BBC: Why Irish soldiers who fought Hitler hide their medals

troposphere

Five thousand Irish soldiers who swapped uniforms to fight for the British against Hitler went on to suffer years of persecution.

One of them, 92-year-old Phil Farrington, took part in the D-Day landings and helped liberate the German death camp at Bergen-Belsen - but he wears his medals in secret.

Even to this day, he has nightmares that he will be arrested by the authorities and imprisoned for his wartime service.

"They would come and get me, yes they would," he said in a frail voice at his home in the docks area of Dublin.

And his 25-year-old grandson, Patrick, confirmed: "I see the fear in him even today, even after 65 years."


Continued: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-16287211

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Fuinseog

troposphere wrote: »

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I believe this has been discussed before. if you referring to a bunch of deserters who just walked away from the Irish army to enlist in another then it is hardly a great surprise.
no army in the world appreciates deserters. they should consider themselves lucky they were not shot. a lot of them were not even given prison sentences.

I see you are located in the USA. what did the US army do with the San Patricios?

maddragon

Agree with Fuinseog. While I certainly would support the cause these men fought for, they should not have deserted the army of their own country to do so, an offence which carried the death sentence in many armies during wartime. They should be pardoned at this stage however.

FiSe

That 'bunch of deserters' is almost entire IDF-Army of today - having said that I am not quite sure sure how many members are serving in the Army, but during the Civil war it was around 20-25000, so taken that number, 5000 people is 1/4 to 1/5 of the whole Army. Not a 'bunch of deserters' in my limited point of view.
More less failure of the system of the Irish Defence Forces during emergency period.

Zillah

Fuinseog wrote: »

what did the US army do with the San Patricios?

Uhm, the San Patricios deserted the US army and then fought against the US army. Doesn't even begin to compare.

Fuinseog

Zillah wrote: »

Uhm, the San Patricios deserted the US army and then fought against the US army. Doesn't even begin to compare.

they fought against oppression and sectarianism. Surely, a noble cause?

Fuinseog

FiSe wrote: »

That 'bunch of deserters' is almost entire IDF-Army of today - having said that I am not quite sure sure how many members are serving in the Army, but during the Civil war it was around 20-25000, so taken that number, 5000 people is 1/4 to 1/5 of the whole Army. Not a 'bunch of deserters' in my limited point of view.
More less failure of the system of the Irish Defence Forces during emergency period.

if you go AWOL from any army you are a deserter. the British army would not have looked kindly on that and handed out lenghty gaol sentences to its members who fought for another army, James Brady, an Irish man for example went over to the Germans and was incarcerated for his troubles.


there is a certain amount of revisionism at play here. We are told Irish men fought in the British army to liberate the camps, but personally I believe they fought for a sense of adventure as there was not much happening here at the time. in any case the Brits apparently only found out about the evil deeds of Belsen et al when they liberated them.
presumably they thought Dachau, which was open in 33 was a holiday camp, for they did little about it until the war started, indeed they did little against it during the war.
I wonder would they have done anything about Belsen had they entered into an alliance with Germany instead of feeling their empire was under threat?
by the way these Irishmen fought for the glory of the British Empire, an empire the nazis used as a model to oppress people, an empire which treated Indians as slaves and referred to them as savages. hardly a noble cause.

FiSe

Ahhh, how I did miss that 'Empire and it's Glory' phrase

I think that there's been a lot of things mixed together. Yes they might be related in the context of the WWII, yet, they are irrelevant in the context of small farmer Irishman joining RDF/FCA - LDF, my bad, apology - in a hope of adventure and some action, only to be clowning around with archaic rifle and 5 rounds of ammunition and order to protect his country from anticipated invasion of steel and fire.
No wonder that he hasn't turned up one day and rather went up North or across the Irish sea to join the other army, which he could see as an ally and protector of Irish freedom. Perhaps... or perhaps the pay and chance of adventure was larger than on the peat bog guard duty?

Either way, nobody is arguing that 'deserter' term, but rather pointing out that those guys were not rehabilitated as yet.


Back to the British Army deserters. Are you aware that Brady, after swapping his uniform, was supposed to be fighting his own crowd? And he himself as well as other volunteers of BFK got away very lightly after the war, unlike most of the German SS men.
...and for the other nations, Czechs, for example. Downed and captured Czech aircrews were treated as a traitors and many of them were accused of treason. Although not desrters in the real meaning of the word, there were looked at as citizens of country which formed part of the 3rd Reich - Protektorat Bohmen und Mahren. De facto they were traitors fighting 'their own nation', yet they have been fully rehabilitated at the end.

Anyway, I'm outahere

johnny_doyle

isn't part of the angle of this story that the Irish Government didn't follow the legal procedure for those who desert from the armed forces ie imprisonment and came up with a punishment process that had no basis in civil or military law?

Is there any analysis of when desertions took place (start of war, after the Dublin bombs, pre-Dunkirk/post-Dunkirk, pre-Normandy/post-Normandy)?

Were any additional border controls in place during WW2/Emergency that could have stopped the flow of deserters (and non-deserters) joining the allied forces?

Fuinseog

FiSe wrote: »

Ahhh, how I did miss that 'Empire and it's Glory' phrase

I think that there's been a lot of things mixed together. Yes they might be related in the context of the WWII, yet, they are irrelevant in the context of small farmer Irishman joining RDF/FCA in a hope of adventure and some action, only to be clowning around with archaic rifle and 5 rounds of ammunition and order to protect his country from anticipated invasion of steel and fire.
No wonder that he hasn't turned up one day and rather went up North or across the Irish sea to join the other army, which he could see as an ally and protector of Irish freedom. Perhaps... or perhaps the pay and chance of adventure was larger than on the peat bog guard duty?

Either way, nobody is arguing that 'deserter' term, but rather pointing out that those guys were not rehabilitated as yet.


Back to the British Army deserters. Are you aware that Brady, after swapping his uniform, was supposed to be fighting his own crowd? And he himself as well as other volunteers of BFK got away very lightly after the war, unlike most of the German SS men.
...and for the other nations, Czechs, for example. Downed and captured Czech aircrews were treated as a traitors and many of them were accused of treason. Although not desrters in the real meaning of the word, there were looked at as citizens of country which formed part of the 3rd Reich - Protektorat Bohmen und Mahren. De facto they were traitors fighting 'their own nation', yet they have been fully rehabilitated at the end.

Anyway, I'm outahere

I should point out that there was not RDF or FCA in this country from 1939-46. the organisation was called LDF and they had modern weapons.
to my knowledge Brady fought in the east, not on the western front.

seamus

Interesting, not something I was ever aware of. I knew Irishmen fought for the allied forces, but I didn't know there was such massive desertion from the IDF.

I guess taking a contextual view, you can see why these deserters would be so heavily punished on return. Many of the Irish would have still considered there to be a conflict between Ireland and the UK, so there would have been a, "The enemy of my enemy..." attitude in relation to the Nazis.

Neutrality was also such a staunchly-held ideal at the time (far more than it is now IMO), that to desert the IDF to go off and fight a war is effectively a direct act of treason against the state itself, never mind deserting in order to join the "enemy's" armed forces.

The punishment was unusual and deliberately revenge-seeking rather than being simple punishment, but I can see why the government felt the need to make such a statement.

Hindsight is 20:20 though. Even in the years following WWII, the full extent of the Nazi plan wasn't fully known and I don't think people realised the full horror of what it was the allied forces saved Europe from. In that regard I do think it would be appropriate for the Irish government to pardon those still alive, as IMHO the service they did for the good of humanity overrides the insular interests of our individual state.

FiSe

seamus wrote: »

Interesting, not something I was ever aware of. I knew Irishmen fought for the allied forces, but I didn't know there was such massive desertion from the IDF.

I guess taking a contextual view, you can see why these deserters would be so heavily punished on return. Many of the Irish would have still considered there to be a conflict between Ireland and the UK, so there would have been a, "The enemy of my enemy..." attitude in relation to the Nazis.

Neutrality was also such a staunchly-held ideal at the time (far more than it is now IMO), that to desert the IDF to go off and fight a war is effectively a direct act of treason against the state itself, never mind deserting in order to join the "enemy's" armed forces.

The punishment was unusual and deliberately revenge-seeking rather than being simple punishment, but I can see why the government felt the need to make such a statement.

Irish Neutrality during WWII wasn't, really, unbiased and I think that we wouldn't believe how much in allied favour it was - the British that is - from supplying military intelligence to the broadcasting of any U-boot sights around Ireland to regular visits of British military attaches to Ireland and so on... Reward was a few breadcrumbs thrown from the other side, but that's different history and it says a lot about how unprepared pre-war Irish goverment of the time was.

And let's not forget that there was an agreement not to prevent any Irish citizens from leaving Eire to join allied army.
I pressume that goverment 'suicidal defence strategy' didn't add to the morale of the folk in uniform.

Looking at it from normal everyday point of view:
Everyody knows that Paddy O'Brien is in the LDF and that he hasn't turned up on the meeting - and that he's most likely planning to go over the puddle, wich is OK as long as he's not LDF/Army member. Nothing easier than send two lads to pick him up and send him to the prison...

LDF did have modern weapons of sort, but hardly enough to be considered modern fighting unit as a such

Fuinseog

Hindsight is 20:20 though. Even in the years following WWII, the full extent of the Nazi plan wasn't fully known and I don't think people realised the full horror of what it was the allied forces saved Europe from. In that regard I do think it would be appropriate for the Irish government to pardon those still alive, as IMHO the service they did for the good of humanity overrides the insular interests of our individual state.[/QUOTE]

the full extent of the nazi plan was made known in 1926 when Hitler brought out Mein Kampf. he was a man of his word. those who helped him into power and those nations which appeased him have alot to answer for what happened.

i fail to see how the irish men fighting for the allies aided humanity, was the firebombing of German cities humane. was the atomic bomb a sign of humanity? they killed people with whom they should have had no quarrel or who had done them wrong.

Zillah

Fuinseog wrote: »

they fought against oppression and sectarianism. Surely, a noble cause?

You were comparing the Irish punishing those who went AWOL to the US punishing those who went AWOL and then killed US soldiers. The comparison would only be valid if the Irish deserters then joined forces that were at war with Ireland.

Manach

However, the potential was there for those who deserted the Irish army to be fighting against their country. Churchill had plans to seize the treaty ports and the US ambassador at the time had threatened intervention. As in the case of the abortive allied invasion of Norway, neutrality was no shield in WWII.

tac foley

Interesting post, gentlemen. Not all Irishmen going over the water got their wish. My dad was a bus driver in Co Cork, after serving his country as a soldier during and after the Civil War. He went over to England in 1942 for reasons that might have been familial, after all, every single one of his immediate family [brother and four sisters and all their families] were already there, incidentally leaving his wife and two sons behind. He was treated like the former crown prisoner that he was, and had to report to a police station every saturday morning, so HE wasn't exactly welcomed with open arms. As a result of his earlier anti-crown activities during the War of Independence [he was a fine demolition operative and skilled arsonist, specialising in converting police stations], and that he was also a jailbird, he was not permitted to join the armed forces of the crown. Nevertheless, he ended up as a civilian worker, repairing tanks with his well-developed skills as a welder amd metal worker - learned whilst trying to keep old buses on the awful roads of pre-war Co. Cork.

He also met my mom. But that's another story for another day.

Apologies for the slight thread drift.

tac

museologist

First of all, this suggestion that these men ‘swapped uniforms’ is misleading. The Soviet pilots who fought in the Korean War swapped uniforms – at the instruction of their government – but these men were deserters. They swore an oath and broke it. As the UK unlike the US never gave any assurance that they would not invade Eire it was not beyond the realm of possibility of that these deserters could have been pitted against their former comrades had the circumstances required a British invasion.

I find it sad though that a 92 year old man does not know that he has paid his debt to Irish society now and that nobody is after him anymore, and that it is not his war experiences that keep him awake at night but the consequences of his desertion. I seriously doubt very many people would object to him putting on his medals. I also found the claim that 60% of the Irish population supported the idea of a German victory in the war rather surprising.

kabakuyu

Parallel thread here as well http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?p=76236465

Morlar

That Radio 4 documentary was pretty shocking in terms of journalistic integrity. Probably the most distorted programme I have ever encountered from the BBC in relation to Ireland (or any other subject for that matter).

If anyone wants to give it a listen :

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b018xtr9

The entire premise of the programme ignores legitimate Irish wartime defence needs and glosses over the reasons for the desertions or of any comparative penalties in place elsewhere (including the UK).

Here are some highlights from that programme from memory :

(the deserters were) "villified and severely punished."

This is untrue and a distorted exaggerated version of reality.

'Banned from most employment, some even had their children taken away'.

Actually they lost their benefits accrued for previous service in the Irish Army and were in addition barred from Irish STATE funded employment for a period of 7 years.

'91 yr old Phil Farrington lives in fear of the list'

This man would appear to be senile, and exploited for the purposes of this campaign and that programme in my view. There can be no reasonable justification for legitimising a 92 yr olds unfounded fears of persecution from the Irish state in 2012 for deserting the Irish Army during the period of WW2.

What has been the effect on your life of being called a deserter.
Presenter - 'Do you still believe you would be arrested as a deserter'
92 yr old - 'Oh, you would'."

This from the BBC . . . .with no effort at introducing balance or reality to the coverage of this subject.

Gerald Nash ' measure one of the most vindictive by the Irish government.... treatment of those who allegedly deserted . . .'

There is no 'allegedly' about it. They deserted as a matter of fact not opinion.

Paddy Reid -
"Punitive measures in the extreme"

I'd make the point that loss of benefits and barred from State funded employment for 7 yrs was not punitive in the extreme, by comparison those measures amount to an extremely light touch. Again nothing from the bbc in terms of comparative responses from other nations to wartime desertion.

'Professor Gerald Morgan' -

Partition of Ireland disastrous, ... I would say 60% anti-British..
'we are going to make these guys pay in as cruel a way as possible'
'thrown into jail while home on leave with other deserters'
'according to Irish senator Mary O'Brien a far worse fate was to ... 'appallingly enough their children the ended up in specialised industrial schools like goldenbridge . . . they had a special code added to their names which means they recieved specially harsh treatment'

Totally unsupported conclusion from a Senator and also from an English lecturer at Trinity who to the best of my knowledge was not a 'Long standing History Professor' as the programmes pre-publicity asserted.

'grim looking Victorian building'
'beatings with rubber truncheons ... industrial school system'
;for the children of british soldiers treatment was particularly bad'
code of ss=child of british soldier 'to be singled out for special abuse'
'physical and sexual abuse the norm'
'just because their fathers had, in inverted commas deserted the Irish army'

Again totally unsupported nonsense and from one Labour TD, one Senator and one English lecturer. Again there was no 'deserted in inverted commas' they were deserters without inverted commas.

There was an interesting article about this subject in History Ireland recently for anyone looking for a more informed less distorted coverage :

http://www.forthesakeofexample.com/DeV%27s%20Treatment%20of%20Irish%20Deserters%20by%20Bernard%20Kelly%20History%20Ireland%20September%202011.pdf

later12

Disgracefully distorted journalism.

That documentary is an absolute farce; for the reasons pointed out by Morlar above. It does not to the soldiers any justice to lie about and misrepresent history.

BBC Complaints can be made here. I would recommend that anyone concerned about the journalistic integrity of that broadcast should make a quick complaint.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/complaints/forms/?reset=#anchor

Morlar

later10 wrote: »

Disgracefully distorted journalism.

That documentary is an absolute farce; for the reasons pointed out by Morlar above. It does not to the soldiers any justice to lie about and misrepresent history.

BBC Complaints can be made here. I would recommend that anyone concerned about the journalistic integrity of that broadcast should make a quick complaint.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/complaints/forms/?reset=#anchor

I lodged a complaint. Here is the form reply I recieved :

Dear Mr ********

Reference xxx-******-XXXX

Thanks for contacting us about BBC Radio 4’s ‘Face The Facts’.

I understand you felt the programme was biased in relation to Ireland.

Impartiality is the cornerstone of all our news and current affairs output and we ensure all our correspondents and production teams are aware of this to help us deliver fair and balanced coverage for all the stories we report.

It’s not always possible or practical to reflect all the different opinions on a subject within individual programmes. Editors are charged to ensure that over a reasonable period they reflect the range of significant views, opinions and trends in their subject area. The BBC doesn’t seek to denigrate any view, nor to promote any view. It seeks rather to identify all significant views, and to test them rigorously and fairly on behalf of the audience. Among other evidence, audience research indicates widespread confidence in the impartiality of the BBC's reporting.

Senior editorial staff, the Executive Committee and the BBC Trust keep a close watch on programmes to ensure that standards of impartiality are maintained.

I'd like to assure you that I’ve registered your complaint on our audience log. This is a daily report of audience feedback that’s made available to many BBC staff, including members of the BBC Executive Board, channel controllers and other senior managers.

The audience logs are seen as important documents that can help shape decisions about future programming and content.

Thanks again for taking the time to contact us.

Kind Regards

Kevin Freeburn

BBC Complaints

www.bbc.co.uk/complaints

NB This is sent from an outgoing account only which is not monitored. You cannot reply to this email address but if necessary please contact us via our webform quoting any case number we provided.

later12

I haven't got any reply from my complaint yet.

Just to pick up on the only relevant point they seem to have made in that reply to you

It’s not always possible or practical to reflect all the different opinions on a subject within individual programmes.

The point is not that "all the different opinions" were not represented; the point is that some facts were simply incorrect.

Or how about the fact that inappropriately leading questions were used

-"Do you think they would still come after you?"
-"Oh of course they would"

Also, it would have been perfectly possible to devote at least a few sentences to counter some of the suggestions (brought on by 'leading questions as above) within the time constraints.

For example

Ireland was a vulnerable state in an already compromised situation at the outbreak of war: it could reasonably have argued that it could not afford to lose soldiers to desertion. Why should the UK have been granted greater right to self defence than Ireland?

These are extremely basic points that the BBC neither raised nor entertained. The documentary is nothing but sham journalism; I really expected better from BBC Radio 4.

Fuinseog

the topic featured in todays Irish Times. Apparently more than 5,000 deserted and not all of them enlisted into the allied forces.

pay appears to have been a significant factor. even today Irish soldiers complain of how little they earn.

HavingCrack

Fuinseog wrote: »

pay appears to have been a significant factor. even today Irish soldiers complain of how little they earn.

I always wonder do people not check the pay before they join the army, surely it is like looking for work in any sector. Joining the army and then compaining about the pay after you join makes it look like a lot of them had no idea what they were signing up for.

later12

I finally got a response back from the BBC a number of days ago. Here is what they wrote.

Dear Tadhg

Reference CAS-1227618-R7M7ZY

Thanks for contacting us about ‘Face the Facts’ on BBC Radio 4.

I understand you were unhappy with the content of the programme on 4 January, particularly in relation to the discussion of the treatment of Irish army deserters and feel we “insinuated” that the Irish government could have allowed its people to starve.

Your concerns were raised with the programme, who have responded as follows:

“Thank you for taking the trouble to write regarding our edition of Face the Facts on January 4th 2012 dealing with the desertion of soldiers from the Irish Army during World War 2. Obviously I am sorry you were so unhappy with the content. We regarded this primarily as a human story - the largely untold story of a group of soldiers who volunteered to take part in World War 2 and who suffered in a very personal way as a result of their decision. Naturally, we tried to set this in its proper historical context. A senior academic at Trinity College, Dublin who has written about Ireland and World War 2 and two politicians were interviewed, and included, to assist with that ambition. Nevertheless, this was not a programme about Ireland's wartime neutrality.

On the question of "deserters" generally, it is perfectly true that other armies, in different circumstances, have treated deserters equally harshly, possibly more so, in some cases. To my mind, that fact doesn't invalidate these particular stories. It's also worth pointing out that these men faced no court martial and "the list", which effectively barred them from State employment, was apparently still in operation around twenty years ago.

TD Gerald Nash, makes it clear "the list" was primarily about State employment:

Nash:

"You couldn't get a job with the electricity supply board, you couldn't get a job with the local authority, with the health board - you were excluded from such positions which would have given relative comfort to a lot of families."

Nevertheless if "the list" reflected general disapproval of these men, its very existence might have affected the more general employment prospects of those on it. Our deployment of the term "starvation order" derived from how these punishments were described in the Dail in the post-war period. While I accept that the continuing fear of reprisals expressed by a 92-year-old may be unfounded, he is entitled to express his opinion. The fact of his on-going fear was supported by his family. The allegation that the children of soldiers were "singled out" is made in Spitting on a Soldier's Grave, written by Robert Widders, who has extensively researched these matters.

While I accept this has proven to be a controversial programme, my sense is that the overwhelming response is to agree with the campaign we highlighted - that these soldiers faced a punishment which was disproportionally harsh. I accept of course that others will disagree and that the passage of time may be affecting opinion.

Thank you for taking the trouble to write, I hope you feel I have addressed your concerns.”

Please be assured your complaint will be added to our audience log, a daily report of audience feedback that's made available to many BBC staff, including members of the BBC Executive Board, channel controllers and other senior managers.

The audience logs are seen as important documents that can help shape decisions about future programming and content.

Thanks again for taking the time to contact us.

Kind Regards

Andrew Hannah

BBC Complaints

www.bbc.co.uk/complaints

NB This is sent from an outgoing account only which is not monitored. You cannot reply to this email address but if necessary please contact us via our webform quoting any case number we provided.

gizmo555

later10 wrote: »

"the list", which effectively barred them from State employment, was apparently still in operation around twenty years ago.

I wonder did Mr Hannah think even for a moment about how little sense this makes. The youngest of these men, if they enlisted at the age of 18 in 1945, would have been 65 twenty years ago. Is he seriously suggesting that as recently as 1992, the state was going to the trouble of ensuring men who were at retirement age anyway were not getting state employment because of what they did 47 years previously?

Morlar

The BBC also state the the list was not confined to barring deserters for 7 years from STATE funded employment only :

Nevertheless if "the list" reflected general disapproval of these men, its very existence might have affected the more general employment prospects of those on it.

And they say this in their Response to a complaint about their accuracy to begin with !!

I don't believe they have treated complaints seriously at all.

They produced a very heavily biased programme built on errors, omissions, exaggerations & lies supplied mainly (it seems) by a lobbying group and it's advocates who have no scruples.

Either the bbc innocently fell for all of this (and are still falling), or the journalist and editorial team who made the radio show, are in full support of this campaign and don't take things like journalistic integrity or impartiality seriously at all (at least not in this case).

FYI the script of 'The Disowned Army - Face the Facts' is now online here :

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b018xtr9

later12

In my own case I was a little bit annoyed at the fact that they only responded to one or two of the points I made in the email. The rest just wasn't responded to.

One criticism was that there was an insinuation that the Irish government would allow these men or their families to starve. The email in reply seemed to think this related to the name of the order "starvation order", but I expressly pointed out it was a response to a suggestive question by Waite, and the respondent's uncontested opinion on the state allowing him to starve.

Waite
These things were referred to as starvation orders could that have ever have literally been a reality?

Reid
Yes, yes I - well I can only speak from my own experience that there was no food in the house for days on end so we had to go down to what they call the penny dinners...

This is just one small example of the many misleading and unbalanced aspects of this documentary. The idea that the children of these men had a code added to the end of their names which was to single them out for extra-brutal treatment is something else that has gone completely uncontested and quite honestly sounds a little incredible.

The sad reality is that lots of Irish people faced destitution and misery in the immediate years after WWII right up until the Lemass era (and beyond, indeed). I have a hard time seeing anything in this documentary or in the BBC's response that really ascertains a sustained campaign against these men in Irish society.

murfinsurfin

Now that the pardoned order has gone out, may I add my 2p worth?
My father joined the Irish Army because he assumed he would have to defend our country against the Hun, as had his father & father-in-law in WW1. He had no illusions about war, having listened to stories, but felt his duty required him to act. When it became obvious that we were not going to war, in fact his routine seemed to consist of forced route marching, meeting up with an LDF contingent for manoeuvres, & beating the crap out of them, he decided to follow his girlfriend, who joined the ATS in Belfast. He wanted to be involved, but not as an aggressive killer, so enlisted in the RAF fire service. He saw service in UK, Gibralter & Italy. His most harrowing duty was hosing out the remains of the bomber tail gunners, & at one stage, watching an officer shoot dead a german pilot who was burning to death hysterically in his 109, having crash landed on the airdrome. The officer was not blaisee about that incident, it affected him badly. During this mayhem he managed to get engaged to his girlfriend, I never found out how. He returned in 1946 & they married, was demobbed soon after, returned to Ireland, was turned down for a job with Dublin Fire Brigade. As he spoke some Italian then, he managed to get work for one.
I cannot find if he is on the list, because the only way to find out is to buy the confidential report from a British Militaria shop. Does anyone know if the list can be obtained here?
The LDF was a part-time voluntary service, I think using Lee Enfield 303 Mk1s. They would not have been listed as deserters for not turning up for service, as the regular army would. There would have been however, I assume, LDF volunteers who would have been required to become full-time army in certain cases, as in cases throughout the worlds armies.

gizmo555

My father's sister served in the British army as a driver with the ATS and was killed on active service in Europe in 1944. I am immensely proud of her and the sacrifice she made in defeating Nazism.

I have other family members who served in the Irish army all through the war and I am just as proud of them. The comments about how the Irish army did no fighting and endured long, boring routine for five years completely miss the point that they fulfilled their duty in acting as a deterrent to invasion.

In his infamous broadcast at the end of the war, Churchill made very clear that he gave very serious consideration to invading Ireland and that it was a very finely judged decision. One of the things that tipped the balance against an invasion - and the same applied to the Germans - was the deterrent effect of the Irish army.

Wibbs

Fuinseog wrote: »

i fail to see how the irish men fighting for the allies aided humanity, was the firebombing of German cities humane. was the atomic bomb a sign of humanity? they killed people with whom they should have had no quarrel or who had done them wrong.

Ah the old Dresden Hiroshima moral equivalence defence. It tends to come out in such debates. Yes they were repugnant attacks on civilians, however there is one big difference when one compares such acts to an act like the holocaust and it's real simple. When the nations that were attacked surrendered the attacks stopped. Jews, Jehovahs witnesss, Gypsies, homosexuals, political prisoners and any others the German authorities classed as untermenschen never had that choice and even if they had "surrendered" they would still have kept on killing them. That's why it was called the "final solution". Dresden et al were horrible "solutions", but temporary ones and that's what tips the scales of horror and repugnance. Oh and people(certainly in teh forces) had a fair idea what was going on in the camps and in occupied territories, all that truly shocked was the mechanised scale and the realities of walking corpses on newsreels.

I have rellies that joined the Allied forces at that time(not just the British), while others stayed at home and joined our forces. The reasonings they all gave were twofold; 1) for a couple it was pure economics in the pre war world, with few enough career options at home and 2) they were all convinced Hitler if not stopped would come here(and had planned to at some stage "Plan Grun", though interestingly at that stage Hitler would have only come at the request of the Irish gov, then again he was fond of such "requests" masking true intentions). One great uncle of mine had visited Hitlers Germany before the war. Quite a percentage of people thought it was a brave new world and an impressive state at the time. He didn't. He was very very worried about what he saw. When it kicked off and the Americans joined the war(he didn't want to "take the kings shilling" though was tempted), he joined the Yanks and requested he be deployed in the European theatre rather than the Pacific because of it.

Funny enough even coming from that background I would be very much on the fence of men with regard to those who've sworn allegiance to their country's military, who then go AWOL and join another. Doesn't quite square with me. If they had wanted to join allied forces for whatever reason, then why sign up to the IDF? Certainly those rellies of mine who made a point of staying here and joining up made a sharp distinction between those people and those that went overseas without deserting.