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Remembered Today:

Cairo gang


PFF

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This has been a fascinating hread and its relationship to the GW seems clear enough. Whatever you do, don't hide it away.

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  • 1 month later...

No the wiki photo is not the Cairo Gang. The Cairo Gang were all officers who met at the Cairo Cafe and included Baggalley and Ashmun(t) Aimes. These shorties are probably not the Igoe gang as they were police although one of them number 9 appears to be in a photo wit hwhat is generally regarded as a photo of Eugene Igoe. I can dig this out. Too short to be coppers not too short to be auxies in mufti.

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  • 2 weeks later...

No the wiki photo is not the Cairo Gang. The Cairo Gang were all officers who met at the Cairo Cafe and included Baggalley and Ashmun(t) Aimes. These shorties are probably not the Igoe gang as they were police although one of them number 9 appears to be in a photo wit hwhat is generally regarded as a photo of Eugene Igoe. I can dig this out. Too short to be coppers not too short to be auxies in mufti.

hi, as far as I can recall the men in this photo were named in a book last year by E.McCall called "Tudors Toughs"

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The Cairo Gang were all officers who met at the Cairo Cafe and included Baggalley and Ashmun(t) Aimes

Once misinformation gets going it is very difficult to stop it!. The Cairo Gang is a modern, post 1950 creation, it was never used in contemporary documents. I defy/encourage anyone to come up with an original use of the expression any earlier. You can also run it through the Google gismo to show its origins at that time.

An explanation of "The Cairo Gang" photo - click . They were F Coy ADRIC, the photo, and there are at least two different annotated copies using the same names, on the IRA file in Bur Mil History in Dublin it shows clearly who they were. The IRA called the "Special Gang" not "Cairo Gang"

attribution.jpg

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Yes so Leonard Appleford is positively identified he was an Auxiliary and was shot down off duty in Grafton St. Dublin. The photo says he is dead so it could be this was taken after June 24th 21. Denitith was wounded at Brunswick St. Winch was I/O for F Coy.

Stapley G A (MM) I think was a section leader-if 9 is McLean it could be Donald McLean who was killed on Bloody Sunday, definitely a Cairo gang member. I say it could be him because he looks quite different in his army uniform photo.

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Bloody Sunday was 21 Nov 1920, and the McLean to whom you refer died then

There is a D F McClean (Aux No 588) in F Company , who is much more likey to be in a photograph of F Coy men!

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  • 2 years later...

Picking up on this very old thread, I noticed that two* of the casualties served in the Lancashire Fusiliers. The Lancashire Fusiliers were stationed in Dublin in 1920, so it would appear that they were targeted that day. I am fairly sure that they would not have been in the Intelligence arms of the British in Dublin. The LF journal might have some detail on how they got caught up in the shootings. I assume on a Sunday morning they would not have been on duty and at home. Interestingly both were at Gallipoli, both wounded and both very likely evacuated to Egypt and probably Cairo.

Separately I note another was 5th Bn Suffolks and then the 2nd Kensingtons (TF) - G G Warnes Curious to understand how a TF Battalion Officer ends up in Dublin. Incidentally he was also in Egypt and Gallipoli in 1915 at the same time as the Lancashire Fusiliers.

So three casualties all with a link to Egypt. Pure coincidence?

MG

* Capt B C H Keenlyside 1st Bn Lancs Fus WIA Gallipoli

Lt Col W J Woodcock 9th Bn Lancs Fus WIA Gallipoli

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  • 3 months later...

Martin , I came across your addition to this thread, let me reply

GG Warnes was in fact in the ADRIC - my notes on him and his fate - click and more here click

Keenlyside and Woodcock were "collateral damage" on the raid on Pembroke Street - click . There were a great many British officers in that house, and the raid was almost certainly after the Intelligence agents there - Price, Dowling, Murray. Obtaining accommodation for British officers was "difficult" in Dublin at that time (for obvious reasons) so they tended to be concentrated in this way.

"A link to Egypt" - if you don't mind I will ignore that question :-) :)

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  • 3 weeks later...

Hi. The explanation is simply that the well known photo is 'not' Cairo but a special squad, possibly, though remotely the Igoe gang, one face matches up to two pics, and has been alleged wrongly I assert as Angliss. The photo has been named as a special squad in mufti going to meet a consignment in Ballabriggs. What is more certain is that the photo was taken down the side of Brunswick police station, now Piaras Sr. Station.

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Here is the photo of Igoe allegedly again and company. Is that car a Ford I have to ask, Id say its a Crossley bit look at chap on left of photo arm hanging out. I am pretty certain it is the chap hang n7mber 9 at the back of the misnamed Cairo photo. . As for Igoe gang tho, I say no again they're too short I believe for RIC regular which is what Igoe gang were, being bought in from the country areas and spoiling for a fight.

post-6619-0-43132600-1455730336_thumb.jp

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Number 9 and photo above are a match i believe.repostewd for comparison.

post-6619-0-85226700-1455730948_thumb.jp

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Picking up on this very old thread, I noticed that two* of the casualties served in the Lancashire Fusiliers. The Lancashire Fusiliers were stationed in Dublin in 1920, so it would appear that they were targeted that day. I am fairly sure that they would not have been in the Intelligence arms of the British in Dublin. The LF journal might have some detail on how they got caught up in the shootings. I assume on a Sunday morning they would not have been on duty and at home. Interestingly both were at Gallipoli, both wounded and both very likely evacuated to Egypt and probably Cairo.

Separately I note another was 5th Bn Suffolks and then the 2nd Kensingtons (TF) - G G Warnes Curious to understand how a TF Battalion Officer ends up in Dublin. Incidentally he was also in Egypt and Gallipoli in 1915 at the same time as the Lancashire Fusiliers.

So three casualties all with a link to Egypt. Pure coincidence?

MG

* Capt B C H Keenlyside 1st Bn Lancs Fus WIA Gallipoli

Lt Col W J Woodcock 9th Bn Lancs Fus WIA Gallipoli

Another in Egyptian intelligence from Egypt namely Osbert Bryce F.Smyth(e) ahor in a raid by Dan Breen/Sean Treacy in Fernside, Dublin. Ans apparently Captain Lees who was shot down on a Dublin. Street.
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The shooting of Warnes and Appleford I a little contradiction, not usual for this time period. The Books say they were killed off duty, in mufti during a round up by IRA who swept through an area in Dublin in June 1921. The facts also point out that Dublin IRA had been rendered non functional after the burning of custom house in May 1921 when just about anyone of note in the active service was caught and interned in what was effectively a botched job I'm a military sense. The circumstances need reexamining, as the men of these units would have been permanently on duty.

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I have now tracked down a photo of the man who, on theory, should be number 3 on the Cairo Gang photo.Problem is it is taken 22 years after the Cairo Gang. So it is virtually impossible to say if it is the same man or not.Cairo_gang-dup.jpg

your man on the left is William Lorraine Tiny* King taken in ww2. Look up Pathe Black and Tan wedding this is definitely not him on the right.
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Igoe here we go again definitely him in pic a little stouter in uniform but no iron waiscoat as it was asserted the Igoe gang used to go out in. The truck photo was taken in barrack yard, Dublin castle or somewhere, hence relaxed posed shot. This photo is most probably an official police photo hence hands up high, I would think as a detective.

post-6619-0-86273400-1456229523_thumb.jp

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