During the emergence of the Irish Free State in 1922, Michael Collins needed an instant army and put one together as best he could.
One of the first to answer the call was my uncle Joseph Reardon, who had been a ‘graduate’ of a youth organisation and military nurturing ground formed by Constance Markievicz and Bulmer Hobson. His commandant in the Drumcondra branch was Seán Heuston, later to be executed as a leader in the 1916 Rising.
Joseph signed up for the emerging army as a private in B Company, 1st Battalion, having previously worked in small jobs around Dublin. One of these was at a billiards hall in Rathmines, another as a courier for a stockbroking firm in Dame Street.
His father, also Joseph, a tailor in McBirney’s of Aston Quay, and his mother Mary lived at 23 Sackville Avenue, Ballybough. And it was there on November 26th, almost 100 years ago, that an army messenger arrived telling them to go urgently to the telephone exchange in Crown Alley, Temple Bar, where their son had been seriously wounded while on guard duty.
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No transport was provided, and by the time they arrived Joseph had been taken to Mercer’s Hospital nearby and was operated on for a bullet wound to his lower stomach. Despite the best efforts of a surgeon, Joseph died on the operating table after a huge loss of blood. He had just turned 17. A boy soldier.
Since then, and over the best part of a century, the details were never fully explained to his family and descendants. A cloak of silence, bordering on secrecy, descended to cover his parents’ grief, possibly compounded by the fact that their second son, Michael, took the opposing republican side in the Civil War. Joseph’s death was not spoken about, and when in my early teens I drew up the courage to ask about him, my grandmother took a one-paragraph newspaper cutting from a kitchen drawer, which recorded the death as an unfortunate gun accident. I recall her putting the slip of paper back in the drawer, closing it slowly and standing there a while without saying a word.
It is only in the past two years that my brother Paul, a former journalist in Dublin and now living in Perth, Australia, was, with great perseverance, able to slowly extract details through Ireland’s Freedom of Information (FoI) Act that provided insight into what happened.
He unearthed the following statement, signed by ‘’TH Capt’', giving an account of Joseph’s final hours:
‘’The above man lay in Mercer’s Hospital dying: for without more blood life would be impossible. The M O of this barracks asked for six volunteers, to give blood to this man.
“I paraded the Military Police at Beggars Bush and called for the necessary volunteers, with the result that of a parade of 70 men I had 30 volunteers, of the six volunteers one man only was needed, the man selected being Pte Martin O’Connor, Military Police, Beggars Bush. Unfortunately, the operation was unsuccessful and Pte Reardon died.’’
Army documents stated that Joseph was not in any way responsible for the gunshot wound that took his life. But these details did not seem to have been passed on to his family members and so, consequently, most believed he had accidentally discharged his own gun while loading it.
An Óglaigh na hÉireann statement, signed by Lieut Gen Gearóid Ó Súilleabháin, recorded that Joseph’s death had been accidental and ‘’he was killed in the course of his duty while on active service and death was not due to any serious negligence by him’’.
It appears that besides this, and a few other brief comments, no full or official inquiry took place. Joseph was buried in Glasnevin. His parents received an interment grant of £10 and a gratuity of £50.
What occurred when his parents applied, two years later, for the newly introduced army pension scheme for the loss of their son’s income became a humiliating saga for them that dragged on for decades. It was not until August 23rd, 1957 — a gap of 33 years — that they were awarded a pension of £180 per annum without any retrospective payment. Both parents died within a year of receiving the miserly amount.
The FoI documents reveal a tale of bureaucratic form-filling and repetitive questioning, plus a request for a record of Joseph’s health for the three years prior to his death. An army payment of £6 had a note attached requesting someone ‘’check this for income tax’'.
The saga included visits from police — soon to become gardaí — and questioning by Army officials. On one occasion a police sergeant was sent from nearby Fitzgibbon Street station to quietly ask questions in the neighbourhood and ‘’interrogate’' family members on the household income. At another time, the examiner at Dublin Command, Collins Barracks, was informed: “The family consisted of herself, her husband, a tailor working at present, one son who is also working, and five other children.” He concluded: ‘’In the circumstances, I think she is not badly in need of financial help.”
Joseph’s death is just one story from that terrifying time in our history.
In 1967, a memorial for Free State soldiers was finally erected in Glasnevin Cemetery. But, even then, Joseph’s name was not included on it.