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"Though I am an Englishman, I must say the Irish soldiers have fought magnificently. They are the cream of the Army. Ireland may well be proud of her sons. Ireland has done her duty nobly. Irishmen are absolutely indispensable for our final triumph."—Letter from Brigadier-General W.B. Marshal, of the 29th Division, on service at the Dardanelles.

"Your Irish soldiers are the talk of the whole Army. … Their landing at Suvla Bay was the greatest thing that you will ever read of in books. Those who witnessed the advance will never forget it. … God! the men were splendid."—Captain Thornhill, of the New Zealand Force.

"As you know, I am not Irish. I have no Irish connections whatever. In fact, I was rather opposed to the granting of Home Rule; but now, speaking honestly and calmly, after having witnessed what I did—the unparalleled heroism of these Irishmen—I should say nothing is too good to give the country of which they are, or rather were, such worthy representatives. My God! it was grand. It filled one with admiration and envy. … I have no religion, but it was most charming and edifying to see these fine chaps with their beads and the way in which they prayed to God. We are all brothers, but to my dying day I bow to the Irish."—Letter from a Scottish soldier at Gallipoli.

"Tell Ireland she may well be proud of the Irish Division. No men could have fought more gallantly or achieved better results. More of our countrymen are required to beat the Germans. I am certain that Ireland will respond as enthusiastically now as she has always done throughout her past history. Eire go brath!"—Lt.-General Sir Bryan Mahon, Commanding the 10th (Irish) Division.

It is these soldiers of ours, with their astonishing courage and their beautiful faith, with their natural military genius, with their tenderness as well as strength; carrying with them their green flags and their Irish war-pipes; advancing to the charge, their fearless officers at their head, and followed by their beloved chaplains as great-hearted as themselves; bringing with them a quality all their own to the sordid modern battlefield; exhibiting the character of the Irishman at its noblest and greatest—it is these soldiers of ours to whose keeping the Cause of Ireland has passed to-day. It was never in worthier, holier keeping than that of these boys, offering up their supreme sacrifice of life with a smile on their lips because it was given for Ireland. May God bless them! And may Ireland, cherishing them in her bosom, know how to prove her love and pride and send their brothers leaping to keep full their battle-torn ranks and to keep high and glad their heroic hearts!

I find it hard to come within the compass and key suitable for a Preface when I am asked to write a few pages to introduce a book about our Irish soldiers. Too many things surge up demanding expression—gratitude, appreciation of the significance of what they are doing, anxiety that Ireland may play the part to them that history has assigned to her. I must only do the best I can and select a few points to remark upon.

And, first, let me remark upon this point about which there is now universal agreement. The war has brought into view again what had been somewhat obscured of late: the military qualities of the Irish race. There are now, throughout the armies in the field and throughout the world which follows their fortunes, no two opinions upon this point. I quote among the words at the head of this Preface the tribute of an English General at the Dardanelles which I have seen in a recent letter, because it is typical of the military opinion one hears on every hand, and because for his generous praise he has found an expression which well sums up the general verdict. The Irish soldiers, he says, are "the cream of the Army." On the Western front I heard the same idea put in another pointed phrase; "We always look upon an Irish regiment as a corps d'élite." The war, in short, is proving anew the experience which other wars—and other armies under other flags—have so often tested, and which makes it a maxim with British Generals, as it was in Sir Ralph Abercrombie's day, always to try and have some Irish troops included in their commands, if possible, to be on hand for work about which no risks of failure can be taken and for which an inspiring lead is essential. It is proving again that the Irish people, like their racial kinsmen the French, are one of the peoples who have been endowed in a distinguished degree with a genuine military spirit, a natural genius and gift for war which produces born soldiers and commanders, and which is the very reverse of the brute appetite for slaughter. Irish soldiers may be few in comparison with the scale of modern armies. They bulked larger in the armies of Wellington, of which they formed the backbone, when the proportions of population were different. They may be comparatively few, but their quality is admittedly precious. As the English General above quoted says, they are an "absolutely indispensable" ingredient.

I shall have to talk about the Irish soldiers in this Preface; and I want any comrade of theirs who is not Irish who may chance to see these lines, and any other reader who is not Irish, to bear in mind that it is about Irish soldiers I am intended to talk here, and not about others; that that is my business here; and I would beg them to understand that in fulfilling this duty I am not overlooking for a moment the renown of English, Scottish, Welsh, or Dominion soldiers. Also, I would like to tell them this: that it is from the Irish soldiers—and I have listened to it from their lips again and again—you will hear the heartiest and warmest tributes to the valour and staunchness of their British and Dominion comrades. These gallant comrades, I know, will be the last to begrudge us the pious task of making some record of the Irishmen's work who have fought and died by their side, and of trying to add, as her sons would wish, to Ireland's honour through their deeds. The official record has not been copious, and Ireland may be pardoned the watchfulness of a mother's pride.

Let me turn from the soldiers themselves for a moment to look at the significance of the part they are playing before history. It is important for Ireland, and I am sure it is also important for the British Empire, and perhaps for America as well, to appreciate the part taken by the Irish troops in this war. The war, which in a night changed so many things, offered to Ireland a new international place, and her brave sons, not hesitating, acting upon a sure and noble instinct, have leaped forward to occupy it for her. After long struggles the Irish people had won back from England a series of rights—ownership of the land, religious equality, educational freedom, local self-government—an advance which had coincided with and been helped by the emancipation and rise of British democracy. The culmination was reached when in the session of 1914 the Imperial Parliament passed the Act to establish national self-government. Ireland had said, "Trust me with this, and I will wipe out the past and be loyal to the Empire"; and the answer—somewhat long delayed, no doubt, but still it came—was the King's signature to the Government of Ireland Act. Thus when the war arrived Ireland had at once a charter of rights and liberties of her own to defend, and, like Botha's South Africa, her plighted word to make good. The war by a most fortunate conjunction united in a common cause the defence of England against a mighty danger and the defence of principles for which Ireland, to be true to herself, must ever be ready to raise her voice or draw her sword. Besides her honour and her interest—her interest, always the last thing to move her, but now happily involved in the same cause—human Freedom, Justice, Pity, and the cry of the small nationality crushed under the despot's heel appealed to her. These things she has followed throughout her history, mostly, up to now, to her bitter loss, but not to the loss of her soul; in that is her distinction now. Her sons, fighting for her honour and her interest, are fighting for these things too. It is for these things—Honour, Justice, Freedom, Pity—she will stand in that new place of influence she is winning in the world's councils. There, acting with and through her sister democracies, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, and Great Britain—in all of which, as in the great Republic of the West, her children are a potent leaven—her spirit will help to bend the British Empire to a mission of new significance for humanity. That is the heritage of her tradition. It was in that spirit her sons went throughout Europe influencing the world of a thousand years ago. That is the spirit her sons are illustrating upon the field of war to-day.

Ireland has chosen this path. I would pause for a moment further to ask people to think a little on this: suppose she had, as well she might with her history, and as some of her sons both at home and in America have wanted her to do, chosen a different alternative? Ireland's strength as an international factor is not to be measured only by her political position at the heart of the Empire or her strategic position in the Atlantic, or by the size of her population at home, but also by the millions of her kin throughout the Empire and America, whose deep and enduring sentiment for her, linked as it is with their distinguished and never-tarnished loyalty to the new lands of their adoption, is one of the striking facts of modern history. Germany understands this factor; and keeps on making unceasing and ingenious efforts, especially in the United States, to make her account with it.

For Ireland to have chosen the opposite alternative, or to be flung into it by the fortune of war, would in my opinion be for her an unmixed calamity, the worst in her history. Her fate as a possession of Germany, as Germany's western fortress, naval base, Heligoland of the Atlantic, would from the nature of the case be far worse than that of Prussian Poland, Schleswig, and Alsace for the last forty years. Only those who are ignorant of Prussianism and its most recent methods—methods followed long ago by every tyrannical Power, including the England of the past, but which Prussia still maintains as a menacing anachronism in the age of democracy—have any illusions upon this matter. The Irish people, with a few insignificant exceptions, have no such illusions. They have, for the first time in their history—a memorable fact—put a national army into the field, a glorious army! And they have put that army in the field for the express purpose of defending Ireland from such a fate and of doing their share in helping to rescue the unfortunate and heroic peoples who have already fallen under it.

With the Irishmen already serving, or who obeyed the call as reserves when war was declared, and those who have volunteered since the war, the Irish army in the field has amounted to 154,038 men to this date, and this number is being increased and replenished at the rate of about a thousand men a week. More than a hundred thousand have volunteered since the war, and before the year is out it is our hope that at least half another hundred thousand will have followed their example. To these may be added for Ireland's credit the officially acknowledged Irish units in Great Britain, such as the "London Irish," the "Liverpool Irish," the "Tyneside Irish" (a brigade). But account cannot be taken, though their existence may be noted, of the many thousands of Irish in English and Scottish regiments and in the Canadian and Australian forces. There are some special Irish Colonial units, too, apart from the Irish, in practically every Colonial battalion, such as the Vancouver Irish Fusiliers and the Quebec Irish Regiment. A short time ago General Botha's wife at Capetown presented green flags to a South African Irish regiment. But it is the army raised in Ireland itself which is our more special concern here, for that is the army which it is Ireland's privilege and duty to maintain at its full strength in the field; and that consists of the regular battalions of the historic Irish regiments and of three specific new Irish Divisions with "service" battalions of the same regiments. Each of the new Divisions is under the command of a distinguished Irish General. The three together would constitute an Army Corps. The formation of these three Irish Divisions is a fact of great note. It is the first time Ireland is officially represented in the field by a larger unit than the regiment.

It is to be noted that this book only deals with the achievements of the old Irish regiments, and one of the new Irish Divisions, namely, the 10th. The 16th Irish Division, the 36th Irish Division, and the Tyneside Irish Brigade have only recently gone to the Front.

From letters home from men and officers, from the speeches of Generals delivered immediately after an action, and sometimes sent home in a letter or an order of the day, from the spontaneous testimony of onlookers of other corps rather than from official reports, the record, so far, of these Irish levies, old and new, is put together. Official mentions are scant. The official account given by Admiral de Robeck of the landing and taking of "V" Beach, with its sunken wire entanglements, one of the most extraordinary of deeds, and valuable in results in spite of the appalling cost to the Irish battalions who accomplished it, for it rendered the landing of the troops that arrived later safe—a feat which General Sir Hunter Weston next day declared to be "without parallel in the history of feats of arms"—did not even mention the names of the glorious Irish regiments—although the names of the regiments concerned in all the other landings were given with eulogies. General Hamilton, in explanation of his meagre references to the Tenth Division at Suvla, says he found it difficult to obtain "living human details." I do not refer to this by way of complaint, though I hope this omission may yet be officially set right. The thing is past, and there is going, we hope, to be a great change in such matters in future. Besides, the facts get known. Such deeds cannot be hidden—they are too great. I refer to the matter to explain why it is that books like this, imperfect as it is, have to be compiled. Other volumes like it will have to supplement the tale. We Irish are determined that henceforth the doings of our armies in the field shall not be in vain in any sense. Piously shall we glean the record, whether official or unofficial, and what our men, our officers, and our Generals think ought to be known shall no longer, so far as we can help it, remain unknown. Our brave lads in the battle-line may rest assured that their country is lovingly and proudly watching them, and that the sacrifice they make in her name will, as they wish it—for their wish is the same as the dying Sarsfield's on the field of Landen—go to her profit.

The record so far brings Ireland great honour. And this excites no jealousy in the Army—for it is from the other corps in the Army itself comes the most generous testimony to the work of the Irish soldiers and the most comrade-like regret where it is thought there has been lack of recognition. What stands out is that on every front, and whether new levies or regulars, the work of the Irish troops has not only been of great merit in every instance, but of exceptional merit, and they have to their credit some of the most splendid and astonishing achievements. The Irish Guards at Mons, the Royal Irish Regiment at Ypres, the London Irish at Loos (dribbling a football before them as they charged—the boys in the trenches, before the charge, holding out the matches with which they had lit their cigarettes to show each other that their hands were not shaking), the regular battalions at "V" Beach, the new "service" battalions of the Tenth Division at Sulva, I name out of a long list to illustrate this statement. To General Mahon's Division, composed exclusively of new levies who were civilians when the war began—thousands of Nationalist families in Leinster, Munster, and Connaught represented its ranks—the terrific open fighting at Suvla Bay (which began with the shelling of the lighters at the landing and the bursting of chains of contact mines as they set foot on shore) was their first experience of being under fire. Undismayed, their coolness undisturbed, they formed for attack as if on the parade ground. These were the "freshies" spoken of in the letter partly quoted above of Captain Thornhill, himself a representative of those magnificent Australian and New Zealand troops whose prowess has been another of the revelations of the war. "The Empire can do with a heap more 'freshies' of the Irish brand," he writes. "Their landing at Suvla Bay was the greatest thing you will ever read of in books by high-brows. Those that witnessed the advance will never forget it. Bullets and shrapnel rained on them, yet they never wavered. … God! the men were splendid. The way they took that hill (now called Dublin Hill) was the kind of thing that would make you pinch yourself to prove that it was not a cheap wine aftermath. How they got there Heaven only knows. As the land lay, climbing into hell on an aeroplane seemed an easier proposition than taking that hill."[1] It may be well to point out, for it bears upon one of the popular fallacies about Irish character, that it is not only in the desperate charge or the forlorn hope that Irish soldiers have proved their worth in this or other wars. They have shown it equally in the tenacity, grim yet cheerful, with which for days and weeks and months difficult positions are held and bitter hardships borne. Again, let it be noted what this whole young Tenth Division proved itself fit for after its months at Gallipoli. When it was decided to occupy Salonika and to march to the aid of the Serbian army it was to the Irish Division, under their splendid Irish commander, General Sir Bryan Mahon, that the place of honour for this desperate enterprise was given. Coming straight from their hard service in the Peninsula, they performed in the Serbian mountain passes above Lake Doiran what General Sarrail, the eminent French Commander, the vanquisher of the Crown Prince's Army at Verdun, has pronounced to be one of the most striking feats of arms of the whole war. Acting as a rearguard against an army ten times their number, they did what was neither expected nor counted upon. But their instinctive military genius, as well as their courage and determination, came into play, and they held up the overwhelming enemy for so long and with such skill that the entire French and British forces were able to withdraw safely to their defensive positions without the loss of a single gun or a single transport wagon.

One seems to be verging on exaggeration in these accounts, but the thing is bare truth, and I am striving to bring out what has been done for Ireland by the character of these troops. I have indicated their martial quality. But they have brought another quality into the field which is equally characteristic and therefore should at least be mentioned here, and which, perhaps, in the circumstances of the time, deserves a special reference. That is, their religious spirit. Everybody has remarked it. The Irish soldier, with his limpid faith and his unaffected piety, his rosary recited on the hillside, his Mass in the ruined barn under shell-fire, his "act of contrition" in the trench before facing the hail of the assault, his attitude to women, has been mostly a singular impression. And his chaplain! The Irish battalion must have its chaplain as well as its colonel, and both must be of the best. The chaplains of every denomination and of every corps have made a noble name for themselves in this war; but I am speaking here only of the Irish chaplains—of the men like Father Finn, killed at "V" beach, refusing to stay behind on the ship because, as he answered, "The place of the chaplain is with the dying soldier"; and like Father Gwynn, of the Irish Guards, killed at the French front, of whom his battalion commander, a Protestant Irishman, writes these words: "No words of mine could express or even give a faint idea of the amount of good he has done us all out here, or how bravely he has faced all dangers, and how cheerful and comforting he has always been. It is certainly no exaggeration to say that he was loved by every officer, N.C.O. and man in the battalion. The Irish Guards owe him a deep and lasting debt of gratitude, and as long as any of us are left who saw him out here, we shall never forget his wonderful life, and shall strive to lead a better life by following his example." This quality of our soldiers appears to have impressed observers, as well as their fighting quality. It is referred to again and again, and the same transference of thought from the character of the men to the cause of their country, as appears in one of the letters above quoted from a Scottish soldier, a spectator of "V" beach, occurs repeatedly: "The race that can produce such men, who did such glorious work for the Empire, has the most perfect right to get the freedom of its country and the right to rule it. … There is not a man in the service but who would willingly do anything now for the Irish people—yes, the Irish Catholics."

Thus we see that our Irish troops in this war are fulfilling a mission. As I said at the outset, it is into their keeping, with the eyes of the world upon them, that the cause of their country for the time being has passed. The influence of their action upon her fortunes will extend far beyond the immediate effects which will appear the moment the war is over. No people can be said to have rightly proved their nationhood and their power to maintain it until they have demonstrated their military prowess; and though Irish blood has reddened the earth of every continent, never until now have we as a people set a national army in the field. I have written vainly if I have not shown, moreover, that never was a people more worthily represented in the field than we are to-day by these Irish soldiers. It is heroic deeds entering into their traditions that give life to nations—that is the recompense of those who die to perform them—and to Fontenoy, Cremona, Fredericksburg, and the rest, these soldiers of the Irish people to-day have added Mons, Ypres, Loos, "V" beach, Suvla Bay, Lake Doiran. How do the Irish people regard their armies in the field? How do their brothers at home regard these brothers in the battle line, who, at the call of danger and national opportunity, by passing into the soldier's panoply have lifted the name of Irishmen to a new plane in the world's eyes, and opened to their country's cause a new outlook? To themselves the same opportunity of ennoblement comes. The ranks of their brothers in the field are thinning under the wastage of war. Will they keep them filled? Aye, will they! I have given my lifetime, such as it has been, to the service of Ireland in a deep faith in the essential nobility and wisdom of the Irish people. I should be untrue to that faith if for a moment I had any doubt on this matter—if I could harbour for a moment the idea that the young men of Ireland could think unmoved of the wistful bewildered faces of their noble brothers while they held back, could watch the ranks of the Irish armies thinning, and the glorious regiments, brigades, and divisions gradually filling up with others than Irish soldiers until their character as Irish armies finally vanished and ceased to exist—and something, I fear, would go with that character which Ireland might never get back. No, the Irish race has not changed, as these very soldiers have proved. Chivalry is of its essence, and nations who do not want to die, but to live, as Ireland does, must act through their essential qualities. Those brave sons in the field need not fear for the honour they have won for their country. Their brothers are coming to them. Ireland's armies will be maintained.

J.E. REDMOND.

February, 1916