The Irish in the First World War - In Action

In Action

Boredom, hunger, cold, disease, martinets and rear echelon desk jockeys, punctuated with occasional bouts of sheer terror and undignified death.

Retreating and finding a new horse

Irish troops fighting at Mons in August 1914 soon found themselves making a desperate retreat. Cavalry trooper E. H. de Stacpool describes losing his own horse and finding a replacement.

"That retreat from Mons was one test of endurance"

The early battles in France were fought in open country. Jack Campbell describes the retreat from Mons.

"We saw the first wounded we had ever seen"

The British invasion of Gallipoli in Turkey proved to be disastrous. The Lansdowne Pals found themselves in the thick of it. Edgar Poulter describes conditions at Chocolate Hill.

"We weren't eight or nine feet from them"

In this clip, a veteran describes a night raid across the River Struma, which formed the Macedonian front line between Greece and Bulgaria. The action probably took place in October 1916.

"It was the first time I saw tanks"

Jimmy O'Brien recalls seeing tanks for the first time in 1916 at Beaumont Hamel and how seven hundred men were lost in the battle.

"It would be very hard to describe the Somme"

Emmet Dalton, who won a military cross at the Battle of the Somme, tells Cathal O'Shannon about his experience, the use of creeping barrages to advance and the loss of over 800 men in a 24-hour period.

"A curious thing occurred: a lark started singing"

This veteran describes going over the top at the Battle of Messines Ridge, 7 June 1917, just after the British Army had detonated 19 massive mines. In the confusion, he came across some terrified German troops.