The Roll of Honour of the South Armagh Brigade of Óglaigh na hÉireann is here.

On Thursday evening, 11 November 1982, IRA Volunteers Gervais McKerr, Eugene Toman and Sean Burns were ambushed and executed in Lurgan by the RUC. Both Eugene and Sean had recently insisted on returning to active service involvement in Lurgan, despite having gone 'on the run' and leaving the town for a short while after Sean was identified during an IRA operation.

Local members of the RUC and UDR had a long involvement in sectarian murders, including those of the Miami Showband, and of dual membership with the illegal paramilitary UVF.

The three Volunteers left McKerr's house shortly after 9.35pm. Minutes later, less than half a mile away at Tullygally Road east, they met their deaths in a hail of RUC automatic gunfire.

Thousands turned out in Lurgan to mourn the three Volunteers as they were buried with full IRA military honours on Sunday, 14 November.

Addressing the mourners, Sinn Féin's Jim McAllister accused the RUC of a policy of summary execution.

Such was the public outrage that three RUC men were eventually charged in connection with the murders. But the three were acquitted in 1984 by Lord Justice Gibson, who said that they were "absolutely blameless". He commended them "for their courage and determination in bringing the three deceased men to justice, to the final court of justice".

Gibson's remarks demonstrated for many people that Britain's 'shoot-to-kill' policy in the Six Counties was sanctioned at the highest level.

In April 1987, Gibson was killed in an IRA landmine as he crossed the border at Killeen in South Armagh.

Antoine Mac Giolla Bhríghde, Ciaran Fleming, Danny Doherty and Willie Fleming

On Sunday 2 December 1984, IRA Volunteers Antoine and Ciarán took part in an operation against crown forces near Drumrush in County Fermanagh.

The SAS captured, tortured and executed Antoine. Ciarán together with an IRA backup team came to Antoine's aid and killed a SAS member but Ciarán was killed as they withdrew.

On Thursday 6 December 1984, Danny and Willie were driving on a motorbike on active service through Derry. When they entered the grounds of Gransha Hospital, an SAS undercover squad ambushed and killed them.

At the inquests, the coroner stated that the SAS had put 60 bullets into Willie's body and 24 into Danny's.

Patrick Cannon and Peter McElchar

Finbarr McKenna
Imprisoned in '71, '73 & '76.
Died on 2nd Mat, 1987 in Belfast.

Charles English died during an attack on crown forces in Derry's Bogside on 6th August, 1985. He was 21 years of age

Shortly after 7.30am on Friday, 5 January 1979, two IRA Volunteers – 24-year-old Lawrence Montgomery, a married man with two children, and 24-year-old Frankie Donnelly, also married – were killed when a bomb they were transporting exploded prematurely in the Ardoyne area of Belfast.

The Two Brendans

First Battallion, South Armagh Brigade

Died in a premature explosion in Creggan, South Armagh on 29th Feb, 1988

Brendan Moley

Brendan Burns

The Gibralter Three

GHQ Staff

Executed while unarmed by the SAS on 6th March 1988.

In September 1995, a decision was made by the European Court of Human Rights that the United Kingdom government violated the fundamental right to life when its agents killed three unarmed Irish Republican Army (IRA) members in 1988 in Gibraltar.



Dan McCann

Mairead Farrell

Sean Savage

Kevin McCracken

Former Blanketman

Shot in Turf Lodge, Belfast on 14th March 1988 while preparing to attack the British Army who had surrounded Sean Savage's family home.

Caoimhin MacBradaidh

Died on 16th March, 1988 in Milltown Cemetery, Belfast while defending his people at the funeral of the Gibralter Three.

Hugh Hehir
Former POW, Long Kesh
Killed by the Gardai in Co. Clare on 6th May, 1988.

Tony Gough
Killed on 22 Feb, 1996 in Derry City

Brian Dempsey
Belfast Brigade
Died near Omagh, Tyrone on 25th June, 1986

Gerard Logue
Killed on the 21st of March, 1987 in Derry City

Seamus McElwain
Co. Monaghan
One of the 38 who took part in the 'Great Escape' from Long Kesh in 1983.
Killed near Roslea, Co. Fermanagh on 26th April, 1986.

Patrick O'Hagan
Escaped from Magiligan Prison in 1975
Died on 9th August, 1986

Laurence Marley - Belfast
Escaped from Newry Courthouse in 1975.
Credited with planning the 'Great Escape' from Long Kesh in 1983.
Killed by right-wing death-squads on 2nd April, 1987

Jim McKernan
Killed in Belfast on 14th Sept, 1986.

Liam Ryan 39 years, Ardboe, Co. Tyrone, shot dead by the UVF in the Battery Bar on 30 November 1989. Michael Devlin 33 years, also from Ardboe, was killed in the same incident.

Mr Ryan, who was married, was the owner of the Battery Bar situated near Ardboe on a small peninsula jutting out into Lough Neagh, which had only one access road leading to the bar. On the night the gunmen struck a dart competition was taking place and the bar was relatively full. Shortly before closing time several of the customers, including Mr Ryan and Mr Devlin were in the hall of the premises when two gunmen approached the building. When they saw the men in the hallway they immediately opened fire wounding Mr Ryan and Mr Devlin and another man. One of the gunmen who was armed with a AK47 assault rifle fired a number of bursts of gunfire at the building to keep those inside pinned down to allow his colleague, who was armed with an automatic pistol, to finish off the two wounded men lying in the hallway.

The gunmen fleeing the scene went to great trouble to disguise their means of escape. A car, reportedly used by the gunmen and found burned out some distance from the attack, was, according to local people, seen on fire at the time of the shooting. People in the area believe the gunmen actually escaped across the Lough on a fast boat.

Unionist gunmen used a similar method during the murder of Sinn Fein Councillor Eddie Fullerton at Buncrana, Co. Donegal, in May 1991, burning a car as a diversion while the killers fled north across Lough Swilly in a boat.

One of the weapons used in the attack, an AK47 rifle, was used in the murder of Phelim McNally near Coagh, Co. Tyrone, in November 1988. Mr McNally had been sitting in his brother's home when gunmen fired through a window. The gunmen's intended target had been Francis McNally, a Sinn Fein Councillor in the area.

Both weapons used in the attack were part of a huge haul of weaponry smuggled into the North of Ireland by unionist paramilitaries in the winter of 1987. Several British agents working within unionist paramilitaries had acquired the weapons in South Africa, and later the shipment was monitored by British intelligence agencies from there to the Ireland. Yet despite the British ‘security forces' arranging and knowing every movement of the arms haul unionist paramilitaries were able to take possession of it in the north in December 1987, and began its distribution amongst several unionist paramilitary groupings in January 1988. An unnamed source in the British Intelligence Services admitted the above in January 1993, putting the fact that unionist paramilitaries received the weapons down to a ‘breakdown' in their surveillance operation losing all trace of the haul when it was landed in the North of Ireland.

To date no one has been charged in connection with the murder of Mr Ryan or Mr Devlin.