State Papers: Family of Irish man assassinated on Bloody Sunday in 1920 awarded £7,500
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The family of an Irish man assassinated by Michael Collins’ squad on Bloody Sunday in 1920 was awarded £7,500 (equivalent to €450,000 today) in compensation by the British Government.
Captain Patrick McCormack, who served in the Royal Army Veterinary Corps in the First World War, was shot dead in the Gresham Hotel in Dublin on the morning of November 21, 1920.
McCormack, 47, was originally from Castlebar, Co Mayo, and was the nephew of the late bishop of Galway Francis McCormack.
He joined the RAVC in 1917 and served in Egypt. After the war, he remained in Egypt and was in Ireland buying horses for the Alexandra Turf Club at the time of Bloody Sunday.
Capt McCormack was shot dead in the hotel by a team led by Paddy Moran who was later executed by the British for his involvement in Bloody Sunday, although not for the Gresham attack.
The suggestion Capt McCormack was a British spy outraged his family, particularly his mother Kate, who said she could not bear the notion that her son had been engaged in “dishonourable conduct against his country".
Compensation records for people killed on Bloody Sunday, which have been released by the National Archives, reveal McCormack’s widow, Noellie, received £4,500, while their daughter Grace was awarded £2,000, and his mother, Kate, was given £750.
The British government decided on the compensation amount in June 1921, but responsibility for payment sparked a contentious exchange between the British and Irish Free State governments.
Files show it was originally proposed the costs be shared equally. However, the Irish government refused, citing captured IRA documents that allegedly confirmed Capt McCormack’s role as a British informant.
“His execution was decided on in a responsible quarter after due consideration and he was shadowed for some time before it was found possible to carry it out,” the letter from the Department of Finance in 1925 stated.
The letter was sent to Alexander Reid Jamieson in the Colonial Office with a terse note: “I take it you will now accept full liability for payment of the award in this case.”