1 12 Harberton Road Highgate London W. 21st May 1916 Dear Mr. Dillon I am in receipt of your
letter of the 18th May & as you wish
to have details of this conversation,
I shall endeavour to put it on paper
as best I can. I was sitting in the
cabin of the Greenore boat where there
was a good number of Soldiers & some
one near handed me the 'Sketch' of the
day to have a look at it. As I was
about to open it, I noticed on the front
page a photo of Mr Sheehy-Skeffington,
evidently addressing a gathering.
Whilst looking at it , a soldier on my
left bent over in some surprise, &
said 'Hello, I saw that fellow; he was
shot along with three others in
Portobello barracks'! I said, is that so?
'Oh yes, I was one of the firing party & 2
a devil of a job we had with them', he
answered. ' We placed them along
some brick walls & shot them, one
after another, at breakfast time.'
There were eight of us in the
firing party. That fellow there' (pointing
to the picture of Sheehy-Skeffington) when
he heard the first discharges, fell
insensible & when it came his turn
we tried to stand him; but it was
no use, so we had to shoot him on
the ground.' He then went on to say, that
he deserved to be shot, although in his
opinion he got no trial & he seemed
to think too that the officer 'would
get into a row over it. I said I thought
the officer was not an Englishman.
As no, he answered, I know him well, he
belongs to near Newtownards, - it
was Adjutant Morgan. We were all
Belfast men who shot them - all
from the Victoria Barracks'! I was rather nervous about
questioning him too sharply & went
cautiously. I got news, however that Mr 3
Sheehy-Skeffington would eat nothing
after being taken. This the soldier
put down as a fear of his being
poisoned & appeared never to have
heard of a hunger-strike. Several
of his remarks were very strange
& made his story appear extremely
likely. He appeared to be puzzled,
for instance, that the bullets
passed through the bodies of the
victims, & smashed the bricks
behind. This soldiers name was
Morrison, as I learned from some of his
comrades remarks; he was going to
Grantham from the Victoria Barracks,
Belfast & belonged to the Royal Irish
Rifles. Looking up the Army list
on reaching here I found that a Lieut.
Morgan was attached to the 3rd Batt.
Royal Irish Rifles Such is a brief account of the
affair & I regret that I could not
see you personally as I think it would
be more satisfactory You have information, no
doubt, which will enable you to set a 4
proper value on the story; to me,
of course, it is simply mysterious
I shall be thankful though
to have your opinion of it & shall
be glad, at any time, to give you
further details. I am
Yours truly Phil. J. McArdle