The murder of Captain Joseph T. Thompson (aged 32) of the 1st Battalion, Manchester Regiment in Ballincollig, county Cork on 20 November how ruthless the IRA had become as they were determined to put an end to the military’s reign of terror over the civilian population.   Thompson left Ballincollig on the afternoon of 20 November ‘in a motor bicycle to visit some friends’ but was soon afterwards ambushed by th...

Some outrages and murders throughout the month of November 1920 failed to generate the same level of condemnation as Kevin Barry, Bloody Sunday or Kilmichael.   One such murder was that of Constable James Wood who was shot at Ballybrack Railway Station, near Killarney and died six days later on 15 November. Woods, aged 29 had been returning from leave when he was attacked by an armed group at the railway station. Co...

The murder of Fr Michael Griffen (aged 28) in Galway in November 1920 was seen by many as one of the most grotesque acts carried out by either side in the Irish War of Independence.   On the night of 14 November Griffen was lured from his house in Galway city on the pretence of assisting a person who lay seriously ill. Three men played their part in the ruse but more were involved in the interrogation that followed....

Espousing the cause of Labour became a dangerous position throughout the autumn and winter of 1920 as union members became the target of the military and the police.   In some cases the Black and Tans as they marauded through the countryside paid little heed to who was who and often targeted the offices of prominent local officials. In November 1920 the secretary of the ITGWU in Ardee, county Louth, James Dolan was ...

Amidst all of the bloodshed which November 1920 brought, the cause of labour and the work of unions continued, protecting the rights of workers.   However, within that remit of protecting workers the unions by this stage were also involved in the wider Republican campaign which was waging throughout the country. In November 1920 the newspaper The Watchword of Labour publically condemned those who had gone to work on...

In November 1920 Sir Hamar Greenwood, in the course of the discussions in the British House of Commons described the Irish Bulletin newspaper as the organ of the ‘murder gang’ claiming that it espoused outrage and sympathised with murder. This may have been true in some respects but it did condone the murder of innocent civilians and the damage to property. On the contrary, it actively engaged in reporting the crimes, w...

In an effort to highlight the rapacity of the British military, and in particular the actions of the Black and Tans in reprisal, newspapers such as Irish Bulletin published the names and details of those who had been subjected to extreme violence or who had been murdered. In November 1920 the Bulletin carried the following information about the terror campaign in Ireland:   Murder of Denis Carey of Nenagh, taken fro...

The events on Bloody Sunday, particularly in Croke Park where a football match between Tipperary and Dublin was attacked by the Black and Tans, has received considerable media attention this month on the 100th anniversary of the event. In Croke Park recently the names of the 14 victims, including Tipperary footballer Michael Hogan were remembered in a very poignant ceremony. Less well known though are the names of some of t...

The events on Bloody Sunday in Croke Park; the murder of members of the ‘Cairo Gang’ by Michael Collins’ ‘Squad; the execution of Kevin Barry and the ambush of the Black & Tans at Kilmichael loom large over the story of the War of Independence in November 1920. But what else happened during that month in Ireland 100 years ago? The pages of the Irish Newspaper Archive and Radical Newspaper Archive provide the answ...

Download the latest reports from the day after Bloody Sunday form the Evening Herald.  ...