Killing of Eileen Quinn

Eileen Quinn
Kiltartan Castle located near the Quinn farm
Born
Eileen Gilligan

1895 or 1896
County Galway, Ireland
Died (aged 24)
County Galway
Cause of deathShot
CitizenshipUnited Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland

Eileen Quinn (née Gilligan; 1895 or 1896 – 1 November 1920) was a young mother from County Galway.[1] On All Saint's Day 1920, she was shot dead outside her home by the Black and Tans of the Royal Irish Constabulary (RIC) in what was described as "essentially a drive-by shooting".[1] The incident was one of the most notorious civilian reprisal killings during the Irish War of Independence.[2]

Background

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In the spring of 1920, the Black and Tans of the Royal Irish Constabulary (RIC) were deployed to Ireland to fight in the Irish War of Independence.[3] As a barracks town, Gort in County Galway, had a particularly strong presence of British forces, including both soldiers and policemen.[4] The month of November was an extremely violent time in the county.[5] Eileen Quinn and her family lived at Kiltartan near Gort.[6] Her husband Malachy Quinn was a farmer.[7] Their farm was located on the main Galway/Gort road.[8]

Killing

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On 1 November 1920, Quinn was seven months pregnant and waiting for her husband Malachy to return from the fair in town. It was All Saints' Day and she was sitting on the front wall of her house with her three young children when she was shot.[9] Her nine month old baby had been on her lap.[10] The bullet pierced her stomach and the child she was holding fell from her arms. She crawled back to the house to tell her servant that she was shot exclaiming "take in the little children!".[7] Alarm was raised and local women tried to save both Eileen and her unborn child. One of the doctors who attended her Doctor Sandys said "she had bled so much that she could bleed no more".[6] Malachy returned home to find his wife dying on the kitchen settee.[6] He had followed a trail of blood that led from the front garden wall.[6]

The local priest Father John Considine, was called to the house on the evening of her murder. Eileen had told him that she was shot by Black and Tans on a truck as they passed by her house. Father Considine administered the last rites to Eileen and later strongly condemned the murder from the altar.[11] The RIC chief constable in Gort refused to take a formal statement from her as she laid dying.[6] She died from being mortally wounded eight hours after she had been shot.[11] The incident was considered as "essentially a drive-by shooting".[1] Eileen was shot in what her family believed was a reprisal for the killing of an RIC constable, Timothy Horan, two days earlier in an Irish Republican Army ambush five miles away at Castledaly.[6]

A Military Court of Inquiry was held by British authorities three days after her death (and on the same day as her funeral) which recorded a verdict of death by misadventure.[12] Despite an inquest, no one was ever held accountable for her murder. The fatal shot had come from a moving vehicle and so no one person was blamed.[13] Days after the killing, RIC personnel took two brothers from South Galway from their home and tortured them before killing both and dumping their bodies.[11]

Reactions

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On 8 March 1921, the British government made an ex gratia grant of £300 to Malachy Quinn.[14] The case was referenced by the poet and Nobel Prize winner W. B. Yeats in his poems "Nineteen Hundred and Nineteen" and "Reprisals".[15] The local protestant landlord and patron of Yeats Lady Gregory wrote angrily about the killing in her journals.[16] When she heard about the case she wrote six articles in The Nation to alert the British public to atrocities being carried out in Ireland.[11] She however did not approve of these poems for his references to her deceased son Robert.[17][18]

The case was raised in the House of Commons on a number of occasions.[19] Chief Secretary for Ireland Sir Hamar Greenwood was questioned on the case every week throughout the month of November by numerous Members of Parliament (MPs).[6] Greenwood said “two police lorries were passing at the time, and it may be that the wounding resulted from a shot fired in anticipation of an ambush in the neighbourhood".[20]

The then-young Conservative MP Oswald Mosley questioned the Chief Secretary on 25 November 1920:[21]

(whether) Mrs. Eileen Quinn, of Kiltartan, County Galway, was killed by a shot fired from a passing police lorry on 1st November, 1920, while sitting on a wall in broad daylight with a child in her arms; whether he will state the distance between this wall and the road from which the shot was fired; whether the position of Mrs. Quinn at the time she was shot was in full view of the road; whether the police occupying the lorry in question were called as witnesses at the court of inquiry; how many rounds of ammunition were fired by the occupants of this lorry in the course of their journey; and how far away was the nearest point at which murders of soldiers or policemen had occurred to the scene of Mrs. Quinn's death?

— Oswald Mosley, Parliament, Hansard

Legacy

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Her grandson Gerard Quinn is a human rights lawyer, and he has given talks on the case.[22] Her grand niece is award-winning documentary maker Orla Higgins.[23] In 2019, she made a documentary on the case for RTÉ entitled Reprisals: The Eileen Quinn Story.[16][24] In 2023, Galway City Museum hosted an event in memory of Eileen Quinn.[25]

References

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  1. ^ a b c Duggan, Keith (28 November 2020). "Sordid murder of hurling brothers still resonates in south Galway". The Irish Times. Retrieved 2025-03-29.
  2. ^ "The killing of Eileen Quinn". lawsociety.ie. 6 November 2020. Retrieved 2022-11-02.
  3. ^ "Explainer: Who were the Black and Tans and the Auxiliaries? | Century Ireland". www.rte.ie. Retrieved 2025-03-29.
  4. ^ "Black and Tans: 'Half-drunk, whole-mad' and one-fifth Irish". The Irish Times. Retrieved 2025-03-29.
  5. ^ "A Galway man was Ireland's loneliest martyr". Tuam Herald. 2020-10-28. Retrieved 2025-03-29.
  6. ^ a b c d e f g "'Other cheated dead': Murder and reprisals in Galway's Gregory-Yeats Country | Century Ireland". www.rte.ie. Retrieved 2025-03-29.
  7. ^ a b "Horrible Outrage Near Gort - A Woman Killed with Child in her Arms - The Galway Observer, Saturday, November 6th, 1920". Retrieved 2 April 2025 – via places.galwaylibrary.org.
  8. ^ "Commemorating the RIC and the DMP". The Irish Times. Retrieved 2025-03-29.
  9. ^ "ILLUSTRATED TALK: The Tragic Death of Eileen Quinn • Galway City Museum". Galway City Museum. Retrieved 2025-03-29.
  10. ^ "Eileen Quinn, Mother of Four, Shot Dead by Black and Tans, Gort 1920". The Irish at War. 2020-11-01. Retrieved 2025-03-29.
  11. ^ a b c d "Britain's terrible history in Ireland highlighted in new radio documentary". IrishCentral.com. 2019-09-06. Retrieved 2025-03-29.
  12. ^ "Remembering Eileen Quinn". Galway Advertiser. 14 December 2023. Retrieved 2025-03-29.
  13. ^ "Come out, ye Black and Tans". The Irish Times. Retrieved 2025-03-29.
  14. ^ "Eileen Quinn". theauxiliaries.com. Retrieved 2025-03-29.
  15. ^ Griffiths, G. M. (2011-03-23). "Reprisals – W.B. Yeats". Move Him Into The Sun. Retrieved 2025-03-29.
  16. ^ a b "Documentary On One: Shining a light on Ireland's troubled past". RTE. 2019-08-23.
  17. ^ O'Malley, Seamus (2022-06-23), O'Malley, Seamus (ed.), "Lady Gregory and the Voice of The People", Irish Culture and “The People”: Populism and its Discontents, Oxford University Press, p. 0, ISBN 978-0-19-285841-2, retrieved 2025-03-29
  18. ^ "Yeats's 'perfect man'". The Dublin Review. Retrieved 2025-03-29.
  19. ^ "DEATH BY MISADVENTURE, GALWAY. (Hansard, 17 November 1920)". api.parliament.uk. Retrieved 2025-03-29.
  20. ^ "Centenary Anniversary of Tragedies in South Galway • Galway City Museum". Galway City Museum. Retrieved 2025-03-29.
  21. ^ "SHOOTING FATALITY, GALWAY. (Hansard, 25 November 1920)". api.parliament.uk. Retrieved 2025-03-29.
  22. ^ "The Uncertainty of History: Remembering Eileen Quinn". Galway Arts Centre. Retrieved 2025-03-29.
  23. ^ "Documentary Maker: Orla Higgins". 2023-08-29.
  24. ^ Murphy, Judy (2023-09-01). "RTÉ doc on Civil War tragedy from award-winning producer". Connacht Tribune - Galway City Tribune. Retrieved 2025-03-29.
  25. ^ "SPECIAL EVENT: Remembering Eileen Quinn • Galway City Museum". Galway City Museum. Retrieved 2025-03-29.
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