Tullyhommon
| Tullyhommon | |
| Fermanagh | |
|---|---|
 The Crimean War Tree in Tullyhommon | |
| Location | |
| Grid reference: | H110668 |
| Location: | 54°32’58"N, 7°49’50"W |
| Data | |
| Dialling code: | 028 |
| Local Government | |
| Council: | Fermanagh and Omagh |
| Parliamentary constituency: |
Fermanagh and South Tyrone |
Tullyhommon or Tullyhomman is a small village in Fermanagh, sitting beside the border with the Republic of Ireland, marked here by the Termon River. Across the river in County Donegal is a bigger village, Pettigo, and the two, linked by one road bridge, function somewhat as one. At the 2001 Census, the village had a population of 63 people.[1]
The name of the village is from the Irish Tulaigh Uí Thiomáin, meaning 'Ó Tiomáin's hillock'.[2]
History
On 4 June 1922 the village was occupied by members of the Irish Republican Army, as part of a campaign led by Michael Collins against Northern Ireland, during the Battle of Pettigo and Belleek. The village of Belleek, twelve miles from Tullyhomon became part of the new Northern Ireland and Pettigo was retained by the Irish Free State. Soldiers from the British Army crossed Lough Erne in order to fight the IRA and the estimated casualties were three IRA men killed, six wounded and four captured, the British lost one soldier while two civilians who were killed in the fighting. There is a memorial on the Belleek Road in Pettigo to those who "died fighting against British forces in Pettigo 4-6-1922", while a mere few yards from it in Tullyhommon is a memorial to those "who gave their lives in the Great War 1914–1918".[1]
The Troubles
On 30 August 1973, Staff Sgt Ronald Beckett (aged 36) was killed while trying to defuse a bomb planted by the Provisional IRA at Tullyhommon Post Office.[3]
On 8 November 1987, a Provisional IRA bomb exploded at a Remembrance Sunday ceremony in nearby Enniskillen, killing 11 people and injuring 63. A few hours after the blast, the IRA called a radio station and said it had abandoned a 150 lb bomb in Tullyhommon after it failed to detonate.[4][5] That morning, a Remembrance Sunday parade (which included many members of the Boys' and Girls' Brigades) had unwittingly gathered near the bomb, which was larger and had the capacity to inflict more casualties than those at Enniskillen.[5] British soldiers and officers of the Royal Ulster Constabulary had also been there,[5] and the IRA said it triggered the bomb when soldiers were standing beside it. It was defused by security forces and was found to have a command wire leading to a "firing point" across the border.[4][5]
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 Victoria Johnson (10 October 2019). "A river runs through: All that divides the adjoining towns of Pettigo and Tullyhommon is the River Termon. Brexit could change that....". thedetail. https://thedetail.tv/articles/a-river-runs-through. Retrieved 15 March 2020.
- ↑ Tullyhommon - Placenames NI
- ↑ Malcolm Sutton. "Index of Deaths from the Conflict in Ireland: 1973". Conflict Archive on the Internet. http://cain.ulst.ac.uk/sutton/chron/1973.html. Retrieved 8 October 2015.
- ↑ 4.0 4.1 "Police: IRA Planted Bomb in Town Near Enniskillen That Didn't Explode", 11 November 1987; retrieved 5 November 2012.
- ↑ 5.0 5.1 5.2 5.3 McDaniel, Denzil. Enniskillen: The Remembrance Sunday bombing. Wolfhound Press, 1997. pp. 119-120