THERE have been some excellent local history books published in recent years but there are few that can match the spectacular standards set by Kathleen and Lew Thorne in their superb ‘They Put The Flag a-Flyin’’, the story of the Roscommon Volunteers from 1916 to 1923.
Roscommon may not be immortalised in the history books as a hotbed of republican activity during the War of Independence but IRA volunteers in the county were extremely active nonetheless. They were involved in countless ambushes, raids, assassination attempts and robberies during the difficult years from the Easter Rising to the end of the tragic Civil War. Kathleen Hegarty Thorne and her husband, Lew, have painstakingly chronicled each of these events - major and minor - to produce an extraordinarily detailed study of the War of Independence and Civil War in Co Roscommon. Their exhaustive research has also taken them into other counties and there is a wealth of information in this book from Counties Mayo, Sligo, Leitrim, Longford and West-meath.
The end product is a local history book like no other. ‘They Put The Flag a-Flyin’’ is a 520-page epic containing information and photographs that have never before seen the light of day. There is such a depth of information in the book that one suspects there is no other county in Ireland that can boast such a detailed account of its formative years in the new Free State.
The story behind the book is almost as interesting as the narrative that is contained within its pages. Kathleen Hegarty Thorne was born in Kansas City, Missouri, close to the location where her emigrant grandfather from Ballinaheglish in Co Roscommon had settled. Kathleen’s granduncle, Edward ‘Ned’ Hegarty, had played an important role in the IRA in Co Roscommon during the War of Independence, acting as Chief of the Republican Police in South Roscommon from 1919-1922. But, like many of his generation, he had been written out of Irish history.
When Kathleen Hegarty Thorne visited Roscommon in the early 1990s she could find little about her granduncle. She was shocked that no-one in the area appeared to be able to offer her information on a man who had fought for the freedom of his country. The American decided that if no-one else was willing to record the history of the brave men who had put the flag a-flyin’ in County Roscommon, she would do it herself.
Thus began an ambitious and wholly unlikely project that was to continue for more than a decade. Kathleen Hegarty Thorne and her husband, Lew, sought the assistance of a committee in Co Roscommon - headed by men like Michael Lennon and Tony Conboy - who provided them with the basic information that set them on their way. But it was to a long journey.
Kathleen and Lew researched their book from their base in America, travelling to Roscommon every year to continue their work ‘on site’. The end result is a piece of historical research of which any scholar would be proud. ‘They Put The Flag a-Flyin’ is an incredibly detailed study of the IRA’s activities in Co Roscommon during the early years of the Free State. It is a book that is refreshingly informative and deeply poignant, a celebration and a eulogy to the heroic men and women who risked life and limb to ensure that their country won its freedom.
One of the great mistakes of the past has been to use the morals and criteria of late twentieth-century Europe and Ireland to judge the men of 1916-23. It is easy to say in 2005 - with the comfort of 80-year-old hindsight - that the IRA should not have resorted to violence during the War of Independence. The reality is that war and violence were the raison d’etre of the 1910s. War was raging in mainland Europe - the war to end all wars as it was billed - and Ireland was never going to escape the blood harvest that Europe was intent on creating. The men of 1916 and the War of Independence choose violence because there was nothing else on offer. Their generation knew nothing only bloodshed and war; it was the solution to every political problem.
Whether one agrees or disagrees with the men of 1916 - and their successors in the War of Independence - no-one can deny the courage or the determination of these men and women. They were deeply committed to the cause of Irish freedom and many of them suffered greatly for their idealism. Some of the incidents that are recalled in this book are truly hair-raising and it is important that these events are never forgotten by future generations: Ireland’s freedom did not come easily or cheaply. It was a painful and difficult process and we can see from the pages of ‘The Put the Flag a-Flyin’’ that many of the participants in the War of Independence and Civil War were emotionally and physically damaged for the rest of their days. There is nothing glorious about war - even a war that results in the liberty of one’s country.
Nor is there a happy ending to ‘They Put The Flag a-Flyin’’. The outbreak of Civil War in 1922 ensured that there would be no fairytale denouement to Ireland’s fight for freedom. The men who fought side by side in the opening chapters of the book are suddenly ranged against each other in a bitter and pointless feud that took many lives and countless friend-ships. As the author rightly says, the dreams were “torn asunder”.
No words can possibly do justice to the exceptionally high standards that have been set by Kathleen Hegarty Thorne in ‘They Put The Flag a-Flyin’. It is quite simply the most outstanding local history book that this reviewer has ever seen. Apart from the exhaustive research that has been under-taken by the author over the past decade, the book itself has been designed and printed to an incredibly high standard. The photo-graphic reproduction is excellent and one can only marvel at the number of historical pictures from the era that the author has managed to source. Anyone who has ever worked on a local history book knows that photographs are hard to come by and the author must have crawled into every attic in Co Roscommon during the course of her indefatigable research.
This is a book that should take pride of place in the home of every Roscommon person. A finer book will not be published in the county for many a long year.
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