Post by Admin on Mar 24, 2013 21:16:16 GMT -5
Ireland and the First World War:
the Historical Context
Introduction – the numbers involved
Between August 1914 and November 1918 considerably over 200,000 Irish served in armed forces engaged in the First World War. They fall into three main categories. In the first place a fair number were serving soldiers at the start of the conflict. For example in August 1914, in the British army there were 28,000 Irish-born regular soldiers and 30,000 reservists who were immediately called up back to the colours. Secondly there were what were known as ‘Kitchener’s men’, people who responded to the urgent call for volunteers made by Lord Kitchener, appointed Secretary of State for War in August 1914, and most dramatically represented in the world-famous ‘Your Country Needs You’ poster. Between August 1914 and February 1916 (more or less when conscription was introduced in Great Britain, and just before the Easter Rising in Ireland) about 95,000 men joined up. Thirdly, there were those who joined up during the rest of the war, after the initial recruiting ‘surge’, up to November 1918. These men total about 45,000, including nearly 10,000 recruits in the last three and a half months of the war alone.
MORE AT: www.qub.ac.uk/sites/irishhistorylive/IrishHistoryResources/ArticlesandLectures/IrelandandtheFirstWorldWar/
the Historical Context
Introduction – the numbers involved
Between August 1914 and November 1918 considerably over 200,000 Irish served in armed forces engaged in the First World War. They fall into three main categories. In the first place a fair number were serving soldiers at the start of the conflict. For example in August 1914, in the British army there were 28,000 Irish-born regular soldiers and 30,000 reservists who were immediately called up back to the colours. Secondly there were what were known as ‘Kitchener’s men’, people who responded to the urgent call for volunteers made by Lord Kitchener, appointed Secretary of State for War in August 1914, and most dramatically represented in the world-famous ‘Your Country Needs You’ poster. Between August 1914 and February 1916 (more or less when conscription was introduced in Great Britain, and just before the Easter Rising in Ireland) about 95,000 men joined up. Thirdly, there were those who joined up during the rest of the war, after the initial recruiting ‘surge’, up to November 1918. These men total about 45,000, including nearly 10,000 recruits in the last three and a half months of the war alone.
MORE AT: www.qub.ac.uk/sites/irishhistorylive/IrishHistoryResources/ArticlesandLectures/IrelandandtheFirstWorldWar/