Famous Like Me > Actor > H > Stephen K. Hayes
Profile of Stephen K. Hayes
on Famous Like Me |
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| Name: |
Stephen K. Hayes |
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| Date of Birth: |
9th September 1949 |
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| Place of Birth: |
Wilmington, Delaware, USA |
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| Profession: |
Actor |
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From Wikipedia, the free Encyclopedia
Stephen Hayes was a member and leader of the Irish Republican Army.
From County Wexford, Ireland, Hayes was active in GAA circles in Wexford and served as secretary to the county board in the early 1930s. He joined the IRA and was on the IRA Army Council in January 1939 when it declared war on the British government.
When IRA chief of staff Seán Russell departed on IRA business to the USA (and subsequently to Nazi Germany), Hayes was left in control of the organisation. After Russell's death in August 1940 on board a German U-Boot en route to Ireland, Hayes became chief of staff. His time in office was marred by controversy and it is widely believed that he served as an informer to the Garda SÃochána.
Hayes reportedly met with German agent Hermann Goertz on 21 May 1940 in Dublin shortly after the latter’s parachuting into Ireland on 5 May 1940. The meeting was raided and money, a radio transmitter and a German airman's cap were seized, along with details of the German plan named Operation Kathleen.
Another meeting on 15 August 1940 on Rathgar Road, Dublin organised by Hayes and attended by senior IRA men Paddy McGrath, Tom Harte and Tom Hunt, was also raided by the Garda SÃochána.
On 30 June 1941, Northern-based IRA men kidnapped Hayes, accusing him of being a spy. By his own account, he was tortured and "court-martialled" for "treason" by his comrades. He wrote an enormous confession to delay his inevitable execution and managed to escape in September 1941, whereupon he promptly handed himself into the Garda for protection.
The Officer Commanding (O/C) of the IRA's Northern Command, Seán McCaughey, was convicted on 18 September 1941 of the kidnapping. After a long hunger and thirst strike in Portlaoise prison, McCaughey died on 11 May 1946.
Within IRA circles, Hayes is still considered a traitor and an informer. One of the main allegations against him was that he informed the Garda SÃochána about IRA arms dumps in Wexford. This was later blamed on a Wexford man named Michael Devereux, an officer of the Wexford Battalion, IRA. He was subsequently abducted and murdered by an IRA gang in Tipperary on Hayes’ orders. George Plant, a Protestant IRA veteran, was later executed in Portlaoise for Devereux's murder.
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