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Welcome back to This Day in Irish History. I'm your host, Raymond Welsh. Before we dive into today’s story, if you’d like to explore other significant events that happened on this day in Irish history, visit thisdayirishhistory.com—the link is in the episode description. Now, let’s turn to May 12, 1921, and the harrowing events near Gortaglanna in County Kerry—events that would reverberate through Irish memory and song as the Gortaglanna Executions.
The Irish War of Independence was reaching its most intense and violent phase in the spring of 1921. Across the country, the Irish Republican Army—largely made up of young volunteers—was locked in a fierce guerrilla struggle against British forces, including the feared Black and Tans. These recruits, drawn hastily from British World War I veterans, had earned a grim reputation for brutality and reprisal killings. It was in this brutal climate that four young IRA men—Paddy Walsh, Paddy Dalton, Jerry Lyons, and Con Dee—found themselves cornered on a quiet country road near Gortaglanna.
The four volunteers were members of the North Kerry Flying Column, a mobile guerrilla unit that had been active in ambushes and sabotage missions against British targets. On the morning of May 12th, the men were traveling through Knockanure, a small rural village in north Kerry, when they were surprised and captured by a British patrol. The arresting unit included members of the Royal Irish Constabulary and the Black and Tans. What followed was not a transfer to barracks or a trial—but summary execution.
According to both eyewitness accounts and later testimonies, the men were subjected to a brief interrogation in a nearby field. Paddy Walsh and Paddy Dalton were taken aside and shot dead without warning. Jerry Lyons, sensing what was coming, made a desperate dash for freedom. He did not get far. He, too, was gunned down. Con Dee, the fourth man, was wounded in the leg but managed to scramble away through the fields. He survived, against extraordinary odds, and later provided a detailed account of the atrocity.
The Gortaglanna Executions, as they came to be known, quickly became emblematic of the extrajudicial violence employed by British forces in Ireland. Unlike combat deaths or fatalities during ambushes, this was cold-blooded killing—three unarmed prisoners shot without trial or provocation. The event galvanized public opinion in Kerry and beyond. It reinforced the widespread belief that British rule in Ireland rested not only on outdated political control, but on the barrel of a gun and the threat of terror.
This tragedy also entered the cultural bloodstream of the nationalist movement. It was immortalized in one of Ireland’s most powerful rebel ballads, “The Valley of Knockanure.” With its haunting refrain and mournful melody, the song tells of the fallen volunteers and the cruelty visited upon them. For generations of Irish people, especially in Munster, the song served not only as a memorial but also as a rallying cry—a reminder of sacrifice and resistance.
But beyond the mythologizing, there were real families who bore the scars. Paddy Dalton had been an agricultural laborer, barely into his twenties. Jerry Lyons was a committed volunteer with dreams of a free Ireland. Paddy Walsh had a reputation for quiet determination. Their deaths were mourned deeply in their communities and helped fuel continued resistance throughout the remainder of the War of Independence.
The surviving volunteer, Con Dee, remained active in the struggle and would live to see the eventual signing of the Anglo-Irish Treaty later that year, which ended hostilities but triggered a new and bitter Civil War. Still, the events of May 12 never left him, and his testimony ensured that the truth of what happened at Gortaglanna would not be forgotten.
Today, a memorial stands near the site of the executions. It’s a quiet place, surrounded by farmland, where visitors can pause to reflect on the cost of freedom and the toll of violence. The Gortaglanna Executions remind us that history is not just made in parliament halls or on battlefields, but in isolated corners of the countryside—where courage, cruelty, and sacrifice intersect in the most human of ways.
Thank you for joining me on this journey through Ireland’s rich past. Please like and subscribe, and until next time, I’m Raymond Welsh—Slán go fóill!
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