The Killing of Alan Bell
Introduction from Chronology
Resident
Magistrate Alan Bell (who had been investigating the Dáil Loan and Sinn Féin
funds held in nominal bank accounts – See
Mar-02-20/2) was taking the Dun Laoghaire
tram from his home at 19 Belgrave Sq in Monkstown to
the city centre when he is removed from the tram by IRA men and shot dead on
Merrion Road in Dublin near the Simmonscourt Rd.
More
Detail
Mick
McDonnell and Liam Tobin did the shooting. Bell is shot three times with one
bullet entering his skull. The other IRA men present were Vinny Byrne, Joe
Dolan and Joe Guilfoyle. They were
members of the IRA’s Intelligence Dept and Squad. The IRA men did not wear masks. There were
about 60 people on the tram but nobody came forward to identify the
killers. Afterwards, Alan Bell’s body
lay in front of the railings of the Royal Dublin Society.
Townshend
comments that Collins was a “finance minister with the unusual advantage of
also running a death squad” (Townshend (2014), pg 91). O’Sullivan Greene says “The shooting of Alan Bell marked
what might be called the end of the beginning of the War of Independence.” (O’Sullivan
Greene also argues with O’Halpin and Hopkinson about
the reason why Collins had Bell assassinated saying that it was mostly to do
with his investigation of Dáil accounts – see O’Sullivan Greene (2020), pgs 190-196.)
Fanning
says that this shooting took place on March 20th.