Anti-Treaty Soldier Denis Creedon Jr

Anti-Treaty Soldier Denis Creedon Jr (aged about 32) of Evergreen Road, Cork city, and Lower Horsemount, Ballinagree, near Macroom (near Donoughmore)

Date of incident: 14 Sept. 1922

Sources: Death Certificate (Cork Urban District No. 6, Union of Cork), 17 Sept. 1922 (misdated 15 Sept. 1922); CE, 15, 16, 18 Sept. 1922; SS, 16, 23 Sept. 1922; FJ, 18 Sept. 1922; II, 21 Sept. 1922; MSPC/DP2292 (Military Archives); Rebel Cork’s Fighting Story, 25; O’Farrell, Who’s Who, 218: Cork One Brigade (1963), Roll of Honour; Keane (2017), 305, 417; Creedon, O’Brien, and Healy Memorial, Donoughmore, Co. Cork, http://www.irishwarmemorials.ie/pdf/408.pdf (accessed 5 Aug. 2017); http://irishvolunteers.org/ira-1-cork-brigadedonoughmore-cemetery-co-cork/ (accessed 3 March 2018).

Note: Denis Creedon Jr was seriously wounded in the fighting near Donoughmore on 14 September 1922 and died of his wounds two days later at the Mercy Hospital in Cork. See CE, 18 Sept. 1922. According to the inscription on the Creedon, O’Brien, and Healy Memorial at Donoughmore, Creedon was a member of C Company of the Sixth Battalion of the Cork No. 1 Brigade. See also Cork One Brigade (1963), Roll of Honour.

The Southern Star provided the following account of this incident: ‘A party of eight National troops on the way from Donoughmore to Blarney in a Lancia car last evening [14 September] ran into an ambush near Donoughmore. Between forty and fifty Irregulars opened fire on them, using three machine guns. The car ran right through, and then six of the soldiers were sent back to reply to the fire of the Irregulars. Owing to their very small numerical strength, the party was cut off by the attackers from the two men whom they had left as a guard on their car, and then matters looked very bad for the troops, for both the party of six and the two in the car were attacked and surrounded. Those in the car, however, succeeded in starting the engine, and they fought their way back to the others, picked them up, and continued their journey to Blarney. Here they procured reinforcements, and the joint party, numbering about 40 men, returned with all possible haste to the scene of the ambush. The attackers had not dispersed, and an engagement was immediately opened, [with] both sides using machine guns, rifles, etc. As a result of the fight one Irregular, stated to be a man named O’Brien, of Evergreen, Cork, was killed, one was seriously wounded, and three were captured. . . . None of the [National] soldiers was hit during either fight. Late last night [14 September] a wounded Irregular [Denis Creedon], who had been hit in the neck, thigh, and hand, was brought to the Mercy Hospital, Cork. He is in a very critical condition and had to be operated on during the night.’ See SS, 16 Sept. 1922. Creedon died on 16 September. See MSPC/DP2292 (Military Archives).

The victim’s father Denis Creedon Sr was awarded a partial-dependant’s allowance or gratuity of £100 in 1936 under the Army Pensions Acts. His sister Mary Creedon also received an allowance from 1954 until her death in 1962, while his brother Michael Creedon was in receipt of an allowance between 1962 and his death in 1976. The victim’s pension file indicates that Denis Creedon Jr had served as a Volunteer from some point in 1919; he continued his service with the IRA throughout the War of Independence and during the Civil War until his death in mid-September 1922. See MSPC/DP2292 (Military Archives).

Denis Creedon Jr was in 1901 one of the three children (two sons and a daughter) of Denis Creedon Sr and his wife Margaret. These three children, ranging in age from 5 to 11, co-resided with their parents at house 9 in the townland of Knocknagoppal in Rahalisk parish near Macroom. The young Denis Jr was then aged 11; his younger sister Mary was aged 7, and his younger brother Michael was aged 5.