It was June 1921, when the IRA’s West Cork Flying Column retreated up the Borlin Valley towards the Cork/Kerry border. In hot pursuit were thousands of British troops who had been deployed to eliminate the Column, while more soldiers blockaded their escape route to Kerry.

The odds were heavily stacked against the IRA men, but morale remained high. Their commander was, after all, the charismatic Tom Barry who, in just eight months, had established an international reputation as an able, cunning and fearless guerrilla fighter. A hero in West Cork, he enjoyed one considerable advantage: the local populations's unquestioning loyalty.

Tom Barry, commander of the flying column pictured in 1921

Thomas Bernard Barry was born in 1897 near Killorglin, County Kerry, the son of an RIC constable. After running away from the prestigious Jesuit College at Mungret, County Limerick, he joined the British Army and was posted to the Mesopotamian during World War I. Discharged in April 1919, he soon came after into the gravitational field of the Hales brothers. From a radically Republican family in West Cork, they introduced him to revolutionary ideals.

Joining the IRA, his military experience ensured he rose quickly through the ranks, to command the West Cork Flying Column. Soon after, the 23-year-old Barry sprang to international prominence at Kilmichael, near Macroom, County Cork. On a lonesome country road, 36 volunteers under his command ambushed and annihilated a patrol of 17 Auxiliary police.

Now, as his most challenging hour approached, he drew on his wartime experience. He was aware that to the east lay the isolated valley of Gougane Barra where he had conducted military training in the past. He knew that if the Flying Column could reach this sanctuary, they would avoid the British blockade on the nearby Keimaneigh Pass and be beyond the encircling cordon. The problem was, however, that to reach Gougane Barra, the volunteers would have to cross the Shehy Mountains and then descend into the Coomroe Valley.

Guerilla Days in Ireland: A personal account of the Anglo-Irish War by Tom Barry

To achieve this, it would be necessary to descend 300-metre cliffs. In anticipation of this, local IRA Commander, Din Cronin, was tasked to collect every rope in the Coomhoola Valley. Then, after nightfall, Barry moved his men onto the isolated mountainside under the guidance of a local man, Murty Cronin. The account in his book, Guerilla Days in Ireland, vividly describes a nightmarish march of many hours in thick darkness, often sinking knee-deep in boggy ground.

Eventually, the column reached the rim of the great cliffs above Coomroe, where, without guidance, the men would certainly fall to their deaths. Cronin, however, knew a weakness in the ramparts, a descent route known locally as Poll. This consists of a steep, rocky defile that narrows at one point to a treacherous gully, but this was their only feasible escape route into Gougane Barra.

Poll, the rocky gully down which Tom Barry escaped. Picture: John G O'Dwyer

Having descended Poll a couple of times myself, I discovered to my cost that, even in daylight, it is a steep, wet, knee-twisting gully where even experienced hill-walkers must exercise great diligence. For the column descending in darkness, it must have been epic, with the constant danger of falling or being hit by rocks displaced by those above.

Barry vividly describes volunteers slithering downwards with the aid of stretched-out rifles and ropes that had been tied together to form a single line. An hour later, “bruised and wrenched” but without serious injury, they reached the valley floor of Coomroe. Here, it was just an easy walk to Gougane Barra and hospitality provided by the local hotel...

Feeding and billeting 100 hungry men is no mean feat, but this mammoth task didn’t prove a problem as the ladies of the local Cumann na mBan (women’s IRA volunteers) had already collected food and blankets from the surrounding valleys. Next day, frustrated British forces abandoned the round-up and returned forlornly to barracks. Shortly afterward, Barry led his column triumphantly out of Gougane Barra — the Scarlet Pimpernel of West Cork had escaped once again.

Meanwhile, public opinion in Britain and particularly the United States had turned against the brutal way the war in Ireland was being conducted. Atrocities might be ignored at far-flung corners of the empire, but these were happening within the Britain. Soon, British authorities were in secret negotiations with Sinn Féin. Within a month, the Truce not only concluded the War of Independence but also dropped a curtain on Tom Barry’s brief but stellar epoch as a guerrilla commander.

To visit the scene of Tom Barry’s dramatic escape:

Start from the Gougane Barra Hotel, and continue by the lakeshore to the barrier where cars pay a fee. Continue by the nascent River Lee and soon, you will observe a steep gully high in the great cliffs above some open ground on your left. It was down this gully that the Flying Column escaped under cover of darkness from encircling British troops.

Statue of General Tom Barry, Fitzgerald Park, Cork. Picture: Denis Minihane

A fuller account of Liam Lynch's life is contained in Stories from the Irish Uplands by John G O'Dwyer, published by Currach Books