CHAPTER XIX

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CAPTURE AND ESCAPE OF GENERAL LUCAS.

The capture of Brigadier-General Lucas was effected on June 26th, 1920, by Liam Lynch, George Power, and a few more of Lynch’s staff. General Lucas, who was stationed at Fermoy and commanded in that district, was accompanied by Colonel Danford, R.E., and Colonel Tyrell. Lynch and his comrades drove up in a motor car and surprised the three British officers at a place called Conna, near Castlelyons, seven or eight miles from Fermoy, where General Lucas had taken a fishing lodge. They were taken completely by surprise and removed to a waiting motor car. The original idea was to hold the General as a hostage to be exchanged for Bob Barton, T.D., who was then being treated as a criminal in an English prison, where he was undergoing a 10 years’ sentence for “sedition.”

When Lynch had driven his prisoners for some distance they were conversing amongst themselves in Arabic. The purport of their conversation was made clear when, half an hour later, they suddenly attacked their captors. In a sharp melee which ensued Colonel Danford was wounded. Lynch thereupon sent a motor back to Fermoy military barracks by Tyrell, whom he also released, while Lucas was removed to a place of safety in the keeping of the I.R.A. The manner in which the English soldiers at Fermoy showed their appreciation of a generous foe who had released a wounded officer was to wreck the town next night—the second time within twelve months that Fermoy had been wrecked because of a successful exploit by Liam Lynch.

Lucas himself was every inch a gentleman and a soldier. For five weeks he was a prisoner of the I.R.A., and during that time he was treated with the courtesy and kindness befitting his rank and character. Every facility was given him for communicating with his relatives, and he had every comfort that his captors—themselves “on the run” with their prisoner—could provide. To his credit be it said he acknowledged this later, though I believe he got into trouble with the British War Office.

His last place of detention was a house in East Limerick. From there he made his escape on the night of July 29th, in circumstances which it is not in my province to narrate.

Now, on the morning of July 30th, Sean Treacy and the rest of us had planned an ambush on the road between Limerick and Tipperary. At that time our men were creating much trouble for the enemy by holding up trains and mail cars to censor letters for information. In this way we got much valuable information from time to time, including evidence against local spies here and there. So serious a problem did we create for the British that they had to take special precautions to prevent military mails and despatches falling into our hands. For instance, the Limerick garrison adopted the plan of sending a special military escort by road to the Limerick Junction every morning to take the mails off the train there, and thus avoid possible raids on the 20 miles of the branch line from Limerick Junction to Limerick.

We determined to ambush this party. The spot we selected was half a mile on the Tipperary side of the village of Oola. That would be about six miles from Tipperary town, fifteen from Limerick city and four from Soloheadbeg. Although we were on the main road from Limerick to Waterford we had a great stretch of country by which we could escape southwards, getting back towards East Limerick. The country is comparatively flat with good thick hedges of whitethorn as cover along the roadside.

We expected the military car to arrive from Limerick about 10.30 a.m. A few minutes before that time we felled a tree across the road to block their path. Then we took up our positions, still well out of view, for it must be remembered that in the village of Oola itself, almost in view of our selected spot, there was a strong garrison of peelers, and on the other side of us, two miles away at the Limerick Junction, was another R.I.C. garrison.

Sharp to time the military car came tearing along from Limerick. Just when they turned a corner and drove almost into the barracks we opened fire. Like a shot every man jumped from the car and took cover to reply to our men.

A fierce encounter followed for half an hour. In the first minute two of the British dropped their rifles and rolled over dead, but the others continued to pour volley after volley in the direction from which our fire came. But we were in a difficulty. There were only seven of us there, and we had only ten rounds of ammunition per man.

To add to our troubles we suddenly saw another military car arrive on the scene from the Limerick direction also. We had not calculated on that. These reinforcements must have arrived by accident, but with our limited supplies we could not continue to engage the whole party. We decided to retire. As we were retiring, still checking the enemy with an odd volley from the fields we saw a half a dozen R.I.C. men with rifles coming up from the village to give further help to the military. If we had had enough men or enough ammunition in the first instance we could, of course, have detailed a few men to feign an attack on the barracks so as to keep these fellows indoors; but we could not afford that, and so our plans miscarried.

[Illustration: THE FLYING COLUMN IN TIPPERARY.]

We retired without losing a man or receiving a wound. The enemy had three dead and three wounded.

Next morning we learned more than we knew while engaged in the attack. Brigadier-General Lucas was actually with the enemy forces. He had, as I said, escaped the previous night. He wandered all through the night through the fields not knowing exactly where he was and endeavouring in the first place to avoid any of our men who might have been sent in pursuit of him, and in the second place trying to get in touch with some of his own forces, police or military. On the morning of the ambush he arrived at the village of Pallas, three miles on the Limerick side of Oola, and evidently was picked up by the passing car.

We, of course, did not recognise him. As a matter of fact we were not even aware of his escape. The whole thing was a mere coincidence, though the English newspapers next day splashed the story as an “attempt to recapture the General.” Perhaps it is as well we did not recognise him. Anyhow, we wish him luck, now that all is past.

A few days after this engagement at Oola I returned to Dublin. For some time I was kept busy with minor activities. It was only then, too, that I found an opportunity of having removed from my body some of the bits of hand grenades with which I had been wounded at the attack on Rear Cross police barracks.

This was in the autumn of 1920. We had now been a year and a half on the run with a price on our heads. But I was becoming more reckless. The war was going on with greater intensity every day. I saw that the struggle of the Irish people was taking the shape I had always hoped. The British soldiers and police, particularly the Black and Tans and the Auxiliaries—the latter were all ex-officers of the British Army, and were the garrison’s gentlemen murderers—were day and night looting shops, burning private houses, and murdering prisoners and torturing youths. But the more savage became their methods of repression the more determined the Irish people became to fight to the bitter end. Practically the whole country was now on our side, helping us with food and information when they could not give us more active assistance. Men who had not the same views as we had on active warfare were being driven into our ranks because if they stayed at home in their beds they would be murdered by the British in the dead of night. In fact, their only hope of safety was to get “on the run.”

If anybody not intimately acquainted with the events of that period thinks I am accusing the British too much I can only refer him to the Irish newspapers of the time. These newspapers were bitterly opposed to our policy and our methods, so they were not likely to exaggerate on our behalf. Moreover if they dared to suggest any charge that could not be sustained against the British they knew they would be at once suppressed. Yet, day after day for a year and a half these papers reported the murder of scores of prisoners, the shooting of men in their beds, the looting of towns and the burning of whole streets.

The historian will yet calculate the millions of pounds worth of damage they committed and the hundreds of murders they perpetrated. It is a well-known fact that dozens of these Black and Tans have since committed suicide or gone mad because of the horrors for which they were responsible.

And all this time the I.R.A. was every day becoming a vaster and more perfect military machine. My prophecy to Sean Treacy of 1918 was being fulfilled. Once the fight for freedom started in earnest, as I had said, it was being kept up with renewed vigour.

During this visit to Dublin I put a novel proposal before Headquarters, the adoption of which changed the whole nature of the struggle. I shall outline my proposal in the next chapter.

Meantime I must here refer to my ever trusty friends, at whose houses my companions and I were ever welcome while in Dublin, even though torture and imprisonment would have been the fate of any under whose roof we might be known to shelter. I cannot recall them all now, but some I can never forget—Seumas Ryan, of The Monument Creamery; the Bolands, of Clontarf (Harry’s people); Seumas Kirwan, of Parnell Street (a Tipperary man); the Delaneys, of Heytesbury Street (now Seumas Robinson’s people-in-law); the Flemings, of Drumcondra; Mr. and Mrs. Duncan, of Irishtown; Seumas and Mrs. O’Doherty, of Connaught Street, (later my good friends in America); Martin Conlon and, of course, Phil Shanahan.

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