104 year old Veteran views ‘Wind that shakes the Barley’

Thursday June 29, 2006 20:01

by Sean McIntyre

Dan Keating (104), and patron of Republican Sinn Fein , made a two hour trek to see new film "The Wind That Shakes The Barley".

104 year old Veteran views ‘Wind that shakes the Barley’

It took Dan Keating two hours to travel by bus to Cork City where, in the presence of Loach, the film premiered last Wednesday. Even at the age of 104, it was a trip that Mr Keating, who fought against the Black and Tans in the struggles of the 1920s, was determined to make.

"It brought back old memories, all right , I thought it was very factual now, very good. It worked very well, I thought." Keating, a rifleman, took part in two large-scale "Tan war" actions, at Castlemaine and Castleisland in Co Kerry, in which twelve Black and Tans and other British personnel were killed. He is one of the few men alive to have witnessed events at first hand.

The "Tan war" is now officially viewed as the triumph of courageous rebels against British occupation, and is commemorated with pride by all political parties in the Republic of Ireland. But the subsequent civil war, in which Keating fought on the side of the anti-treaty rebels, pitted brothers against brothers in a vicious conflict which created internal divisions that are dying out only now. So, while tales of the Tans have always been told with relish, the Irish are mostly very reticent to recall the civil war.

Mr Keating said of his civil war opponents: "They were worse than the Black and Tans, and they committed some awful atrocities. In one week they murdered 19 people - comrades I knew only too well. They were just gone overnight."

One of these actions was carried out on the eve of a truce. "We knew the truce was coming up.’ .Mr Keating's life is doubly remarkable in that he has survived not just physically but also in terms of his opinions. These have remained absolutely intact for almost 90 years.

He is the patron of Republican Sinn Fein, a Republican party. Its members regard themselves as the true heirs of the state's founding fathers. Mr Keating has never accepted a state pension because he regards the Dublin government as fundamentally illegitimate. He refused to accept the state's standard €2,500 (£1,380) award to centenarians because he was "stunned" to hear the Irish President saying that her ambition was to walk through Dublin with the Queen.

He describes the current Irish peace process as "a joke", saying his views have "never changed" over the years’, the only time you will ever have peace is when the people of the 32 counties elect one parliament."