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

The book brings together all aspects of this Irish experience, from the young banker working on Grafton Street, through the IRA volunteer interned in the Curragh, to the soldier fighting in North Africa with the British Army. Through vivid stories and recollections, this book shows how the Emergency period in Irish history was a triumph of peaceful methods over the tradition of physical force. Through statesmanship, not violence, Eamon de Valera was able to secure Irish independence and sovereignty, save the nation from war, and firmly establish that there was only one government, one army, and one legitimate state within Eire, and that was the state of which he was Taoiseach. The book contains interviews with those who were intimately involved in the Irish cultural, social and intellectual movements of the 1940s, volunteers from the IRA, Garda officers, employees of the bank, the civil service and the post office, as well as those serving in the British and Irish Armies.