“I’ll have my Christmas Dinner in Heaven”- Fr Frank Canavan (1915 – 1950) by Mairéad O’Brien First published in JOTS 19 (Journal of the Old Tuam Society), pages 34 – 43.

 

Missionaries are often called upon to risk their lives for their faith. Since 1929, twenty-three Columban Fathers and one Columban Sister paid the ultimate price when they answered that call. Fr Frank Canavan was one of the seven Columbans who died the death of a martyr during the Korean War (1950-53).1 At the outset of the conflict, he had the opportunity to remove himself from danger but committed to his mission, and with no thought for his safety, chose to remain, thereby sealing his fate.

Early Years

Francis John Canavan was born in Headford in February 1915 to shopkeepers Joseph Canavan (1862-1932) and Eliza (Lizzie) Kyne (1874-1955), the second youngest of their nine children. After finishing his primary education in Headford NS in 1929, he enrolled at St Mary’s College in Galway, where his mother’s first cousin, Canon Peter Davis, was President

When he left St Mary’s, he decided to join the priesthood. Fr Andy Moran, his parish priest, wrote him a glowing letter of recommendation which summarised him perfectly: ‘his piety and character will pull him through where strong men would fail.’ He is ‘quiet and conducts himself well, steadfast I should say, very tenacious and persevering.’ These were qualities which would stand to him.

 

 

In 1935 he joined The Society of St. Columban, also known as The Maynooth Mission to China. The society had been formally launched in 1918 by Fr John Blowick from Belcarra, Co Mayo and Fr Edward Galvin from Cork. Having received approval from the hierarchy, they leased Dalgan House, Shrule, Co Mayo, where they opened a seminary. In 1927 the society bought Dowdstown House in Navan, Co Meath, renamed it Dalgan House and moved its operations there.2 The building was in poor condition and due to a lack of funds the new college only received its first students in 1941. Frank was ordained in Shrule in December 1940, one of the last to be ordained there.

 

 

Kinvara
Due to travel restrictions during World War II, some Columbans were sent to parishes in England, but that option was not open to Fr Frank. Threatened with an ulcerated stomach, he was required to remain in Galway where he followed a special diet until his health improved. He ministered in Oughterard from 1943 to 1945 and then in Kinvara until 1948, when he got word that he was being posted to South Korea. Maura Mongan (née Muldoon) and her brother Kevin have vivid memories of Fr Frank’s departure from Kinvara. Their parents, Joseph and Sarah Muldoon, were both school teachers in the local boys’ school and were well acquainted with him. Maura was only a child and many decades have passed since that farewell but the palpable emotion and solemnity of the evening served to embed the events in her memory. Usually, Maura and her siblings, like all children back then, were told to stay out of the way when visitors called, but this night they were allowed to remain. Fr Frank asked them all to kneel as he blessed each of them individually. Her mother, Sarah, was visibly upset at the thought of this gentle soul heading off to a ‘Godless’ country so far away. To console her, he gave her his rosary beads which she always cherished. In her final years of illness, ‘Fr Canavan’s rosary beads’ gave her comfort and were entwined around her fingers as she drew her last breath.

Maura’s brother Kevin did not hold onto that same memory but he can recall his excitement when he received Fr Canavan’s bicycle. The priest, having no further use for it, gave it to the young lad. Whether it was purchased or gifted, Kevin cannot recall. He does remember that it was a godsend to him – he could now cycle the ten kilometres round trip for his music lessons in the convent in Kinvara.

 

 

 

 

Chuncheon, Kangwondo Province, South Korea
In January 1949, following a holiday at home, Fr Frank embarked on the next chapter of his life, not realising that it would be a short chapter and his final one. Setting out from Cobh, his first stop was New York where he visited his Canavan cousins and climbed to the top of the Empire State Building. From there he travelled to Korea. His new parish, Jungrim Dong, was in the city of Chuncheon which lay close to the border with North Korea. When he arrived there, he immediately began to get to know the people and their culture and to learn their language. Initially, he found it difficult to stomach the local food, but with persistence, he grew accustomed to it.

Although he had a serious side, he was also blessed with a dry wit. In his letters home, he entertained his mother with stories of removing his shoes before entering a home and sitting on the floor rather than on chairs. He also wrote about the threat of invasion from North Korea, which was always bubbling in the background. He made light of the prospect by suggesting that if he was killed, his mother could cut up his old coat and sell the strips as relics in the shop. One can only imagine the conversations over the shop counter in Headford as his mother relayed these snippets from Korea. He joked, somewhat prophetically, with his sister Meg about his Korean name, which was Fr Sohn – “Now that I am Sohn (sown) in Korea, I hope I will bear good fruit.” 

War Breaks Out
After World War II, Korea was partitioned along the 38th parallel, thus becoming two sovereign states: North Korea was backed by Communist Russia and South Korea by the West. Tensions constantly smouldered between the two ideologies, and at 4 a.m. on Sunday, June 25, 1950, the North Korean Peoples’ Army launched a blitzkrieg attack on the Republic of South Korea. American President Harry S. Truman quickly directed General Douglas MacArthur, the commander of the forces in the Far East and Japan to provide support to the struggling South Korean military. Western nations also pledged to send troops and MacArthur was given command of this combined United Nations forces. 

At the outbreak of the conflict, forty-two Columban priests were posted in Korea, two-thirds of whom were Irish-born. Monsignor Tom Quinlan, who was the Prefect-Apostolic, Fr. Hubert Hayward, Fr Pat Burke and Fr Canavan were living at the mission in Chuncheon. Fathers Hayward and Burke had gone to Seoul the day before the attack and could not return afterwards because of the invasion.

Although the war had been brewing for some time, the attack took people by surprise. That Sunday morning, as Fr Phil Crosbie made his way from his parish in Hongchon to visit his confrères in Chuncheon, he did not pay too much heed to the sound of gunfire - he thought it was just another minor incursion by the North Koreans. He was looking forward to chatting with Fr Frank – they had studied together for four years in Shrule and had only met recently for the first time in eight years. At that meeting, Fr Crosbie had noted that his friend had changed little, except that “the
burden of chronic illness lay heavier on him.” As a child, Fr Frank contracted double pneumonia and measles – both illnesses leaving him with a weakened constitution. Then, when he was studying in Dalgan, a bout of influenza took a further toll on him.

That evening, as they sat chatting, the American adviser to the South Korean forces in the province called to advise them to leave, offering them transport south to safety. Msgr Quinlan had decided to remain with his parishioners and made it clear to Fr Frank that he had his blessing to go as he was still only a language student. Even though he had already decided to stay, Fr Frank discussed his options with Fr Crosbie, who gave him many good reasons to leave the danger zone. Although he had no official pastoral role, Fr Frank wished to keep Msgr Quinlan company and to help him guide and protect their flock in this time of great danger. The Monsignor, understanding the young man’s strong desire to remain, allowed him to do so. The following morning, as Fr Crosbie made his way back to Hongchon, he thought of Fr Frank and the image “of a small sick man with a smile in his eyes and peace in his heart, turning his face to a gathering storm” came to mind.

The presence of North Korean soldiers increased over the next couple of days. Shells landed in the Columban compound, setting fire to the old church. Bullets ricocheted around the place. Artillery fire was sometimes so loud that they could not hear themselves speak as they sheltered in the relative safety of their almost completed new cathedral. Msgr Quinlan later commended the “heroic courage” displayed by Fr Frank under this barrage.

Arrest
On July 2nd, as Msgr Quinlan was celebrating Mass, North Korean soldiers burst in, looted the place and arrested the two men. The soldiers marched them, hands in the air, to army headquarters, where they were incarcerated for a few weeks. Major Chong Myong Sil, the man who would later lead them on the infamous ‘Tiger Death March’, repeatedly interrogated them about their general family background, schooling, and political and religious affiliations. The rations of food, which consisted mainly of boiled rice and pickled turnips, were paltry – whereas the hunger was terrible, the thirst was worse.

In the meantime, Fr Crosbie had been arrested and was also imprisoned there. He later described the feeling of relief he experienced when he heard the two familiar voices of Msgr Quinlan and Fr Canavan replying as their names were called out at roll call. Some days later, he heard them being taken away and feared that they were going to be executed. A week later he himself was taken out and was preparing himself to die when, to his great relief, he found himself at the main gate of the jail with none other than Msgr Quinlan and Fr Canavan. Capture by the enemy can be terrifying, but it is comforting to know that you are not alone!

Seoul
The three men were then transported by train to Seoul. There they were thrown into an overcrowded basement with up to one hundred men, women, young children, diplomats and members of religious orders. The Catholic religious included His Excellency, Bishop Byrne who was the Apostolic Delegate in Korea, his secretary, Fr Booth, some French Fathers of the Paris Foreign Missions, three of whom were between the ages of 75 and 82, two Sisters of St Paul of Chartres, one of whom was 76 and five Carmelite Sisters one of whom was blind. Among the other religious was Mother Mary Clare Whitty from Fenloe, Co Clare, the 67-year-old Anglican Superior of the Holy Cross Society in Seoul. There were two family groups, both of whom survived the war: a Tatar couple had six children between the ages of one and eighteen years, and a Russian couple had three children aged two, five and eight.

Despite the extreme heat, the windows were kept tightly shut. The stifling atmosphere, hordes of flies, fleas and mosquitoes and meagre rations of food and water wore them down physically. To demoralise them, their captors played cruel mind games, keeping them in a constant state of fear. From the torture chamber above them, they could hear the moans and cries of prisoners who refused to renounce their faith, denounce Capitalism and embrace Communism. Sometimes these torture sessions were staged to intimidate the prisoners but sometimes not, and the prisoners could not tell the difference.

Fr Frank had managed to bring his books with him and with the help of Fr Crosbie, continued studying the Korean language. After several days in Seoul, the group was packed onto a train bound for Pyongyang, the capital city of North Korea. The train slowly made its way for thirty-six hours, standing in stifling heat in sidings by day and moving only after dark to avoid detection by South Korean forces. For the first twenty-four hours they were not even given a drink of water.

Pyongyang
In Pyongyang they were interned for two months in a school which had been converted into a concentration camp. Both the quantity and quality of the food were poor here and they were edging closer towards starvation. They were not allowed physical exercise but the monotony of their days was sometimes broken by card games – one of the French diplomats had the foresight to bring a deck. Even without the common bond of language, they managed to form a cohesive group.

Manpo
In September 1950, General MacArthur executed a daring amphibious attack on the coastal town of Incheon in South Korea. By October, American troops had advanced into North Korea. News of MacArthur’s arrival raised the prisoners’ hopes of an early release, but it was not to be. Chinese troops entered the war on the North Korean side prolonging the conflict.

In early October, the group was moved northward ahead of the advancing Americans to Manpo, a town close to the Chinese border on the Yalu River. Here they received some cottonpadded clothing – everyone got a jacket, but there were not enough trousers to go around. The quality and quantity of the food also improved and they were allowed to wash themselves and their clothes in the Yalu River. About 700 American prisoners of war who had been captured in the early stages of the war joined them here – many of them were wounded and all of them had been brutally treated. On Sunday mornings, the Catholics, who constituted one-third of the civilian group, recited the rosary and sang hymns, using Latin as a common language. For the priests in the group, being prohibited from saying Mass was worse than all the other deprivations and physical trials. When Msgr Quinlan celebrated his first Mass after his release in 1953, he was so overcome with emotion that he broke down in tears halfway through.

There were a few light-hearted episodes provided, unwittingly, by Fr Frank and appreciated by all. One was related to a precious cup of water that he had managed to procure. It was so cold in Manpo that to obtain drinking water, one had to hack out chunks of ice from the water supply with an axe and then melt them in a pot. Fr Frank had gotten hold of a mug of boiling water from such a pot. He left it on the window sill to cool. In the meantime, he became engrossed in a hand of bridge. One of the guards arrived to borrow a safety razor from one of the prisoners. When he saw the mug of hot water, he decided to use it for shaving. He grabbed a mirror and soap and started the process. When Fr Frank looked up from his game and saw what was happening, he was outraged, and took the mug and threw its soapy contents out the window. Dumbfounded at first, the guard exploded in a torrent of verbal abuse. Fr Frank, who had little Korean, did not understand what was being said but certainly understood the body language. Fortunately, Msgr Quinlan’s diplomatic intervention calmed the situation.

Over the next few weeks, because of strafing by American aircraft, they were moved to nearby Kosan, from there to Jui-am-nee, an old mining town and then back to Kosan. The acquisition of a rare ration of soya beans provided another diversion to break the monotony of camp life. The Korean men in their group took charge of cooking the beans – carefully washing them and placing them in a cooking pot with just the exact amount of water. They boiled the beans until they were soft and most of the water had boiled off. Then they damped down the fire to allow the remaining water to evaporate slowly, thus, cooking the beans to perfection. Happy that everything was under control, they left the pot unattended. In the meantime, Fr Frank spotted the beans sitting in a pot with little or no water. Thinking that they were going to burn, he quickly poured a bucket of cold water over them, thereby turning what should have been a rare delicacy into a pot of flavourless mush. After he died, the Koreans reminisced with affection about the day Fr Frank had unwittingly ruined their precious ration of beans.

“Then let them march till they die. That is a military order”.
They returned to Manpo, where Major Chong Myong Sil took command of the prisoners. Nicknamed ‘The Tiger’ because of his love for killing people, he addressed the group through a translator, mocking the missionaries and calling them parasites. The prisoners were told to discard everything that could be used as a weapon and that included the walking stick of the eighty-two-year-old Fr Villemot. ‘The Tiger’ informed them that that they would be marching at military pace to Chunggang, a town about 145 kms away. Anyone who dropped out without his permission would be severely punished. The senior civilian, British Commissioner Herbert Lord of the Salvation Army protested that over forty of the group – children and exhausted and elderly prisoners – would struggle to keep a fast pace. ‘The Tiger’s’ response was brief and chilling and a harbinger of what was to come – “Then let them march till they die. That is a military order.” The captives were then divided into groups of forty to fifty, with a U.S. army officer responsible for each group.

The ‘Tiger’ Death March
On the evening of October 31st, the prisoners set out in a long, slow, pitiful column of men, women and children, with the American soldiers in front and the civilians bringing up the rear. All the prisoners were struggling from the onset – the cumulative effects of three months of captivity – exhaustion, malnutrition, dehydration and dysentery – had taken a physical toll. Most of the prisoners were captured in July and were wearing summer clothes. Some people did not even have shoes, and others had handmade cloth ones. Their thin blankets offered no protection against the North Korean winter. The Carmelite Mother Prioress, Mother Thérèse, had to leave her sick bed to join the march and Fathers Crosbie and Canavan walked one on each side of her, supporting her as she struggled to keep up. On the second full day, when she felt faint, with the help of two others, they carried her for a while on a makeshift stretcher using a blanket and two straight branches, taxing their strength.

 

 

 

Sketch of the Death March by Corporal Carl V. Cossin of Columbus, Ohio (Courtesy of the National Park Service, Andersonville National Historical Site, ANDE3474)

The guards continually harassed the slower prisoners using bayonets and rifle butts to hurry them. Captain Sir Vyvyan Holt, the British Minister to Seoul, who was part of the group, frequently but unsuccessfully fought the case of the Columbans with their captors, stressing that they were men of God and proclaiming that Ireland, the country of their birth, was a neutral country.

As the march continued, prisoners began to drop out, too weak to continue. ‘The Tiger’ became so enraged that he decided to shoot the section leader who had lost the most men. That section leader was thirty-four-year-old Lt. Cordus Thornton from Texas. When asked why he allowed his men to disobey orders and fall out, Thornton replied, “Because, sir, they were dying.” When asked why he did not order other soldiers to carry them, he replied that he would then be condemning the carriers to death from exhaustion. Following a kangaroo trial, ‘The Tiger’ publicly executed Thornton with a bullet to the back of the head.

At the end of each long day, the prisoners had to squat on their heels in the cold and listen to 'The Tiger’ ranting about the evils of Capitalism and the benefits of Communism. For the first two nights, the prisoners slept in frost-covered fields, huddled together for warmth using corn stalks for cover. Some tried to dig holes in the frozen ground for protection against the elements and many succumbed to frostbite. Meals, which consisted mainly of a ball of half-cooked corn or maize, were infrequent and irregular. ‘The Tiger’ became so frustrated with the time it took to feed the large number of prisoners that he often ordered the march to recommence before they had all been fed.

At one stage, two-thirds of the prisoners were carrying the other one-third. Fr Frank, who was not a robust man, was always on hand to help, exhausting himself. As the march progressed, several prisoners sat by the side of the road, believing that an oxcart would pick them up and carry them the rest of the way. They were mistaken, and the sound of gunfire heralded their executions.

After the second full day of marching, they were allowed to sleep indoors in a small schoolhouse. The diplomats and civilian families were housed in one room. The remaining civilians were packed tightly into a room in which the Columbans were allocated a small corner. As the room filled up, a general melee erupted outside as the prisoners-of-war attempted to push their way in – to be left out in the cold meant certain death as temperatures dropped as low as -50⁰ C. Cramped muscles, body odours and the smell of dysentery created a suffocating atmosphere in the darkened room that night. Forced to remain seated with knees tucked into their chests, most of the prisoners were unable to stand in the morning and had to crawl from the room.

That morning the women in the camp were told that transport was being arranged for them. After the main column had departed, it became clear that there would be no transport, and they were forced to set off without the usual assistance of the men. Around midday, following an uphill march, the exhausted women re-joined the main group. Two of them – seventy-six-yearold Carmelite, Mother Béatrix and Mrs Funderat, a sixty-nine-year-old Russian widow – unable to keep up, had to be left behind and were subsequently executed. As the march progressed that afternoon, several American soldiers, exhausted, sat down by the side of the road. The sharp crack of rifle shots could be heard soon after. That night their accommodation was a little more spacious – the civilians slept in a chapel and the remainder in a nearby school.

On the morning of the fourth day, snow began to fall as they approached a series of mountains, making conditions treacherous. They set out early at a rapid pace as ‘The Tiger’ needed to get through the Chasong pass before snow blocked it. The climb became steeper, the snow became heavier, and the biting Manchurian wind penetrated to the very marrow of their bones and took away the little breath they had left. They slaked their thirsts by eating small pieces of ice that clung to the shrubs and those without shoes left bloody footprints in the snow. Execution was the price exacted for being too exhausted to continue, and the bodies were summarily dumped over cliffs – to hinder later identification, their ‘dog tags’ were removed from the American soldiers. By late afternoon, the prisoners had negotiated the pass and reached the town of Chasong.

Here ‘The Tiger’ relaxed the pressure on the civilians but the American soldiers were given no quarter. Commissioner Lord and Msgr Quinlan argued successfully for transport for the weaker civilians. Oxcarts arrived to bring the women and children and the old and sick men the remainder of the way to Chunggang, their journey’s end. Here they were housed in an abandoned schoolhouse. Sr Mary Clare, the Irish nun, survived the march but died from exhaustion on November 6th, 1950. It was a few days later – November 8th – before the remainder of the marchers arrived. Over the eight days they had covered 146 kms of mountainous terrain in sub-zero conditions, losing ninety-eight American prisoners-of-war and two civilians

Chunggang - From Death March to Death Camp
Conditions sank to new lows in Chunggang. Rations were estimated at four hundred grams of rough grain per day and drinking water was scarce. Older people, who had lost their teeth through neglect, found it difficult to eat the food. Fatigued and starving, survivors now began to perish from a variety of ailments, most notably pneumonia and chronic dysentery.

‘The Tiger’ insisted that all the prisoners conduct outdoor physical training each morning. Although the temperatures were sub-zero, the prisoners had to strip down to their shirts. After the first morning of these exercises, Fr Frank and Bishop Byrne became feverish and developed coughs. Pneumonia set in very quickly.

At midnight on November 16, after the camp was blitzed by American fighter aircraft, the prisoners were moved to Hachangri, about three miles from Chunggang. Bishop Byrne and Fr Frank and those who were too sick to march were brought to the new camp in ox carts. When they arrived there, they had to stand around for an hour in the cold until a house became vacant for them. Their accommodation was cramped, but at least it was heated.

Here North Korean army medical personnel visited the camp. Through their incompetence and lack of medicines, they lost more patients than they saved. The sick were transferred to a ‘hospital’ nearby. A thick layer of frost covered the walls, and the patients were given two straw mats, one to lie on and another to use as a blanket. The ‘hospital’ was simply a few squalid flea-ridden hovels where ill prisoners were brought to die – the chances of survival were so poor there that it became known as the ‘morgue’.

Msgr Quinlan managed to get special rations of white rice and sugar for the two sick priests, who could not eat the rough Korean food. He was in constant attendance on them and never once did either of them complain. For a time, he succeeded in hiding the fact that they were ill but eventually, they were ordered to go to the ‘hospital’. Fr Frank walked there, but Bishop Byrne had to be carried, and on the morning of November 25, he passed away peacefully.

“I'll have my Christmas dinner in heaven”
On December 4, Fr Frank was allowed back to the main camp. That evening it was clear that he was still unwell. The next day he was worse, and as he was led away to the ‘hospital’ for the second time, the others attempted to cheer him up by telling him that they would all be eating Christmas dinner in the free world. “I'll have my Christmas dinner in heaven,” he replied prophetically.

Msgr Quinlan stayed with him on the night of December 5. Fr Frank’s tenacity and perseverance had sustained him throughout his internment and carried him along on the Death March. His body, already weakened by his childhood illnesses, could take no more. He took his last breath on the 6th December, the feast day of St Nicholas, patron saint of Galway – a saint to whom he had a great devotion. The Monsignor laid out his body, clothed in his light summer soutane. That evening they hacked a shallow grave in the frozen ground and buried him near Bishop Byrne.

Aftermath
The war in Korea dragged on for three years. The whereabouts of nine missing Columbans was a cause of great concern in Ireland and abroad. It was only when the surviving priests were released in April 1953 that it was confirmed that seven out of the nine missing men were dead – only Fr Crosbie and Msgr Quinlan had survived.

Fr Crosbie travelled to Headford to personally offer his condolences to Fr Frank’s mother and sisters. For the Canavan family, hopes of a homecoming were dashed. There would be no chance to say goodbye and no grave to visit – only precious words of comfort from a man who had shared Fr Frank's final ordeal. They were consoled by the knowledge that, after five months of brutal captivity, their son and brother, having received the Last Rites, passed away peacefully in the company of a friend – his place in Heaven guaranteed.

Fr Frank lies in an unmarked grave in North Korea. Today a granite Celtic cross with his name stands over an empty grave in the burial plot behind the cathedral in Chuncheon. His name is also engraved on the family gravestone on the floor of the ruins of Ross Errilly Friary, Co Galway and on a memorial plaque in the grounds of Headford church. A memorial to the seven Columban martyrs and Sr Mary Clare was erected in Yongsan-gu, Seoul, in 2013 by the Embassy of Ireland to Korea, the Irish Association of Korea, the Irish Government and other associations.

 

L to R: Memorials at Ross Errilly Friary and Headford Churchyard (Courtesy of Mary Burke), Memorial in Seoul (Courtesy of Herstoric Ireland)

Death March Casualties
A precise account of casualties is difficult to establish. Approximately 800 prisoners marched out from Manpo on October 31st. According to Private ‘Johnnie’ Johnson from Ohio, who secretly kept a list of casualties on scraps of paper, 496 prisoners from their group died in captivity throughout those three years. Those who avoided execution died from various ailments brought on by starvation, dehydration, exposure, ill-treatment, the gruelling pace and lack of medical care. Those who survived were reduced to skin and bone. Nobody knows what happened to ‘The Tiger’ – and according to military sources, it would be almost impossible to find out.

Epitaph
In a tribute paid by Msgr Quinlan to Fr Frank in 1997, he summed up the young priest’s commitment to his calling – “no words of mine could sufficiently extol his priestly virtues.” One of Fr Frank’s greatest virtues was his Christian love for his fellow humans which can be encapsulated thus: ‘I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep’ (John 10:11). Although depleting his limited reserves in the process, he continued to help the sick and the old who could not keep pace on the Death March, bringing them spiritual comfort and giving them a chance to live another day.

Fr Frank is one of the eighty-one modern-day martyrs whom the Korean Catholic Church is promoting for beatification. In 2014 they were declared Servants of God – the title granted to individuals at the first stage of canonisation. Their cases were discussed last June at the South Korean’s Special Episcopal Commission to Promote Beatification and Canonisation. As ‘witnesses of modern and contemporary faith’ of the Korean Church they were declared worthy of the status of sainthood. It will nevertheless take a few years before Headford can pay homage to its first saint.

Appreciation
Sincere gratitude to historian Fr Neil Collins SSC for his generosity in giving of his time and sharing information and photographs. Thank you to Gearóid O’Broin and Hugh Byron, nephews of Fr Canavan; Maura Mongan, Kevin Muldoon and Very Rev. Dr Hugh Clifford, Kinvara; Kevin Flood and Fr Ray Flaherty, Headford. As always, thank you to Gerry O’Brien and Mary Burke.

Sources
The Far East - Magazine of the Columban Missionaries
W. C. Lathamx, ‘Ordeal of the Tiger Survivors’ Army History 75 (2010): pp. 6–17 Carmel and the Korean Death March by the Carmelite Nuns of Seoul, South Korea.
Philip Crosbie, March Till They Die (Brown & Nolan, 1955)
Fr Neil Collins SSC, A Mad Thing to Do – A Century of Columban Missions (1916-2016) (Dalgan Press, 2017) Roger Hermiston, The Greatest Traitor: The Secret Lives of Agent George Blake (Aurum, 2014).
Gearóid O’Broin, ‘Fr Francis Canavan’ in Roots of Faith: A Journey of Hope to mark the 150th Anniversary of St. Mary's Church, Headford (2015) https://columbans.ie/about-us/columban-martyrs/.
The Irish Catholic

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¹ Fr. Tony Collier (37), from Clogherhead, Co. Louth was killed on 27th of June 1950; Fr Jim Maginn (38), of Newcastle, Co Down (was born in Butte, Montana to Irish parents who returned home to Newcastle when he was nine), was killed on 4th July 1950; Fr. Patrick Reilly (34) from Drumraney, Co Westmeath was killed on the 29th of August 1950; Monsignor Patrick Brennan (49), born in Chicago, Fr. Tommie Cusack (39) from Ballycotton, Liscannor, Co Clare and Fr. Jack O’Brien (31) from Donamon, Co Roscommon were killed on the 24th of September 1950 at the Massacre at Taejon.
² Dowdstown House was purchased for £15,000. It was the international headquarters of the Columban Fathers until 1967 when they moved to Dublin. In 1981 it was re-dedicated for use by Meath Diocese as a retreat and pastoral centre and was named after Fr John Blowick, one of the founder members.

 

ARREST IN KOREA

By the Right Rev. Monsignor Quinlan (Far East June 1953)

The invasion of South Korea by the North Korean army began at 4 a.m. on Sunday, June 25, 1950. Our mission headquarters in Kangwondo was only twelve miles from the border. During the 6 o’clock Mass we could hear the sound of guns; before the last Mass and Benediction were over at 11 o’clock the sounds had grown considerably louder. We thought at the time that it was just another of the Northern raids, and the radio had not yet given news of the general attack over the whole line.

Fathers Hayward and Burke
Father Hayward and Father Patrick Burke had business in Seoul. I told them to go ahead and tend to it. They were to return on Tuesday and little they or we thought that on Monday the road back would be cut off by a strong, well equipped Red army. Father Frank Canavan and I wished them a good journey and jokingly told them not to let the Reds get them. Then we settled down to catechism classes, examination and instruction of catechumens, and other routine Sunday classes.

By 6 p.m. the radio carried the news of the invasion over the 38th line at all points. The townspeople grew uneasy and many began to flee by train and truck to Seoul.

Father Tony Collier was stationed in a new mission in another part of the town. He visited us on Sunday evening and told us that a few Koreans near his mission had been wounded by stray bullets and that he had given them first-aid treatment. His mission was overlooking the bridge which spanned the river between the city and the oncoming Red army. I thought severe fighting would occur around the bridge and I asked Father Tony if it would not be better to abandon his mission and come to ours, which was a good distance away from the bridge. I shall never forget his answer. “I would prefer to stay with my own Christians. Short of a direct hit by a shell I shall be safe in the residence and I may be able to help my people if the Reds capture the city. I’ll be seeing you,” he replied, and returned to his mission.

That was the last time I saw dear Father Tony, and not until I returned to Ireland was I to learn the story of his death.

 In this, the first of three articles on his war-time experience in Korea, Monsignor Quinlan tells of the battle for Chuncheon and his own and Father Quinlan’s arrest. An incident leads him to believe that Father Collier had been shot, though he had to wait until his return to Ireland last April for confirmation of the fact.

 “We Shot an American”.
But an incident on Thursday, June 29, made me uneasy for him. An officer was looking at the new church building as I came up for Mass. He covered me with his rifle and asked my nationality. I told him, and my Chinese contractor assured him, that I was Irish. “We shot an American in town the day we arrived here,” he said. “But there were no Americans here,” I told him, “where was the man you shot?” “Up there,” he replied, pointing in the direction of Father Tony’s church. For us priests to go on the street would have meant certain death and I had to be content with asking some Catholic women to try to get to Father Collier’s church. They made the attempt but were turned back.

Later another Korean officer called. I told him of my fears for Father Tony and asked him to take me to his mission. He refused, but promised to go and see and come back to let me know. He went away but never returned. Next evening (July 1) I got in touch with a local communist who had a pass from the Red army and could go about the town as he liked. He promised to return next morning, but when the morning came we had been arrested.

Citizens Flee from Chuncheon
I return now to the events of that first Sunday evening.

By 10 p.m. the sound of the guns was very near and the occasional shell was reaching the outskirts of the town. On Monday morning the exodus of the townspeople was in full swing; people with bundles on their heads, in their hands, people leading or carrying children, old people, young people – they went by the main road to the south, over by-roads, over the hills and away from us. By noon most of the 60,000 inhabitants had fled. I think not more than 500 people were in the town on Monday evening.

To Go, or Stay?
On Monday afternoon Major Hogge, The U.S. military adviser to the South Korean forces in the town, called to see us. He told us he was leaving and going south to Wonju, and offered to take us with him. I asked if he knew what was the United States policy towards the invasion. (If the United States was going to take a hand, I thought, the invasion would be rolled back soon; and in that case we would have gone with Major Hogge.) He told me that he did not know. Then I replied, “We shall stay. Our place is here with our Christians.”

I turned to Father Canavan and said to him, “Father Frank, what do you want to do? You have no charge of souls here, no district for which you are responsible. You are free to go, and if you want to go I shall give you my blessing and think as much of you as if you stayed.” He thought for a minute or so, and then he replied, “If you will allow me, I should like to stay here with you to help. I can hear confessions.” “ Father,” I replied,” this may be final for all of us. We shall not have an easy time with the Reds and may even lose our lives. If you want to go, this is your last chance.” “ I want to stay,” was his reply. Major Hogge said goodbye to us and left.

On Monday night I told Father Frank to consume the Blessed Sacrament, and a little later we went to shelter in the new church, which was strongly built. Shells had been falling around the mission compound and on the road below it, which leads to the south; bullets were pinging all over the place. We settled down to spend the night in the new church. Father Frank and I and some of our Catholics who had not gone away, lay around against the granite wall. On the stroke of midnight the real battle for Chuncheon began. Both sides gave all they had; artillery, machine-guns and rifles were blazing away. We could not hear each other’s’ voices. After about half an hour it ceased and for the rest of the night no firing occurred.

At dawn the attack was renewed. By 8 o’clock in the morning we could see the South Korean troops evacuating the town. About 9 o’clock a shell made a direct hit on the roof of the new church. It crashed through the roof but did not start a fire. A few minutes later another shell fell on the old church a little below the new building, and fire broke out immediately. Telling Father Frank to remain in the new building until I called for him, I went down to the old church to see if a few buckets of water would extinguish the fire. Just as I got there another shell fell quite near it and I decided that it would be foolish to go on the roof.

Ten minutes later the shelling and rifle fire completely ceased and I called Father Frank and the servants from the new building. We started to haul water in buckets from a sixty-foot well in an effort to extinguish the fire on the roof, but all we succeeded in doing was to keep it from breaking into a great flame and spreading to neighbouring houses. Some of us worked on the roof, others began to clear out the church furnishings; altars, vestments, harmonium, stations of the cross.

 First Meeting with Reds
At about 10.30 in the morning we had our first encounter with two soldiers of the North Korean army. They came into the compound with their rifles at the ready. I was hauling water from the well and Father Frank was standing beside me to pass the bucket on to the next person. The soldiers covered us with their rifles and I said to them in Korean: “ How do you do? Can we offer you a drink of water?” They came up to us, their rifles still covering us, and one of them said to me,: “Comrade, who are you? “I am a Catholic priest,” I replied. “Are you American?” he asked. “No, I am Irish and proud of it,” I said. “You speak Korean well. When did you come here?” “I have been here for twenty years,” I said. He grew a little more friendly, though he didn’t lower his rifle. Turning to Father Canavan he asked: “ And who are you?” “I, too, am Irish,” replied Father Frank in Korean. “What are you doing here?” came the next question. “A shell fell on our church and set it on fire, and we are trying to keep the blaze from spreading to the neighbouring houses,” was the reply. “That is good work. Carry on, comrades.” Then they left us.

All day long until 11 0’clock that night Father Frank and I with a few willing Korean helpers doused the burning building with buckets of water. By then the roof had collapsed and the danger of the fire’s spreading to the neighbouring houses was over. At 11 0’clock it began to rain heavily. The fire was now only a smouldering one and we were dead tired, so we left off work and lay down just as we were. Next morning we continued working on the church, sousing the smouldering patches, putting the vestments away in one room of the residence, and clearing up the mess as best we could. So we spent the day – Wednesday June 28.

Communists Again
No Red soldiers bothered us that day or the next. On Friday and Saturday we had visits from some of them, who looted my house of everything but did not touch the one in which Father Frank was living. On Sunday, July 2, Father Frank said his Mass first and I began immediately after him. Up to then all had been quiet, but just as I began the Gloria rifle shots rang out in the yard. A North Korean army officer and about five soldiers rushed into the room next to the one in which I was offering Mass and with their rifle butts they smashed the glass in the windows and bookcase and began to throw everything about. They next entered the room in which I was offering the holy sacrifice. The officer saw a small statue of the Blessed Virgin on a low press. He took it in his hand, raised his hand above his head, then smashed the statue against the floor.
I stopped, and turning to him in my vestments I said: “Why are you doing this? Your headquarters here in town know that we are here. They will not be pleased with what you are doing.” A few Catholics had been kneeling at Mass. Terrified at what they had seen, they rushed out into the yard and tried to escape. A soldier fired at them (fortunately he did not hit them) and they returned very frightened. Then an officer searched Father Canavan. He took away his watch, his fountain pen, everything he had in his pockets, and ordered us into the yard. I took off my vestments and walked into the yard with Father Frank.

Arrest and Interrogation
There we were told to put up our hands and march before the six braves through the town to headquarters. At headquarters we had a long argument with the senior officer about our nationality, the existence of God, the existence of the soul and various other topics until about 11 o’clock in the morning. Then he sent us to the newly-arrived Internal Security forces under guard. They continued to question us until 7 o’clock that evening. At 7 o’clock one of the security officials said: “I know all about the history of the Catholic Church in Korea. Tell me all and leave out nothing.” I replied: “Since you know all about the Catholic Church in Korea, and since neither of us has had even a drop of water since we got up at 6 o’clock this morning, would you mind if I don’t give you the history you asked for just now?” He became a little more friendly at that and promised to get us some water and some food to eat.

THE LONG CAPTIVITY
By the Right Rev. Monsignor Thomas Quinlan (Far East August 1953)

In last month’s issue of the Far East Monsignor Quinlan described the arrest of himself and Father Frank Canavan and the beginning of their interrogation by Korean Communist Security Police in Chuncheon. This month he describes their transference from Chuncheon to Seoul and eventually to an internment camp near the Yalu River on the Manchurian border. He gives details of the deaths of Bishop Byrne and Father Canavan.

 THE COMMUNIST security official gave us a cup of water and some rice and told us to rest on the chairs in the room in which we were. We spent the night in the chairs and next day our interrogations were continued. That night we were both put in the lock-up. We spent one week in the lock-up; then, one night at 11 p.m., we were called out and put on a truck with guards with fixed bayonets on either side of us. We thought our end had come. The truck started down the main street, but to our relief turned a corner and drove into the regular jail yard. After a time each of us was put into a separate cell. I could hear Father Phil Crosbie’s voice in the corridor (he was, as I learned later, captured in his parish 25 miles away) and he, too, was put into a separate cell. There we remained until the night of July 16.

Meeting with Other Captives
Towards midnight on July 16 we were called out, put on a truck and taken to the station, where we were entrained for Seoul under heavy guard. We reached Seoul at dawn and were taken to a large building in the city and ushered into a big room. There we found his Excellency, Bishop Byrne, the Apostolic Delegate in Korea, his secretary, Father Booth; some French Fathers of the Paris Foreign Missions; five Carmelite Sisters; two Sisters of St Paul of Chartres; a few foreign civilians, and about 200 Korean civilians – all of whom had been taken in for interrogation. We were told to join Bishop Byrne and his group and allowed to talk to them in whispers. The bishop told us that they had been brought in the previous day and had spent the night on chairs or lying on the floor.

Next evening Bishop Byrne and the rest of us prisoners (except the Koreans) were put on a bus, taken to a station a little north of the city, and entrained for Pyongyang. The train travelled by night only, and after three nights we arrived at Pyongyang – on the morning of July 21. In Pyongyang we were taken to a court-room, given something to eat, and each of us was asked for his complete life’s history. The same evening, around 9 o’clock, we were taken by truck to a school-house some five miles north of the city. There each of us was given a blanket, we slept on the floor, and a little food was supplied to us three times daily. Two months in these quarters, and then on the evening of September 5 we were suddenly ordered to pack, taken into Pyongyang, and the same night were put on board a train with 700 U.S. prisoners of war, bound for the frontier town of Manpo on the Yalu river.

Kind Camp Commandant
The distance from Pyongyang to Manpo is only about 200 miles, but since we travelled only at night, and very slowly, we reached Manpo only on September 12. There we were separated from the U.S. prisoners and lodged in two rows of houses a little outside the town. Accommodation was fair, the food good, and we were given plenty of it. The North Korean officer in charge was a kind man who treated us well, and allowed us to go to the Yalu river each day for ablutions and laundry. In Manpo, as a result of the good food, those of us who had been suffering from beri-beri were once again restored to health.

Some three weeks later, early in October, we were suddenly moved to a village called Kosan about twenty miles down the Yalu from Manpo. There the accommodation was good, the food good as before, and the same officer was in charge. After about a week in Kosan we were moved again, to a place in the mountains about twelve miles away. I think that move was dictated by military necessity; the U.S. forces were coming up the main road along the Yalu River and were expected to reach Kosan very soon. It was thought that fighting might occur at Kosan and the camp commandant did not wish to endanger us.

At the new camp in the mountains there were rumours among both prisoners and guards that the war was over. On October 25 we were suddenly moved back to Kosan again. The Chinese volunteers had started to pour into Korea across the Yalu from Manchuria. Kosan was a deserted village when we reached it and after only a night in it we continued our march to Manpo. There we could sense a change in the situation. We were put into a burned down house, only the walls of which were standing, though it did not appear to have been bombed. In a field near is we could see 700 U.S. prisoners. They were sleeping under open sky. We at least had the shelter of a wall. In Manpo our kind commandant took leave of us and another commandant, not nearly so kind, took charge.

Nine-Day March
After two nights in this place, on the evening of October 31, we were told to pack our blankets and get ready to march. The U.S. prisoners led the way and we, the internees, brought up the rear. We had walked three miles when we were told to camp in a corn field. There was no shelter and we slept on the bare ground. Next morning we continued the march and that night we again slept in the open. The following morning there were ten among the U.S. prisoners dead from exposure and a number of others were unable to march. After that each night we had a shelter over our heads, sleeping in schools or houses or any other accommodation that happened to be available. On November 9 we reached the end of our long march and were housed in a number of school buildings in a village called Chungkang. During the nine-day march 98 people had died one way or another.

On that same march Bishop Byrne and Father Canavan had caught colds, and in the schoolhouse of Chungkang an incident occurred which, I think, caused pneumonia to develop in the case of each of them. The camp commandant ordered us to get out each morning for physical drill or warming-up exercises. We had to remove our coats for it, though the weather was very cold: I should think there were bout fifteen degrees of frost. After the first morning of these exercises the bishop’s and Father Frank’s cold were worse; they had a fever and coughed a great deal during the night. But they did not grow any worse during the next few days and I thought they would recover.

On November 16 we were again ordered to move, this time to a place only three miles from Chungkang, called Hachangri. The sick who were unable to march, including the bishop and Father Frank, were brought to the new camp the following day on ox-carts. The house in which we were put up was very good but very small for the purpose: Twelve men were consigned to one room sixteen feet long by nine feet wide. Though it was fairly warm, to rest comfortably in it was impossible.

I knew by the flush on their faces and their fever that Bishop Byrne and Father Canavan had developed pneumonia. The North Korean army doctors came to visit them, but they had very little medicine. Next day they came again and said they had made arrangements to have the sick transferred to another house about a hundred yards from ours. The camp commandant visited us too and I appealed to him to give special rations of milk and chicken broth for the sick men, who could not eat the rough Korean food. I explained to him that Bishop Byrne was the Vatican representative and had done much to help Korea. He replied that they had no supplies of milk and that there was not a hen or a chicken in the village, as all had been taken by the villagers when they were evacuating the houses for us; but he appeared to feel sorry for the sick and promised to order special rations of white rice and sugar for them. This promise he kept.

The four sick men were told to get ready to move across to the other house, and before he left the room Bishop Byrne said: “After the privilege of my priesthood this privilege of suffering with you all for Christ is the greatest of my life.” Then he, Father Frank, a French priest and one civilian set out across the muddy field.

We helped them on their way, carrying their blankets for them, while the wind blew the falling snow in our faces as we moved across to the house. The room in which they were to be accommodated opened on to the yard and its door had been removed. There was only a straw bag to keep the weather out and the floor was cold, but at least it had plenty of straw. We laid them down on it and tried to make them comfortable as best we could.

Bishop Byrne Dies
The bishop grew worse each day and on the morning of November 25 he passed away peacefully. In addition to pneumonia he had been suffering from beri-beri contracted on the long march, yet never once had I heard him murmur or complain, and he frequently exhorted the two priests and the layman to bear their sufferings gladly for Christ. This, indeed, they did. I was in constant attendance on all of them and never once did one of them complain.
When Bishop Byrne was arrested in Seoul he was wearing only a light clerical coat. No coffins were provided for the dead, but I buried him in my soutane, hoping that its hard red buttons would afterwards help us to identify his remains. We collected some stones and placed them on his grave in the shape of a cross, then returned to the camp.

And Father Canavan
Father Frank Canavan and the other two recovered and on December 4 Father Frank was allowed back to our camp. I was with him on his way back and he told me he felt fine and would like something to eat, but that evening he complained of not feeling so well. Next day he was worse and he remarked to someone: “I shall have my Christmas dinner in Heaven.” I stayed with him on the night of December 5, and on the morning of December 6 – the Feast of St Nicholas, as he reminded me – he died quite peacefully. I laid his body out, clothed in his light summer soutane, and that evening we buried him near Bishop Byrne. I shall be able to locate the graves of both if I ever get a chance to return there.

FATHER CANAVAN could not be called a robust man, but in Chuncheon under fire he displayed heroic courage and on the long march helped the sick and the old who could not keep up with the others. No words of mine could sufficiently extol his priestly virtues.

Ireland may be justly proud of her missionary son.

Father Frank was 35. He was the seventh of the seven Columban Priests to die