THE YEAR IS 1975. A young Irish-American is on a mission to enlist in an elite unit of the US Marine Corps. His goal: to receive the most intensive military training possible and then go to Ireland to join the IRA and fight to end the British occupation of the North.
In this powerful and brutally honest memoir of his extraordinary experiences, John Crawley details the gruelling challenges of his Marine Corps training, and how, not long after his discharge, he joined the IRA. Soon he found himself in Boston, working with notorious American mobster James ‘Whitey’ Bulger to amass a shipment of weapons. When captured on the Marita Ann gun-running trawler off the Kerry coast, Crawley was imprisoned for ten years, and upon his release he became one of the masterminds behind the IRA’s plan to throw London’s electrical system into disarray.
Crawley is blisteringly candid about the people he worked with and unflinching in his commentary on the IRA leadership. Through it all comes the steadfast voice of a man on a mission, providing an evocative and passionate account of where that mission led him and why. To this day, he remains committed to the establishment of an all-Ireland Republic.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
John Crawley is a former Sergeant in the United States Marine Corps and a former Irish Republican Army volunteer. Born in New York to Irish immigrant parents, he moved to Ireland as a young teenager and later returned to America to receive formal military training in order to join the IRA. John was imprisoned for ten years for taking part in a daring cross-Atlantic gun-running operation. Upon his release, he returned to IRA active service before being arrested in London for conspiracy to cause explosions. He received another 35-year sentence but was released from prison under the terms of the Good Friday Agreement. John remains committed to the establishment of a united Irish Republic.
Contents
Prologue
1. Recon
2. Volunteering
3. Goodbye Kansas
4. A Lone Gunman
5. A Fiver for Boston
6. Whitey
7. Boston’s Littlest Terrorist
8. Assembling an Arsenal
9. Into the Eye of the Storm
10. Portlaoise
11. Political Context
12. Sweet Freedom
13. Reactivation
14. The Belly of the Beast
15. A Different Agency
16. Down the Republic!
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Reviews
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The Yank
Highly readable, no holds barred account of the life of a guerrilla activist in the Irish Freedom Struggle with accompanying analysis of the political forces at play in contemporary Ireland.
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The Yank
Very good and informative book. About time someone wrote the truth, warts and all. Crawley has written what others are thinking. Politic’s is a rotten business and that’s down to the politicians. I would highly recommend everyone with an interest in the history of the Irish struggle to read this book.