Editing Bloody Sunday (1920) (section)

===Morning: IRA assassinations===
{{Infobox civilian attack
| title      = Bloody Sunday shootings
| image      =File:Cairo gang.jpg
| caption    =A photo purportedly of the Cairo Gang, but possibly the Igoe Gang, RIC officers who were brought to Dublin to identify and target IRA men who had moved to the capital from their respective counties.
| location   = central [[Dublin]]
| coordinates=
| date       = 21 November 1920
| time       = Early morning
| timezone   = GMT
| type       = [[Assassination]]s
| fatalities = '''15''':{{plainlist|
* 9 British Army officers
*1 RIC sergeant
*2 Auxiliaries
*2 civilians
*1 uncertain (probably a British agent)}}
| injuries   = 5
| perp       = [[Irish Republican Army (1919–1922)|Irish Republican Army]]
| susperp    =
| weapons    = [[revolver]]s, [[semi-automatic pistol]]s
| numparts   =
| dfens      =
}}

Early on the morning of 21 November, the IRA teams mounted the operation. Most of the assassinations occurred within a small middle-class area of south inner-city Dublin, except for two shootings at the [[Gresham Hotel]] on Sackville Street (now [[O'Connell Street]]). At 28 Upper Pembroke Street, six British Army officers were shot. Two Intelligence officers were killed outright; (Lieutenant-Colonel [[Hugh Montgomery (Royal Marines officer)|Hugh Montgomery]]), a staff officer, died of his wounds on 10 December; the rest survived. Another successful attack took place at 38 Upper Mount Street, where another two Intelligence officers were killed.{{sfn|Dolan|2006|pp=798–799}}{{sfn|Leonard|2012|pp=115–120}} A British Army [[dispatch rider]] stumbled upon the operation on Upper Mount Street and was held at gunpoint by the IRA. As they left the scene the IRA exchanged fire with a British major who had spotted them from a nearby house.{{sfn|Dwyer|2005|p=185}}

At 22 Lower Mount Street, one Intelligence officer was killed, but another escaped. A third, surnamed "Peel", managed to keep the assassins from entering his room.{{sfn|Dolan|2006|pp=801–802}}{{sfn|Leonard|2012|pp=110–113}} The building was then surrounded by members of the Auxiliary Division, who happened to be passing by, and the IRA team was forced to shoot its way out. One IRA volunteer, [[Frank Teeling]], was shot and captured as the team fled the building. In the meantime, two of the Auxiliaries had been sent on foot to bring reinforcements from the nearby barracks. They were captured by an IRA team on Mount Street Bridge and marched to a house on Northumberland Road where they were interrogated and shot dead.{{sfn|Dwyer|2005|p=182}} They were the first Auxiliaries to be killed on active duty.<ref>Eunan O'Halpin & Daithí Ó Corráin. ''The Dead of the Irish Revolution''. Yale University Press, 2020. p. 227</ref>

At 117 Morehampton Road, the IRA killed a sixth Intelligence officer, but also shot his civilian landlord, presumably by mistake.{{sfn|Dolan|2006|p=802}}{{sfn|Leonard|2012|pp=109–110}} While at the Gresham Hotel, they killed another two men who were apparently civilians, both of them former British officers who served in the First World War. The IRA team had ordered a hotel porter to take them to specific rooms. In one of them (MacCormack) was apparently not the intended target. The status of the other (Wilde) is unclear.{{sfn|Dolan|2006|p=803}}{{sfn|Leonard|2012|pp=120–129}} According to one of the IRA team, James Cahill, Wilde told the IRA he was an Intelligence officer when asked his name, apparently mistaking them for a police raiding party.<ref>Eunan O'Halpin & Daithí Ó Corráin. ''The Dead of the Irish Revolution''. Yale University Press, 2020. p. 224</ref>

One of the IRA volunteers who took part in these attacks, [[Seán Lemass]], later became a prominent Irish politician and served as [[Taoiseach]]. On the morning of Bloody Sunday, he took part in the assassination of a British court-martial officer at 119 Lower Baggot Street.{{sfn|Dolan|2006|p=799}}{{sfn|Leonard|2012|pp=106–107}} Another court-martial officer was killed at another address on the same street.<ref>Eunan O'Halpin & Daithí Ó Corráin. ''The Dead of the Irish Revolution''. Yale University Press, 2020. p. 223</ref> At 28 [[Earlsfort Terrace]], an RIC sergeant named Fitzgerald was killed, but apparently the target was a British lieutenant-colonel Fitzpatrick.<ref>Eunan O'Halpin & Daithí Ó Corráin. ''The Dead of the Irish Revolution''. Yale University Press, 2020. p. 225</ref>

There has been confusion and disagreement about the status of the IRA's victims on the morning of Bloody Sunday. At the time, the British government said that the men killed were ordinary British officers or (in some cases) innocent civilians. The IRA were convinced that most of their targets had been British Intelligence agents. In a 1972 article, historian Tom Bowden concluded that "the officers shot by the IRA were, in the main, involved in some aspect of British intelligence".{{sfn|Bowden|1972|p=27}} Charles Townshend disagreed: in a response published in 1979, he criticised Bowden's work, while presenting evidence from the Collins Papers to show that "several of the 21st November cases were just regular officers".{{sfn|Townshend|1979|pp=380–382}} The most recent research, by Irish military historian Jane Leonard, concluded that, of the nine British officers who were killed, six had been undertaking intelligence work; two had been court-martial officers; another was a senior staff officer serving with Irish Command, but unconnected with military intelligence. One of the two men shot at the Gresham Hotel (Wilde) was probably on secret service, but the other was an innocent civilian, killed because the assassins went to the wrong room.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.bloodysunday.co.uk/murdered-men/wilde.html|title=Mr Leonard William/Aidan Wilde|website=www.bloodysunday.co.uk|access-date=9 June 2020|archive-date=4 July 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200704101021/http://www.bloodysunday.co.uk/murdered-men/wilde.html|url-status=live}}</ref>{{sfn|Leonard|2012|pp=120–129}}

In all, 14 men were killed outright, and another was mortally wounded, while five others were wounded but survived. Only one Squad member was captured, Frank Teeling, but he managed to escape from jail soon after.{{sfn|Hopkinson|2004|p=90}}{{sfn|Bennett|1959|p=130}} Another IRA volunteer was slightly wounded in the hand. IRA volunteer and future Irish politician, [[Todd Andrews]], said later that "the fact is that the majority of the IRA raids were abortive. The men sought were not in their digs or in several cases, the men looking for them bungled their jobs".{{sfn|Dwyer|2005|p=19}}

Collins justified the killings in this way: <blockquote>My one intention was the destruction of the undesirables who continued to make miserable the lives of ordinary decent citizens. I have proof enough to assure myself of the atrocities which this gang of spies and informers have committed. If I had a second motive it was no more than a feeling such as I would have for a dangerous reptile. By their destruction the very air is made sweeter. For myself, my conscience is clear. There is no crime in detecting in wartime the spy and the informer. They have destroyed without trial. I have paid them back in their own coin.{{sfn|Dwyer|2005|p=191}}</blockquote>

'''List of those killed'''<ref>Eunan O'Halpin & Daithí Ó Corráin. ''The Dead of the Irish Revolution''. Yale University Press, 2020. pp. 223–227</ref><ref>[http://www.bloodysunday.co.uk/murdered-men/MURDERED-MEN.html Bloody Sunday on 21 Nov 1920] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201204120722/http://www.bloodysunday.co.uk/murdered-men/MURDERED-MEN.html |date=4 December 2020 }}. [http://www.bloodysunday.co.uk/index.html British Intelligence in Ireland] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210126000925/http://www.bloodysunday.co.uk/index.html |date=26 January 2021 }}.</ref>
*[[Peter Ashmun Ames|Lieutenant Peter Ames]] (British Army Intelligence Officer) – Upper Mount Street
*Lieutenant Henry Angliss (cover name 'Patrick McMahon', British Army Intelligence Officer) – Lower Mount Street
*Lieutenant Geoffrey Baggallay (British Army Court-Martial Officer) – 119 Lower Baggot St
*Lieutenant George Bennett (British Army Intelligence Officer) – Upper Mount Street
*Major Charles Dowling (British Army Intelligence Officer) – Pembroke Street
*Sergeant John Fitzgerald (RIC officer) – Earlsfort Terrace
*Auxiliary Frank Garniss (RIC Auxiliary, former British Army lieutenant) – Northumberland Road
*Lieutenant Donald MacLean (British Army Intelligence Officer) – Morehampton Road
*Patrick MacCormack (civilian, former British Army [[Royal Army Veterinary Corps|RAVC]] captain) – Gresham Hotel
*[[Hugh Montgomery (Royal Marines officer)|Lieutenant-Colonel Hugh Montgomery]] (British Army Staff Officer) – Pembroke Street (died on 10 December)
*Auxiliary Cecil Morris (RIC Auxiliary, former British Army captain) – Northumberland Road
*Captain William Newberry (British Army Court-Martial Officer) – 92 Lower Baggot Street
*Captain Leonard Price (British Army Intelligence Officer) – Pembroke Street
*Thomas Smith (civilian, landlord of MacLean) – Morehampton Road
*Leonard Wilde (civilian and possible Intelligence agent, former British Army lieutenant) – Gresham Hotel