Lieut. Michael Francis (Frank) Fogarty Engineer Officer 3rd Battalion North Kilkenny Brigade I.R.A.

Lieut Michael Francis Fogarty

Appointed Engineer officer 3rd Battalion North Kilkenny Brigade in September 1920

 Lieut Michael Francis Fogarty elected as Battalion engineer known locally as Frank he was a blacksmith and a motor mechanic by trade.

He was aged about eighteen and was the only support to his widowed mother and a family of six younger than himself he was a great lad”. Garrett Brennan.

In Fogarty’s forge they started experimenting on hand grenades made from barrel steel of 3” diameter which Fogarty screwed and capped at both ends, a quarter inch bolt held in position by a spring and passed through a hole in one cap acted as a firing pin. The barrel then was ground to splinter. After several “tryouts” as the called them they made one which worked. The job was slow as the battalion engineer had to work on them after hours. He had a couple of employee’s who were not trusted to that extent.

They also experimented with a mine made with Concrete and gelignite in a half cwt paint drum. The gelignite and the detonator were contained in a seven pound paint tin in the centre. The concrete and shrapnel iron were poured in three stages leaving each lot about two days before the next lot was poured in. The mine was exploded by fuse. They tried it out in a wood and when it exploded, it brought down a tree and made a five foot crater in the ground. There was only one drawback it could not be used with any accuracy against a moving target. To improve the trigger device they sat about trying to use an electrical trigger like the “shot firer” used in the mines.   

Fogarty and Brennan asked a returned American who had knowledge of medical devices to make an induction coil for them he said that “he could not”, so they then asked him if he could order a hundred yards of bell wire he said that “he would not dare order such an amount”. He suggested using a ford motor coil. They obtained one, but it was defective. They reckoned they had been given a cast off.


They knew that the “shot firer” was available in the mine when they made the suggestion of a raid to the Brigade commander they were told that they were forbidden from attacking the mines, or the military on explosive escort and that order came directly from GHQ in Dublin.After the attack on Solaheadbeg, GHQ had given the order because the owners had threatened to close down the mines. The only commercial mine being supplied with gelignite in the whole of the country was Castlecomer and Capt. Wandesforde had threatened to close it down if there was any interference. This would have put 500 people out of work, including 300 miners and 200 carriers and cut the fuel supply off to the local people around a fifteen mile radius.

Another idea they came up with was a wire hawser strewn across the road between two tree trunks to knock troops off their trucks. Frank Fogarty had measured the height of the cab with a lathe laid carelessly beside a military truck when it called for petrol one day at his uncle’s garage. 

Their next project involved a device to disable trucks by puncturing  tyres. It was a British military design, anti cavalry caltrop/cheval-trap. This was an arrangement of iron spikes in a tetrahedral pattern, generally about 3 to 4" high, these would be strewn in the path of infantry or cavalry to spike their feet and disable them. The tetrahedral pattern ensures that the cal trap stands on a tripod of spikes, with one spike pointing vertically, and this is so whichever way up they are thrown. It was copied from a British military design supplied by GHQ in Dublin, and after several attempts they came up with a copy. They supplied the finished pattern to the rest of the Battalion. It was to be used against the “Crossley tenders” being used by the British at the time to puncture the tyres. 

“Another innovation at the time was a gadget for puncturing the tyres of trucks and it was a four pronged piece of iron so designed or shaped that no matter what way it was thrown on the road one spike or prong was always pointing upwards. To be effective of course, the wheel of the lorry would have to driven straight on to it” Patrick Dunphy.

 

Martin Barrett Castlecomer