Prologue
It was the talk of the town, and the surrounding countryside for miles around. There was not an adult in the county who had not heard what had taken place. Normally a local person’s death, even within this tough and brutal environment, was greeted with sorrow and sympathy. This was different – very different! No sympathy and definitely no sorrow! There was worry for the assailant (or assailants, if the tale was to be believed) but absolutely no tears were being shed for the victim. Indeed within this downtrodden and abused community it would have been hard to find one person with a shred of feeling even for the victim’s nearest and dearest, if he had had any. The local clergy, of both denominations, needless to say, since it came with the territory, restrained from actually saying ‘put out the flags’ but within their hearts, they cheered along with everybody else and if they did not, then they certainly understood why their flock found it impossible not to cheer at the event.
Within the Murray family, however, the mood was not one of celebration and relief. What had started out as a daring, if definitely foolhardy, escapade, had gone very wrong somewhere along the way. Patrick and James Murray (Paddy and Jim, of course to everybody) were 15 and 14 years old respectively. They were full of energy, devilment and a burning need to ‘make changes’. They had seen their family and their neighbours slave away since their birth – and knew that the same had been the case way before that time – with whole families of poor, benighted and emasculated people reduced to scratching a living just to put a crust on the table, and more thoroughly undeserved brass in their landlords’ pockets. There were four more Murrays following on from Jim. With their father, Thomas, looking thirty years older than his 43 years, and their mother, Mary, trying to keep a smile upon her face, regardless of the true state of her body and mind, the oldest two boys were determined that things must change. The family was often at odds even with itself. Paddy, in particular, was critical of his father that he was so accepting, and that he had not felt compelled to do something much sooner. How could he just drift along ignoring everything about him so long as he had sufficient pochin in his gut and a pencil in his hand. Well, if he was not man enough to take up the fight, then Paddy would have to do it instead. That was how it started. No plan, no thought of consequences, no real thought of anything other than ‘making a difference’, ‘righting a wrong’, ‘making things change’. Change, any change, had to be for the better, surely?
Jim, was far less driven, although he nonetheless saw and understood the rebellion that was in his older brother’s soul. Even with his more philosophical nature and milder temperament, it still only took a spark, something he could be less detached about, to ensure that Jim too would be recruited. Thus, the naivete of youth and an unfortunate local tragedy became the catalyst for more change for the family than they could ever have imagined.
