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DUBLIN CITY COUNCIL has officially named a bridge in north Dublin after a 19-year-old UCD student and head of an IRA unit who was executed during the War of Independence.
Dubliner Frank Flood was hanged at Mountjoy jail in March 1921 after being captured by British forces following the Drumcondra ambush, where the IRA unit he was leading was caught attacking an RIC lorry that was crossing the Drumcondra bridge.
He’s known as one of ‘The Forgotten Ten’, who were executed and buried in unmarked graves on unconsecrated ground.
A plaque was unveiled by Lord Mayor of Dublin Mícheál Mac Donncha at the naming ceremony today, officially declaring the bridge to be the Frank Flood Bridge. Members of Frank Flood’s family attended the ceremony.
“Frank Flood typified the bravery and dedication of thousands of republicans throughout history who were willing to sacrifice their lives and liberty, but [who] remain unknown to the general public,” said independent councillor Cieran Perry at the ceremony.
“I don’t think we can overestimate the importance of commemorating the heroic men and women who risked all to free the country.”
At the age of 19, Frank Flood held the role of First Lieutenant of the ASU (Active Service Unit) of the IRA’s Dublin Brigade. On 21 January 1921, Flood led an assault on an RIC patrol, in what’s known as the ‘Drumcondra ambush’, and was captured.
Three of his comrades in the ambush were executed on the same day: Thomas Bryan (24); Patrick Doyle (29), and Bernard ‘Bertie’ Ryan (21). Michael ‘Mick’ Magee (24) died on 22nd March as a result of wounds, while Dermot O’Sullivan (17), another participant in the ambush, survived on the basis of his age, with his sentence commuted.
On 4 October 2001, The Forgotten Ten were afforded full state honours with a private service at Mountjoy, followed by a requiem mass at St Mary’s Pro-Cathedral in Dublin. The cortège passed through the centre of Dublin and was witnessed by tens of thousands of people.
Nine of the ten, including Frank Flood were buried in Glasnevin Cemetery.
Additional reporting by Christine Bohan
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Good decision.
RIP a brave volunteer.
@roscommonman: honouring our “legitimate” murders. Sure their guns only fired good Catholic bullets into the black prods
@Permo Dermo: Oh please shut up.
@Ian Walsh: of all the brilliant people Ireland has produced the only names our politicians can come up these days are chosen from a pool of minor criminals aka freedom fighters.
@Permo Dermo: shut up
@Permo Dermo: ‘legitimate murders’
He was an officer in the Irish Republican Army acting under the command of the First Dail which had been given a clear mandate in December 1918. Sinn Fein’s manifesto clearly stated that, if elected, it would withdraw from Westminster and set up a government in Ireland. It also declared that it would defend that government using military means. Against this government, elected with a clear majority, Westminster employed Auxilliaries (among others) to suppress it. They were exceptionally ruthless in action (not to mention their penchant for shooting people ‘trying to escape’) and tactically proficient. Frank Flood took part in an ambush against a better armed and highly experienced and very well paid enemy who knew what he was getting into. Legitimate murders? Perhaps I’m missing something…
Surely Ireland today should have a way of remembering our War of Independence and all our brave Óglaigh na hÉireann that lost their lives fighting for our freedom against the occupation
@Mentis Green: I’d agree once you’re not trying to shoehorn the Provos in. Their use of Oglaigh na hEireann is an affront to our actual defence forces.
@Honeybadger197: So the South’s fight against occupation is different to the North’s fight against occupation which started when the Nationalist population where being burned out of their homes and shot in the streets by a sectarian police force with the help of Loyalists..
@Honeybadger197: The Defence Forces are more Oglaigh trí Cheathrú na hÉireann in reality. They were Ball-all use, when Irish people were getting burned out of the other quarter of Ireland by the ‘forces of law and order’ and their hymn howling supporters.
@Honeybadger197: wow!tongue in cheek??or just blatantly hypocritical?
So you’re saying the provos just emerged in 1972 for the craic,it’s got nothing to do with 50 years of unionist domination and denial of equal rights?
@David Garland:
The RUC would have been a more balanced police force if Catholics were free to join. It was the republican godfathers and not the Orange Order that prevented then from joining.
Contrived rioting in Nationalist ghettos probably did as much damage as that done by Loyalists. Only that the PIRA usurped the Civil Rights Movement a lot more could have been achieved peacefully and with better community relations.
@Sam Alexander: check sam’s comment out for a brilliant example of victim blaming and a made up Orwellian type of history. Stunning.
@Sam Alexander: wow is your middle name revisionist?
@Sam Alexander: the civil rights march of 5th October 1968 was battoned off the streets by the RUC long before the provos appeared.Then a civil rights march in 1972 resulted in 14 people being shot dead by the paratroopers,the provos were only really emerging at the point.
both those events demonstrate that the British/unionist state were not prepared to treat nationalists as equals so how you can possibly blame the PIRA for hijacking the civil rights movement is beyond me!
In the not too distant future we’ll have to remove Irish men’s names from monuments of various construction due to the offense caused to women and immigrants.
@K D’Arcy: aww petal you mean we’ll actually be acknowledging other people than men? Diddums.
@Deborah Behan: I greatly anticipate your comments, they’re of such maturity and wisdom its seldom seen on the Journal. You’re a true intellect.
@Aprice: Oh look another fake Twitter profile so you can post your tripe that you wouldn’t say from your real account. What a dirty coward you truly are.
God bless him.great idea call bridge after him..brave lad who gave his life for his country.
@Declan burke:
What was his plan B for when they achieved independence. The Unionists were right – Home Rule, Rome Rule.
@Sam Alexander: a few decades previously a million people starved to death, yeah the union was great for the country..
@Sam Alexander: that’s exactly what happened and our country had a defacto ruler in John Charles McQuaid.
@Sam Alexander: His plan was presumably the implementation of the 1919 Proclamation. It can be Googled. Regarding Home Rule – Rome Rule… Home Rule was far from perfect, but it had been in the statute books, only to be usurped illegally by Carson, Craig and others, who conspired in 1914 with Imperial Germany to usurp under arms an Act of Parliament, and to fight the British Government, so that they could remain British.
The Unionists were ‘right’… How? They conspired with Germany, while Germany was gearing up for war with Britain. They openly defied the British Government, threatening force if they did not have their way. This distracted Britain in no small measure during the summer of 1914, which played directly into the hands of the Kaiser.
Ireland WAS a theocracy – post Civil War – but thousands of Frank Floods fought for something far more progressive; more progressive than both Catholic fundamentalist Ireland, and equally zealous and pious Ulster
@Bart Teeling – some perspective based on 1841 and 1911 census: during those 70 years the combined populations of England, Scotland and Wales doubled.
In Ireland it dropped by 55%
Great decision. A young hero who gave his life, he should be remembered.
Contemporary accounts of the incident. Worth a read. http://www.cairogang.com/incidents/drumcondra-jan-1921/drumcondra-ambush.html
@Honeybadger197: great read.i see Robert Pike(the informer who got 5 volunteers killed by tipping the R.I.C. off before the ambush ) was taken out by the IRA afterwards and executed-I suppose in your view there’s nothing wrong with that but the execution of informers by the Provos is deplorable or somehow worse.
The execution of anyone is terrible but both the IRA in 1921 and the IRA of the 70’s/80’s/90’s were fighting a foreign army who were equally ruthless when they got the chance.
@Adam O’Donoghue: *who got 8 volunteers killed(3 shot,5 later executed)
@Adam O’Donoghue: “i suppose” – you supposed wrong. I left the link without comment. Naturally, apologists like yourself decided 2 + 2 = 7. Did you know the Provos murdered more Catholics than that ruthless foreign army did? How do you rationalise that when eulogising the Provos?
19 years old….. head of an ambush unit.
Another young man sent to be slaughtered by fat old republicans supping their pints….in the safety of their local pub fighting for Ireland…… me arse.
Speaks volumes
@Mr Grumble: He fought unlike you being a keyboard warrior Mr Grumpy!
@Niall O’Neill: probably didn’t know what he was up against
19 not 39
@Mr Grumble:
Probably related to the informer,
Trying to justify his actions
@Niall O’Neill: I’m no warrior….. just don’t swallow all that dying for your country shite.
Much prefer to stay alive and contribute to society.
@Mr Grumble: You forgot to mention that you also prefer to sot on your ass enjoying the slice of freedom that your forefathers won for you, while you criticise them for doing so.
Here’s to the day when all the country will be free and unified.
@Mr Grumble: maybe you’re just lucky you didnt have to make that choice? But you feel ‘edgy’ slagging somebody who did? Gobs***e
@Tír Eoghain Gael:
I just don’t believe your romantic version of events
Free….. United Ireland.. rubbish.
Free from what exactly
I’m Irish…. but there little to be proud of.
History has a tendency to be often wildly inaccurate…. especially our history
@Mr Grumble: Nothing romantic about war. But when people fight and die for your benefit, when fighting was the only option available, it is right and proper to honour their memory.
@Mr Grumble: self determination. An Irish land ruled by Irish people for the good of Irish men and women, not for the good of some foreign monarch. There’s nothing romantic about it. Every people should have the right to govern themselves democratically. Anyone or thing blocking that right should be removed, peacefully or by force if necessary.
@Mr Grumble: suppose it is better to die at home rather than the mud of Flanders. At least that young man believed in what he died for unlike the thousands of young men who died for the so called freedom of small nations.
@Mr Grumble: As a ardent student of this period in Irish history I am completely unaware of any such sanctuary for the likes of Oscar Traynor and Richard Mulcahy – neither of whom was fat, or old in 1921. On the other hand Winston Churchill, who ‘sent in the Auxies’ was quite rotund and, apparently, enjoyed a tipple or two… in the absolute safety of Westminster and Blenheim Palace of course…
He certainly was not a snowflake. Unlike 19 year olds of today.
@MiseBean: just a misled child
@Mr Grumble: just like the misled 250,000 boys under the age of 18 who fought for Britain in WW1.
This young man died a mayter for he’s country I bet he’s turning in he’s grave with the Ireland of today
@Aprice:*martyr *his *his
Also, Ireland today is a much better place than it was back then, I’m afraid. Apologies if that doesn’t fit in with your cynical and delusional rhetoric.
The flood bridge? Has a certain ring to it, given the weather we’re having.
A tad surprised it wasnt called berties bridge..
have your say