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The returned home world war 1

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  • 03-03-2013 2:30pm
    #1
    Joyce86
    Registered Users Posts: 7 ✭


    We are a voluntary group who are researching those Irish Men and Women who returned home from world war 1 to the island of Ireland. This is not for profit research, not going to be sold and our aim is to try and get the names into a more permanent form. So far we have 20,000 names on www.thereturnedww1.com We are doing this because we think those who returned deserve to be remembered. They all had their own reasons for enlisting. If you know any names, please consider sending the name to us.

    We have started a petition "Dublin City Council: To name the new luas bridge "The returned home WW1"" and need your help to get it off the ground. We would be most appreciative if you would consider supporting our application. Here is the link:-
    http://www.change.org/en-GB/petitions/dublin-city-council-to-name-the-new-luas-bridge-the-returned-home-ww1
    You can sign our petition by clicking here.
    If you know of anyone else who might support our petition, please feel free to pass this on.

    Many thanks,


«13

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    #2
    ejmaztec
    Registered Users Posts: 23,974 ✭✭✭✭ejmaztec


    The name doesn't roll off the tongue much, no doubt it will have a good nickname even if its official name becomes "The returned home WW1".:D


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    #3
    Joyce86
    Registered Users Posts: 7 ✭Joyce86


    True, but it would be great to remember their contribution for whatever reason they enlisted in world war 1. They did come home and many of them were treated in an abominable fashion, some were spat on in the street and so on. They are not remembered in any memorial as far as we can make out, hence our lists.


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    #4
    johnny_doyle
    Registered Users Posts: 1,021 ✭✭✭johnny_doyle


    on the main menu on the website it should say Remembrance not Rememberance. :mad:

    It would be hard to think of a worse name for a bridge.


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    #5
    Joyce86
    Registered Users Posts: 7 ✭Joyce86


    Thanks for spotting the incorrect spell!

    You do realise this is to remember those men and women who enlisted for whatever reason in World War 1 and who returned. Some of them were vilified when they came home. They deserve respect not ridicule.


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    #6
    johnny_doyle
    Registered Users Posts: 1,021 ✭✭✭johnny_doyle


    no problem with the aim or objective of the project (I spend a lot of my time researching WW1 soldiers on the WW1 forum on Boards.ie and on the Great War Forum) but think it's a dreadful name for a bridge.

    For some information about 2 Irish soldiers who survived WW1 and returned :

    http://johnny-doyle.blogspot.co.uk/2013/02/ex-soldier-malachy-halfpenny.html

    http://johnny-doyle.blogspot.co.uk/2013/02/ex-soldier-joseph-walsh.html

    Mine didn't come home from WW1 unfortunately.


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    #7
    mickmackey1
    Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 3,288 ✭✭✭mickmackey1


    Joyce86 wrote: »
    They deserve respect not ridicule.

    Take it easy, it's the name of the bridge that's being ridiculed not the volunteers.


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    #8
    Dr.Nightdub
    Registered Users Posts: 108 ✭✭Dr.Nightdub


    Not being churlish, but aren't all the Irish who volunteered for WW1 - both those who returned and those who didn't - already commemorated by the Memorial Gardens in Islandbridge? Apart from that, I thought the City Council had asked for nominees who had a specific connection with Dublin, not Ireland in general.


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    #9
    ejmaztec
    Registered Users Posts: 23,974 ✭✭✭✭ejmaztec


    johnny_doyle wrote: »
    no problem with the aim or objective of the project (I spend a lot of my time researching WW1 soldiers on the WW1 forum on Boards.ie and on the Great War Forum) but think it's a dreadful name for a bridge.

    For some information about 2 Irish soldiers who survived WW1 and returned :

    http://johnny-doyle.blogspot.co.uk/2013/02/ex-soldier-malachy-halfpenny.html

    http://johnny-doyle.blogspot.co.uk/2013/02/ex-soldier-joseph-walsh.html

    Mine didn't come home from WW1 unfortunately.


    Those unfortunate not to return don't seem to get a mention in the naming of the bridge. If all of those Irishmen involved were commemorated, at least the name could be simplified.:(

    I don't think that a vast number of names on a petition is going to get the powers that be to give it the name that's been put forward.


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    #10
    pinkypinky
    Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 6,616 Mod ✭✭✭✭pinkypinky


    We had a thread about this group almost a year ago (where did that time go?!) when it was first reported in the genealogy forum. Ceannrua kindly emailed them some questions on our behalf but I don't think there was ever a response.

    http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?p=77668122

    Personally, I think that would be a terrible name for a bridge.

    Genealogy Forum Mod



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    #11
    R.Dub.Fusilier
    Closed Accounts Posts: 588 ✭✭✭R.Dub.Fusilier


    Joyce86 wrote: »
    You do realise this is to remember those men and women who enlisted for whatever reason in World War 1 and who returned. Some of them were vilified when they came home. They deserve respect not ridicule.

    To be honest its a sh*te name for a bridge no matter who its named after. Who of your group came up with the namedid you contact any of the regimental associations etc. and get their input? I think not.

    They old soldiers do deserve respect and people here on boards like Johnny Doyle and enfield and many others have been helping posters with finding information about their relatives ,for a few years now ,who fought in WW1 and died in WW1 and beyond. So you first couple of posts are not realy going to help you out.


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    #12
    R.Dub.Fusilier
    Closed Accounts Posts: 588 ✭✭✭R.Dub.Fusilier


    Dr.Nightdub wrote: »
    Not being churlish, but aren't all the Irish who volunteered for WW1 - both those who returned and those who didn't - already commemorated by the Memorial Gardens in Islandbridge? Apart from that, I thought the City Council had asked for nominees who had a specific connection with Dublin, not Ireland in general.

    IMO there is more than a good chance that it will be named in relation to Easter 1916.


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    #13
    gobnaitolunacy
    Closed Accounts Posts: 3,073 ✭✭✭gobnaitolunacy


    R.Dub.Fusilier wrote: »
    IMO there is more than a good chance that it will be named in relation to Easter 1916.

    Do we really need yet another thing named after something/someone that's 1916-related?


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    #14
    pedroeibar1
    Closed Accounts Posts: 5,108 ✭✭✭pedroeibar1


    gobnaitolunacy wrote: »
    Do we really need yet another thing named after something/someone that's 1916-related?

    No we don't; however, there will be much publicity about this as it is another means of distracting the populace from the current woes - a form of 21st century bread and games.


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    #15
    ejmaztec
    Registered Users Posts: 23,974 ✭✭✭✭ejmaztec


    gobnaitolunacy wrote: »
    Do we really need yet another thing named after something/someone that's 1916-related?

    It makes a change from dead GAA sports people, I suppose.


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    #16
    pinkypinky
    Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 6,616 Mod ✭✭✭✭pinkypinky


    I'd really like to see it named after a woman, even if it has to Countess Markievicz to chime in with the centenary decade. Nothing against her, of course, I'd prefer someone more recent perhaps. However, as long as it's not religious or another dead male writer, I'm good.

    Genealogy Forum Mod



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    #17
    CeannRua
    Closed Accounts Posts: 470 ✭✭CeannRua


    pinkypinky wrote: »
    We had a thread about this group almost a year ago (where did that time go?!) when it was first reported in the genealogy forum. Ceannrua kindly emailed them some questions on our behalf but I don't think there was ever a response.

    http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?p=77668122

    Personally, I think that would be a terrible name for a bridge.

    Just to say no, I didn't get any further response. There was just the initial statement that they would open a Boards account and reply direct to queries here.


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    #18
    Peregrinus
    Registered Users Posts: 26,056 ✭✭✭✭Peregrinus


    The main point of giving a name to a bridge (or anything else) is to enable people to refer conveniently to the bridge, and the suggested name here doesn't come close to being useful for this purpose. The name is awkward and inconvenient and, even if you can persuade the Corporation to assign it officially, nobody will use it. There's plenty of precedent for bridges being known by names other than the official name; the bridge universally known as Capel St Bridge is not in fact called Capel St Bridge, and I doubt if one Dubliner in a hundred used the name Mellows Bridge, or could locate Mellows Bridge if asked.

    Commemorating the returned of the Great War by assigning a name which will be almost immediately forgotten is probably not a good plan.


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    #19
    Fratton Fred
    Closed Accounts Posts: 26,567 ✭✭✭✭Fratton Fred


    It will just end up being called traitors bridge.


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    #20
    enfield
    Registered Users Posts: 1,109 ✭✭✭enfield


    This is an excellent endeavour. Well done!! I wish you the every success with it.
    Kind regards.
    Tom Burnell


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    #21
    Elmer Blooker
    Registered Users Posts: 6,035 ✭✭✭Elmer Blooker


    Joyce86 wrote: »
    True, but it would be great to remember their contribution for whatever reason they enlisted in world war 1. They did come home and many of them were treated in an abominable fashion, some were spat on in the street and so on. They are not remembered in any memorial as far as we can make out, hence our lists.
    could some the abuse have been justified at that time when feelings were running high after the 1916 Rising? (I certainly don't think it was justified)
    I only discovered very recently that the Dublin Fusiliers took part in The Rising.
    I was always led to believe that troops were brought from the UK to Dun Laoghaire and marched to Dublin,( from what I can remember from books I've read these were the Sherwood Foresters - The Battle of Mount Street Bridge)
    The involvement of "our own" is putting down the Rising is something that we'd rather not hear about and has been swept under the carpet.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Royal_Dublin_Fusiliers#1916_Easter_Rising


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    #22
    Reekwind
    Closed Accounts Posts: 2,126 ✭✭✭Reekwind


    Joyce86 wrote: »
    You do realise this is to remember those men and women who enlisted for whatever reason in World War 1 and who returned. Some of them were vilified when they came home. They deserve respect not ridicule.
    I hate to be the one to ask this but here goes: why?

    Obviously vilifying people is never very nice but why should a bridge in Dublin be named after people who fought in the British Army? As far as I'm concerned these men did not die for Ireland and they did not die for a particularly noble cause. There may have been a certain dignity in the conditions that they endured but I don't believe that going to war is an inherently heroic act that demands a major landmark. I can sympathise with their plight but personally I do not feel in the slightest way indebted to those soldiers

    If the families and relations of those who fought in WWI want to commemorate their dead then they can do so in private or at Memorial Gardens. If you want otherwise then you'll have to explain why exactly the returning soldiers deserve "public recognition". And I ask this as someone whose grandfather spent most of his life in the British Army

    I don't want to come across as hostile but I reject the assumption that those who returned from Flanders deserve automatic plaudits. There's a difference between that and correcting the opprobrium that was lumped upon them by contrmpoaries


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    #23
    R.Dub.Fusilier
    Closed Accounts Posts: 588 ✭✭✭R.Dub.Fusilier


    Reekwind wrote: »
    I don't want to come across as hostile but I reject the assumption that those who returned from Flanders deserve automatic plaudits. There's a difference between that and correcting the opprobrium that was lumped upon them by contrmpoaries

    I think Joyce86 is flogging a dead horse myself.

    I can't see how naming a bridge nearly 100 years after these lads came home is automatic plaudits.

    Irish people seem to forget that a great many Irish Volunteers fought in WW1 and may of those who fought in the War of Independence fought in WW1 including Tom Barry and Emmett Dalton to name just two off the top of my head.


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    #24
    Neutronale
    Registered Users Posts: 429 ✭✭Neutronale


    johnny_doyle wrote: »
    no problem with the aim or objective of the project (I spend a lot of my time researching WW1 soldiers on the WW1 forum on Boards.ie and on the Great War Forum) but think it's a dreadful name for a bridge.

    For some information about 2 Irish soldiers who survived WW1 and returned :

    http://johnny-doyle.blogspot.co.uk/2013/02/ex-soldier-malachy-halfpenny.html

    http://johnny-doyle.blogspot.co.uk/2013/02/ex-soldier-joseph-walsh.html

    Mine didn't come home from WW1 unfortunately.

    You could call it the Halpenny bridge...
    Malachy Halpenny served with the Royal Field Artillery during the Great War,
    number 120000.

    After his return to Belfast, he was to fall victim of the
    B Special/RIC Cromwell Gang reputed to be under the command of District
    Inspector Nixon. In June 1921, he was dragged from his bed and beaten.
    Halfpenny's feet were pierced by a bayonet to prevent any chance of escape. He
    was shot several times and his bullet riddled body was found in a field having
    been thrown on a barbed wired fence. 17 bullet wounds were counted.


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    #25
    Peregrinus
    Registered Users Posts: 26,056 ✭✭✭✭Peregrinus


    There is something odd about the idea of honouring people whose achievement is, basically, that they did not die in the Great War, but survived it to return home afterwards. While not dying is certainly an achievement, it’s an achievement which could have been achieved much more directly by not enlisting in the first place.

    Should we, then, name a bridge or other facility in honour of those who did not enlist? Perhaps in honour of those who fought the anti-conscription campaign? I can’t see anyone taking this seriously.

    Surely, if we named the bridge as suggested, what we’d actually be honouring is not so much the fact that they survived, as the fact that they enlisted and fought. And I think we can legitimately ask why we would want to do that.

    It’s fair to say that they were a big cohort of people who are now largely forgotten. They’re forgotten, I think, because the cause with which there were identified - the Allied cause in the Great War - proved eventually to be not so very relevant to the Irish story. The much smaller number who fought in 1916, and in 1919-22, had a far greater influence on this nation’s story, and they’re the ones we remember.

    It wasn’t always so. It’s true that returned servicemen were sometimes vilified in the street. But they were also the beneficiaries of housing schemes, of war hospitals, of pension systems. Armistice Day was a big event in Dublin throughout the 20s and 30s, because so many people had served, or knew someone who had served, or died. It was Eamon de Valera, remember, who performed the formal opening of the Memorial Gardens at Islandbridge, which only later fell into total ruin. The almost complete eclipse of this aspect of Irish history came later, as those involved died off, and their service was seen to have provided no enduring legacy to the nation.

    I think it’s right that this story should be remembered. Even if it turned out to be a historical dead end, dead ends matter, if only for what we can learn from them. Whether we need to express that remembrance in terms of “honouring” the people involved is, I think, another question.


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    #26
    GRMA
    Closed Accounts Posts: 1,417 ✭✭✭GRMA


    Hopefully they'll name it after one of the women of 1916.


    Why should we be commemorating British soldiers? We should be commemorating and remembering those who fought and died for Irish freedom, not for a colonial power.

    Thats not to say they shouldnt be commemorated at all, they already are and there is no need to name a bridge in the capital of Ireland to honour people who fought in a foreign and oppressive army... and I say that as someone whose ancestors fought in WW1. Even besides that the proposed name is terrible.

    I'm reminded of a version of 'The Foggy Dew';

    Right proudly high over Dublin Town
    They hung out the flag of war
    'Twas better to die 'neath an Irish sky
    Than at Sulva or Sud El Bar

    And from the plains of Royal Meath
    Strong men came hurrying through
    While Britannia's Huns, with their long range guns
    Sailed in through the foggy dew

    'Twas Britannia bade our Wild Geese go
    That small nations might be free
    But their lonely graves are by Sulva's waves
    Or the shore of the Great North Sea

    Oh, had they died by Pearse's side
    Or fought with Cathal Brugha
    Their names we will keep where the fenians sleep
    'Neath the shroud of the foggy dew

    But the bravest fell, and the requiem bell
    Rang mournfully and clear
    For those who died that Easter tide
    In the springing of the year


    Read more: DUBLINERS - THE FOGGY DEW LYRICS


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    #27
    kabakuyu
    Registered Users Posts: 1,135 ✭✭✭kabakuyu


    Name it after Martin Doyle VC, MM. After WW1 he was a member of the West Clare brigade of the IRA during the war of Independence.That should keep everybody happy.


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    #28
    R.Dub.Fusilier
    Closed Accounts Posts: 588 ✭✭✭R.Dub.Fusilier


    kabakuyu wrote: »
    Name it after Martin Doyle VC, MM. After WW1 he was a member of the West Clare brigade of the IRA during the war of Independence.That should keep everybody happy.

    Good suggestion. Or even after Fr. Willie Doyle killed in action. or Fr Browne WW1 Chaplin and beloved priest from Gardiner Street and Titanic fame.


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    #29
    Joyce86
    Registered Users Posts: 7 ✭Joyce86


    The memorial gardens in islandbridge commemorate those (about 49,000) who died during world war 1.

    As far as we understand it , there is no memorial to honour those who did returned home (men and women) from world war 1. We are applying to have the new luas bridge named "The returned home" to specifically honour those who did return home from WW1. We have amended the name slightly.

    There were dubliners who enlisted and who returned home. Many joined the royal dublin fusilers and the south irish horse amongst other regiments.

    It is true, maybe our petition will not make a difference in suceeding to have the bridge named "The returned home" but at least it is highlighting a need to remember in someway those that did.

    www.thereturnedww1.com has our contact details if anyone has name/s of relatives they would like us to add. Again, we are completely voluntary project.


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    #30
    Joyce86
    Registered Users Posts: 7 ✭Joyce86


    Do you represent the Royal Dublin Fusiliers.


    R.Dub.Fusilier wrote: »
    To be honest its a sh*te name for a bridge no matter who its named after. Who of your group came up with the namedid you contact any of the regimental associations etc. and get their input? I think not.

    They old soldiers do deserve respect and people here on boards like Johnny Doyle and enfield and many others have been helping posters with finding information about their relatives ,for a few years now ,who fought in WW1 and died in WW1 and beyond. So you first couple of posts are not realy going to help you out.


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    #31
    Neutronale
    Registered Users Posts: 429 ✭✭Neutronale


    Joyce86 wrote: »
    The memorial gardens in islandbridge commemorate those (about 49,000) who died during world war 1.

    As far as we understand it , there is no memorial to honour those who did returned home (men and women) from world war 1. We are applying to have the new luas bridge named "The returned home" to specifically honour those who did return home from WW1. We have amended the name slightly.

    There were dubliners who enlisted and who returned home. Many joined the royal dublin fusilers and the south irish horse amongst other regiments.

    It is true, maybe our petition will not make a difference in suceeding to have the bridge named "The returned home" but at least it is highlighting a need to remember in someway those that did.

    www.thereturnedww1.com has our contact details if anyone has name/s of relatives they would like us to add. Again, we are completely voluntary project.

    Why do you feel the need to honour them, they fought for the English Queen, let them name a bridge in England for them.


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