Capt James Kelly spent a lifetime trying to clear his name after his involvement in the Arms Trial, writes Liam Reid
Since the Arms Trial, when he first came to national attention, Capt James Kelly had many incarnations, as a sculptor, newspaper editor, publican and Dáil candidate.
But it was his campaign to clear his name over his involvement in supplying arms to the North that took up the vast proportion of his time.
It was a campaign he pursued to an obsessive degree through the media and the courts to the very end, when, last Thursday, days before his death, he lodged preliminary court proceedings relating to the original trial.
The eldest of 10 children, he was born in Bailieboro, Co Cavan, in 1929, into a staunchly republican family. He attended primary school locally and went to secondary school in St Patrick's College in Cavan, and Presentation College, Bray. Following his Leaving Certificate, Kelly joined the Defence Forces in 1949 as a private and was commissioned two years later.
In 1960 he was promoted to captain and appointed staff officer to the intelligence section of Army headquarters. His involvement in Northern Ireland began in August 1969 while visiting his brother in Belfast when trouble erupted in Derry. He travelled there to witness the attacks first hand. He reported back to his superior, Col Michael Hefferon director of intelligence, who told him to return to Northern Ireland and keep abreast of the situation.
Kelly spent the next six months building up contacts in the nationalist community. He also made contact with a Hamburg arms dealer, with a view to importing guns from the Continent to help with the defence of Northern Catholics.
Two attempts to import the guns through Dublin port, and subsequently Dublin airport failed when gardaí became aware of the plans.
Shortly afterwards, in May 1970 Jack Lynch sacked two of his ministers, Neil Blaney and Mr Charles Haughey. Lynch said that two weeks previously he had been informed by Peter Berry, then secretary general of the Department of Justice, of the plans to import arms. Lynch was told this was done with the knowledge of both ministers and using a £100,000 Catholic distress fund established by the government.
Both Mr Haughey, who had ultimate responsibility for the funds as minister for finance, and Blaney, who was a member of a cabinet sub-committee responsible for the Northern relief fund, were charged with conspiracy to import arms. A District Judge at a preliminary hearing found that Mr Blaney had no case to answer.
Capt Kelly, Belfast IRA man and nationalist leader John Kelly, and Albert Luykx, a Belgian-born Dublin-based businessman were also charged in relation to the attempted importation of arms. All were acquitted. Mr Haughey has always denied knowledge of the plot.
James Kelly never denied his involvement, however, but always maintained he was merely acting on orders from Col Hefferon, and ultimately the then defence minister Jim Gibbons. John Kelly has also alleged that Lynch and other ministers were also aware of the plans.
His campaign to clear his name began immediately with a book, Orders for the Captain, which he had to publish himself. He used the letters pages of national newspapers to pursue his campaign, and took a number of successful legal actions against various media outlets over reports about the Arms Trial. In May this year he won €70,000 in a settlement against Gill and Macmillan. Capt Kelly's campaign to clear his name met with its greatest success when the original Garda statement of his superior, Col Michael Hefferon was unearthed. It turned out it had been altered to exclude implications that the then minister for Defence, Jim Gibbons, had approved the plan to import arms.
An RTÉ Primetime report in 2001 detailed the revelations and claims by leading lawyers that the prosecution would never have been brought against Capt Kelly based on the original statement. As a result Mr Dessie O'Malley, who was minister for justice at the time of the original Arms Trial, faced questions in the Dáil over his role.
Two subsequent reports by the then minister for justice, Mr John O'Donoghue, and the attorney general, Mr Michael McDowell, cleared Mr O'Malley of any involvement in changing the statement. The inquiry concluded it was probable that there was no conspiracy in changing the statement, as the editing of statements was normal at that time. A report by the Garda Commissioner, however, claimed that "no member of an Garda Síochána edited any statement taken during the course of the [Arms Trial] investigation".
Despite his 1970 acquittal, Capt Kelly, who resigned from the Army in 1970 over the affair, said it had destroyed his life and any possibility of a subsequent professional career. It left him unemployable, he said, as his name had never been cleared.
Initially he became active in politics, joining Aontacht Éireann, the party founded by former Fianna Fail minister Kevin Boland and born out of the arms crisis.
He ran unsuccessfully for the Dáil on two occasions in 1973 and 1977 in the Cavan-Monaghan constituency, and also narrowly failed to be elected to Cavan Co Council in 1979. He rejoined Fianna Fail in the 1980s, joining the party's national executive in 1985, and resigned four years later over the party's policy on extradition.
After the Arms Trial he also tried his hand at various careers, moving to Australia in 1975 and returning to run the family pub, the West End, in Bailieboro, which he subsequently sold.
In the mid-1980s he became proprietor of a local newspaper, the Cavan Leader, which closed, and he also turned his hand to bog oak sculpture.
He is survived by his wife Shiela, who he married in 1955, and six children.