On a fateful day in late November, Mick Hogan did line out, 

He travelled from his native Tipp to take on Dublin in Croke Park.

He took his place upon the field then hoisted high the ball went in,

The cornerback gave his best for all of Tipp but little did he know that t’would be the last breath he’d take on Erins field that day.

The British came and gunned him down and many more besides,

Dear young Mick died by his teammates sides, as his blood did spill over by the old Hill and corner of the Cusack side.

Those white and green Tipp jerseys, were filled with sweat and tears, but they did turn red that day with the blood of Erins child.  

And now when we sit, as we make that trip, to Croker that is so fair,

The stand is called, opposite where he did fall, in his memory today.

Rest well now those who since have wore, our dear blue and gold, but we’ll ner forget that white and green of old, 

And dear Tipperary will not forget, Mick Hogan and our heroes of yore. 

 

The memory of an event, that became known as Bloody Sunday 24 hours after it happened, still lingers one hundred years on in our collective psyche, as people of Tipp recall in a distant way the name of Mick Hogan and the event that is synonymous with the GAA and Croke Park and Tipperary football to this day.

2020 marks a very special year for Tipperary football in that it is one hundred years on from Bloody Sunday when one of our own was shot, fell and died on the famous sod of Croke Park. Mick Hogan, like the rest of the Tipperary panel and like those that wear the Tipperary jersey to this day, went out to represent his homeland and play alongside his teammates. His passing, and that of the others that lost their lives, had a profound effect on all those present and how the GAA developed subsequently.

Now as we approach 2020, most who read this will be filled with fond memories of Croke Park and of the fine performances of Tipperary hurling and football teams there over the past decade. Oft some of us have sat in the Hogan Stand, called after the Grangemockler corner back who was shot on Bloody Sunday, and we have tried to see in our minds eye what happened that day and the context of Ireland at that time and how it changed and turned into what we now know as home in the 21st century.

This coming year, the Bloody Sunday Football Commemorative Committee, a sub-committee of the Tipperary Football Committee, will run a series of events across the year to commemorate that era and event in our history.

On November 21st 2020, there will be a commemorate match played in Croke Park to honour the memory of those who were there on the fateful day when the course of history changed. Ahead of it, we will host a series of events in the months leading up to the match.

Croke Park and Dublin GAA will also be organizing commemorations and our committee are liaising closely to ensure an integrated programme of events. We hope there will be something for everybody across the year and that people will gain a deeper understanding and broadening of knowledge and develop an awareness of ‘Bloody Sunday’ and its meaning.

In Tipperary sport runs deep and for many in our fine county this centenary, of those times, will be a poignant and heart felt one. We hope to, as best we can, to encompass and bring the GAA community and indeed the wider community on a journey of remembrance along the way with us.

Our senior footballers back then in November 1920 left Tipp on a journey to Dublin and from that time forth the story of Tipp football and indeed the GAA and society in general changed forevermore. Now as we reflect on 2019 and the respective stories for the Tipp hurling and football teams, we look ahead to 2020 filled with all the hopes and dreams a new year brings. We hope you will take a moment sometime along the way and think of those times and people and feel that connection between then and now.

The Tipperary football and hurling teams and respective managements are busy preparing now in Dr Morris Park and selectors are planning the road ahead for 2020 but for the new senior football manager, David Power, the Tipp senior footballers and Gaels everywhere, there is an engagement in Croke Park in November 2020 that will be filled with the past and the present. In a way it’s a distant folk memory and yet the moment Tipperary and Dublin, in jerseys of old, take the field one hundred years on from 1920, it will be as real as the moment Mick Hogan took his place on the field between the Cusack Stand and the Hill and lined out at corner back when the fateful challenge game between Tipp and Dublin got underway. One hundred years on, we will pause and reflect..

The Tipperary football committee has a series of events planned for the coming year with our planned events beginning in March:

 

On March 2nd at 7.30pm in Nenagh, John Flannery will host a lecture relating to Bloody Sunday in association with the Ormond Historical Society.

 

On March 28th, at 7.30pm, at Bru Boru Cultural Centre, Cashel in partnership with Comhaltas Ceoltoiri Eireann, Tipperary GAA will host a cultural evening of music, song and dance entitled “An Dushlan” which will be directed by Ray Conway. 

 

On April 28th, at 7.30pm, in ‘The Source’ Thurles author Paul Rouse, Associate Professor in UCD, who has written extensively on the history of Irish sport, will continue with our lecture series relating to Bloody Sunday. 

 

From May to September 2020 a series of commemorations will take place across the season at the gravesides of the panel of players who played a role on Bloody Sunday. We will remember them and lay a wreath by their graveside. More dates and details will be on the the ‘Tipperary GAA’ official website, the ‘Friends of Tipperary football’ website and on local media platforms closer to the time.

 

On October 21st, at 7.30pm,  as the centenary date approaches, Michael Foley author of “The Bloodied Field”, will host a lecture in Fethard about the events and time Bloody Sunday took place.

 

On November 7th, at 19:30, a Memorial Mass celebrated by Archbishop Kieran O’Reilly, relating to ‘Bloody Sunday’ will take place at the Cathedral of the Assumption in Thurles. 

 

On November 21st, in the evening time, a football game to commemorate the challenge match between Tipp and Dublin one hundred years before will take place in Croke Park, Dublin.

 

On November 22nd 2020 in Grangemockler, Bloody Sunday, and those of the time, will be remembered.

 

More details of all events to follow across local media and social media platforms. We hope all the people of Tipperary and beyond will connect with this major milestone in GAA history.

Stephen Gleeson – PRO