Skip to main content

1921-3

RIC Constable Thomas R. Johnston

RIC Constable Thomas R. Johnston (aged 19) from County Cavan (Parnell Bridge, Cork city)

Date of incident: 4 Jan. 1921

Sources: II, 5, 24 Jan. 1921; FJ, 5 Jan. 1921; Weekly Summary of Outrages against the Police (CO 904/148-50, TNA); Military Inquests, WO 35/152/39 (TNA); Commandant P. J. Murphy’s WS 869, 23 (BMH); Michael Walsh’s WS 1521, 12-13 (BMH); Michael Murphy’s WS 1547, 34-35 (BMH); Seán O’Connell’s WS 1706, 9-10 (BMH); Patrick Collins’s WS 1707, 9-10 (BMH); Abbott (2000), 180-81; Kautt (2010), 165; Kingston (2013), 45.

 

Note: At about 7 o’clock on the night of 4 January 1921, a party of ten policemen from Empress Place were crossing Parnell Bridge on their way to Union Quay Barracks when a bomb was thrown into their midst. Six of the ten policemen were wounded in the attack, and two of the six later died—one (Shortall) on 7 January and the other (Johnston, wounded in both legs) on 20 January at the Cork Central Military Hospital. Constable Johnston had barely more than two months of service with the RIC; previously, he had been a labourer.

The Irish Revolution Project

Scoil na Staire /Tíreolaíocht

University College Cork, Cork,

Top