World War I and Athy

Next Sunday, November 13th at 3.00pm we will gather in St. Michael’s Cemetery to remember the young men from Athy and district who died in the first World War. It is a commemoration ceremony which was first started over 30 years ago. Those early services were held at a time when public commemoration of our war dead was not a common feature of Irish life. Indeed remembering the Irish men who died fighting in an English uniform on foreign battle fields was not thought appropriate. Clem Roche in his excellent book ‘Athy and District World War I Roll of Honour’ lists 226 men from our town and outlying areas who died in that war. They enlisted for a variety of reasons. Unemployment and poverty provided sufficient reason for many of the young men who enlisted. All of them were encouraged by Athy’s church and civic leaders to enlist and they were treated as heroes as they marched behind the Leinster Street Fife and Drum Band on their way to the local railway station from where many of them travelled to the Royal Dublin Fusiliers Barracks in Naas. The soldiers demobbed at the end of the war found that public attitudes had changed dramatically compared to the recruiting days of a few years earlier. The execution of the 1916 Rebellion leaders led that change and it was amplified by the demands for Home Rule and the developing demand for Irish independence. Many decades were to pass before the Irishmen who died in World War I were acknowledged. So many families in south Kildare were affected by the deaths of husbands, fathers, sons and brothers. Indeed the loss of so many young men from a relatively small Irish provincial town created social and family problems which were evident for generations afterwards. The people of Athy have made amends for the decades of silence surrounding the victims of World War I. Clem Roche’s book of Athy war dead was published in 2016 and subsequently a very fine World War I memorial was unveiled in St. Michael’s Cemetery. Further research has revealed the names of Athy men not previously known who died in the 1914-18 war and their names have recently been added to the Athy memorial. The List of Athy’s war World War I dead has now reached 256. Recent generations of Irish people have lived through peaceful times and for many of us it is difficult to appreciate the heartfelt sense of loss endured by wives, parents and children following the death of a loved one. Here in Athy there were accounts of multiple deaths within the same families. Three sons of John and Mary Kelly of 4 Chapel Lane were killed in the war. They were joined in death by the three sons of John and Margaret Curtis of Quarry Farm and the three sons of James and Bridget Byrne of Chapel Lane. How could we measure the sorrow and loss of those families or any of the families who like the Staffords of Butlers Row and the Hannons of Ardreigh House, each of whom suffered the loss of two sons. The deaths of 26-year-old John Coulson Hannon and his 20-year-old brother Norman Leslie were to cause their father John to commit suicide and was largely responsible for the closure of the Hannon Mill shortly thereafter. Yet as I sat in school in the Christian Brothers in St. John’s Lane taking history lessons, I never heard of Athy men’s involvement in the First World War. History lessons in the 1950s ended with the 1916 Rebellion and so an important part of the town’s story was never told. Indeed the families of the dead soldiers felt unable for decades to commemorate their dead or to give public expression to their loss. Thankfully the sacrifices shared by the local families who lost loved ones in war can now be acknowledged. We can take pride in understanding why young men from Athy went to war over 100 years ago. Most of all we can acknowledge the hardships suffered by those men while in the trenches and the hardship and deprivation suffered by the families who lost loved ones in war. The commemoration for Athy men who died in the First World War and in all wars takes place on Sunday next at 3pm in St. Michael’s Cemetery. The next lecture in Athy’s Arts Centre History Series will be given by Kevin Kenny, who will speak of the life and adventures of the Kilkea born polar explorer, Ernest Shackleton. Kevin will give his talk under the title ‘Get down on your knees and pray for Shackleton’. Admission to the lecture, which will take place on Tuesday 15th November at 8pm in the Arts Centre, Woodstock Street is free.