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John Brennan Cassidy
"Young Brennan on the Moor
Brennan on the Moor
For Brave and undaunted
was young Brennan on the Moor"
Clancy Brothers Song
John B and the Black and Tans
 
By
Eileen T. Cassidy as told to Chris Cassidy
--Can you tell the story about your brother and the Black and Tans?
A: Oh, people still talk about that. It was right in the
neighborhood.
My brother John was working out in one
of the
fields owned by William Gillespie. Two men came
along
and they started to question him. They said to him,
‘did
two men go by here at 10 this morning’ or whatever time
it was. And
he said, ‘well I didn’t see anybody. ’And they kept on
asking him,
‘well, are you sure? Well, how about around
10
o’clock. Did anybody go by then?’ And they went on
and
on with questions like that. And they were getting
angrier and
angrier because they weren’t getting any
information. The questioning out on the roadside lasted a long
time. So
then they took him into the buyer beside the cows and
told him to
kneel down. Then they talked to each other about
shooting
him. And you could imagine – I think he was
15 years
old by then. And, of course, he never spoke only
to say yes
or no to whatever questions they asked him. But
he was
really terrified. So they said, ‘well I think you should
kneel
right there.’ And then another would say, ‘No, I think we’ll put him
over there.’ And they went on with that kind of thing. And I guess
they thought that eventually if he knew anything, he would tell it.
And I think at the end, they were convinced he didn’t know anything.
So they said, ‘Oh well, I think we’ll let him go.’ He didn’t get
over that for a long time. He used to have nightmares and
everything.
Q: Were the two men Black and Tans?
A: No, I don’t know. They could have been. I remember the Black and
Tans rode what was called a motor lorry, which was like a big truck.
And a whole load of them would come riding through the country. And
they had dirt roads at that time. And the roads were not very secure
so when they drove, it would make big ridges in the road, the thing
was so heavy. It made a lot of noise.
The Black and Tans were in Donegal Town at one time. One day, we
heard they were coming out to the country and they came along in the
truck. And oh, it made such a noise, you could hear it. And the
schoolmaster – he was scared to death. He didn’t know whether they’d
come in and shoot us or what they would do. But it slowed down and
then it went right by.
But they used to go into some of the stores in town and take some of
the merchandise and just throw it out in the streets. They did all
kinds of things. It was terrible. And nobody could do anything about
it. They were all people that were in jail that were released just
to come out to torture the Catholics.
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