#OnThisDay 1921 IRA ambushed an RIC patrol of a Ford touring car & two trucks at Kilmeena, Mayo, killing one RIC man & wounding another. The two RIC trucks stopped before the ambush site & fifty Black and Tans under the cover of suppressive machine gun fire snuck up & attacked the IRA from the rear & killed five. Of the 41 ambushers, only half of them had rifles, the rest mostly armed with shotguns. Cmdt Michael Kilroy managed to pull the rest of his column out of the danger zone.
The bodies of those killed at Kilmeena were dumped on the street outside the RIC barracks in Westport. The locals were disgusted, as was the Earl of Sligo from Westport House, who was no friend to the republicans, who complained that their remains should be treated with respect.
Kilroy and the Mayo IRA would get their revenge a fortnight later at Carrowkennedy.
The Irish at War 