The Commonwealth War Graves Commission (CWGC) is an intergovernmental organisation of six independent member states whose principal function is to mark, record and maintain the graves and places of commemoration of Commonwealth of Nations military service members who died in the two World Wars. The commission is also responsible for commemorating Commonwealth civilians who died as a result of enemy action during the Second World War. The commission was founded by Sir Fabian Ware and constituted through Royal Charter in 1917 as the Imperial War Graves Commission. The change to the present name took place in 1960.
Plan Kathleen, sometimes referred to as the Artus Plan, was a military plan for the invasion of Northern Ireland by Nazi Germany, sanctioned in 1940 by Stephen Hayes, Acting Irish Republican Army (IRA) Chief of Staff. Plan Kathleen is distinct from Operation Green, the German military plan to invade Ireland, also drawn up in 1940.
The Emergency was a state of emergency in Ireland in the Second World War, throughout which Ireland remained neutral. It was proclaimed by Dáil Éireann on 2 September 1939, allowing the passage of the Emergency Powers Act 1939 by the Oireachtas the following day. This gave sweeping powers to the government, including internment, censorship of the press and correspondence, and control of the economy. The Emergency Powers Act lapsed on 2 September 1946.
Lieutenant Commander Eugene Esmonde, was a distinguished Irish pilot in the Fleet Air Arm who was a posthumous recipient of the Victoria Cross (VC), the highest award for gallantry in the face of the enemy awarded to members of Commonwealth forces. Esmonde earned this award while in command of a British Fleet Air Arm torpedo bomber squadron in the Second World War.
A war grave is a burial place for members of the armed forces or civilians who died during military campaigns or operations.
Stephen Hayes was a member and leader of the Irish Republican Army from April 1939 to June 1941.
Seán Russell was an Irish republican who held senior positions in the IRA until the end of the Irish War of Independence, and was chief of staff from 1938 to April 1939. He was buried at sea following his death on a Kriegsmarine U-boat that was returning him to Ireland.
The Cross of Sacrifice is a Commonwealth war memorial designed in 1918 by Sir Reginald Blomfield for the Imperial War Graves Commission. It is present in Commonwealth war cemeteries containing 40 or more graves. Its shape is an elongated Latin cross with proportions more typical of the Celtic cross, with the shaft and crossarm octagonal in section. It ranges in height from 18 to 24 feet. A bronze longsword, blade down, is affixed to the front of the cross. It is usually mounted on an octagonal base. It may be freestanding or incorporated into other cemetery features. The Cross of Sacrifice is widely praised, widely imitated, and the archetypal British war memorial. It is the most imitated of Commonwealth war memorials, and duplicates and imitations have been used around the world.
Operation Shamrock was a scheme bringing refugee children from mainland Europe to Ireland in the aftermath of the Second World War. It was organised by the Irish Red Cross, and involved about 500 children, mostly from Germany, who stayed for three years before returning home.
Milltown Cemetery is a large cemetery in west Belfast, Northern Ireland.
Hermann Görtz was a German spy in Britain and Ireland before and during World War II, liaising with the Irish Republican Army (IRA). After the war, he committed suicide rather than be deported from Ireland to Germany.
Glencree is a valley in the Wicklow Mountains in eastern Ireland. It is the third-closest valley in the mountains to Dublin city, the first being Glencullen and the second Glenasmole. The River Dargle flows down the valley, which rises to a height of about 400 metres. The foot of the valley is site of the village of Enniskerry.
Operation Lobster I was an Abwehr plan to infiltrate three German agents into Ireland, in July 1940. It was part of a wider series of missions carried out within the framework of Operation Lobster during World War II.
Friesack Camp or Camp Friesack was a special World War II prisoner of war camp where a group of Irishmen serving in the British Army volunteered for recruitment and selection by Abwehr II and the German Army. The camp was designated Stalag XX-A (301) and located in the Friesack area, Brandenburg region. The training and selection by Abwehr II and the German Army occurred during the period 1940–1943.
The Irish Republican Army (IRA), a paramilitary group seeking to remove Northern Ireland from the United Kingdom and unify Ireland, shared intelligence with the Abwehr, the military intelligence service of Nazi Germany.
Operation Mainau was a German espionage mission during the Second World War. It was sanctioned and planned by the German secret service (Abwehr) and executed successfully in May 1940. The mission plan involved inserting Abwehr agent Hermann Görtz into Ireland by parachute.
The MV Kerlogue was an Irish ship attacked in World War II that has become the exemplar of neutral Irish ships during the war. The Kerlogue was a very small ship that was attacked by both sides and rescued people from both sides. She was almost sunk by a German mine and was strafed by the Royal Air Force, being left for dead. She rescued the Wild Rose of Liverpool and the survivors of the German destroyer Z27 and its escort, the survivors of which, in the latter case, were brought back to Ireland and interned until the end of hostilities.
The SS Irish Oak was an Irish-operated steamship which was sunk in the North Atlantic during World War II by a German submarine.
Charles Algernon Fryatt was a British mariner who was executed by the Germans for attempting to ram a U-boat in 1915. When his ship, the SS Brussels, was captured off the Netherlands in 1916, he was court-martialled and sentenced to death because he had attacked the submarine as a non-combatant. International outrage followed his execution near Bruges, Belgium. In 1919, his body was reburied with full honours in the United Kingdom.
The Old Church Cemetery is an ancient cemetery on the outskirts of the town of Cobh, County Cork, Ireland which contains a significant number of important burials, including a number 3 mass graves and several individual graves containing the remains of 193 victims of the passenger ship RMS Lusitania which was sunk by a German torpedo off the Old Head of Kinsale during the First World War in May 1915 with the loss of more than 1,100 lives. The Commonwealth War Graves Commission register and maintain the graves of 127 identified Commonwealth service personnel from the same war.
