The Invisible War
T
SUNDAY, 21 NOVEMBER 1920
he day began under a crisp autumn sun in the heart of a
sleeping city. Johnny McDonnell, Willie Maher and Michael Lawless met after eight o’clock in front of O’Tooles GAA club on Seville Place near Sackville Street and hurried to the docks. They crossed the River Liffey by boat and walked to Dunlop House, a giant redbrick building at the corner of Westland Row and Denzille Street. Sean Daly was already there. Herbie Conroy was with him, holding a sledgehammer underneath his coat. Then came Tom Ennis, the senior IRA man among them. McDonnell and the others also knew Ennis from O’Tooles. Years before the IRA made different men of them, football and O’Tooles was the bond that first brought them together. Some Sundays they went to see Johnny play in goals for Dublin. The rest of the country knew Johnny from the newspaper pictures as ‘the man in the hat’, famed for keeping his peaked cap on during games to shield his eyes from the sun. His brother, Paddy, was an even bigger star. They were all neighbours and friends, teammates and family before they became comrades. Before they went 34
