Patrick Toomey

 

Nothing in Death records under "Patrick" or "Toomey" for Macroom. The only reference is in Caffereta's Diaries http://www.theauxiliaries.com/men-alphabetical/men-c/cafferata-ro/diary/cafferata-diary.html

There is no date in the diary, but it is sometime between Sep and Dec 1920. Cafferata writes

Paddy Toomey was not only the town drunk but was also ‘a bit simple in the head, so we used to pick him up and take him to his bit of a one roomed cottage and wrap him up in a few old blankets he had and leave him to sober up. We often gave him a few bob hoping he’d buy a bit of food with it or something for his chest and lungs, which were in a dreadful state. This bit of kindness led to the rumour getting round the village that we were giving Paddy money in exchange for information as to the I.R.A. Paddy couldn’t have given information on anything, let alone the I.R.A. . . . But rumour is a dangerous thing, however, however founded, and one night one of our curfew patrols heard a couple of shots and on investigation found Paddy up a dark alley face downwards with a couple of Colt .45 Automatic bullets through him. On him was pinned a small note with one word on it, “Informer”! This was the first time that any of us really realised that we were in the middle of a serious business. Poor Paddy was just a harmless old cattle drover, and here he was shot to ribbons on suspicion only.’1

The only other oblique reference is note in one of the Ernie O’Malley Notebooks recording an interview with Daniel Corkery, O/C of the Macroom Battalion. Corkery recalled that two spies had been shot in the area, one of whom ‘was a half fool who wanted to be in with the other crowd’.

Bout there ppears to be no death certificate, and if the ADRIC had found a body as Cafferata indicates, then there should have been an inquest

 

 

Shot by IRA as British spies