Nephew of loyalist murder gang's 'real target' tells of uncle's flight

By Michael McHugh

The family of an IRA man at the centre of a probe into a loyalist murder in Dundalk today broke their silence on the matter.

George Mussen, who is now dead, is reputed to have been the real target of a four-man Red Hand Commando gang from north Down which murdered Seamus Ludlow in May 1976.

Mr Ludlow, a forestry worker from Dundalk, was picked up in the assassins' car in the town, driven close to his home and shot dead.

There have been a string of public inquiries into his death amid concerns about the failure of gardai to charge anyone with the murder.

Mr Mussen was interned a number of times because of his republican views and fled from Co Down to Dundalk where he was allegedly targeted by loyalists the night of Mr Ludlow's death.

"I heard that he may have been a target. He was in Dundalk at the time and I heard that somebody was going down to pay him a visit," his nephew Ciaran Mussen said.

"The circumstances surrounding his flight from Hilltown were that the Army visited his home in connection with an arms find and he said he was going out to make some tea and he escaped out the back door.

"He lived in Dundalk for a number of years, about 10 perhaps, and he would have been in Dundalk in the 1970s. It has been said that George could have been a target."

The gunmen are believed, according to the Ludlow family, to have looked unsuccessfully for Mr Mussen before settling on Mr Ludlow.

The on-the-run republican was an independent republican candidate for south Down at one stage and he polled over 11,000 votes. He spent up to 10 years in Dundalk before returning to Northern Ireland to live out the rest of his days.

Mr Mussen escaped in the mid-1970's after the Army called at his home in connection with an arms find nearby. Although technically still on the run from the authorities he was extremely elderly by the time he returned to Northern Ireland and was not arrested.

"He did have a strong republican connection, he was from a fairly staunch republican background," Mr Mussen added. "By 1971 he was moving towards the Provisionals."

During a Dail hearing of the Justice Committee in Dublin earlier this year, retired Supreme Court Justice Henry Barron said Dundalk Garda may have been warned about an imminent attack in the area involving one of the suspects.

It is believed the operation against Mr Mussen may have been linked to that warning.

Four suspects have been interviewed by the RUC about the Ludlow killing but none were charged. Two of them admitted being on the scene at the time of the murder.