30 September 2022, “Independent councillor Kieran McCarthy said: ‘The tree line on Boreenmanna Rd in particular is incredible. It’s quite beautiful at autumn time and it would be an environmental travesty if those trees were actually cut down’ “, Road-widening plans prompt ribbon protest on Boreenmanna Road, Road-widening plans prompt ribbon protest on Boreenmanna Road (echolive.ie)
Monthly Archives: September 2022
Kieran’s Our City, Our Town, 29 September 2022
Kieran’s Our City, Our Town Article,
Cork Independent, 29 September 2022
Journeys to a Free State: A City of Rifle Fire
Despite the securing of Cork City by the National Army of the Irish Provisional Government across August 1922, Anti Treaty IRA members continued to pursue their aims, and Civil War was brought to street corners and into buildings. The Cork Examiner outlines several tit-for-tat activities across September 1922.
In the early hours of 2 September 1922, the forces of the National Army stationed in the city in the course of raiding operations, discovered what was a munitions factory in the house at the corner of the South Mall and Queen Street (now Fr Mathew Street). The munitions were discovered in the upstairs portion of the house over 17a South Mall or 1 Queen Street. A gentleman named Mr McGuckin, who resided there has been arrested, and was detained.
The discoveries made by the troops during their search of the premises included: three boxes of bombs, two bags of bombs, about eight rifles, the same number of revolvers (of either Colt or Webley pattern), large quantities of ammunition, mostly of the dum-dum and explosive type, and machinery for the manufacture of bombs and ammunition.
The two bags of bombs were found underneath the flooring in one of the rooms. The machinery, which was of a very elaborate nature, was right at the top of the house. It was in perfect working order and was capable of turning out quantities of bombs and ammunition, while special provision had also been made for the manufacture of dumdum bullets. The ammunition found on the premises was principally of this type, and included bullets for Thompson and Lewis guns, as well as rifles, revolvers, and even pistols.
On 2 September in the morning at 10.15am an attack was made on the soldiers stationed at one of the city’s national army bases at the Cork City Club, Grand Parade at the intersection of the South Mall. Machine gun and rifle fire was opened upon them. One was killed and fourteen injured. The attack was opened on them from the opposite side of the river – Sullivan’s Quay.
A motor bicycle and sidecar were proceeding slowly up the quay from Parliament Bridge in a westerly direction. A machine-gun was mounted in the sidecar attachment and trained on the Grand Parade. As soon as the soldiers came into view of the two men in this vehicle the machine-gun opened fire.
At the same moment two men with rifles were seen to fire on the unarmed soldiers from the roof of a house a little to the Parliament Bridge side of Friary Lane, which turns off Sullivan’s Quay at right angles, almost opposite the National Monument. Two other men opened fire from another low roof on the western side of the corner of Friary Lane. The wounded were all brought to the Mercy Hospital.
In the early hours of 5 September snipers were active and several of the National Army posts in the city were attacked. None of the soldiers was hit. The only casualty was Miss Elizabeth O’Meara, who was wounded while in bed at her residence on the Grand Parade. Firing started in the vicinity of Victoria Barracks about midnight, but seemed at first to be merely an effort to draw the fire of the National soldiers. As the morning advanced, however, the firing developed, and machine-gun fire could be distinctly heard for a long time about daybreak.
About 2am an attack was made on the Metropole Hotel, and the sniping in the vicinity of this building continued for nearly six hours until about 7am. Near dawn, shots were fired at the City Club base, Grand Parade, from all sides, but particularly from the rear and from the south side of the river. Replies of gunfire from the National soldiers had the effect of quickly silencing the snipers. Casualties amongst the IRA, if any, were unknown. All the National Army soldiers escaped unhurt.
The Cork Examiner records that on the morning of 7 September, a series of raids on mails were made in different districts in the city, about 25 postmen (of 47 active postmen that morning), engaged in delivering letters, were held-up and the contents of their bags being appropriated by armed men. In each case the postman was confronted by two or three men, who produced revolvers and forced him to hand over the contents of his post-bag. In many cases the postmen had commenced delivery before being hold-up, but in a few cases all the letters were taken. Some of these were recovered by the Post Office. They were handed by an armed civilian.
About 10pm on 13 September night some eight to ten soldiers – all unarmed – were testing a motor lorry, which had been undergoing repairs at Messrs Johnson and Perrott’s garage in Emmet Place. They took the car for a short trial spin towards St Patrick’s Bridge, and it was while doing so that the bomb was thrown at the lorry. It fell into the car, but, very fortunately, did not explode. The person who threw it escaped into the darkness.
About 9.15pm on 18 September 1922 machine gun fire was opened at the National Army troops posted at Moore’s Hotel on Morrison’s Island. The attack came from the opposite side of the river, where a motor car was believed to have had a machine gun. There were no casualties among the troops, but a Mrs Haines, who was a guest in a house adjoining Moore’s Hotel, received several bullet wounds. She was brought to the Mercy Hospital in a critical condition.
Shortly after 9pm on 28 September a small party of National Army troops were travelling along the Ballvhooly road towards the city. A bomb was thrown at them from inside a gateway, which led to the backs of some houses, and from which an easy escape could be made. Due probably to the aim of the thrower the bomb went well wide of its mark, and none of the troops sustained any injuries. Indeed, beyond a small hole in the road and a few broken panes of glass in the houses in the immediate neighbourhood, no physical damage was done, but the local neighbourhood was highly concerned.
Many thanks to everyone who attended the 2022 season of public historical walking tours.
Caption:
1170a. National Army soldiers in front of the commandeered Cork City and County Club at the intersection of the Grand Parade and the South Mall, photographed by W D Hogan (source: National Library, Dublin).
Kieran’s Our City, Our Town, 22 September 2022
Kieran’s Our City, Our Town Article,
Cork Independent, 22 September 2022
Launch of A History of the Glen
Gerard Martin O’Brien’s book on The Glen in the heartland of Cork’s northside is an impressive landmark and beautiful publication. It is a personal memoir brought alive with deep research on the story of such a space of industrial heritage but also the movement in recent years to restore the space as one of Cork’s leading biodiverse parks. The book is entitled Faeries, Felons and Fine Gentlemen, A History of the Glen, Cork, 1700-1980 and is being launched at 7.30pm at Mayfield Library on 23 September, aka on Culture Night.
The book is intermixed with Gerard’s stories of growing up in the heart of the Glen to the stories of the various industries, which harnessed the power and space of the Glen river valley. In his introduction, Gerard noted about playing in the Glen amidst the ruins; “My Glen, the one I grew up in, had such diamond-like qualities as far as I was concerned. Yet, as a youngster, when I explored the old ruins, mused on the function of old waterways, and listened to stories of past activities and occupations, I should have understood how my ‘permanent world’ was already changing and had always been changing”.
Gerard’s idea for the book had its origins in the chance discovery of an old photograph of Goulding’s factory, which is not just remarkable for the clarity of the image, but also surprised Gerard with the clarity of recall the image engendered. It was one of three taken by the intrepid aerial photographer, Captain Alexander (‘Monkey’) Morgan in 1956, which Gerard discovered in the Morgan Collection in the National Photographic Archive.
Gerard describes that the Glen River is neither big nor long but rises from the springs and marshes in Lower Mayfield and Banduff and flows west. It is joined at Valebrook by another stream emanating in upper Ballyvolane (Ballincolly). The enlarged river flows through the Glen. At Blackpool it joins the bigger and longer Bride River. The river provided power to many industrial enterprises over the past three hundred years. Five mill ponds of varying sizes once punctuated its course at relatively even intervals between where it first emerges near the Fox and Hounds Crossroads, and Spring Lane at the western end.
As far as a history of the Glen is concerned, Gerard details that there were many versions of what the Glen had been like ‘before’ and the farther he went back in time, the less clear-cut anything became. Even the names changed and changed again through the lack of standard spelling or mistranslation: Glounapooka, Glounaspike and Glounaspooks are now forgotten names once associated with opposite ends of the Glen.
Before the eighteenth century, Gerard speculates the activities that went on there. For instance, the trees that covered the Glen in the nineteenth century were English elm, which had been introduced to Ireland in the seventeenth century. For such trees to colonise an area, there must have been a clearance of native woodland – but by whom and why is not recorded. Of arable faming Gerard denotes: “There is evidence to show that the eastern part of the Glen, being arable, was farmed long before the eighteenth century. Then of course, going back into prehistory, the post ice-age landscape would have been entirely different, and at some stage it is possible that much of the lower Glen, possibly all the western half, was a big lake before the river eroded its way through the rocky pass”.
Gerard’s research details that the quarrying of stone, sand and gravel probably represented the first efforts at exploitation of the Glen’s resources. Historic documents refer to a ‘north’ and ‘south’ sand quarry in the eighteenth-century Glen. A third quarry was also opened in the nineteenth century on the borders of Cahergal and Clashnaganiff townlands. The rock on the south face of the Glen was also quarried, most likely to build the mills in the eighteenth century and the distillery in the early nineteenth. However, from examining a succession of early OS maps, Gerard argues that it is probable that the quarrying of stone continued, at least periodically, throughout the nineteenth century. The sand quarries have now either been built over or landscaped, but evidence of the stone quarries can still be traced.
The earliest date for which references can be traced for any of these mills is the beginning of the eighteenth century. Gerard argues that it is not impossible that one or two ‘prototype mills’ existed before that. The Dodge family, one of the first families to make their mark on the Glen, may have prospered but their prosperity was a relative one: they were comfortable but did not amass a large fortune and plied the same trade for a century.
Gerard maps out and writes in detail that towards the end of the eighteenth century, flax milling was established at the eastern end of the Glen, but the process appears to have lasted only thirty years at most, before the mill was converted to a starch mill. The only other manufacturing process to be carried on in the Glen at that stage was iron working – a trade as old as corn milling – so it appears that a slow, steady, hardly changing way of life prevailed for the first century covered in this work. Gerard describes that in effect, the mills are centred in two clusters; “The iron mill, flax mill and one corn mill were located at the eastern end of the Glen where the landscape is broader, and the hills rise gently from a wide, marshy base. The malt/corn mills and the distillery/fertiliser factory were at the western end where the hills rise steeply to approximately one hundred feet and the valley floor has a characteristic V-shape”.
With the beginning of the nineteenth century the establishment of the distillery introduced an industrial model to the Glen. Gerard outlines that the first of these individuals, Humphreys Manders, went bankrupt almost immediately. The Perrier Brothers, with more money and experience, straightaway took his place. They did not live in the Glen and had other interests elsewhere in the city. The nineteenth century would see several such individuals associated with the Glen. Then, as the twentieth century dawned, a new type of industry dominated the landscape – Goulding’s Fertilisers, which was arguably the first Irish multinational industry.
Faeries, Felons and Fine Gentlemen, A History of the Glen, Cork, 1700-1980 by Gerard Martin O’Brien – copies can be bought at the launch or contact Gerard through his website www.bluehorsepress.net.
Caption:
1169a. Gerard Martin O’Brien, age four, standing by the ‘Hatch’, The Glen, circa 1957, from Faeries, Felons and Fine Gentlemen, A History of the Glen, Cork, 1700-1980 by Gerard Martin O’Brien.
Cllr McCarthy: Fortnight Left for Cork BusConnects Consultation, 19 September 2022
Independent Cllr Kieran McCarthy calls on householders with concerns on the proposed BusConnects route from Maryborough Hill through to Douglas Road across Boreenmanna Road and Well Road to make submissions to the consultation process by Monday 3 October on Cork BusConnects.ie.
BusConnects Cork aims to enhance the capacity and potential of the public transport system. It will support the delivery of a low carbon and climate-resilient public transport system in addition to greatly improving accessibility to jobs, education whilst playing a key role in regeneration and improvements to public realm and City Centres.
Cllr McCarthy noted; “The plan is ambitious but proposes dramatic changes to the roadscape in order to future proof public transport across the city. I continue to receive a lot of calls and emails from locals asking for City Council members to intervene but on this enormous set of plans, the democratic powers of local Council members have been dismissed, and the National Transport Authority is now the key decision maker.
“If local residents have questions, they can still contact me. I have heard from many local residents who have concerns on the widening of Douglas Road, Boreenmanna Road, Well Road and Grange Road. It is crucial that those who live along these roads and who are still not unaware of the plans that they log onto Cork BusConnects website and come up to speed with proposals to take strips of front garden space, tree corridors and on-street car-parking”, detailed Cllr McCarthy.
Cllr McCarthy also organised a number of public meetings on the National Transport Authority proposal to place a 20 metre wide bridge to facilitate bus and cars over Ballybrack Woods from Donnybrook Hill to Maryborough Woods as part of the Grange to Douglas Bus Corridor. Cllr McCarthy noted: “This is a shocking act of environmental vandalism. Yes there is a need to improve the nature of public transport in the city and in the south east of the city but not at the expense of demolishing half a woodland to do it”.
Kieran’s Our City, Our Town, 15 September 2022
Kieran’s Our City, Our Town Article,
Cork Independent, 15 September 2022
Launch of Discover Cork: Schools’ Heritage Project, Year 21
It is great to reach year 21 of the Discover Cork: Schools’ Heritage Project. It is just slightly younger than this column but both this column, the schools’ heritage project (below) and the walking tours are all about popularising more of Cork’s history and story for interested citizens and the next generation.
Over 15,000-16,000 students have participated in the Schools’ Heritage Project through the years with many topics researched and written about – from buildings and monuments to people’s stories and memories.
Never before has our locality and its heritage being so important for recreation and for our peace of mind. In the past two years, more focus than ever before has been put on places and spaces we know, appreciate, and attain personal comfort from.
The Schools’ Heritage Project is aimed at both primary and post primary level. Project books may be submitted on any aspect of Cork’s rich past. The theme for this year’s project is “The Value of the Past”. Funded by Cork City Council, the Project is an initiative of the Cork City Heritage Plan.
The Project is open to schools in Cork City at primary level to the pupils of fourth, fifth and sixth class and at post-primary from first to sixth years. There are two sub categories within the post primary section, Junior Certificate and Leaving Certificate. The project is free to enter. A student may enter as an individual or as part of a group or a part of a class entry.
Co-ordinated by myself, one of the key aims of the Project is to encourage students to explore, investigate and debate their local heritage (built, archaeological, cultural and natural) in a constructive, active and fun way. Projects on any aspect of Cork’s rich heritage can be submitted to an adjudication panel. Prizes are awarded for best projects and certificates are given to each participant. A cross-section of projects submitted from the last school season can be gleamed from links on my website, www.corkheritage.ie where there are other resources, former titles and winners as well as entry information.
Students produce a project on their local area using primary and secondary sources. Each participating student within their class receives a free workshop in October 2021. The workshop comprises a guide to how to put a project together. Project material must be gathered in an A4/ A3 size Project book. The project may be as large as the student wishes but minimum 20 pages (text + pictures + sketches).
Projects must also meet five elements. Projects must be colourful, creative, have personal opinion, imagination and gain publicity before submission. These elements form the basis of a student friendly narrative analysis approach where the student explores their project topic in an interactive and task-oriented way. In particular, students are encouraged (whilst respecting social distancing) to attain material through visiting local libraries, engaging with fieldwork, making models, photographing, cartoon creating, and making short snippet films of their area. Re-enacting can also be a feature of several projects.
For over twenty years, the project has evolved in exploring how students pursue local history and how to make it relevant in society. The project attempts to provide the student with a hands-on and interactive activity that is all about learning not only about heritage in your local area (in all its forms) but also about the process of learning by participating students.
The project is about thinking about, understanding, appreciating and making relevant in today’s society the role of our heritage, our landmarks, our oral histories, our environment in our modern world for upcoming citizens. So, the project is about splicing together activity on issues of local history and heritage such as thinking, exploring, observing, discovering, researching, uncovering, revealing, interpreting, and resolving.
The project is open to many directions of delivery. Students are encouraged to engage with their topic in order to make sense of it, understand and work with it. Students continue to experiment with the overall design and plan of their work. For example, and in general, students who have entered before might engage with the attaining of primary information through oral histories. The methodologies that the students create provide interesting ways to approach the study of local heritage.
Students are asked to choose one of two extra methods (apart from a booklet) to represent their work. The first option is making a model whilst the second option is making a short film. It is great to see students using modern up todate technology to present their findings. This works in broadening their view of approaching their project.
This project is kindly funded by Cork City Council (viz the help of Niamh Twomey, Heritage Officer) Prizes are also provided by the Old Cork Waterworks Experience, Lee Road.
Overall, the Schools’ Heritage Project for the past 21 years has attempted to build a new concerned generation of Cork people, pushing them forward, growing their self-development empowering them to connect to their world and their local heritage. Spread the word please with local schools. Details can be found on my dedicated Cork heritage website, www.corkheritage.ie.
Caption:
1168a. Front cover of 2022-2023 brochure for Discover Cork Schools’ Heritage Project.
Kieran’s Question to CE and Motions, Cork City Council Meeting, 12 September 2022
Question to CE:
To ask the CE for an update and progress report on the resolution of the collapsed car park quay wall at South Gate Bridge (Cllr Kieran McCarthy).
Motions:
To ask the South East LEA for an update on the progress of Coach Hill Road Works Scheme, Rochestown? When will plans be presented to the public and funding be put in place? Cllr Kieran McCarthy).
To ask the Roads and Transportation SPC on why the provision of home insurance has become a feature of our parking by-laws permits (Cllr Kieran McCarthy).
Kieran’s Our City, Our Town, 8 September 2022
Kieran’s Our City, Our Town Article,
Cork Independent, 8 September 2022
Journeys to a Free State: Remembering Timothy Kennefick
It has been fifteen years since this column focussed on the Timothy Kennefick memorial near Coachford. My thanks to Tony McCarthy, Blarney for raising Timothy’s story way back when this column was exploring and writing about the River Lee valley.
On a Sunday drive around 2002, a friend asked Tony McCarthy to go and see people home from America –the children of Timothy Kennefick – Tim and Ellen, both in the late autumn of their lives. Corkman Tony McCarthy was drawn to their story and sympathetic to the basic memorial that existed near Coachford, which recorded the death of their father and his part in the Irish Civil War.
As Tony chatted to the Kennefick family on that Sunday afternoon from a history point of view, the facts on the stone and especially the question of who Timothy Kennefick was brought back to life. With their imaginations fired, Tony and others assembled a committee and began to work on perhaps improving the Kennefick memorial in line with the wishes of the Kennefick family.
The man in question Timothy Kennefick was born the sixth of nine children to Michael and Katherine Kennefick in Cork in 1893. In 1914 he lost one brother due to an accident. His father passed away in 1916 and his mother just five days before his own life was taken. In fact, he was on route to her funeral when he was captured and killed. He married Ellen Enright on 19 July 1919. The family lived upstairs at the Pier Head Inn in Blackrock, where he was a Bar Assistant. The Inn stands to this day, although with updated furnishings. This was where his daughter Kathleen was born.
In his early twenties, Timothy Kennefick left the operation of the Pier Head Inn for full time IRA duties. He learned to drill, to camp, to march and to scout. He moved his family over to the Lady’s Well hill, where his mother lived. Captain Timothy Kennefick was involved in the Anglo-Irish war until the truce was called in July 1921.
After the Treaty was signed on 6 December 1921, the first shot of the Civil War was fired in June 1922. The Civil War lasted until May 1923. Families split and friends parted. Captain Timothy Kennefick took the anti-treaty side during the Civil war, similar to Tom Barry, Dick Barrett, Liam Deasy, Dan Breen, Richard Russell and Liam Lynch. Every known Republican was swept into prison. The houses of people who had sheltered and nursed and helped the very men in power, when they were irregulars themselves, were raided and ransacked by day and by night.
Timothy Kennefick was always an active man thus rising to the position of “Captain”. During the month of September 1922, tension was very high in the Cork area after the August ambush of Michael Collins at Béal na Bláth. Timothy was billeted out near Ballingeary when he got news of his mother’s death. He was a passenger in Mr Seamus Cotter’s lorry making his way back to Cork for the funeral when they were apprehended by Free State soldiers at Mishells Gates.
According to the evidence presented at an inquest after Timothy Kennefick’s death, Emmett Dalton was the Commanding Officer over 30 Free State Officers on Friday, 8 September 1922. They had three lorries and an armoured car. Mr Seamus Cotter the owner of the truck and Mr Herlihy another passenger were allowed go free. Timothy was arrested and put into a caged truck.
The full party then travelled on towards Coachford where all thirty Free State soldiers had breakfast at Thomas Burke’s Restaurant. The prisoner was left in the caged truck. After breakfast some of the Free State soldiers got into the caged truck and travelled towards Dripsey. They turned right and stopped at Oldtown.
The inquest concluded that it was there that the Free State soldiers tortured and murdered Timothy. He had several marks on the face two broken teeth, and bullet wounds to the head. The groups then returned to join the rest of their party in Coachford.
There was an inquest held by coroner J J Horgan at Fr Gilligan’s house in Coachford on Monday 11 September 1922, on the circumstances surrounding the death of Timothy. The following was the verdict of the jurors;
“We find that Captain Timothy Kennefick was wilfully murdered at Nadrid Coachford on Friday 8th September 1922 by a party of Free State troops and we bring in a verdict of wilful murder against the officer in charge of the Free State troops at Coachford on the morning in question and Richard Mulcahy as Minister for Defence and that the cause of death was shock and hemorrhage due to laceration of the brain caused by bullet wounds. We extend to his wife and relatives our sincere sympathy in their bereavement”.
A little boy was born shortly after Timothy was murdered. Ellen and the children moved shortly afterwards to the east coast of the United States to carve out a new life. Over eighty years later, the commemoration committee of the Kennefick memorial collected funds to revamp the memorial itself. A high cross replaced the stone inscribed slab, which can now be viewed at the side of the monument. Finbarr McCarthy of Denis McCarthy, Mallow Road, sculpted the piece and it was unveiled on 4 October 2006 near Coachford.
Captions:
1167a. Picture of Timothy Kennefick, c.1920 (source: Tony McCarthy).
1167b. Timothy Kennefick Memorial, Coachford, County Cork August 2022 (picture: Kieran McCarthy).
Kieran’s September Historical Walking Tours (All free, 2 hours, no booking required):
Saturday 3 September, Blackpool: Its History and Heritage; meet at square on St Mary’s Road, opp North Cathedral, 2pm.
Sunday 4 September 2022, Ballinlough – Knights, Quarries and Suburban Growth; meet at Ballintemple Graveyard, Temple Hill, 2pm.
Saturday 17 September 2022, The City Workhouse; meet just inside the gates of St Finbarr’s Hospital, Douglas Road, 2pm.
Discover Cork: Schools’ Heritage Project Launches for Year 21
Independent Cllr Kieran McCarthy has launched the Discover Cork: Schools’ Heritage Project 2022/23. The project is in its 21st year and is open to schools in Cork City. It is funded by Cork City Council and the Project is an initiative of the Cork City Heritage Plan.
The City Edition of the Discover Cork: Schools’ Heritage Project (est. 2002/03) is aimed at both primary and post primary level. Project books may be submitted on any aspect of Cork’s rich past.
The fourth-class level is open to fourth class students. The primary senior level is open to students of fifth and sixth class. Post primary entrant/s will be placed in Junior Certificate or Leaving Certificate levels. The post primary level is open to any year from first to sixth year.
A student may enter as an individual or as part of a group or as part of a class project. The theme for this year’s project is “The Value of the Past”.
Free and important project support in the form of free virtual workshops led by the Project Co-ordinator Cllr Kieran McCarthy will be held in participating schools across September and October 2022. This is a 40 minute workshop to give participating students ideas for compilation and resources.
Free workshop support is also available to schools who have never entered before and wish to have a workshop to see how the project works or to get some perspectives on Cork history. Information on entering this year’s project is on Kieran’s heritage website, www.corkheritage.ie.
Cllr McCarthy noted: “It is great to reach the twenty-first year of the project. Over 15-16,000 students have participated in the project through the years with many topics researched and written about – from buildings and monuments to people’s stories and memories. The Project continues to encourage and work with Cork students in celebrating, highlighting, debating and creating fresh approaches to Cork’s cultural heritage. The Project also focuses on students gaining acknowledgement and self-confidence from their work”.
“In addition, never before has our locality and its heritage being so important for recreation and for our peace of mind. In the past two years, more focus than ever has been put on places and spaces we know, appreciate, and attain personal comfort from”, concluded Cllr McCarthy.
View the brochure here: 2022-23-Discover-Cork-Schools-Heritage-Brochure.pdf (corkheritage.ie)
Kieran’s Our City, Our Town, 1 September 2022
Kieran’s Our City, Our Town Article,
Cork Independent, 1 September 2022
Journeys to a Free State: The Burial of Michael Collins
The morning after the death of Michael Collins in Béal na mBláth on 22 August, his body lay in Cork City’s Shanakiel Hospital. From an early hour on 23 August, the surrounding roads leading to the hospital were packed with people.
The Cork Examiner records that some members of the public were admitted to the hospital grounds and a few had the honour to enter the room, where the body was lying in state. Officers of the National Army formed a guard of honour and the room was laden with floral tributes and choice blooms. Michael’s comrades including Major General Dalton, were present. Many citizens passed in and said a silent heartfelt prayer and departed again. A number of clergy were also present, including Most Rev Dr Cohalan, Bishop of Cork.
Meanwhile National Army troops lined up along the sweeping avenue to the hospital. About noon, the prayers for the dead having been said by Rev Scannell of Farranferris and the assembled clergy, the lid was placed on the coffin and removed to the hearse. The pall bearers were Major General Dalton, Colonel Commandant Kingston, General Liam Tobin, Colonel Commandant Vincent Byrne, Colonel Commandant Seán O’Connell and Lieutenant Commandant Dolan.
The order was given to the troops to reverse arms and the coffin was brought out followed by a group of nurses carrying the wreaths. The hearse moved down the ranks of the troops, and the military funeral procession went on its way.
As it proceeded on to Sunday’s Well, over Thomas Davis Bridge, Western Road, Washington Street, St Patrick’s Street, and down to Penrose Quay, where the remains were to be put on board a ship to be taken to Dublin, there were repeated deep lines of sorrow by the general public.
When it became known in the city that the body was going to be taken to Dublin by the SS Classic, people in large numbers thronged the quays, and by the time the funeral cortege approached St Patrick’s Quay and Merchants Quay mass crowds were present. The approaches to Penrose Quay were, however, guarded by National troops, and to prevent congestion, the public were not allowed nearer the SS Classic than the Brian Boru Bridge.
The SS Classic arrived from Fishguard at 10.30am, and the news of the death of General Collins caused grief amongst the passengers, many of whom were visibly affected. Captain Harrison was asked by the National Army for the vessel to convey the remains of Michael Collins to Dublin, and the necessary preparations were at once made.
At 1pm an armed guard with a machine gun went on board, and a little later the armoured car Slievenamon with her crew arrived, the armoured car being was also placed on board the vessel.
Throughout Cork all places of business were closed as a mark of respect to the memory of Michael Collins. The tricolour was flown at half-mast from all the buildings occupied by the National troops.
As the crowds became denser, members of the newly-formed Cork Civic Patrol, under Mr Jeremiah Murphy, assisted the military in keeping the quays clear. Their task was, however, an easy one, for the mourning citizens had only to be told once that their presence on Penrose quay would delay the troops and the transfer of the coffin to the ship.
Shortly after 1pm the funeral cortege moved slowly down Penrose Quay. Bishop Cohalan and several priests walked in front of the coffin, which was covered with the tricolour and borne in a hearse drawn by a pair of black horses. Behind it walked the relatives and friends of the deceased, well-known public men and political sympathisers, and finally the troops with arms reversed.
The Bishop, priests, and friends of General Collins went immediately on board. At 1.15pm the coffin was removed from the hearse, and was borne on the shoulders of General Dalton, General Tobin, Staff Captain McGrath, Commandant Friel, Staff Captain Courtney, and Captain Conroy to the vessel. It was received on board by the Bishop and the ship immediately departed.
Before the Waterford coast had been reached, a wireless message was picked up to the effect that the SS Lady Wicklow was on her way to Cork to convey the remains to Dublin, and that members of the Provisional Government were aboard. Passing Waterford, the SS Lady Wicklow was hailed and instructions communicated to her to return to Dublin. She immediately stopped and started her return journey. The SS Classic reached the mouth of Dublin Bay at 1am on 24 August.
The Cork Examiner records that the body passed through the silent streets of Dublin in the early morning. Over the cobbled quays the gun carriage, carrying the flag draped coffin, made its way. Despite the hour and the uncertainty of the time of arrival along the streets there were gathered with large groups of people.
The procession passed along the silent streets to St Vincent’s Hospital, Stephen’s Green. The remains lay in the mortuary with a guard of honour of military officers until about half-past nine the following morning, when they were removed to the Community Chapel.
Before the coffin was removed from the mortuary the blessing was given by Rev John McLaughlin, Acting Chaplain. Before being removed from the mortuary to the chapel the remains of Michael Collins were embalmed. In addition, Sir John Lavery painted the picture of Michael Collins as the body lay the coffin in the community chapel.
Michael Collins’ remains were removed at 7pm that evening to Dublin City Hall, where they laid in state until the following Sunday evening. They were then taken to the Pro-Cathedral. Solemn High Mass was be celebrated at 11am on the Monday morning, 28 August 1922 after which Michael Collins was buried in Glasnevin Cemetery.
Caption:
1166a. Painting of Michael Collins by Sir John Lavery, August 1922 (picture: Hugh Lane Gallery).