Author Archives: mickot

About mickot

Born 1955, I joined B Coy, 21 Bn in 1972.

Mortar Shoot 10th Oct 1987

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81ShootFollowing training during Annual Camp in Tralee on the support weapons there was a shoot the following October. The video attached here also clears up one of the great controversies of the 21 Bn and I believe vindicates Des Fitzgerald from a vile calumny which I heard repeated last Friday night.

About 20 seconds into the video it is clear that Des actually STOPS a guy putting the bomb into the tube upside down! I heard that Des actually had to leave the country such was the slagging he took over the fact that he was about to fire a mortar bomb upside down. I also heard a name of the number two that Des corrected but his back is to camera and we will leave it unsaid.

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Then and now…

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The 62 Bn Christmas Dinner was held in the Royal (Starlight) Hotel Bray on Jan 4th 2013. In the bar beforehand we recreated a photo first taken in 1975 of Pat Cuffe, Paddy Maher and Mick O’Toole. See if you can tell which picture was taken in 1975 and which is now!

The meal must have been designed to remind us of the dining hall all those years ago and the highlight, for me at least, was the dessert of jelly and ice cream served in the stainless steel bowl. I thought the GOC was about to visit we were treated so well!

Here are some photos of the evening.

Glen of Imaal – 19-20th October 1974

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FCA039My notes on these photos gives the date as 19th/20th October 1974 for an overnight in The Glen of Imaal. I have no recollection of any training we did, but I do recall the night out in the The Glen Inn on Saturday. B Coy travelled in luxury by CIE coach and the sing-song on the bus included such old favourites as “An engineer told me…” and “Three German officers…”, as well as some new ones like Brendan Grace’s “The Boot Boy song”.

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Mass in Dun Laoghaire

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Here is a video of the Mass in Dun Laoghaire for deceased members of B Coy that I referred to in my post on “Church and State”.

The Colour Party is commanded by Rossa Lyons, with Mick O’Toole as flag officer and Gerry Paley and Noel Lyster as escorts. In the Guard of Honour I can recognise Tom Walsh, Kevin Connolly, Tony Taaffe, Cpl Chernobyl, Paddy Henry, Bernard Swan and Ciaran Giles.

As well as Father Breslin’s somewhat un-orthodox sermon the event was notable for Rossa’s total lack of understanding of the liturgy. He was told that when the consecration arrived he was to give the order to “Present Arms”. “The wha?”, says Rossa. In an attempt to inform him, he is told “when the priest holds up the bread and wine”. Then at the offertory, when the Padre says the  “Blessed are you, Lord, God of all creation. Through your goodness we have this bread to offer…”, Rossa gives the order, and proceeds to leave the Guard of Honour at the present for a good ten minutes. At least the bugler had the sense to wait until the ACTUAL consecration before sounding!

 

Now with added video!

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I have gotten my hands on some video taken by Pat Holahan and digitised by Rossa. Age has not been good to it and Youtube compression has degraded it even more. As if some of the activities of the 21 Bn can be degraded even more!

This test is of the train arriving for camp 1987 – it will NOT survive being zoomed to fullscreen but we can still make out some of the personalities involved!

Edit: I have changed the video compressor and other settings and the quality is somewhat better!

 

The FCA in Bray

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Sample page

I called into Town Hall Bookshop on the Florence Road in Bray recently and picked up a copy of “Pictorial Memories of Bray – Volume 3”. I had seen on the internet that it contained a section of 23 pages on “The FCA in Bray” and so I decided to have a look. The editor is Henry Cairns and Henry himself was manning the shop when I called in. I made the mistake of first asking for “The Pictorial History of Bray – Volume 3” which is a different publication altogether, but Henry put me right! One collection is produced by Bray Cualann Historical Society, of which ex-21Bn member Jim Scannell is the PRO,  and the other by The Old Bray Society. Henry Cairns is also an ex-member of 21Bn.

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Military Vocabulary

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I recently dug out my “Musketry” manual and although it has a pretty old-fashioned name it contained vocabulary, searching ground and fire control orders. The copy I have is dated 1946 and is stamped “Forsa Cosanta Aituil 30 Jan 1952, Carlow” in the old Irish script, the Clo Gaelach.

Read on for a discussion of military vocabulary and some of the phrases that drove us mad as privates and I am sure we used as we rose through the ranks!

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Vet’s beret

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I was talking to Kevin Connolly and Gerry Paley recently about taking a “Veteran’s Table” at the dinner next January and Kevin mentioned that veterans of most units always continue to wear their berets.

That got me thinking and now that the 21st is long gone and the 62nd is soon to follow, maybe we are free to use our old badges as we see fit. Why not start wearing a vets beret with the old Dwyer flash on. It would have the advantage of being easy to buy a black beret, sew on a piece of red material and re-use your shoulder flash which is probably on that old uniform that doesn’t fit you anymore. If I recall correctly we had to buy those flashes so they are ours to own. The cap badges are probably still current and so may give rise to “issues”.

Any thoughts?