress.ie/padraigogoruairc