Anti-Treaty Soldier Daniel O’Halloran

Anti-Treaty Soldier Daniel O’Halloran (aged about 34) of Ballynoe near Queenstown/Cobh (Carrigaloe near Cobh)

Date of incident: 22 Oct. 1922

Sources: Death Certificate (Queenstown District No. 2, Union of Cork), 22 Oct. 1922; Roll of Honour, Cork No. 1 Brigade (Cork Public Museum, Fitzgerald Park, Cork); II, 24 Oct. 1922; Evening Herald, 24 Oct. 1922; CE, 24, 25 Oct. 1922, 22 Oct. 1923; FJ, 25 Oct. 1922; SS, 28 Oct. 1922; Sligo Champion, 28 Oct. 1922; Cork One Brigade (1963), Roll of Honour; Keane (2017), 316, 418; http://www.irishmedals.ie/Anti-Treaty-Killed.php (accessed 17 July 2017).

Note: Daniel O’Halloran was killed on 22 October 1922 when he and other anti-Treaty soldiers ambushed a party of National Army troops, who were first attacked while returning to Cobh from a visit to the Free State barracks at Belvelly. After this attack the National Army troops secured reinforcements from Cobh and returned to Carrigaloe, where they exchanged fire with IRA soldiers in a second ambush. In this exchange O’Halloran was killed, though his dead body was not found until the following day. The Cobh correspondent of the Cork Examiner reported: ‘Last night [Sunday, 22 October 1922], about nine o’clock, as a motor conveying Lieut. Ryan and a soldier passed through the village of Carrigaloe, it was fired at, the car being hit, and Lieut. Ryan sustaining a flesh wound. They returned the fire and then continued on to Cobh, where they reported to Captain Browne. This officer, with a small party, proceeded to the scene of the firing, made a search of some houses in the vicinity, and fired at the overhanging hillside, using a machine gun, where it was thought men were concealed. The National troops then returned to Cobh. This morning it was reported that the dead body of Daniel Halloran was found in a railway culvert in the vicinity of the place where the ambush took place. A revolver, with four cartridges in it, was also found there. Lieut. Ryan’s wound is said to have been caused by an explosive bullet. [The] deceased was a shipwright and a native of the district in which he was found lying dead.’ See CE, 24 Oct. 1922.

At a subsequent court of military inquiry his brother Patrick O’Halloran admitted that his brother Daniel had ‘probably’ been killed ‘in armed opposition to the National forces’, and he stated, ‘I think he was killed in [a] fair fight.’ The court found that the National Army Soldier who had killed O’Halloran had acted properly in the execution of his duty. Daniel O’Halloran had been employed as a shipwright at the Rushbrooke Works in Cobh. See CE, 25 Oct. 1922. According to a report appearing the Irish Independent of 24 October 1922, one National Army soldier was wounded and ‘at least’ three Irregulars were killed in this engagement. Evidence to fully support the claims made in this report has not been found. O’Halloran was the captain of A Company of the Fourth (Midleton) Battalion of the Cork No. 1 Brigade. See Cork One Brigade (1963), Roll of Honour; CE, 22 Oct. 1923.

Reports circulated that O’Halloran was not the only fatality on the anti-Treaty side in the Carrigaloe attacks: ‘The casualties amongst the National troops were very light, one only having been wounded. The casualties amongst the irregulars, however, were heavy, three at least, it is stated, having been killed. From Glenbrook yesterday morning [23 October 1922], groups of men could be seen removing the bodies from the hillside opposite, while passengers on the boats also saw the bodies being removed.’ See CE, 24 Oct. 1922.    

Daniel O’Halloran was in 1911 one of the seven living children (eight born) of the widow Mary O’Halloran of house 12 in Ballynoe (Queenstown). Four of these children (all sons and all single) co-resided with her in that year. The youngest of them was Daniel (then aged 23), who listed his occupation as a shipwright. His older brother Patrick (aged 26) was an engine fitter at the Rushbrooke Works in Cobh.