Return to Killybegs, Page 7

  Tom Williams had just been captured by the British, along with five men from C Company. The 2nd Battalion of the Belfast Brigade had just lost one of its leaders. We had assembled at headquarters around the deserted boxing ring. As a precaution, Danny had only lit a night light. News was flooding in from all over, spreading through the neighbourhood. Every new thing we heard was worse than what we already knew.

  In order to safeguard our march, Tom and his soldiers had opened fire on a police patrol on Kashmir Road. Tom was wounded. He had given the order to retreat, but the police had chased after them like hunting dogs. In Cawnpore Street, our men took advantage of open doors. One policeman forced his way into a house. His name was Patrick Murphy and he was a Catholic. He lived on the Falls Road and had nine children. Everyone knew him. He was shot down in the middle of the living room.

  —He was a dirty fucking peeler! shouted Danny Finley.

  But all the same, he was a Catholic.

  —A fucking traitor! Danny growled.

  We nodded our heads, but our Fianna hearts were conflicted. The IRA had just assassinated one of our own. Or near enough. A Catholic who was feeding his family as best he could.

  —By shooting us in the back, is that it?

  Sure enough. But all the same. He was of our flesh. The British skin was an animal hide. Their blood wasn’t the same colour as ours. It was soldier blood. Thicker, darker, dirtier. By shooting at Murphy, we had just opened our own veins.

  Danny shook me by the shoulders. He asked me to look him in the eye. Better than that! Directly in the eye! And what could I see there? A murderer of Irishmen? No! Of course not! I had to pull myself together, and to learn. I had to go back to the beginning again. This wasn’t a war between Catholics and Protestants! Wolfe Tone, the father of Irish Republicanism, was a Protestant. Well then, what was the difference? A Protestant could join the IRA, a Catholic could dress up as a king’s soldier. Well then, who was our enemy? The Protestant IRA man or the Catholic wearing the British uniform? Which one did we have to fight?

  —Do you understand that, Tyrone Meehan? You’re fighting for the Irish Republic, not for Rome! You left those priests of yours on the other side of the border. So stop mixing everything up, please!

  There were about twenty of us scouts in the room. Danny looked from one to the other to see if everything he’d said had been understood.

  —There are fewer Catholics in the RUC than there are fingers on one hand. Those who join up know the risks involved. Murphy will serve as an example.

  Then he straightened up, legs apart and hands behind his back. And he assumed his voice of command.

  —Na Fianna Éireann, stand at attention!

  We straightened up, arms rigid at our sides and chins raised.

  —Na Fianna Éireann, on your knees!

  We knelt in a single motion, solemn and dignified. All of us together on the cement.

  He knelt in turn and closed his eyes.

  —In the name of the Father, and of the Son ...

  And then we prayed aloud for the grey soul of Patrick Murphy.

  The six IRA combatants involved in the incident were sentenced to death, but only Thomas Williams was executed. Before the judges, my friend claimed responsibility for the operation and for the fatal shots. Although he had been wounded and was choking, prostrated by an asthma attack, and although he had dropped his weapon, he assumed all responsibility. The Irish government appealed for clemency. The Vatican waited in vain for an act of mercy. Tom was hanged at nineteen years of age on 2 September 1942, in the courtyard of Crumlin Road Gaol in Belfast. Buried like a dog inside the compound itself, on prison ground, without a cross, without a plaque, without anything personal. The British deprived us of his body.

  —I met the bravest of the brave this morning. Tom Williams walked to that scaffold without a tremor in his body. The only people who were shaking were us and the hangman, Father Alexis had recounted to the inmates gathered in the prison chapel.

  —Don’t pray for Tom Williams, the chaplain added, pray to him, for at this moment Tom is a saint in heaven.

  So Tom guided us.

  All over the city, groups attacked the police and the RUC with bricks. A police station was burned down. At Crossmaglen, thirty IRA óglaigh attacked the British army base to kidnap an officer and hang him. The operation failed, but a policeman was killed. Two others were shot in County Tyrone. A fourth died in Belfast while pursuing some men who were planting bombs. We were lost, maddened with rage, drunk on vengeance. On the front page of the Belfast Telegraph an outraged journalist wrote of how two Republicans had challenged some American soldiers by giving them the Nazi salute.

  Father Alexis also told of how Tom was whistling on his way to meet death. He was whistling ‘God Save Ireland’, our old national hymn. The one we would sing at home, in the pubs, during marches, in stadia. The one we would hum softly when we passed British patrols. The one we would bellow until we were out of breath, our hands full of stones.

  ‘God Save Ireland!’ said the heroes!

  ‘God Save Ireland!’ said they all.

  Whether on the scaffold high

  Or the battlefield we die,

  Oh, what matter when for Erin dear we fall!

  My brother Seánie was interned in October 1942. No evidence, no trial, no sentence. They were isolating headstrong men. On 3 January 1943, it was my turn, and Danny Finley’s. For a week I had pains in my arms – the left one from being gripped by the policeman, the right from my mother clinging on to me. Hostility, love, two black stains bruising my flesh in equal measure.

  They came in the middle of the night. I rolled down the stairs, dragged by the hair and by my shirt collar. I was sleeping fully clothed, I was waiting for them. Wee Kevin was crying, Brian and Niall were crying, baby Sara was howling in her cradle. A policeman whacked me in the eye with the butt of his gun a few times. He beat my mother on the arms and in the face to force her to let go. She fell, her hands clasped over her mouth. My mother on the ground and my first true cry of vengeance. The one that makes you get up and fight. That hits you in your gut when your heart hesitates. My mother on the ground. Her lips, my face, her saliva and my blood. She had pulled out her rosary and handed it to me with both hands. She was roaring at the Virgin as they carried me away. For the first time, I called on hatred to give me strength.

  Farther up the street, facing the wall and with their hands above their heads, stood Danny and a few men. People were throwing slates from the roofs, hitting the metal of the armoured cars. We were forced into a truck, kicking, punching, enraged. Some police shot at the windows. They were the ‘B-Specials’, the worst of the lot, the assassins of our people.

  We arrived at Crumlin, ten Irishmen, ankles and wrists shackled, walking one behind the other through the corridors.

  Danny and I were the youngest there.

  —Are the Fianna recruiting in playschool now? joked a prisoner.

  It was in this prison that Tom Williams’s body had been desecrated. The place had been described to me. Brick walls messily smeared a greyish-white. The dilapidated paintwork in tatters, blistered, soiled by fingers, shoe soles and damp. The red hexagonal floor tiles underfoot. The metallic passageways, the footbridges, the spiral iron staircases, the arched ceilings, the narrow, never-ending passages. Our cells with their black doors. I knew about all of that, but I had never imagined either the noise or the stench. A nightmare of shouting, of protest, of orders, of human barking. The metal of high barriers, the clanging of doors, the grinding of iron against the floors, the walls, the heavy, clattering footsteps of the guards. People had told me about the solitude of prison, but not the cacophony. I was astonished. And everything smelt of sick men. Their sweat, their breath, their filth, their food, their shit, their piss. Arriving in the B wing of the prison, I brought my hands to my nose, pulling the chain from the others.

  —That stinks of Irish pig, eh wee rebel? the warder spat at me.

  —Don’t an
swer!

  Danny’s order from where he was walking behind me.

  —Doesn’t your mother smell a bit like that between her legs?

  I looked at the dirty day through the skylights that were covered in wire.

  —Reminds you of your pigsty, eh?

  —He’s just a kid! Let him breathe, another prisoner said.

  Without a word the screws threw themselves on him. He fell. We all fell. They were striking us and spitting on us. We tried to protect ourselves. I was lying down, kicking the air. Other warders arrived, yelling. There were a dozen of them running at us, batons raised. They lined up with their backs to the wall, facing each other with us in the middle. They attacked as one, all of them at the same time, like a line of woodcutters. They were crushing our arms and legs under their heels. I was crying out with pain. The others were roaring with rage. Invisible fists were violently pounding against the cell doors.

  —IRA! IRA! IRA!

  I could no longer smell the prison stench. I could no longer hear its metal. I had blood in my mouth and my ears were on fire, my nose smashed. The din was inside me. I thought of my father’s blows, my head turned to stone, blocking out the pain, my eyes burning and my cheeks smeared with saliva to make him think I was crying. A whistle was blown sharply. Two warders threw bowlfuls of freezing water at us. I was cold with fear when I arrived; now I was frozen with pain. We were jumbled in a heap in the middle of the line of cells, a mass of flesh and ropes. The screws were out of breath. They were watching us wordlessly, their batons dangling in their hands. A prison officer arrived. He lit a cigarette.

  —Put them in their cells tomorrow. They’re not moving for now.

  And then he turned away.

  We remained like that the whole night, piled on the concrete that was sticky with blood and water. I was lying on my back, a guy’s foot against my throat, another’s cheek against my cheek and the dead weight of Danny lying on my legs. Someone had vomited. I closed my eyes without sleeping. I was shaking. That’s when I heard a voice, a thin thread.

  —Tyrone?

  It was Danny. He was whispering.

  I had blood in my mouth and dirty, bloody foam caked on my lips.

  —If you can hear me, move your foot.

  I moved slightly.

  —Are you listening to me?

  I made the same painful movement.

  —Well then, here you go. There’s an IRA unit waiting in ambush for an English patrol in the countryside outside Crossmaglen. The Brits pass there every day at five in the evening. At ten past five there’s still no sign of them. Captain Paddy looks at his watch and says, ‘Shit, I hope nothing’s happened to them ...’

  I convulsed. A laugh. Pains in my chest and stomach.

  In ainm an Athar, agus an Mhic, agus an Spioraid Naoimh ...

  I recited the Our Father in Irish in my head.

  And Tom Williams was praying with me.

  The following day I was led to a cell, alone. My twelve-by-seven-foot space contained an iron bed, a bedside table, a slop bucket and a washbowl. There were two hooks on the wall for my clothes. There was an arched brick ceiling painted cream, a floor of caked blood and a high skylight through which the daylight would enter only to dissipate before it reached me on the floor. My first prison cell. And my first tears. They were waiting for a signal from me. Since I’d arrived I’d been too busy with pride and pain. But once the door was locked behind me and the walls closed in around me, I was just a seventeen-year-old. No longer a Fianna, no longer a Republican, not even Irish ... a soldier of nothing and nobody. I cried, curled up on my bed, knees drawn into my chest and hands crossed under my chin.

  At that moment, I understood that my life would be extinguished between these captive walls and my barbed-wire street. I would be coming and going from this place until my dying breath. Hands released, shackled, freed again to carry a gun while waiting for the chains once more, never knowing whether death would be waiting for me on the inside or on the street.

  —No sleeping! Sit up or stand up! shouted a warder, his eye against the peephole.

  So I walked. Three steps, two steps, lengthways, widthways, going, coming back, suddenly altering the rhythm to keep myself alert.

  I turned eighteen on 8 March 1943. I had told a few friends. I heard their voices. They were roaring from their cells.

  —Lá breithe sona dhuit, wee Tyrone!

  Men’s voices, cracked from alcohol and smoking, worn out from shouting and from prison.

  —It’s forbidden to speak in Irish! shouted the warder, banging on the doors.

  Our language was a weapon. The screws knew it.

  On Sunday, 14 March, during Mass, two prisoners approached me. One was huge, the other shorter. Father Alan had no control over his flock of sinners. Some of them were singing the hymns and responding to him, but the others made the most of the service to exchange news. While conversation between prisoners was prohibited, even during exercise time, the ruckus was tolerated here. The warders used to turn a blind eye. One hour of freedom so we didn’t lose the plot.

  —You turned eighteen last Monday, isn’t that right? the big guy asked me.

  A dozen other men suddenly drew around, turning their backs to us and forming a barrier. I was surprised by their surrounding us. I didn’t know the guy talking to me. I nodded.

  —Yes, eighteen on Monday.

  —You’re Lieutenant Seán Meehan’s brother?

  Lieutenant? Seánie was a lieutenant?

  —Yes.

  They glanced at one another. I had been caught out. I acted as though I was in on the secret.

  —Today, Fianna, you have a choice. Go back home when you get out of here, or join us.

  —Nobody is under any obligation, the smaller man said. There are plenty of other ways to help the Republic.

  —By studying, for example, the first guy took over again.

  I shook my head. In Killybegs I had been a poor student. I had never understood much of what went on at school. Neither maths nor logic. I loved Irish, English, history. Nothing else. The priests used to pull our hair. My father would beat me for every bad mark. My mother struggled just to read her prayer book.

  —I was under Tom Williams’s command.

  That was all I said. Neither out of vanity nor insolence. I simply wanted those men to know that I hadn’t arrived from my village yesterday. The big guy pointed out the smaller with a jerk of his head.

  —Joe was with Tom when he was arrested.

  —Joe Cahill, the other murmured, offering me his hand.

  Behind me, the priest was reading from Paul’s Letter to the Romans.

  —‘… but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened ... ’

  The wall of men tightened around me. I raised my hand.

  —I swear allegiance to the Irish Republic and to the IRA, its army, the first prisoner prompted me.

  —I swear allegiance to Poblacht na hÉireann and to Óglaigh na hÉireann.

  —I swear allegiance to the 1916 Proclamation and vow to fight for the creation of a socialist Republic ...

  The chaplain was praying softly. He was trying to scold us. Father Alan was not Father Alexis who had accompanied Tom the martyr. This priest hated us.

  —‘... professing themselves to be wise, they became fools, and changed the glory of the uncorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man …’

  His sermon was tremulous, my promise whispered. I knew he was addressing me. He knew his prisoners. He knew our tricks and our schemes. Every Sunday he would notice whatever passed from hand to hand, the notes, objects and signs. He knew what the absence of one or the presence of another meant. He had observed the men moving to surround me. He knew that in the middle of this closed group, a young man was swearing allegiance. That noiselessly a sinner was in the process of breaking his pact with peace and a soul was escaping him forever.

  When it came to the Eucharist I was in my place, facing him.


  —Let those who have no blood on their hands come forward, said the priest every Sunday.

  And every Sunday I was the only one to kneel in front of him.

  He watched me for a long time that day. I didn’t recognize his face. He no longer wore his smile. My hands were joined. He placed the host on my tongue.

  —Body of Christ.

  I held his gaze.

  —Amen.

  I was miserable.

  When I got up again, he bent over to whisper in my ear.

  —Do you know that you have just promised to kill?

  My hands were still joined, the dry taste of the unleavened bread was still on my palate. I couldn’t say yes. There is no word to justify killing. So I simply maintained eye contact. I didn’t challenge him. I was leaving the door to my heart wide open.

  —By following Barabbas you are condemning Jesus, the priest murmured.

  He looked at the silent congregation. The prisoners were solemn, as though they knew every word being exchanged.

  —Next Sunday, do not come forward to the altar for Communion. Stay with your accomplices.

  And then he turned away from me.

  When I returned to my seat a guy nudged my shoulder.

  —A good quarrel with God beats loneliness.

  And he laughed, while the priest removed his stole in a discontented manner.

  I stayed in Crumlin Gaol for twenty-eight months. And I never went back to the chapel. I had fashioned a crucifix out of breadcrumbs, plaster torn from the wall, and saliva. It was every bit as good as the big silver cross Father Alan used to place on the altar for Mass. When I was released on 26 April 1945, the British had almost won their war. And we were worn out.

  Seánie and I took up my uncle’s chimney-sweep business again. We found a little work locally, but the city centre and the Protestant neighbourhoods were off-limits. Clients would often pay by bartering: we would sweep their chimneys in exchange for food. Róisín was working in the local post office. Mary was helping out in Costello’s grocery. The little ones were trying to make the most out of school. And Mother was losing control. She spent her days between the kitchen and church. She prayed out loud while cleaning the house. Sometimes, she drew a crowd in the street. On the corner of Dholpur Lane, she’d put curses on passers-by, brandishing her rosary. I would take her by the arm then to walk her back home.