Michael Harrington (3) (1945–)

This is a very well written and interesting book. Instead of focusing on the civil war in the whole Munster area the author, a retired teacher, focuses on the civil war in the North Cork area, his own locality. This is the nature of a lot of recent publications about the civil war which focus about the conflict in a specific county. It is very well argued and not biased although the author does show sympathy for those who opposed the Treaty albeit not their tactics. There is a good analysis show more of the critical failures of Liam Lynch’s leadership during the civil war and his failure and that of his subordinates to respond quickly to incursions from Free State forces into the Munster area and to try and relieve the sieges of Limerick and Waterford whose falls gave a major fillip to the Free State. In addition the introduction chapter gives a good critical review of a lot of the main books on the Irish civil war. show less