Upton Train Ambush - 15 Feb 1921

The action was a disaster for the IRA; three of its volunteers were killed and two wounded. Six British soldiers were wounded, three seriously. Six civilian passengers were killed and ten wounded in the crossfire.

A local railway author, Colm Creedon, writes as follows in his Vol II of his trilogy on the CB&SCR (Cork 1989): “On February 15th an appalling massacre took place at Upton a remote country station, on the arrival of the 9.15 am down train from Cork. A party of between forty and sixty insurgents were lying in wait at the station having received information that a large contingent of British forces would be travelling on the train. As it happened, unknown to the waiting attackers, the convoy of troops who had come up by the connecting train from Kinsale did not in fact go westward but proceeded to the City, and only about twenty military personnel were on the 9.15 am train and they were mixed in with the ordinary civilian passengers.

• There were 13 IRA ambushers, led by Charlie Hurley, but they had only 7 rifles, the others had revolvers. The IRA arrived at the station ten minutes before the train. The imprisoned the station master, cleared the station and took cover behind sacks of grain and flour.
• The train arrive shortly before 10am and was carrying around 50 British soldiers of the Essex Regiment, who were scattered through the train and intermingled with civilians. Two IRA scouts, who were supposed to have signalled the of British numbers, never turned up. So Hurley did not know how many troops were on the train and he also wrongly believed that the British troops were all in the central carriage. As a result, when the IRA opened fire on the train, there were heavy civilian casualties. The New York Times reported that "a shower of bullets was rained on the train, practically every compartment being swept"
• As the train pulled into the station the ambushers opened fire. The soldiers returned fire and poured out on to the platform. When Charlie Hurley saw that the enemy force now greatly outnumbered him, he gave the order for withdrawal, shouting to those on the south side to fall back towards the level crossing and gate house to the west of the station.
• The firefight lasted for only ten minutes, but in that time six civilian passengers were killed and ten wounded in the firing between the British and IRA.
• Three of the dead were railway employees - John Sisk signalman; Richard Arthur ticket checker, and a porter who was shot dead through the station house window. One of the civilian victims, who had his head blown off, was a Mr Galvin, a well-known commercial traveller who used this train regularly. Two of the badly injured were women, a Mrs Whitley, Barrack Street, and Mrs Rossborough, Barretts Buildings, both from the city.
• Six British soldiers were also injured, three of them seriously. As far as I can tell there were no British deaths
• Two IRA volunteers were killed outright, another was fatally wounded and two more were badly wounded but survived. Charlie Hurley, who had led the ambush, was among the wounded. His own gun had jammed after the first shot, and as he jumped down from the bridge, he received a bullet wound in the face and also sprained his ankle. IRA man Tom Barry later wrote, "Through some miracle, the nine unwounded and two wounded got away across country, in small parties, with the British following close behind" Three civilian passengers, one unwounded and two wounded were detained by the British on suspicion of belonging to the ambush party

The civilians killed were

• John Spiers
• Thomas Perrott
• James Byrne
• Charles Penrose Johnston
• William Finn
• May Hall
• William Donoghue
• Sean Hegarty
• John Sisk
• Richard Arthur

• Lieutenant John Whelan a native of Liverpool England.
• Lieutenant Patrick O'Sullivan of Raheen Upton.
• Section Commander Batt Falvey of Ballymurphy Upton.

The wounded British soldiers were

• Bandsman W.T.Blundell
• Pte.J.Lloyd
• Pte G.Saniper(from 1st Kings Liverpool)
• Pte H.Dawkins
• PteW.H.Want
• Pte.F.Field(from 1st Essex)

British Soldiers died in Ireland