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1920-44

Petty Officer Charles Brown

Petty Officer Charles Brown (aged 44) of His Majesty’s Coastguard (Ballycrovane near Castletownbere)

Date of incident: 25 July 1920

Sources: CE, 26, 27, 30 July 1920; CC, 26 July 1920; II, 28 July 1920; CCE, 31 July 1920, 29 Jan. 1921; Kerry Weekly Reporter, 31 July 1920; Liam O’Dwyer’s WS 1527, 9-14; Christopher O’Connell’s WS 1530, 12-13 (BMH); James McCarthy’s WS 1567, 12-16 (BMH); Deasy (1973), 119-25; Commonwealth War Graves Commission;

http://www.cairogang.com/soldiers-killed/list-1921.htmlhttp://www.cairogang.com/soldiers-killed/coastguards/brown/brown.htmlhttp://www.cairogang.com/soldiers-killed/coastguards/coastguards.html (accessed 1 Aug. 2014).

 

Note: Brown was killed in the IRA raid on the Ballycrovane coastguard station by perhaps twenty Volunteers. He tried to run out the back of the station but was shot dead. He was buried in Linthorpe Cemetery in Middlesborough. It later emerged that the raiders had shot Brown in front of his wife Caroline, who sought as much as £6,000 in compensation for his death. She testified before the Recorder of Cork in January 1921: ‘Her husband, who was 44 years of age, rushed out the back door and was shot dead before her eyes. She requested the raiders to allow her out [of the coastguard station] to give him a drink, but they refused and compelled her to remain where she was. She had been very ill [ever] since.’ Her husband’s annual earnings amounted to just under £270. She was awarded £4,000. See CCE, 29 Jan. 1921.

The Irish Revolution Project

Scoil na Staire /Tíreolaíocht

University College Cork, Cork,

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