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Welcome to the the Ludlow family's website for the Seamus Ludlow Truth and Justice Campaign.
Return to Home Page.
Links to other pages in the Ludlow family's website are provided in the sliding bar on the left and in the text below and at the bottom of this page. The Ludlow family particularly recommends the independent report produced by the respected human rights organization British Irish RIGHTS WATCH.
This is a photograph of Seamus Ludlow (47), Thistlecross, Mountpleasant, County Louth, an innocent man abducted and murdered by UDR/Red Hand Commando on 1st/2nd May 1976.
To protect his Loyalist killers from justice, the authorities, who were soon aware of the killers' identities, shamefully spread the lies that Seamus was killed by the IRA because he was an informer, and that members of his own family were involved.
False Allegations that Seamus Ludlow's Murder Was A Family Affair!
Worse than the withholding of information and lying to the
victim's family, if indeed that was possible, can only be the way in which
members of the Gardai attempted to smear Seamus Ludlow's own family by
implicating them in his murder. Kevin
Donegan, a brother-in-law (now deceased), who lived at
Dromintee, south Armagh,. and who had several meetings with Garda detectives to
discuss the case, was actually told that the IRA was responsible and that the
killing was "a family affair". He was told that some members of the family were
involved in the murder of their relative. This was an unbelievable
lie.
Kevin Ludlow, at left in this photograph, a brother of the innocent victim, is pictured at Seamus' grave at Ravensdale, with his nephew Jimmy Sharkey. Kevin was told similar lies by members of the Gardai. He was actually given a name of a family member who was falsely alleged to have been involved. The photograph links to another page with more about Seamus Ludlow's family background.
In the early part of his life Kevin Donegan, photographed below,
spent 17 years as a soldier in the Irish army. Respect for the system was
drilled into him during those 17 years in the army, and any doubts he might have
had about officialdom would have been suppressed. Besides, he was reared in a
respectable family and it was perhaps natural for him to believe in and respect
the word of the authorities. Like many people from his generation within the
Ludlow family circle it was difficult to accept that the Gardai would lie. If
they said that Seamus Ludlow was murdered by the IRA they would have been
inclined to believe what they were told.
Thus Kevin Donegan went to his grave on 27 January 1992, filled with doubt, still half believing the terrible lies that he was told by the detectives in Dundalk. The Gardai knew what kind of man Kevin Donegan was and they abused and exploited his trust. It was not his fault as a law-abiding and trusting citizen that Kevin Donegan was so exploited and abused. This photograph of Kevin Donegan links to another page featuring his encounters with the Gardai and the lies that they told him about Seamus Ludlow's death.
At least one other family member was told the same thing. Kevin Ludlow, the victim's only surviving brother, who now lives in County Cavan, was quoted in The Sunday Tribune, 15 March 1998:
"Any time I came back to Dundalk I would call the gardai and this was them all the time: "It was the IRA, the IRA, the IRA". As a matter of fact, he accused one of our relations of knowing about it.". "We'll fucking get them", they would say.
To this day Kevin Ludlow holds secret the name of a family member who he says was falsely accused by the Gardai of being involved in the murder of Seamus Ludlow. That neither this person or any other member of the Ludlow family has ever been arrested speaks volumes about this disgraceful smear. Kevin Ludlow knows this to be a lie and he will not reveal the name of the family member who has been so falsely accused.
All of this is now exposed as rubbish but it is particularly shocking that it now seems that, while they were smearing Seamus Ludlow's family, the detectives already had information about the true identity of the Loyalist killers. These lies were distressing to a family which had lost a loved one in tragic circumstances, a man who had no enemies in the world and certainly not within his close family. Again it is worth stressing, though the Garda sought to implicate members of the Ludlow family in their loved one's death, no members of the family were ever arrested for the crime.
Pictured in a photograph taken some years ago, are Kevin
Ludlow, the only surviving brother of Seamus Ludlow, and his nephew Jimmy
Sharkey, who have spearheaded the family's search for truth and justice for many
years. The photograph appeared in the Sunday Tribune, 15 March 1998. Kevin is
holding an early life photograph of his murdered brother. (This picture is from a cutting supplied by Monsignor Raymond
Murray.)
One nephew, Jimmy Sharkey, however, was interrogated at length by garda detectives in a patrol car on the Bog Road near his home. He recalls that they made great efforts to force him into admitting that he believed that his uncle was killed by the IRA. It seemed important to them that he should believe what they wanted him to believe. It seems relevant to stress here that it is now clear that the Gardai themselves did not believe the lies that they wanted the Ludlow family to swallow.
The Ludlow family is delighted that the day has finally come when the truth of who killed committed the murder is at last revealed. Seamus Ludlow and his family are vindicated and those who spread lies are silent. The Ludlow family have now publicly demonstrated their belief in a cover-up with the erection of a new memorial, photographed here, at the place where Seamus Ludlow's body was found.
Members of the Ludlow family circle suspect that the Gardai were attempting to split the family, to drive members into opposing and accusing camps. A family so divided against itself would be less likely to maintain a determined campaign for truth and justice and thereby permit those who were only interested in covering up the true facts to succeed in their twisted aims.
There can be no doubt that the Ludlow family was indeed split but this is not the fault of the family. They in their grief were exploited for evil purposes by members of a force which was sworn to uphold the law and solve crime.
These attempts to smear the family of Seamus Ludlow were revealed in The Sunday Tribune, 15 March 1998, which can be viewed on the website of the Pat Finucane Centre (see link on the Ludlow family's Links page).
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Go to Unexplained British Army interest.
Go to Family excluded from inquest.
Go to English lies about Seamus Ludlow.
Go to Michael Cunningham's investigation, 1978.
Go to Journalists' Revelations.
Go to BIRW Report.
Go to Map of Seamus Ludlow's Home Area.
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Go to Bulletin Board.
m.donegan@virgin.net Print this page
Click on the Start button above for a final word from the Ludlow family.
Copyright © 2001 the Ludlow
family. All rights reserved.
Revised: March 18, 2001 .