It was formed in 1967 by ex IRA members who left in protest in the early sixties over lack of military action. Its leaders includedPeter Graham, Frank Keane (Former Commandant of the Dublin Brigade of the IRA), Liam Walsh, Joe Dillon and Martin Casey and Maureen Keegan of theYoung Socialists. It recruited members of the MarxistIrish Workers Group.[2] The group drew ideological inspiration fromLeon Trotsky,Che Guevara, and Socialist Irish Republicans from the 1930s such as Michael Price.
Between 1967 and 1970, Saor Éire carried out a number ofbank robberies, the proceeds being used to purchase arms. The group provided arms, training and funding tonationalists in Northern Ireland after the outbreak ofthe Troubles in 1969.[3][4]
20 June 1968: AHibernian bank in Newbridge, Kildare was robbed, £3,174 was taken.[2]
March 1969: A robbery in Newry netted £22,000, the biggest single haul from a robbery in the country at the time.
February 1970: the group took over the village ofRathdrum inCounty Wicklow, stopping traffic and cutting phone lines, and robbed the local bank.[1]
3 April 1970: In the course of a bank robbery in Dublin, a police officer,GardaRichard Fallon, was shot and killed. He was the first member of the Irish security forces to die in the Troubles. Allegations of government connections with Saor Éire were made in theDáil (legislature) immediately afterwards and over the following years.[6] Three men, Sean Morrissey, Patrick Francis Keane and Joseph Dillon were tried for the murder and were acquitted.[1] Over thirty years after his death, the family of Garda Fallon accused the government of assisting members of Saor Éire in escaping after the murder.[1] Previously secret government files made available in 2006 confirmed the sighting ofPádraig "Jock" Haughey, brother of the formerTaoiseachCharles Haughey, in the company of Martin Casey in London buying arms during the period before theArms Trial.[6][2] The government has refused to hold a public inquiry into the matter and possible State collusion with members of the organisation.[6]
July 1970: the offices ofDalton Supplies inCounty Wicklow were bombed, there were no casualties or injuries. The group sent a statement to the newspapers saying it was bombed to force the company to accept the proposals of the Labour Court on behalf of the workers.[2]
13 October 1970: Liam Walsh died in a premature bomb explosion on a railway embankment in Dublin while Martin Casey was critically injured.[2]
25 October 1971: Peter Graham assassinated in Dublin in what was referred to at the time as an internecine dispute about a large sum of money. His killers were never found. Among the mourners at his funeral, along with leading republicans and left-wingers, wereTariq Ali of theInternational Marxist Group andCharlie Bird, previously a member of the Young Socialists and later anews correspondent forRTÉ television. A photograph of the funeral shows Ali and Bird giving aclenched fist salute at the grave.[7]
10 June 1975: Larry White, a leading Saor Éire activist from Cork was shot several times on Mount Eden Road. He died of his injuries a short time later.[8] TheOfficial IRA are widely believed to have been responsible for the killing with a number of members claiming that White had aided theINLA in shooting and injuringSeán Garland inBallymun in March of that year.[9] In 1976 a number of members of the Official republican movement were convicted of the murder of Larry White, among them Bernard Lynch[10] (the husband ofLabour party TDKathleen Lynch). The case was later quashed on the basis that evidence given at the original trial was no longer admissible.[citation needed]
Saor Éire was officially disbanded in 1975, although it remains a Proscribed Organisation in the United Kingdom under theTerrorism Act 2000.[11]
^Hanley, Brian; Millar, Scott (2010).The Lost Revolution: The Story of the Official IRA and the Workers' Party. Penguin. pp. 299–301.ISBN978-0141028453.
