The Washington times., 1921-02-22
IRISH WOMEN
REALMARTYRS
Their Sufferings at Hands Of
Drunken Night Raiders Told
BY Mrs. McWhorter.
BY MARY Y. MewHORTER.
National President, Ladies' Auxiliary,
Ancient order Of BIbsrnIass.

Ancient order Of Bibsrpians.
This is the fin Of series of ar
ticLes Written by Mrs. McWhorter
upon Information gathered IN an er-
tended Investigation ia ireland. Miss
Mary MacSwt1ae;, phose "Iretdna
Today Wds Published recently in
The Washington Times has reUieWed
Mrs. McWhOrter's articles and de-
cIdred that they present true pic
ture of life iR Ireland today.
1t may well be understood that,
because of the, terrible conditions
prevailing in Ireland, life there is
anything but happy. In all such cir
cumstances IL is the women and the
! children that have TO pay. The men
and the boys in Ireland are in the
firing line, the excitement of the
game keeps them up, but for the
women there is only agonized watch
ing and waiting.
IN TERROR OF NIGHT RAIDS.
The nightly raids on the homes
is the hardest thing the. women have
to bear. The men dare not remain
at home, for II they are found there
they are shot; hence the women and
children are left at the mercy OF
drunken brutes, who know no Law but
their own" IL is not to be wondered,
then, II the women and girls and chill
dren OF Ireland are nervous wrecks,
starting convulsively at the slightest
sound.
The raids usually take place dur
| ing curfew hours. The usual hour
for the arrival of a raiding party
at an Irish home is about 2 o'clock
in the morning. The poor women
are awakened by thunderous
knocking at the front door. The
| intruders do not walt for admit
tance, but proceed instantly TO bat
ter down the door and. more often
than not, another party Is battering
down the back door. This is a pre-
caution in case some of the men OF
the family might be sleeping at
home. in which case their escape is
cut off. Let me give a few in
stances OF the way the women of
Ireland are made to suffer.
The late Ned Daley. one OF the
Easter week martyrs OF 1916, has
mother and four sisters living in
Limerick City. They have no living
male relatives so should be immune
from raids. Still they are raided
regularly. During the week of Au-
gust Is. they were raided five times.
| visited them the day after the last
raid had taken place. I found them
in a highly nervous state bordering
on hysteria.
BLACK AND TANs DRUNK.
The mother told me that in the
case OF each nightly raid the black
and tans' were so drunk they could
rardly walk and went around the
house brandishing revolvers and
n int inc nnr NJ hA 90
and daughters. Mrs. Daley told me
also that she did not know the mo-
nent that they would all be shot.
| Mrs. Tom Clarke, another daugh-
ter, whose husband was also an
Easter week martyr. lives in Dublin.
| She has three small sons. Her home
is raided on an average OF once a
week. AS a result, her eldest son,
who was never very strong, is now
a nervous wreck.
| Mrs. Liam Mellows, whose two sons
are Irish republican soldiers and
! hence never at home, lives alone-her
husband having died last July. About
twenty-five soldiers and "Black and
| Tans" invaded her home one morning
| Last October. i went to see Mrs. Mel
| lows the next day. She told me that
the raiders stayed about four hours,
| and, along with tearing up carpets,
! breaking furniture, and all that, ate
everything she had in the house.
AS ! looked at this little wisp of
a woman I marveled that she could
have lived through such n terrible ex-
pcrience, yet she only made a joke
out OF it, There was. however,
nervous twitching about her features
that told me her experiences had been
anything but a joke.
In Lahinch, in the County Glare
while the "Black and Tans" were en-
gagged in burning that village, a young
married man was asleep in one OF the
cottages; he was awakened by the
smoke OF the burning cottage and
tried to make his escape in the COM
pany of his young wife.
He was shot down, petrol was
poured over his body and he was
thrown back into the burning cot
tage. His young wife was an agon-
lied witness of this fiendish act.
SHOOT MAN DYING OF ILLNESS.
In. the village OF Bansha two young
men named O'Dwyer were shot dead
their aged mother looking on helpless
and heartbroken. In another village
! in Tipperary a young man named
Ryan was near death from pneu-
monia his sister was watching by
his bedside, as his hours were num-
.bored. The black and tans" forced
an entrance to the room, the sister
| pleaded that her brother was dying:
still those things In human form
riddled that poor fellow with bullets.
The Countess Markeivicz, whose
only fault is that she organized the
Fianna Grish Boy Scouts). was SEN
fenced to death after the 1916 rising: