4 replies to this topic

[Airshipped]

I was wondering if anyone had done research in respect of the British military burials in Ireland in the post-WWI era.

I'm aware that c 180 regular British military personnel died during the War of Independence era, and that the majority of these are recorded on the CWGC site.

However, a search of CWGC for burials in what is now the 26-county Republic of Ireland for the period 01-Jan-1919 to 31-Dec-1921 gives a total of 591 dead:

http://www.cwgc.org/...ad.aspx?cpage=1

I know I could probably use keyword searches such as 'Antrim' or 'Tipperary' via Geoff Sullivan to trawl the 591 for Irish next of kin details but a large number of entries have no information regarding the dead.

I was just wondering if anyone had undertaken research in this area?

My interest lies in those who served with the RFC, RNAS, RAF and WRAF but from what I've seen thus far there are quite a number of dead not on the CWGC site, e.g. some died of wounds, others of flu. (From my aviator lists I'd probably mention John C Porte, who died of TB contracted on military service, and Private Denis Critchley who died in the Mater Hospital on 04-Nov-1918, as examples but I'm sure that those tracking particular regiments have seen similar results but on a much larger scale).

Any suggestions welcome.

[corisande]

If you go to this page - click you can then access deaths by whatever regiment you want

The "total"  of British soldiers who died in Ireland I have is currently click here

    killed in action - 177 before the truce and another 16 after the truce. On 21 November 1921 the British army held a memorial service for its dead, of all ranks, of which it counted 162 up to the 1921 Truce and 18 killed afterwards. To an extent it depends how you define KIA in Ireland
    killed accidently by firearms - 56 deaths
    suicide - 26 deaths
    murdered by another soldier - 4 deaths
    accidental deaths - 48 deaths from non-firearm related accidents
    illness - 99 deaths. Spanish Flu accounted for many of these. This figure is grossly under-recorded as it is impossible to ascertain the number of deaths

The British very very bad at recording deaths. There are a great number of unrecorded bodies still  buried in bogs today.
Many of the deaths in Ireland never got to the papers, and the bodies were buried in England. Even if you were to cross check CWGC against Irish GRO you could never get the figures.
I have only recorded deaths in the "army of occupation" - I use that term descriptively, not to wind anyone up. In other words I have excluded Irish who died at home, may have a CWGC grave, but were not stationed in Ireland because of the counter insurgency in War of Independence. The Irish will be the bulk of your 591 CWGC burials.

[Stanley_C_Jenkins]

Talking of soldiers killed in Ireland, I understand that moves are afoot to erect memorials at selected "ambush" sites in south-western Ireland, and that soldiers and policemen, as well as the IRA, may be included on the monuments (?)

[kildaremark]

Stanley_C_Jenkins, on 11 April 2012 - 05:30 PM, said:

Talking of soldiers killed in Ireland, I understand that moves are afoot to erect memorials at selected "ambush" sites in south-western Ireland, and that soldiers and policemen, as well as the IRA, may be included on the monuments (?)

Now that would be a surprise. We cant even but up memorials to those who fought and died to preserve the Irish Free State during the Civil War in 1922-23.

Mark

[Airshipped]

kildaremark, on 13 April 2012 - 07:58 PM, said:

Now that would be a surprise. We cant even but up memorials to those who fought and died to preserve the Irish Free State during the Civil War in 1922-23.

Mark

So true, the entity known as the 'National Graves Association' only commemorates republican dead in its "Last Post" publication.

However, preserving the Saor Stat Éireann entailed quite a range of legal and extra-judicial killing, and so it was probably difficult even for the "victors" of the civil war do anything which would've been perceived as keeping things at boiling point through monuments in areas in which the local population were anti-Treaty.