CURRAGH CIVILIAN EMPLOYEE MURDERED

 

A military court of inquiry, in lien of an inquest, assembled at Kilbeggan, Co. Kildare on the 15^th June 1921, for the purpose of investigating the death of Michael Power, aged 40, civilian employe [sic] Royal Engineers, of the Curragh Camp. According to the evidence, deceased, who was an ex-soldier, lived with his wife and four children at Brownstown, Curragh, when one night, about 11 o’clock, their cottage was surrounded by fifteen men, who started to burst open the door. Power immediately went down and opened it, and two masked men, armed with revolvers, entered. They asked him if he was Power, and then took him away, half dressed. He returned home at 4 a.m. the next morning, and stated that he had been taken to a big house and tried for alleged larceny by a Sinn Fein court, which sentenced him to leave the country for a period of twelve months on the following Monday.

Power obtained quarters in the Curragh Camp and employment with the Royal Engineers in September, 1920. In April, 1921, his wife visited her sister at a house where she was employed in Kilbeggan. Power joined his wife later, and left about 7 p.m. At 9 p.m. four men, two of them masked, came to the house and asked Mrs. Power where her husband was. She told them he had gone home. The men then searched the house, upsetting everything. Two of them had revolvers.

On the 10^th June, 1921, Mrs Power again visited her sister at the house in Kilbeggan. Power went with her and remained about an hour. He then said that he was going into the yard and would be back in about five minutes. Mrs. Power was up stairs at the time, and after her husband had left she noticed men approaching the house. When she observed the centre man put a white handkerchief over his face she became suspicious and went down stairs and into the yard to look for her husband. She found him lying face downwards in a stable. He was unconscious, and, although she remained with him till he died about half an hour afterwards, he never spoke.

A medical witness gave evidence that deceased had bullet wounds on the left side of the chest, the left groin, and the left collar bone. All wounds had been caused by small calibre bullets, which had been fired from a distance of at least three yards.

The Court found that Michael Power was wilfully murdered by some person or persons unknown.