Paddy O’Daly’s life seems to have been filled with military service, work and family life, with a good deal of personal tragedies and sad times mixed in. He showed undoubted courage and loyalty, with a definite ruthless streak. He suffered no fools and was a strict disciplinarian as an officer.

His fighting story reads like a Boy’s Own adventure. Sworn in to the IRB by 1907, he was active before 1916; out from the start of The Rising – and wounded; and heavily involved in key IRA operations during the Tan War. Arrested by the British three times, he became a trusted lieutenant of Collins and O/C of GHQ ASU, the Squad. He narrowly missed capture or worse at the Custom House on 25 May 1921. It is hard not to admire his devotion to duty, his personal bravery and contribution to Irish Independence.

Left to right: In Volunteer uniform; with the early Squad; as a senior Free State officer; and in later life.

In civilian life he was a carpenter by trade, later a builder who built his own house which still stands on the Naas Road.

Yet all that has been mostly forgotten or overshadowed by his Civil War notoriety. Major General O’Daly’s lasting reputation for Free State ruthlessness, his Army command’s atrocities and his own personal disgrace in Co. Kerry overshadow his previous contribution to the Republican Cause. He did nothing to help himself – sometimes boastful and always unrepentant. Some of his statements sound contemptuous of victims and critics. To this writer, his photos in uniform show a certain arrogance and superiority in his demeanour. Yet his youngest daughter always defended him, recalling her daddy as a caring but very sad man. Judging from a portrait in the National Gallery, he died a broken-looking man.

Many aspects of his personal life may not be widely known. He suffered several close personal tragedies, once making a coffin for a daughter who died as an infant. His terminally-ill first wife passed away while he was interned and he was given just three hours parole to attend her funeral. Their young family was split up after that loss. He would see two further wives also die young. Both his parents died during the Civil War – as did many of his comrades – and one of his brothers, Frank, was on the opposing side in that conflict.

O’Daly’s story will show that a Tan War hero came to be a figure of hate for many fellow countrymen and women. A noted disciplinarian who seems to have lost his own self-control and allowed horrific reprisals against his fellow countrymen? We cannot tell why these things happened but perhaps we can give some insights.

COMING SOON…

In a forthcoming two-parter on Paddy O’Daly, we will look first at his life and military career up to the signing of the Treaty in December 1921; and then his part in the Civil War and his later life.

Des White