A Millstreet Miscellany (3) - Aubane Historical Society

ullet holes; the floor was carpeted in crumbs; two commercial travellers, with pained expressions
on their faces, sprawled in profound slumber over the only two armchairs in the room; on an inkstained
writing table a Strand Magazine of 1899 served as literary link between Mallow and the
outer world.
After a night of indescribable discomfort, the next morning dawned, if anything, somewhat
wetter than the preceding day. After breakfast we started in a hired motor, the driver of which, we
were given in confidence to understand, was an Ulster man who had deserted from the British
Army, been discharged from the Republican, and was about to offer his services to the Free State —
a military record which inspired us with complete confidence in the resourcefulness of his
character.
Avoiding the main roads, which for several weeks have been completely blocked, we
arrived by a circuitous route over a mountain at Millstreet, where our inquiries for the road to
Killarney were met with derisive shrieks. "If you can lepp and you can swim you may perhaps get
there; not otherwise," we were told. "Every bridge is down and every road is blocked since the
fighting on Sunday." Conscious of proficiency in both 'lepping' and swimming, we pushed
undaunted on our way, running almost immediately into a flying column of Free State troops, who
stopped us and demanded the driver's permit. They were covered with mud, weary and war worn,
having been fighting for two days. "You will meet Irregulars further on," said the officer, "As you
are only ladies they may not take your car; if you had men with you they would certainly do so."
Bidding him good-bye, we charged with thrilled expectancy into the war zone, an old man
who subsequently directed us adding to our growing excitement by informing us that the 'Free
Staters' had "gone back" and that the 'Publicans' were on ahead. Whether the latter were engaged
in burying their dead — the number of which, according to the Free Staters, was almost past all
calculation — or whether we drove through them, concealed behind the hedges, we never
discovered. The disappointing fact remained; we never saw even one member of the phantom army
in whose track we were supposed to be following.
"Are you all mad here?" I inquired of a group of men we next came upon, contemplating a
gaping void in the middle of a village street, in front of which the car suddenly pulled up —only
just in time to prevent our taking a wild leap into the river swirling in the precipitous depths
beneath. "More than half of us," was the cheerful reply, as a couple (presumably of the sane
section) advanced with advice and directions to the driver, whom they conducted down a muddy
declivity leading to the river, into which the car plunged — while we crawled, clinging to the
parapet, over a narrow footway on to the other side. When nearly across, the engine of the car —
which had been gradually getting into deeper water — suddenly stopped. Our hearts sank. Complete
silence fell on the spectators for a moment; after which the entire population of the village, sane and
insane, rushed to the rescue, throwing down stones and eventually hauling the car into shallower
water where the engine was restarted.
Having regained the road, we next found ourselves up against a gigantic tree, prostrate
across our path, its branches sawn in such a fashion as to form snags, — between and underneath
which it did not seem possible for any vehicle to pass. But our motor-driver came up to our
expectations in the matter of ingenuity, arid by lowering the wind-screen and keeping his head to
the level of the steering-wheel, advancing and reversing every few inches, the car emerged
triumphantly, after a good quarter of an hour's manoeuvring, on the other side.
It was the first of many similar obstructions, some of which we struggled under, some of
which we squeezed our way round, and others which we avoided altogether by turning in at the
gates of private demesnes and bumping our way through farmyards, the walls of which had been
pulled down by cars preceding us: experiences so unnerving that at Killarney the driver dumped our
luggage down in the middle of the street and bade us a polite but firm farewell.
At the local garages all requests for a car to continue our journey in proved
useless. Only by aeroplane, we were told, could anybody hope to arrive at Killorglin; "every bridge
is down, and over a hundred trees and all the telegraph posts and the wires twisted in and about and
around them."
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