The Meath 1916 Dead: Thomas Allen

by Noel French

Thomas Allen, was born in Longwood about 1885. While he was very young his mother died and both he and his sister were taken to their grandparent’s house at Ballasport, Hill of Down where Thomas attended the local school and was later apprenticed to boot maker, Pat Halpin of Clondalee. Thomas appeared on the 1901 census as an apprentice to Halpin and was living with the Halpin family.
Having learned his trade, Allen relocated to Dublin and lived with his aunt, Kate Quinn, at 19 Monck Place, Phibsborough. He got a job as a boot and shoe operator in Winstanleys. A few years later Thomas married Margaret Anderson, who also worked at Winstanleys, and they had four children: Tommy, Jack, James and Eileen.
Allen joined the Irish Volunteers and was attached to C Company of the Dublin Brigade. He was said to have been very enthusiastic and so in 1914 he was given the responsibility of organising and training Volunteers in east and north County Westmeath. Every Saturday when he finished work at Winstanleys he took the train to the Hill of Down and spent the rest of the weekend training the Volunteers under his charge.
In July 1914, Allen was involved in getting arms ashore at Howth. He and a number of other Volunteers set off for Howth on Saturday 25th July. They attempted to hire a boat despite the weather conditions being unsuitable. They were told they were there to meet a boat bringing in arms. Late in the evening a messenger arrived and told the men to go back to the city but to remain together. All the men went to Allen’s house and stayed there overnight. They slept little as there was a constant stream of messengers arriving to see Allen. At 7am the men set off for Fairview to join their companies. The ship carrying the arms had been contacted and arrived later that day. 
In 1916 Allen entrusted the mobilisation papers to his cousin, Miss Bee Quinn, who took them to the train to the Hill of Down on Good Friday 1916. Because of confusion within the leadership of the Volunteers the rising did not begin until Easter Monday. Allen joined his company at Parnell Square on Easter Monday where he was promoted to the rank of Lieutenant with orders to assist in the occupation of the Four Courts. Commandant Ned Daly with the 1st Battalion seized the buildings at the Four Courts and the force managed to survive the bombardment by British artillery that destroyed large parts of the city centre. This was a strategic position as it controlled the main route between the military barracks to the west of the city and the headquarters of the rising at the GPO. Four days after the rising began, Allen was shot in the Records Office, (now Courts 22 and 23), during a machine gun attack by soldiers advancing through Smithfield. Allen, Thomas Smart and another Volunteer were barricading a window overlooking Hammond Lane and had almost completed the work when a burst of machine gun fire came from Smithfield direction hitting Allen.
Fellow Longwood native, Éamonn Duggan, attempted to obtain medical assistance from the Richmond Hospital but a British officer in charge of the telephone exchange refused to allow the message to go through. Medical assistance was eventually obtained but it was too late for Allen. His loss was greatly mourned by his company and one of his companions described him: “He was one of our best, always so active, always so reliable as a man and as a Volunteer. His friends and confidants were legion, and he was beloved by all the members of the Company.” Aged 29, Thomas died in Richmond Hospital and his remains were interred in Glasnevin cemetery.
Early in 1917, his aunt sought permission from the British military authorities to exhume the body for reburial in Longwood. She was required to sign an undertaking that there would be no military display at the funeral. The body was taken to St Joseph’s Church, Berkeley Road, and on 6th January the funeral left for the train journey home. It is said that his father who was in the USA paid for his body to be reburied in Longwood.
Allen’s body was returned to Longwood in a lead casket for burial at Kilglass cemetery, just outside the village.
Later a local committee was formed to erect a suitable marker for his grave. Tommy Kelly, an old IRA Volunteer, from Kilcock, Co Kildare carved the magnificent Celtic cross which stands over the grave. Kelly was not a stone mason and this was the only headstone that he ever made. Jim Riley, a Longwood Volunteer in the old IRA, provided the transport, a horse and cart to bring the headstone to the grave.
An annual commemoration was held at Kilglass on Easter Monday until 1934 and then there was a break until 1959. Members of the Old IRA, FCA and GAA took part in the ceremonies in the 1980s. In 1990 the Celtic cross was attacked by vandals and broken into pieces but the grave was refurbished in 2004 by Meath Commemoration Committee.
Thomas Allen was survived by his wife, three sons and a daughter. One of his sons, John, lived in Dublin where he worked as a chemist and another son emigrated to the US. Another son moved to Manchester. Allen’s uncle was James Quinn of Hill of Down while his aunt, Kate Allen, lived at Inan, Longwood. His wife, Margaret Allen, died in 1953 and is buried in Kilglass cemetery, having survived her husband by nearly 50 years.
In 1920, Mullingar Urban Council re-named Gas (or Spoutwell) Lane to Thomas Allen Road in honour of the 1916 hero but the placename change was not officially recognised.

* From ‘1916 Meath and More’ by Noel French