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Michael Collins’ role in the Bloody Sunday Croke Park deaths.

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  • 18-03-2013 2:01pm
    #1
    Robus
    Registered Users Posts: 180 ✭✭


    On the night preceding Bloody Sunday (20th November 1920), David Neligan (The spy in the castle) was in the Gaiety Theatre with Liam Tobin & Tom Cullen when he was told of the murders of the British Spy’s (two of whom were in the next box) planned for the next day.


    Later Cullen ask Neligan was he going to see the important match in Croke Park the next day to which he replied ”No dam fear”, “ the Tans and Auxies would surely revenge themselves by shooting up Croke Park”.


    With two of his most senior intelligence officers made aware of this opinion, did Michael Collins proceed with the shootings with a plan to use the assumed reprisals and deaths of innocent civilians for propaganda purposes?


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    #2
    jonniebgood1
    Registered Users Posts: 3,577 ✭✭✭jonniebgood1


    Robus wrote: »
    On the night preceding Bloody Sunday (20th November 1920), David Neligan (The spy in the castle) was in the Gaiety Theatre with Liam Tobin & Tom Cullen when he was told of the murders of the British Spy’s (two of whom were in the next box) planned for the next day.


    Later Cullen ask Neligan was he going to see the important match in Croke Park the next day to which he replied ”No dam fear”, “ the Tans and Auxies would surely revenge themselves by shooting up Croke Park”.


    With two of his most senior intelligence officers made aware of this opinion, did Michael Collins proceed with the shootings with a plan to use the assumed reprisals and deaths of innocent civilians for propaganda purposes?

    Thats quite a jump. How could he possibly have predicted what was to happen.


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    #3
    museologist
    Registered Users Posts: 28 ✭museologist


    Sounds like hearsay to me, Robus.


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    #4
    pedroeibar1
    Closed Accounts Posts: 5,108 ✭✭✭pedroeibar1


    jonniebgood1 wrote: »
    Thats quite a jump. How could he possibly have predicted what was to happen.

    I agree it is a 'jump' in the context quoted but Collins was expecting trouble at the match. It is well documented in the BMH archive that on the eve of the Croke Park Massacre Collins had a drink in Phil Shanahan’s public house – the Dublin haunt of Tipperarymen who were ‘active’ - and told several there not to attend Croker as ‘there may be trouble’. Several did not go as a result although Shanahan himself did and escaped without injury.


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    #5
    Peregrinus
    Registered Users Posts: 26,153 ✭✭✭✭Peregrinus


    Collins may have foreseen that there would be reprisals for the Bloody Sunday operation, and may have correctly guessed Croke Park as one of the possibilities, but it is a huge leap to suggest that he conducted the operation in order to provoke the reprisals. I'm not aware of any evidence that this is the case.


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    #6
    Neutronale
    Registered Users Posts: 429 ✭✭Neutronale


    Peregrinus wrote: »
    Collins may have foreseen that there would be reprisals for the Bloody Sunday operation, and may have correctly guessed Croke Park as one of the possibilities, but it is a huge leap to suggest that he conducted the operation in order to provoke the reprisals. I'm not aware of any evidence that this is the case.

    Also, you cant carry out operations or postpone them on the basis that the enemy might retaliate...


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    #7
    Robus
    Registered Users Posts: 180 ✭✭Robus


    I’m not suggesting he
    Peregrinus wrote: »
    conducted the operation in order to provoke the reprisals.

    but could he have proceeded while aware of the propagandist potential of the reprisals?


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    #8
    pedroeibar1
    Closed Accounts Posts: 5,108 ✭✭✭pedroeibar1


    Robus wrote: »
    could he have proceeded while aware of the propagandist potential of the reprisals?

    Newton's Third Law - To every action there is always an equal and opposite reaction.
    Of course Collins knew there would be reprisals; did he know that people would be shot?Yes; did he know it would involve troops/RIC surrounding Croke Park and opening fire on those inside/trying to get out? No.


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    #9
    Peregrinus
    Registered Users Posts: 26,153 ✭✭✭✭Peregrinus


    Robus wrote: »
    . . . could he have proceeded while aware of the propagandist potential of the reprisals?
    I think the most we can say is that he would have forseen that reprisals of some kind were likely, and that depending on what form the reprisals took they might or might not have propaganda value for him.

    But the same would have been true of many other operations he conducted, most of which didn't result in quite such "helpful" reprisals as Croke Park. He would have had no particular reason to expect that on this occasion, and I seriously doubt that it could have been a factor in his decision to run the operation.

    Of course, the operation had its own propaganda value - it demonstrated graphically that the affairs and plans of D Branch were an open book to Collins, which was going to be very bad for British morale and reputation. That may have been a factor.

    But undoubtedly the biggest factor was not propaganda, but the inherenent tactical value of the operation - D Branch was real threat to the Dublin Brigade of the IRA. It took the British quite a while to rebuild the same intelligence capacity after Bloody Sunday and, in fact, by the time they succeeded the Truce was imminent.


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    #10
    Robus
    Registered Users Posts: 180 ✭✭Robus


    pedroeibar1 wrote: »
    ?did he know it would involve troops/RIC surrounding Croke Park and opening fire on those inside/trying to get out? No.

    But that's my opening point , his intelligence officers were told the night before that would surely be the reprisal


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    #11
    Professor Xavier
    Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 24 ✭Professor Xavier


    It's hard to say but Collin's may of chosen that date to carry out the killings in order for his men to disappear among the crowds the next day.


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    #12
    Dr.Nightdub
    Registered Users Posts: 108 ✭✭Dr.Nightdub


    I don't get that - far easier to disappear in a city than in a football stadium.


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    #13
    Peregrinus
    Registered Users Posts: 26,153 ✭✭✭✭Peregrinus


    Robus wrote: »
    But that's my opening point , his intelligence officers were told the night before that would surely be the reprisal
    I'm sceptical that they knew there would be reprisals, and it's impossible that they could have known what the reprisals would be since, in the nature of things, the British couldn't have planned their reprisals before the shootings. The most we can plausibly say is that they thought reprisals of some kind were likely, and someone may have speculated that reprisals might happen at Croke Park. To the extent we are told that someone confidently and knowledgeably predicted reprisals at Croke Park, common sense suggests that that's a story that has grown in the telling.


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    #14
    Robus
    Registered Users Posts: 180 ✭✭Robus


    David Neligan commented later in his autobiography, that despite his warning to Tom Cullen, Cullen still went to Croke Park and had to escape over a gate. These comments were published in 1968.

    It is a known that Collins acted on Neligan (& Broy & McNamara’s) advice on numerous occasions both to enable and cancel manoeuvres following information on spy / police /troop movements.


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    #15
    pedroeibar1
    Closed Accounts Posts: 5,108 ✭✭✭pedroeibar1


    Peregrinus wrote: »
    I'm sceptical that they knew there would be reprisals, and it's impossible that they could have known what the reprisals would be since, in the nature of things, the British couldn't have planned their reprisals before the shootings. The most we can plausibly say is that they thought reprisals of some kind were likely, and someone may have speculated that reprisals might happen at Croke Park. To the extent we are told that someone confidently and knowledgeably predicted reprisals at Croke Park, common sense suggests that that's a story that has grown in the telling.


    There was a tip-off at least as early as the Sunday morning that the reprisal would be ‘to mow down people’ at Croke Park – see ‘WS Ref #: 1687 , Witness: Harry Colley,Page 53 of that doc. onwards - there was an attempt to limit the numbers coming into Croke Park and also to postpone the game – interesting report by Colley here


    Other comments :

    WS Ref #: 755 (ii) page 176..........Prior to the occasion, we had been speaking to Comdt. Byrne, who had expressed his opinion against our going to Croke Park. "Something might happen", he mused.

    WS Ref #: 930 , page 8 ........Mick Collins ......... said to Phil Shanahan in the course of his conversation, "If any of you are thinking of going to Croke Park tomorrow, it might be safer for you to stay away as there may be trouble", and having finished his drink, he left as quickly as he entered.

    WS Ref #: 1474 , page 90 ...........On Bloody Sunday, November 21st, I was at the Pillar with Mr. Doris of "The Mayo News" about to board a Drumcondra tram for Croke Park, when a Captain Ryan and another I.R.A. man came to me and said that he had orders from Michael Collins that prominent I.R.A. men who, like myself, were easily identifiable, should be directed to keep off the streets. They insisted that I should at once go with them and take the Sandymount tram to Stella Gardens. I did so.

    I agree there was no convoluted plan/plot by Collins – his objective was to eliminate British intelligence agents and knew there would be reprisals. The fact that the All-Ireland was taking place the following day makes that event an obvious choice for such reprisal(s) but I cannot see how the severity and random nature of those reprisals could have been foreseen before the Agents' killings.


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    #16
    yore
    Closed Accounts Posts: 1,127 ✭✭✭yore


    Dr.Nightdub wrote: »
    I don't get that - far easier to disappear in a city than in a football stadium.

    Perhaps a group of, say 10, people arriving up on a train might be harder to spot if they were among hundreds/thousands of other people.


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    #17
    Peregrinus
    Registered Users Posts: 26,153 ✭✭✭✭Peregrinus


    yore wrote: »
    Perhaps a group of, say 10, people arriving up on a train might be harder to spot if they were among hundreds/thousands of other people.
    Yes, but why gather them together in order to make them hard to spot? The assassinations took place at a variety of locations at more or less the same time. What Professor Xavier suggests is that, several hours later, all the poeple involved in the operation were gathered together, at a place where reprisals were reportedly feared, in order to disperse them. That make no sense at all; they were already dispersed, and much the most sensible thing to do would be to direct them to remain dispersed, and to leave town and or go into hiding by different routes and in different places. There is no earthly reason why you would gather them all together again, in a place expected to be heavily attended by the security forces; that creates a substantial risk for no discernible purpose.


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    #18
    Kinski
    Closed Accounts Posts: 1,555 ✭✭✭Kinski


    pedroeibar1 wrote: »
    ...

    Judging from those quotes, Collins may well have meant that there "could be trouble" if "prominent, easily-identifiable" IRA members showed up at Croke Park, not that he was expecting trouble regardless of who was present.

    The biggest annual sports event put on by a nationalist association was hardly the best place for IRA volunteers to show their faces that day; I mean, if you were a member of the security forces out that day looking for republicans, that would probably have seemed a good place to start.


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    #19
    Professor Xavier
    Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 24 ✭Professor Xavier


    Professor Xavier wrote: »
    It's hard to say but Collin's may of chosen that date to carry out the killings in order for his men to disappear among the crowds the next day.
    Peregrinus wrote: »
    What Professor Xavier suggests is that, several hours later, all the poeple involved in the operation were gathered together, at a place where reprisals were reportedly feared, in order to disperse them. That make no sense at all; they were already dispersed, and much the most sensible thing to do would be to direct them to remain dispersed, and to leave town and or go into hiding by different routes and in different places. There is no earthly reason why you would gather them all together again, in a place expected to be heavily attended by the security forces; that creates a substantial risk for no discernible purpose.

    I would love to know how you came to that conclusion. Where in your mind did I suggest that the gunmen relocate to Croke Park? Match day would of been a pretty busy day in Dublin and easier for IRA men to move about hence the reason why the assassinations probably took place the night before.


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    #20
    Peregrinus
    Registered Users Posts: 26,153 ✭✭✭✭Peregrinus


    Professor Xavier wrote: »
    I would love to know how you came to that conclusion. Where in your mind did I suggest that the gunmen relocate to Croke Park? Match day would of been a pretty busy day in Dublin and easier for IRA men to move about hence the reason why the assassinations probably took place the night before.
    My apologies; I misunderstood you. I thought you meant that Collins's plan was for the men to disappear among the crowds at the match, whereas in fact you meant the crowds in town for the match.


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    #21
    pedroeibar1
    Closed Accounts Posts: 5,108 ✭✭✭pedroeibar1


    Professor Xavier wrote: »
    ......... Match day would of been a pretty busy day in Dublin and easier for IRA men to move about hence the reason why the assassinations probably took place the night before.

    Quite possible. They took no chances - somewhere in the WS's there is a comment that after the initial killings it was expected that the Liffey bridges would most likely be controlled by Crown Forces and that the 'Squad' had someone commandeer the ferry from Ringsend to North Wall in case it was necessary to cross the river.


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