The Irish Experience During the Second World War: An Oral History

Officially, Ireland remained a nation apart during the Second World War. Rather than declaring war, de Valera and his government declared an Emergency, asserting that Eire as a nation would only fight when any other country touched its shores, be that country Germany or Britain. In his declaration de Valera was simply following his own lead in establishing the Free State of Ireland as independent in all matters, even beyond the treaty that made it a nation less than twenty years before. However official neutrality may have been, and however many civil rights were abridged in attempting to maintain it, individual Irish men and women had to act on their own consciences. Here, independent scholar Grob-Fitzgibbon describes the situation during the Emergency, and then allows 15 of those involved to speak for themselves in interviews. Many fought as Irish or in the English army; some waited, preparing for what very well could have been house-to-house combat; others did what they could in a country that remained technically neutral but was restricted and suspected on all sides. Distributed in the US by ISBS. Annotation ©2004 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR