At this time, as I have already explained, Sean Treacy was enjoying the luxury of a hunger-strike in Dundalk Jail. He had been thirteen days without food, and we feared they intended to let him die. We who were outside felt that we should do something without delay. I got a brain wave. Why not capture a Peeler, bring him off to a safe hiding-place, and put him on forcible hunger-strike, and keep him as a hostage for Sean’s safety? I discussed the plan with some of the others: they were favourably disposed; and as we knew that a few policemen regularly patrolled the railway line near the Limerick Junction every evening, we decided they should be our hostages. All preparations were made, and our hiding-place up in the mountainous district on the Limerick-Tipperary border was selected. Forty men were mobilised to carry out the job; but for once the policemen failed to patrol the line. Later I found out that the scheme had been turned down by the Irish Republican Brotherhood, a secret organisation which included the most reliable of the Volunteers, and which practically controlled the Volunteer Army. After that I severed my connection with the I.R.B. Sean Treacy was released in July, 1918. When he came home he was full of plans for organising. I had had an overdose of it in the months that he was away, and from my experience I was more in favour of starting a fight at once than of trifling further with organising. Sean would have his way, and we agreed to differ. I at once started a “munition factory” in partnership with my friend Patrick Keogh. Many a lively dispute we had on various points, some important, some otherwise, but as soon as Sean appeared he always poured oil on the troubled waters. I must give you a description of our factory, lest the reader be picturing an Irish replica of the Krupp works at Essen. The building itself was a small rural cottage owned by Tom O’Dwyer, of the Boghole. Three rooms were let to Denis O’Dwyer, of Dervice. Both he and the owner were well-known characters in Tipperary. Our equipment was of the crudest kind, for we had no machinery. But it was a simple matter to make ordinary black gunpowder. We also turned out crude hand grenades, which, by the way, had to be ignited by a match before being thrown, so you can imagine the risks if these had to be brought into action on a windy or a rainy night. At this time, too, we collected every available cartridge, including sporting cartridges for shot guns, and these were refilled with buckshot. Keogh and I always quarrelled as to whether it was better to put four or eight grains of lead to the cartridge. The reader can easily imagine the effect on a poor devil who might get the full charge of one of these refilled sporting cartridges. Though most of our raids for arms had been carried out by this time, we still found occasion for an expedition of the kind from time to time. My first encounter with the enemy was one night while I was returning from a raid.