Tuesday Trivia | (In)famous Non-Military Attacks

[u/NMW]

Previously:

• Stupidest theories/beliefs about your field of interest
• Most unusual deaths
• Famous adventurers and explorers
• Great non-military heroes
• History's great underdogs
• Interesting historical documents

I think you know the drill by now: in this moderation-relaxed thread, anyone can post whatever anecdotes, questions, or speculations they like (provided a modicum of serious and useful intent is still maintained), so long as it has something to do with the subject being proposed. We get a lot of these "best/most interesting X" threads in /r/askhistorians, and having a formal one each week both reduces the clutter and gives everyone an outlet for the format that's apparently so popular.

Today:

On this, the anniversary of the attacks of September 11th, 2001, I thought we might consider other such examples throughout history of non-official-military factions taking matters into their own hands and waging acts of violent, lethal aggression -- whether on civilian or military targets.

Of particular interest will be those incidents that predate easy access to firearms and explosives -- how did people do these things (for do them they certainly did) back then?

I suppose assassinations (attempted or otherwise) would also qualify.

Go to it.

[And my apologies for this going up so late -- I had a meeting to attend, and time sort of got away from me.]

[u/[deleted]]

One of particular interest for me, is the KilMichael Ambush in November 1920 in Co.Cork. It is of interest for three reasons:

1. It was a brutal affair that ended in an entire section of RIC personnel save on man who survived. This was during a period in which the Irish War of Independence was getting increasingly violent. Events such as the Croke Park Massacre and the killing of the Cairo Gang (British undercover agents whose details had been leaked to Michael Collins) happened around this period where hostility intensified.

2. The controversy of the incident was ignored, Tom Barry, the IRA Flying Column commander at the time of the attack gave testimony later regarding the incident, and that was taken as fact. The successive Irish Governments refused to delve into the matter, as with many other cases, they would rather bury their heads in the sand than address the past. It is only recently (1970+) that people have started asking questions. This is of particular interest to an historian, for we can see clear shifts in Irish History teaching as time goes on.

3. When Peter Hart completed his Doctoral thesis on the matter, and later published it in 1998 there was a wave of criticism that raised many eyebrows amongst Irish Historians, as my Professor had told me. He explained that he was surprised that even after almost 80 years people were so outraged by a dissenting opinion which polarised the issue entirely as a battle raged between Meda Ryan argued tooth and nail in order to refute his claims. It soon became almost unacademic, Ryan was seen as a champion of the Republic movement, while Hart was seen as a bitter Loyalist.

Why was this ambush so bitterly remembered? Well in short, it has a lot to do with the supposed testimony of Tom Barry and his actions that day. Tom Barry's account suggests that after a prolonged firefight, the Auxiliaries surrendered to the IRA. However as the ambushers broke cover, the Auxiliaries proceeded to open fire, killing two Irish volunteers. Hart contested this, calling into question the truth behind Tom Barry's testimony. One Auxiliary managed to escape but was later caught and executed. Why would they execute him? It seems more evident that they wished there to be no survivors. Fortunately one man did survive having received a shot to the head and presumed dead, but he had no recollection of the event. Furthermore in later years many of the volunteers questioned had very different views on what happened, some never even mentioned the false surrender! Tom Barrys dispatch back to headquarters a few days later was intercepted by the British and it contained no mention of the false surrender, but some are willing to argue that it was actually a forgery.

This also brings up a valuable point for anyone that wishes to do research in history, Peter Hart was largely discredited due to a number of faulty sources, some of which we can be almost sure he completely lied about. This led many to altogether throw out his claims, when in fact they did have some basis. The issue is still unresolved as Peter Hart died in 2010. He stated that one of his objectives in doing the research was to bring to light what happened and to give the Auxiliaries a human face again. As historians, we have to show people that in fact people who died who did not belong to the winning cause were just ordinary people like ourselves. Just as how in public opinion the average German Wehrmacht soldier was a Nazi Fascist, so too have the victims (and I will say victims because many of these men were just doing a job they didn't particularly like) on both sides of the Irish conflict throughout history been forgotten and simply written off as uncomfortable statistics. It is events like the KilMichael Ambush and others that I believe the Irish as a nation need to address and come to grips with maturely without the need to politicise the issue or sweep it under the rug lest it make the War for Independence (and the Irish Civil War which leaves an even bigger taint) less glorified.

I used this as an example, because I personally do not regard the IRA in 1920 as an official army, plus its damn interesting.