Francis Lafferty aka James Davis by Trevor James
From the quiet surrounds of Bath Avenue, James Davis who was born in Derry in 1883, led an extraordinary life of military service, rebellion and imprisonment. After joing the Royal Navy, he deserted and enlisted in the British Army under an assumed name. He served in India, Burma and France during the First World War before participating in the Connaught Rangers mutiny in 1920 India. Court martialled and imprisoned, he endured harsh conditions, escaped and joined the IRA. This is remarkable story.
Birth Certificate
Francis
was born in the Derry Bogside in 1883; his father Patrick Lafferty was a cattle
dealer. His father died in 1898 when
Francis was only fifteen, leaving his widow with seven children. Within a year Francis had left home and
joined the Royal Navy. He gave his age as 18 and he signed on for twelve
years. His records described him as 5’
3”, with red hair, hazel eyes and a ruddy complexion. The first year was spent
training. His initial posting was to HMS Caledonia, a boys’ training ship
moored in the Firth of Forth. Subsequent
training took place at Portland, Dorset and Devonport and Francis was a good
student and his conduct was rated as ‘Very Good’. But most of this training had been shore-based
or on moored ships and the real test was still to come on board a sea-going
warship.
In
May 1901, Francis was assigned to HMS Magnificent, a battleship with 672 crew,
which patrolled the English Channel.
Things didn’t go so well for him and by July he had spent 14 days in the
ship’s cells. He lasted another few months
but that November when Magnificent was in port, he left the ship and never
returned – a deserter.
Clearly
Navy life was not for him but maybe Army life would suit. He was eighteen now but a deserter couldn’t
enlist in the Army so he changed his name to James Davis, arrived at the
recruiting office in Dublin and re-enlisted as a private in the 2nd
battalion of the Royal Munster Fusiliers.
He served in India and Burma and was active in the North West Frontier
campaign in 1908. He was part of the
expeditionary force to France during the First World War and would have seen
action at many of the major battles at the Western Front. He was promoted to corporal about July 1918
and as corporal, he was responsible for the discipline of a group of about ten
privates and would relay orders from senior officers. In September 1919, he was transferred from
the Munsters to the 1st Battalion of the Connaught Rangers and sent to India. The battalion arrived in the Punjab in
October 1919 and were stationed at several outposts in the region. James’s Company was assigned to Wellington
Barracks in Jullundur.
On
the evening of June 27th1920, a small group of Connaught Rangers in
Wellington Barracks were discussing the situation at home in Ireland where
martial law had been imposed. Some had
been home on leave and recounted actions of the ‘Black and Tans’ they had seen,
others had received letters from home telling of atrocities in their home
district. They decided to make a protest
against British military behaviour in Ireland: they would ‘ground arms’ and
refuse to soldier. By the next day the
word had spread, and many other soldiers agreed with their stand and also
refused to obey orders. A committee of
seven was elected including James (we will call him James from now on) to liaise
with the authorities and the mutineers agreed to only obey orders that were
given by the committee. Despite
opposition from the officers, they had green, white and orange tricolours made
and flew them in the compound, and sang rebel songs. They also refused to carry arms and had them
locked away in the armoury. Later the
mutineers sent two emissaries to another company of Connaught Rangers stationed
about twenty miles away at Solon, and they took up the protest as well.
The
protests were initially peaceful, with senior officers arriving and trying to
reason with the mutineers but on the evening of 1 July around 30 members of the
company at Solon attempted to retake their rifles from the armoury. The
soldiers on guard opened fire, killing two men and wounding another. This
effectively brought the mutiny to an end.
Troops from other regiments were brought in and all the mutineers, including
James, were placed under armed guard. For over three days they were held in a
compound outside, with no shelter, in temperatures over 46o C before
they were brought to Dagshai in Northern India and court-martialled.
Eighty-eight
men were court-martialled and sixty-one were convicted for their role in the
mutiny. Fourteen were sentenced to death by firing squad, but the capital
sentence was only carried out on one soldier, Private James Daly. James was sentenced to two years hard labour and
discharged from the Army ‘with ignominy’.
After
serving some time in Indian prisons, James was returned to England and sent to
Inkerman military prison in Woking, Surrey.
He was put on laundry work but on October 5th 1921 he somehow
procured a ladder and some rope, scaled the wall and escaped, still in his
prison uniform.
About
a week later, a man dressed in rags, which he had apparently taken from a
scarecrow, was arrested in London for drunkenness. While in custody, one of the police noticed
his similarity to the description of a man who had escaped from gaol, and under
questioning the prisoner confessed to being James Davis. The newspapers reported that he was fined 10s/6d
and taken to Pentonville. Whether this
actually was James seems unlikely, because we do know that later that year, he
was in the north of Ireland.
According
to his own account, he escaped from gaol on September 1st 1921, and
made his way back to Derry, where he immediately made contact with the local
IRA. In his own words “I joined the
2nd Northern Division at Cranagh, Sperrin Mountains, Co. Tyrone, and served as
Brigade Training Officer until December 21st, when a raid was made
on the camp and I, along with three others, were arrested. I was tried at the
Winter Assizes at Omagh, Co. Tyrone and sentenced to five years penal
servitude. I was sent to Peterhead Prison in Scotland to serve my sentence”.
Peterhead Prison in Aberdeenshire was probably the harshest prison in the UK
with a regime of relentless hard labour. It was often referred to as Scotland’s
Alcatraz, but with a biting North Sea wind.
Every day, summer and winter, prisoners were taken to a local granite
quarry and had to break up huge granite boulders using only hand tools. In the prison they were housed in cramped,
freezing cells and with almost no freedoms. Years later James referred to
the cold as being hard to bear, particularly for one who had spent many years
in the heat of India.
Having
spent over four years incarcerated, James was one of ten prisoners known as the
Peterhead Ten who were the last republican prisoners to be released. On their release on January 26, 1926, he made
his way to Dublin. He sought assistance from the government in
finding employment and he worked for a while in the canteen of McKee Barracks, and
as a temporary postman during the Christmas period. In 1927 he was given a job as a labourer on
the restoration of the Four Courts. This
was arranged by the President’s department which often arranged employment for
‘deserving cases’ who had served the state in some way.
He
also applied to the Irish White Cross for help. The White Cross had been established in 1921
to distribute funds raised in America to Irish people who had suffered
financial hardship due to the war of independence. James was awarded a grant of £100, £50 of
which he used to liquidate his debts. He also immediately gave up his job in the Four
Courts.
Possibly
for the same reasons as he was given a job, in the early 1930s he was allocated
a house in the newly built O’Connell Gardens, off Bath Avenue. He was also given a post as an attendant at
the National Museum for which he received £2 /11 shillings a week.
By
the mid-1930s he was the secretary of the Connaught Rangers Mutineers
Association seeking pensions for the mutineers who had all lost their British
Army pensions. This was the time when
Fianna Fail had come to power and there had been promises during the election
that they would do something for these men.
After several years of struggle The Connaught Rangers (Pensions) Act,
1936 was enacted by the Oireachtas to provide for the “payment of pensions,
allowances, and gratuities to or in respect of certain former members of the
1st Battalion, Connaught Rangers”.
A
‘qualified person’ had to:
. have been a member of the 1st Battalion of the Connaught Rangers;
. have joined the mutiny;
. have been court-martialled in Dagshai in August 1920 and
. have been sentenced to death, penal servitude, or imprisonment for no less
than 12 months.
He
married Sarah McKay from Donegal in 1937.
They married in St Columba’s church in Glendowan, Donegal where she was
the sacristan. Although still known as
James Davis, his name on the marriage certificate was Francis Owen Lafferty and
he was still working as an attendant in the National Museum.
His
address on the marriage certificate was 45 Belmont Avenue, Donnybrook although
on his correspondence with the Department of Defence he was citing his address
as 58 O’Connell Gardens.
About
1944, James and his wife moved to 51 Morehampton Road and he was calling
himself Francis Owen Davis. He died from
cardiac failure on the 16th November 1948 in Clonskeagh Fever Hospital. The funeral was in the Church of the Sacred
Heart, Donnybrook and he was buried in Dean’s Grange cemetery.
His name appears on a memorial in Glasnevin cemetery, unveiled in 1949, to the 1st Battalion, Connaught Rangers “in commemoration of those members of the battalion who gave their lives during the mutiny and subsequently for Irish freedom”.
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