On March 10,1915 the 1st Royal Irish Rifles took part in their first major action. The Battle of Neuve Chapelle, was fought between 10 and 13 March 1915. Rifles went over the top. They managed to take the village but at a deadly cost. Over the next three days they would lose nearly 460 men; 18 officers & 440 other ranks. Hugh Andrews from Ballymena, John Campbell from Belfast and Michael Curis from Cookstown were among those who fell on this first day. In 1918 the Royal Irish Fusiliers were in Palestine. Edmund Jess from Banbridge and Edward Magee from Cookstown are remembered at Jerusalem War Cemetery. In 1943 James Cassidy from Rathfriland, an army medic attached to Headquarter Battalion, 1st Parachute Brigade in Tunisia died. He had been Mentioned in Despatches. Joseph Diamond, a member of Broadway Presbyterian Church in Belfast, died in Holland in 1945 serving with the RAFVR. In today’s veterans is Reginald McClelland, one of many in the Royal Navy who took part in the perilous Arctic convoys. He also saw D-Day action at Omaha beach. Read his story here.
Remembrance NI - Every day is a Remembrance Day 