Vandals have desecrated a monument dedicated to the memory of Monaghan's Fergal O'Hanlon and Sean South from Garryowen. The monument erected in the remote location where the two IRA volunteers died at Moane's Crossroads, Altawalk lies just north of the border between Roslea and Brookeborough.
In recent days, vandals have thrown white paint over the commemoration stone partially covering the names of O'Hanlon and South. Fergal O'Hanlon from Monaghan Town and Limerickman Sean South were part of the IRA's 14-man strong Pearse Column who carried out a failed ambush on the RUC barracks in Brookeborough, Co. Fermanagh on New Year's Day 1957. Their names have been immortalised in the song "The Ballad of Sean South", which details how a "lorry load of volunteers approached the border town".
It's not the first time, vandals have targeted the monument, although it has been several years since the last attack. The father of Monaghan Municipal District Councillor Sean Conlon, drove the lorry used in the border campaign ambush. He told Northern Sound vandalism of any memorial is to be condemned: "Regardless, it's vandalism. If it were to occur at a unionist monument or shrine of respect, it's to be categorically condemned right across the board," the councillor told Northern Sound.
