Tommy Furey, known as Tommy Tom Furey (1898-1979) was an
Irish Volunteer.
Tommy Tom Furey was a native of Oranbeg, Oranmore, and was a founding member of the
Oranmore Irish volunteers, established in 1914. Too young to carry a gun, he became a dispatch rider.
On the Tuesday after
Easter Sunday 1916, the Oranmore Company assembled at 10.00 a.m. under the command of Captain
Joe Howley
Joseph Howley, from Oranmore, County Galway, was a member of the Irish Volunteers. He mobilized and led a combined contingent of 106 Volunteers from Oranmore Including Tommy Furey and neighboring Maree on Easter Tuesday morning of the 1916 Ea ...
. Furey participated in the following attack on the local R.I.C. station, which failed. They retreated to
Clairinbridge where they were joined by the Clarinbridge and Maree companies, following which the three companies march back to Oranmore, and decided to march to
Athenry to join up with the local company under command of
Larry Lardner
Larry Lardner, a native of Athenry, County Galway, was a Brigade Commandant for the Irish Republican Army in his locality. He was by trade a publican and a member of the Irish Republican Brotherhood (IRB) Supreme Council for Connacht in 1917. ...
. This followed on information that a detachment of the British army led by Captain Morcombe were on the way from
Galway.
Captain Morcombe and his force reached the centre of Oranmore just as the last of the volunteers were leaving and a brief battle ensued. Furey remained with the volunteers over the next ten days, and participated in the seizing of Moyode Castle, Athenry. With the failure of the rebellion in Dublin the Galway companies disbanded, Furey and his brother Patsy returning home. They, along with almost all of the Oranmore company, were arrested, though their brother Johnny escaped to
Connemara. Transferred to
Arbour Hill
Arbour Hill ( ga, Cnoc an Arbhair) is an area of Dublin within the inner city on the Northside of the River Liffey, in the Dublin 7 postal district. Arbour Hill, the road of the same name, runs west from Blackhall Place in Stoneybatter, and se ...
, Dublin, the Furey brothers were two of fourteen men from Oranmore - including their cousin, Tom Furey of Bushfield - court martialed and sentenced to five years
penal servitude. They were shipped to
Britain, serving time in
Dartmoor prison.
Furey met
Éamon de Valera, also imprisoned at Dartmoor, and participated in a protest against wearing prison clothes. This resulted in Furey being chained to
Thomas Ashe,
Eoin McNeill, Tommy Hunter, J.J. Walsh, and Bill Cosgrave for the duration of their day-long transfer to
Lewes Prison,
Brighton
Brighton () is a seaside resort and one of the two main areas of the City of Brighton and Hove in the county of East Sussex, England. It is located south of London.
Archaeological evidence of settlement in the area dates back to the Bronze A ...
. In Lewes, Furey against participated in agitation, this time to be accorded Prisoner of War status, which resulted in being chained in gangs of seven and a diet of bread and water.
On 15 June 1917, all prisoners were released and given five shillings to return to
Ireland. He had served time in a total of eight prisons.
On being asked by his granddaughter, Brenda Furey, why he never tried to escape, he stated ''"Your couldn't, there would be police with ammunition, continually walking around the wall, and even if we did where would we go because we didn't even know the country."''
Upon his return, he and other prisoners posed for a group photograph. In later life he was a valued source for local historians on the background and events of the Easter Rebellion in Galway, the only other one in the country outside of Dublin.
References
* ''The History of Oranmore Maree'', Brenda Furey, Galway, 1991.
{{DEFAULTSORT:Furey, Tommy
People from Oranmore
People of the Easter Rising
1898 births
1979 deaths