ROINN COSANTA. BUREAU OF MILITARY HISTORY, 1913-21 ...

-12-After locating the concealed rifles and ammunitionplus rifles taken from Tuam station, our first attemptat an ambush was at a place called Gortaleam on theDunmore-Williamstown road. I had arranged with allbattalion and company officers for detailed weeklyreports of enemy movements in their respective areas,and we found that police from Dunmore usually travelledto Ballymore via Williamstown between the third andfifth day of each month. As this whole area is veryflat, we had decided that this was the best positionfor an ambush, as the national school was near thisposition. We had to place a guard on the school inorder that our presence would not become known.We occupied positions on both sides of the. roadat dawn. As no enemy came along before 5 p.m., we hadto call off the guard from the school and withdraw, asthe parents would become uneasy when their childrenhad not returned home. We afterwards occupieddifferent positions on this road away from the school.We occupied positions on the Ruan-Dunmore road.We had found, from reports, that three lorries usuallytravelled on Saturday or Wednesday along this road.We had to evacuate two families to occupy this position,Flaherty's and Piggott's but had to withdraw after oneday.We occupied a position at Dalgan, Miltown, on themain Dunmore-Miltown road, but had to evacuate thisposition early in the day as we had to hold up too manypeople who were on their way to Mass. Shortly afterwithdrawing from this position, three lorries of R.I.C.and Tans passed, going to Miltown from Dunmore, and wewere regretting evacuation and missing ambush. Three