Thurles Information

A rare GAA Gaelic football match ticket for a game between Tipperary and Dublin and which was played on “Bloody Sunday,” November 21st 1920, goes on sale next week.

The ticket is one of only a handful still in existence from that infamous football game held in Croke Park, in which 14 people were killed and 60 wounded, after British soldiers fired on attending spectators and players.

This rare ticket, in fine condition, is attracting huge International attention and is expected to be sold at between €5,000 – €30,000, during a two day auction tomorrow (13th) and Tuesday 14th February, in Foley’s Auction Rooms, Sixmilebridge, Co. Clare.

The story of Bloody Sunday 1920 is a tale of extreme violence in Dublin during the Irish War of Independence, when a total of 31 people, fourteen British, fourteen Irish civilians and three republican prisoners were killed.

The day had begun with an Irish Republican Army’s (IRA) operation, under the direction of Michael Collins and Richard Mulcahy, to assassinate the “Cairo Gang,“or “Special Gang,” and others, using a clandestine group of IRA members known as the “The Twelve Apostles.”

The “Cairo Gang,“or “Special Gang,” were a team of undercover British agents working and living in Dublin. Twelve were British Army officers, one a member of the Royal Irish Constabulary and the last a civilian informant. In the end, of the 35 people originally on Collins’ hit list, only about a third were assisinated, however the action would terrify and cripple British intelligence here in Ireland.

In retaliation for this IRA action, the Royal Irish Constabulary opened fire on a crowd attending a Gaelic football match in Croke Park, killing fourteen civilians. Some police fired into the fleeing crowd, while others outside the Park, opened fire from the Canal Bridge at spectators who climbed over the Canal end wall in their attempt to escape. When the firing stopped seven people had been shot to death, five more had been fatally wounded and another two people lay trampled to death by the fleeing crowd. The dead included two boys aged 10 and 11 years and Tipperary Gaelic football player Michael Hogan, a native of Grandemockler, Co Tipperary. Hogan’s name was memorialised posthumously by the building of the Hogan Stand at Croke Park, in 1924.  Later that evening, three IRA suspects in Dublin Castle were beaten and killed by their British captors, allegedly while trying to escape.

Continue reading Tipperary GAA Bloody Sunday Football Ticket For Sale

Munster MEP Mr Sean Kelly

“The GAA should buy the famous Hayes Hotel here in Thurles.”  So says former GAA President and current Fine Gael Munster MEP, Mr Sean Kelly, who has once again reiterated his proposal that the GAA should buy this historic home of the Gaelic Athletic Association.

Mr Kelly stated; “Hayes Hotel is a major symbol of Irish cultural and sporting heritage and the location of the first GAA meeting in 1884. The GAA was founded at this hotel, so it is the perfect site for a museum to showcase GAA history and its continued growing success nationally and globally. A GAA museum would be an enormous tourist attraction for sports fans. The GAA is built on the dedication and success of local clubs and future EU sports policy will reinforce the need to support grassroots sports. Indeed, I have often cited the GAA as a leading example of how sport can boost the physical, social and economic health of regional towns, during my work at the European Parliament.  Hayes Hotel could also be used as a regional GAA headquarters with staff tasked with supporting local clubs across the country. The creation of a GAA museum, at this time would be timely, as Thurles has been named the 2012 ‘European Town of Sport’.”

Picture courtesy G.Willoughby