The Aftermath
Not counting the 30th Reserve battalion, a total of 5,560 served in the brigade. Of these 2,675 made the supreme sacrifice and few escaped unscathed: the casualty rate was well over 80%. A fitting tribute was paid by chaplain Fr. McBrearty in June 1919 when the 25th’s colour was laid up at St.Mary’s Cathedral:
“ Four and a half years ago they had their first parade in St.Mary’s…..None of them dreamt for a moment that only a mere handful would return to their native Tyneside.”
Sadly that colour was stolen but on 7th April 2001 the colour of the 27th (4th Tyneside Irish) was placed there having been restored and retrieved from Beamish Museum and on 16th September 2003 Mary McAleese, The President of Ireland, rededicated the colour and was piped in by Vincent Robinson of New York whose family have faithfully preserved the brigade’s war pipes entrusted to them by the chaplain.
An Old Comrades association was formed in the twenties and met at Fitzgerald’s Bridge Hotel until the fifties. It was from there next to the castle they marched every St. Patrick’s Day to remember their friends and lay a shamrock wreath on the Eldon Square Memorial. In 2009 that tradition was revived by the Tyneside Irish Cultural Society.
It is very much in the spirit of the Irish peace process and the rehabilitation of the many thousands of Irishmen who served in two world wars that we come together to honour the memory of the Tyneside Irish Brigade; commemorating the men of the four Tyneside Irish battalions who fought, and sadly in many cases, died in the First World War.
We honour their sacrifice every year, appropriately, on St. Patrick’s Day…a special day in the hearts of Irish people.
We are indebted to local historian John Sheen for much of what has been written here. His definitive study of the Tyneside Irish is essential reading.
Tommy McClements
for more reading on the Tyneside Irish check out:
Not counting the 30th Reserve battalion, a total of 5,560 served in the brigade. Of these 2,675 made the supreme sacrifice and few escaped unscathed: the casualty rate was well over 80%. A fitting tribute was paid by chaplain Fr. McBrearty in June 1919 when the 25th’s colour was laid up at St.Mary’s Cathedral:
“ Four and a half years ago they had their first parade in St.Mary’s…..None of them dreamt for a moment that only a mere handful would return to their native Tyneside.”
Sadly that colour was stolen but on 7th April 2001 the colour of the 27th (4th Tyneside Irish) was placed there having been restored and retrieved from Beamish Museum and on 16th September 2003 Mary McAleese, The President of Ireland, rededicated the colour and was piped in by Vincent Robinson of New York whose family have faithfully preserved the brigade’s war pipes entrusted to them by the chaplain.
An Old Comrades association was formed in the twenties and met at Fitzgerald’s Bridge Hotel until the fifties. It was from there next to the castle they marched every St. Patrick’s Day to remember their friends and lay a shamrock wreath on the Eldon Square Memorial. In 2009 that tradition was revived by the Tyneside Irish Cultural Society.
It is very much in the spirit of the Irish peace process and the rehabilitation of the many thousands of Irishmen who served in two world wars that we come together to honour the memory of the Tyneside Irish Brigade; commemorating the men of the four Tyneside Irish battalions who fought, and sadly in many cases, died in the First World War.
We honour their sacrifice every year, appropriately, on St. Patrick’s Day…a special day in the hearts of Irish people.
We are indebted to local historian John Sheen for much of what has been written here. His definitive study of the Tyneside Irish is essential reading.
Tommy McClements
for more reading on the Tyneside Irish check out:
- Tyneside Irish by John Sheen. (Pen & Sword 2010)
- ISBN 978 1 84884 093 5