by Mick Hare
News of the Tans arrival in the village of Ballyslevin had sent a wave of fear around the immediate area. The Tans always arrived in a location when the Crown demanded revenge for some deed perpetrated by the patriots. Three weeks earlier, a squaddie in the British Army, a local lad who had joined up to beat the dole queue, had returned home to see his mother, father and family members. His father was recovering from a mild heart attack and the lad had been obliged to come home. Unfortunately, the local Republican battalion had got wind of this and on the evening before his planned return to his barracks in North Yorkshire he had been abducted on his way home from the local pub and summarily executed as a traitor to Ireland.
Sean, a veteran of the Anglo-Irish guerrilla war, had been angry about the execution, although he had to accept that the presence of a serving member of His Majesty’s Armed Forces did constitute an insult and a provocation. It just seemed a pointless waste of a young Irish life to prove a bleak point. However, when the Tans had arrived three nights ago and rounded up all of the men from the families who lived nearest to the scene of the execution and murdered all eight of them, he was in no doubt about what action should be taken.
So here he was with Eamonn to carry out his part of the night’s action. Their unit had planned three separate actions and each depended on the other for their timing.
Eamonn and Sean crept to the edge of the field and emerged onto the road beside a large personnel truck in front of the tiny barracks. It belonged to the Tans and was used for carrying them to and from the scenes of their atrocities. With silent expertise they set about booby trapping the truck. Sean taped the gelignite to the chassis of the truck and inserted a detonator. They then backed away into the field, playing out a line of cord as they went. Now the action depended upon unit one completing their mission.
Just when it seemed that time would stretch into an eternity they were jolted from their thoughts by a massive explosion coming from the direction of the pub. The crashing of glass and slate roof ripped apart the silence of the night and the flash of light illuminated the sky. Then came the sounds of screaming, crying and groaning as men stumbled out of the bar into the night.
The only villagers were those who had not received the warning not to fraternise with the enemy. The rest of the casualties were Tans and coppers. They had no idea haw many lay dead and wounded inside. Unit one had successfully completed. Now Sean and Eamonn, unit two, were about to go into action. Within seconds of the explosion the barracks door burst open and the rapid sound of orders being barked could be heard across the black silhouetted night. As they had anticipated, the officer considered the distance to the pub necessitated the use of the truck. He screamed at the men to get on board.
As Sean put his hand on the detonator Eamonn crept swiftly to the right, slightly ahead of the truck. When Sean considered that the last man was on board and he heard the sound of the engine starting up he plunged the detonator with a swift, smooth push. There was an agonising instant of silence just long enough for Sean to think, “It’s not worked”. It happened every time. But then the night was ripped apart for the second time. Screams and cries; the roaring of flames; the splintering of glass; the clatter of metal crashing to the ground. All of these sounds in a chaotic maelstrom echoed the earlier explosion that had sliced through the infinite peace that had reigned over the village.
Sean immediately crept to the left of his position and crouched behind a hillock. Tattered and bloody, survivors began to fall out of the burning truck, some with their clothes on fire. At that moment Sean and Eamonn, from their different angles, began to pour bullets into the wreckage. The stumbling survivors were riddled with the incoming fire and they fell, some still consumed by flames.
After several long bursts of fire, Sean and Eamonn stilled their guns. They lay in the flickering night and listened and watched. There was no movement. Still they listened and watched. Then one of the Tans, the officer who had been barking orders started to lift himself from the ground. He got onto all fours, and then pushed himself up into a kneeling position. Just as he moved to put one foot on the floor to begin the painful effort of getting to his feet, first Eamonn and then Sean, let loose one round each. The officer jerked one way, then the other before falling forward onto his face. Just then the petrol tank succumbed to the intense temperature engulfing the vehicle and exploded, spewing flaming liquid into the air and onto the dead and dying, ensuring a one hundred percent fatality achievement. Sean ran back to the detonator, disconnected the leads, stowed it into his shoulder bag and slung it across his back. Eamonn was by his side now. The nervousness was gone and a glow of excitement suffused his expression as Sean caught flickering glimpses of it in the light of the burning truck.
“Okay Sean, me bucko. Let’s make ourselves scarce.”
They turned and ran back across the fields they had come over. After a two mile scramble they saw a gate ahead of them, which stood about five hundred yards from a farmhouse. They stopped and crouched low. Eamonn lifted his head and whistled. He had a good strong whistle and it pierced the night. The tune he whistled was The Camptown Races. They lay back down and stared into the blanket of night. Then a confident whistle came back. The Camptown Races. They jumped to their feet and ran to the gate. “The Camptown ladies sing dis song,” was going round in Sean’s head. As they approached the gate a car drew up and a man stepped out of the shadows beside the gate and came towards them.
“Mission accomplished, Michael,” said Eamonn as they met.
“Well done, boys,” came the reply from Michael, a small man with a black crombie and a trilby hat. “Get in the car and we’ll have you in a place of safety before the empire can get its dreaded claws into you.”
As they pulled away there came the distant sounds of more explosions; one, two, and then three.
“Unit three are making sure the roads are impassable. We’ll have you in Dublin by daylight. When the bastards have finished their reprisals in this part of the world we’ll have you back home with your families.”
And they drove across the broad plain of central Ireland to Dublin, where they would remain in hiding until the heat died down and they could begin planning for their next operation.
Fourteen
1939
Eamonn and Sean completed their warm greetings and talked briefly of old times and people they had known, but then Sean had to remind Eamonn that he had a waiting room full of patients and he would have to get on. They arranged to meet that night in a bar in Cork City. Eamonn said his farewells and left.
Sean explained to Martha that an old comrade in arms from the Anglo-Irish war had turned up and he was going out to meet him. He did not expect to be late, but that she shouldn’t wait up.
Eamonn became a regular visitor to Cork over the next few weeks. Each time he hit town Sean would meet up with him. They often went out drinking but occasionally, they would take in a hurling match. At other times they would head off on bikes around the coast towards Blarney.
They could laugh and joke like only old friends can, but at some point Eamonn would always bring the conversation around to “the cause” and how the situation in Europe might be a great opportunity for Ireland. Eamonn would sometimes come and stay with Sean, Martha and Connie for a couple of nights at a time. Martha sometimes found it a little tiresome to have two men to look after, but deep down she was delighted to see Sean so happy. They were like brothers when they were together. And she smiled at Sean’s attempts to include her in everything they got up to. His consideration for her made her feel loved. For the most part she let them get on with their male pursuits unhindered by her company. She also loved it when they took Conny off with them on one of their jaunts. As they set off on their bikes, Conny sitting astride the crossbar seat Sean had attached for him, she would say to herself, ‘there go my two men,’ and the thought would fill her with contentment.
When September came, the German Reich inflicted its Blitzkrieg upon unsuspecting Poland and the outra
ge of the Nazi-Soviet Pact became common knowledge. Britain and France declared war on Germany and her allies and the world held its breath. The kitchens and pubs of Ireland were filled with conversations about the rights and wrongs of the international crisis and whether DeValera would take the new Republic into the war.
That same month, Sean announced to Martha that he had another appointment in London. The University Middlesex Hospital was providing up-to-the-minute training for general practitioners on how to treat injuries sustained during air raids. That old chestnut again.
Martha had in fact been dreading this announcement. It was her habit to check through Sean’s surgery once or twice a week to make sure that their cleaner, Mary, was maintaining the appropriate levels of hygiene and tidiness. On her last visit some five days earlier she was clearing up some paperwork when a letter fell to the floor. She had glanced at it before she realised what she was doing. And then it was too late. It was from an Andrew Trubshaw – an old rugby acquaintance from university days. A rival from matches between Trinity and Cambridge. It was a harmless letter really. Andrew talked about mutual acquaintances he and Sean had had and he recalled one or two typically undergraduate incidents. But Martha was uneasy because Sean had never mentioned this Andrew Trubshaw to her. And towards the end of the letter the tone altered, but it became obscure.
“The time is coming close, Sean, old buddy,” he wrote. “Old Albion needs the men of the west now.”
To Martha this was not obscure enough. The ‘men of the west’ were famous in song; fighting men who fought the invaders. Now this Trubshaw fellow was suggesting that they would help Albion. Well, Sean lived in Cork. Cork was south, but it was also west.
“And what would a GP in Cork, Ireland be doing with training like that?” she asked sarcastically. “Or have I missed Dev’s declaration of war?”
“It’s only a matter of time, don’t you think?” Sean asked tentatively. “Surely to God we cannot sit by while Britain and France face this nightmare alone!”
“I sincerely hope we can and do,” Martha asserted. “What good would it do to anyone in Ireland to take up arms against Germany alongside the greatest enemy Ireland has ever had? The British Empire has enslaved Catholic Ireland for centuries. For God’s sake Sean, you and your father before you took up arms against the hated British.”
“This is different, Martha. Hitler and the Nazis represent something very different; something the like of which we’ve never encountered.”
“Now you’re sounding like a British propaganda broadsheet. I don’t know how you can say that. You’ve seen the real Germany. You know about German civilisation. You’ve been a part of Brian Hagan’s cultural group. We’re not ignorant anti-German bigots Sean. There is absolutely no reason for Ireland to enter this war.”
“Don’t talk to me about that little snake Hagan. He is nothing but an apologist for Nazi imperialist and racist doctrine. Look, Martha, I lived in Germany. I experienced the rise of Hitler. And yes, I did fight the English in the twenties. But we were fighting to gain freedom. We were fighting for an Irish democracy. We wanted a humane society. Now Britain and France are standing up for humanity and democracy, surely we can be mature enough to know on which side we belong.”
Martha suddenly burst into tears. There was nothing new in these opinions. But they belonged to Dublin and the distance that had grown up between them there. She had hoped they would not re-surface out here in Cork. This was not a new Sean. But it was one she had tried to forget. Why was she married to a man who did not trust her enough to reveal himself openly to her? Why was he tearing down something she thought they had held in common; something she thought had helped to bind and strengthen their relationship? It gave her a feeling of worthlessness.
She couldn’t bring herself to admit she had read the letter from Trubshaw, but she found herself able to say, “You lied to me about your visits to London, didn’t you? You weren’t looking for a job. And you’ve lied to me about this University Hospital training. You’re not going to London to learn how to apply a bandage to a wound. You’re involved in something and as your wife, I think I deserve to be told.”
Sean approached his wife and tentatively reached out to embrace her. She accepted his embrace but there was no submission or forgiveness in her stance. He kissed her hair and whispered, “I can’t tell you, Martha. For the sake of you and Conny, I can’t tell you.”
As his words reached her, he felt her stiffen. He held her shoulders at arms length.
“Martha, please don’t do this. I love you. You know I love you. But I cannot bury my head in this Irish haven and pretend that the world out there does not matter. If Britain falls, how long do you think it will be before the Gestapo is up there in Dublin castle? What will our lives be worth then?”
“I can’t believe you,” said Martha in a cold distant tone. “Here we are, newly set up in our married life. A baby son who adores you. A new baby on the way. There is no compulsion for you to take one step away from here. And yet you are prepared to risk everything. Everything! For what? Tell me that, Sean! For what?”
Sean could find no other answer, and at the end of that week he took the Cork to Swansea crossing and the onward train to London (boat train to London via Swansea).
Sean went and a week later returned. Christmas 1939 came and went and the family enjoyed all the traditional festivities. The war that had been declared in September still hadn’t started. Perhaps everything was going to be all right after all.
They met in Mannix’s bar beside the river and they settled down behind two pints of Guinness. Sean’s delight in Eamonn’s visits had diminished now. The regularity with which he appeared was becoming a concern. Although the campaign for full independence was dormant at the time, it was obvious that Eamonn was still active in the movement.
During Eamonn’s previous visits they had covered all the old ground and there was little catching up they had left to do. Sean and Eamonn had been partners in an active team for fourteen months. To Sean they would always be brothers in arms. Fourteen months might not seem long in the grand scheme of things, but in active combat it was more binding than a lifetime of normal friendship. Britain’s declaration of war against Germany had excited Eamonn and Sean knew what was coming. Knowing the commitment he had made with Andrew Trubshaw, being around Eamonn made him nervous.
“What’s the matter, Sean?” asked Eamonn. “You’ve hardly touched your pint.”
Sean gave a faint smile and sipped at his Guinness.
“War is coming, Sean, make no mistake. England and France will be facing up to a taste of their own medicine at long last. That bastard Chamberlain and his men are already cosying up to DeValera. If we’re not careful we’ll be declaring war on Germany soon and Irishmen will do the fighting and dying for bloody England all over again.”
Sean did most of the listening. He had to be careful about what he said. This old comrade of his had shared the most dangerous of times with him. They had saved each other’s lives more times than they could count. But if Eamonn knew fully what Sean was now involved in, he would have him executed.
Eamonn continued, “We should never have let DeValera back into the country after we drove him out in the civil war. Now is the best chance we will ever have for uniting the whole of Ireland. We must act now against England. Lots of us are active and we have big plans. We haven’t forgotten you Sean. You are well remembered. You have a lot of admirers in the hierarchy. They want you back in. What do you say?”
Sean took a long swig of his Guinness. This was the moment he had dreaded since Eamonn first appeared back in his life. He looked at Eamonn and his bright optimistic face. His eyes said, ‘We can change the world’ and the temptation to become active again was a powerful draw. But then he thought of Martha and his son, Conny. He thought of his new child on the way. He also thought back to his days in Germany and to Raul and Grete and their children Lisa and David . He had to find a way to decline this poisonous invitation witho
ut giving fatal offence. He also thought of his secret commitment. But he quickly pushed that out of his mind.
“Eamonn,” he said carefully. “You and I shared great danger together and there is no man on earth I would trust my life with more than you. But I am different now. I am a doctor. I have to be a man of peace.” He felt the irony of these words as he spoke them in the light of his current affiliation. “I have a wife and son and a new child on the way. Also, I have been inactive since the end of the war. I took no part in the civil war.”