Martin Cahill
| Martin Cahill | |
|---|---|
| Born |
23 May 1949 Dublin, Ireland |
| Died | 18 August 1994 (aged 45) Ranelagh, Dublin, Ireland |
| Cause of death | Assassination by the Provisional IRA |
| Nationality | Irish |
| Other names | The General |
| Spouse(s) | Frances |
| Children | 4 |
| Conviction(s) | Armed robbery |
Martin "The General" Cahill (23 May 1949 – 18 August 1994) was a prominent Irish criminal from Dublin.
Cahill generated a certain notoriety in the media, which referred to him by the sobriquet "The General". The name was also used by the media to discuss Cahill's activities while avoiding legal problems with libel. During his lifetime, Cahill took particular care to hide his face from the media—he would spread the fingers of one hand.
He was born in a slum district in Grenville Street in Dublin's north inner city, the second of twelve surviving children of Patrick Cahill, an alcoholic lighthouse-keeper, and Agnes Sheehan. By the time he was in school, Martin and his older brother John were stealing food to supplement the family's income. In 1960, the family was moved to Captain's Road, Crumlin, as part of the Dublin slum clearances. Martin was sent to a Christian Brothers School (CBS) on the same road where he lived but was soon playing truant and committing frequent burglaries with his brothers. At 15, he attempted to join the Royal Navy, but was rejected, allegedly after offering to break into houses for them and because he had a criminal record.
At age 16, he was convicted of two burglaries and sentenced to an industrial school run by the Oblates of Mary Immaculate at Daingean, County Offaly. After his release, he met and married Frances Lawless, a girl from Rathmines, where his family was living.
With his brothers, he continued to commit multiple burglaries in the affluent neighbourhoods nearby, at one point even robbing the Garda Síochána depot for confiscated firearms. The Cahill brothers soon turned to armed robbery, and by the early 1970s Gardaí at the Dublin Central Detective Unit (CDU) had identified the Cahill brothers as major criminals, when they teamed up with the notorious Dunne gang in Crumlin to rob security vans conveying cash from banks.
In 1978, Dublin Corporation began preparing to demolish Hollyfield Buildings. Cahill, then serving a four-year suspended prison sentence, fought through the courts to prevent his neighbourhood's destruction. Even after the tenements were demolished, he continued to live in a pitched tent on the site. Finally, Ben Briscoe, the Lord Mayor of Dublin, paid a visit to his tent and persuaded him to move into a new house in a more upscale district of Rathmines.
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