Book on NUI graduates involved in first World War launched in Dublin

A book chronicling graduates of the National University of Ireland (NUI) who were involved in the first World War was launched in Dublin on Thursday.

The book, National University of Ireland First World War Centenary Roll of Honour and Essays, is edited by Ronan McGreevy, a reporter with The Irish Times, and Emer Purcell, who is publications manager at NUI. Military historian Tom Burnell is associate editor.

NUI compiled a war list in 1919 of all students, graduates and staff of University College Cork, University College Dublin, and University College Galway, who had died or served in the Great War.

As part of NUI’s decade of centenary programme, the original honour roll is reprinted in the volume along with a collection of essays.

“So much has changed, but if history teaches us anything, there are worse times to be alive,” said Mr McGreevy. “One-hundred-and-ten years ago, the men who featured in this book confronted the reality of a European war bigger and more bloody than any in history.

“The book is a roll of honour about the NUI graduates who were involved in the war. In reality it is a portrait of middle-class Ireland’s participation in that conflict.

“The students, graduates and staff within this book were not compelled as James Connolly put it by ‘economic conscription’. They had everything to lose from participating in this war and 80 of them lost their lives.”

The book includes a substantive introduction accompanied by a selection of individual personal profiles to bring those recorded in the roll to life.

In addition to NUI’s list, the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland’s honour roll is also reproduced along with an essay by Patrick Casey, Kevin Cullen and Joe Duignan examining NUI doctors who served during the war.

[ Ireland’s first World War veterans: Shunned, ostracised, murderedOpens in new window ]

For the first time, a list of the chaplains from St Patrick’s College Maynooth is presented and their lives examined. Fionnuala Walsh discusses NUI’s women students, graduates and staff and explores the ways in which they contributed to the war effort.