Community Notes July 10th

County Final Camogie Win

Barryroe defeated St. Fanahan’s in the County Under 14 B Cup final on Sunday last on a score line of 5-6 to 3-3. Congratulations to all involved especially Rena Collins, Sarah Harte, Maebh O’Sullivan and Orla Ryan of Timoleague.

Ibane Gaels

By the time you have read these notes, both the U21 footballers (against Bandon on July 6th) and the U17 hurlers (against Cloughduv on July 7th) will have played their respective championship games. The U17's were pipped by Ballinhassig last week in the first round by 5-16 to 3-20 in a great game of hurling. The U13 hurlers play Kilbrittain at home on Thursday July 8th at 7:30pm and the the U15 hurlers also play at home against Courcey Rovers on Saturday July 10th at 7:30pm.

100 Years Ago

In June a group of local volunteers were surprised by the military while engaged in making a dug-out at Castleview. The group consisted of Timothy Keohane, Con Lehane, Andrew Burke, Daniel Minehane and Jeremiah Sheehy. They were all armed. The military opened fire as they made their escape. Con Lehane returned fire which helped the others in their escape attempt. Unfortunately, Timothy Keohane was arrested while the others made good their escape. Con got a pony when clear of the military. He gave his revolver to Kate Murphy of Carhue. He had to pass through Timoleague village and he was aided by scouts John Cleary, Harbour View, Leo Marlborough of Church St. and Edward Sheehy of Carhue. He managed to pass through the village safely but about a mile outside as he headed towards Kilbrittain, he ran into another section of military and was arrested. One soldier was placed in charge of Con. That proved to be a bad error of judgement by the authorities. Con seized his opportunity later and disarmed the soldier and made a successful escape. He fired on the soldier with the captured rifle but missed. He made his way through the fields to O’Neill’s house at Maryborough. There his wounds were treated. He was given a change of clothing and Bird Crowley and Maud O’Neill scouted him to safety and they dumped the captured rifle. Con knew the area well as he had spent several weeks at the same house early in the campaign making rifle bayonets. Con was a blacksmith by trade. He was helped by local volunteers. The Kilbrittain volunteers were supplied with all their requirements from O’Mahony’s of Cloundreen and O’Neill’s of Maryborough.

As can be deduced from this, Con was a larger than life character and a fearless fighter. Lionel Fleming, a noted journalist and son of the local rector at Timoleague wrote an autobiography, Head or Harp. It was published in 1965 and tells of their time at The Glebe during The Easter Rising, The War of Independence and The Civil War. Con was a neighbour of the Flemings, living at Castle Upper a few hundred yards from the Rectory.Lionel writes that “although the Rising set Dublin aflame, it had very few repercussions outside of it. In Timoleague, all that happened was that Con Lehane created a sensation by attending Mass in a green uniform and a tie in the green-white-and-orange colours of the insurgents. The same Lehane gained a great local reputation afterwards as having put to fight a whole party of British troops while armed with nothing more than a walking- stick”

While that may have been somewhat exaggerated, Con’s reputation was well known and undisputed even beyond the confines of Timoleague.