Dublin Port’s Emergency Story LDF veteran – Oliver Joseph Doyle
Oliver is seen here with his daughter Rita in Lucan Lodge Nursing Home. (Photograph by Michael Coyne)
As part of our newest project on Dublin Port during the Emergency (1939 – 1946) period we met today and interviewed Oliver Joseph Doyle from Stella Gardens, Irishtown, Dublin.
Oliver who is 98, worked as a iron moulder, but during the Emergency he served with the Local Defence Force (LDF). He first served with an infantry unit based in the RDS before transferring to an anti-aircraft unit in Ringsend.
The anti-aircraft positions around Dublin were vital to the defence of Dublin Port. Oliver told us that his father, Mathew Doyle, also served with the Maritime Inscription and LDF in Dublin Port.
Thank you to Lucan Lodge Nursing Home for facilitating our meeting today.
We are pleased to announce a wonderful project for the Dublin Port Company that will tell the story of the Emergency (1939 – 1946) in Dublin; in particular the defence of Dublin and the port. If you are a veteran or there is a veteran from this period in your family that served in the Dublin area either with the Irish Army, Marine Service/Inscription, Air Corps, Local Defence Force, Local Security Force, Air Raid Warden or St. John Ambulance please do get in touch. We would like to record as many of these stories as possible before they are lost to time.
Although Ireland declared neutrality it did not escape the war. Members of the Defence Forces, emergency services, and Merchant Navy risked their lives to ensure Ireland and its citizens were defended and supplies kept coming in. Anti-Aircraft batteries, coastal artillery, and coastal Look Out Posts became a common feature around the country. Naturally Dublin – the capital – and its port were vital to Ireland’s survival. The war came directly to the Irish people more than once. On several occasions Luftwaffe aircraft jettisoned their bombs after getting lost on their way to targets in Northern Ireland or the United Kingdom. Probably the most significant attack in Dublin came on the night of 31 May 1941, when four high-explosive bombs were dropped by Luftwaffe aircraft on the North Strand area of Dublin City. Twenty-eight people were killed and 90 more were injured in the blast. Some 400 people were left homeless.
This image shows the destruction on North Strand.
We’d love to hear from you if you have a story you’d like to tell.Please Share this post with your friends.
Images with thanks to: Military Archives, Air Corps Museum, Dublin City Archives, and the Independent Newspapers Ireland/NLI collection.
Celbridge LDF circa 1941/1942. (Image courtesy of George Bagnall)
We are currently researching for an upcoming project focusing on the military story of Celbridge, County Kildare.
In the past Celbridge has had several military units of it’s own; a company of Irish Volunteers was formed in 1779 known as the Castletown Union, the Castletown Union Volunteers or the Castletown Volunteers. This unit was reformed into the Celbridge Volunteers in 1784; a company of Irish Volunteers was formed in 1914; local Irish Volunteer and IRA units were also active from 1919 – 1923; on the outbreak of the Emergency in 1939 a unit of the Local Defence Force (LDF) was formed. The Celbridge LDF company morphed into a company of the North Dublin Battalion on the formation of the Fórsa Cosanta Áitiúil (FCÁ) in the late 1940s. The North Dublin Battalion eventually became the 7th Infantry Battalion FCÁ, of which C Company was in North Kildare with platoons in Celbridge, Maynooth, and Kilcock. The unit remained active in Celbridge until the 1980s.
As part of our upcoming project – Celbridge’s Military Story – we are very interested to meet military veterans in the area, especially those who served in the Celbridge LDF and FCÁ. Please Share this post
This project is supported by Kildare County Council Heritage Office.
