Isolated violent incidents reported, despite talk of peace
Ireland, May 1923 - Isolated violent incidents continued to be reported in different parts of the country, despite all the public talk of ceasefires and peace moves.
In Co. Leitrim, two brothers, Patrick and Philip McGuire, were seriously wounded when an armed man, followed by a party of armed men, entered their home near the village of Mohill. The men, one of whom was known to have served in the National Army, suffered gunshot wounds - Patrick to his right lung and Philip to his right jaw. They were taken to District Hospital at Carrick-on-Shannon, there is little hope that Patrick McGuire will survive.
In the east of the country, fourteen members of a column of Irregulars were yesterday captured at a farmhouse in the hills around Valleymount, Co. Wicklow, where they were discovered by a small party of National army troops from Naas in the early hours of the morning. The farmhouse, situated among a small cluster of properties between Holywood and Blessington, was occupied by a Mrs. Norton, her 16 year-old daughter, Sarah, and an employee by the name of Patrick Dunne when the fourteen armed men arrived and forced their entry.
For a quarter of an hour, a fierce gun battle raged, which resulted in the killing of the column’s leader, a northern man who was known as Plunkett. In a statement issued by the National Army headquarters, it is claimed that their troops only fired after being fired upon by the occupants of the house. Following the killing of ‘Plunkett’ the other members of the column surrendered, most of them hailing from Co. Wicklow.
The official account of incidents at the farmhouse is not the only one in circulation, but it is known that the captured column had been operating in the foothills of the Wicklow Hills for some time and that captured along with them was a cache of rifles, guns, ammunition and other military items.
Meanwhile, a decomposed body discovered by National troops in a glen in the Galtee Mountains has been brought to Clonmel where an inquest has been told that the remains cannot be identified. A doctor told the inquest that the greatly decomposed body shows signs of an entrance and exit wound caused by a bullet.
[Editor's note: This is an article from Century Ireland, a fortnightly online newspaper, written from the perspective of a journalist 100 years ago, based on news reports of the time.]
