Formation of First
Southern Division IRA
Introduction from Chronology
Formation of First Southern
Division at a meeting held in Kippagh near
Millstreet. This was the first major move in the divisionalisation
of the IRA.
More
Detail
The
First Southern Division consisted of the three Cork Brigades, the three Kerry
Brigades, the two Waterford Brigades and the West Limerick Brigade.
Liam
Lynch (formerly Brigade Commandant Cork No. 2) was appointed Divisional Commandant
and Florence O'Donoghue (formerly Adjutant Cork No. 1) was appointed Divisional
Adjutant. Ernie O'Malley represented GHQ. Sean Moylan is appointed
Commandant of the Cork No. 2 Brigade. (Lynch says that Cork No.2 is split with
Moylan given command of Mallow, Kanturk, Newmarket, Charville and Millstreet Battalions. While George
Power is given command of Fermoy, Castletownroche and
Mitchelstown battalions.)
Cork
No. 1 was represented by Sean O'Hegarty and Florence
O'Donoghue; Cork No. 2 by Liam Lynch and Sean Moylan; Cork No. 3 by Liam Deasy and Tom Barry; Kerry No. 1 (North) by Andy Cooney and
Kerry No. 2 (South) by Humphrey Murphy and John Joe Rice. The other
brigades were not represented. There was discussion of sending columns to
less active areas. There was also a decision made to
attack all Crown forces on a particular day in the divisional area if the
British executed the four IRA men due to be hung in Cork – see Apr-28-21/2.
Sean
O’Hegarty, a ‘master of invective’,
verbally tore O’Malley to shreds.
(Co-incidentally,
in March 1921, Lynch had taken over as Divisional Centre of the South Munster
Division of the IRB. The South Munster Division of the IRB consisted of
Cork, Kerry and Waterford.)
For
a discussion on IRA divisionalisation see Townshend (2014), pgs
274-280.