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IRELAND & THE WAR: DOWNLOAD TEXT - AT SEA

Tragedies at Sea: By far the greatest number of Irish casualties incurred during the Great War were during service with the Army. It was, however, the conflict at Sea which brought the full horror of the war to Ireland’s shores. On the 1st of May 1917, the principal New York newspapers published an advertisement sent to them by the German Embassy in Washington. The message contained the following warning:

Travellers intending to embark on the Atlantic Voyage are reminded that a state of war exists between Germany and Great Britain and her allies; that the zone of war includes the waters adjacent to the British Isles;’ and that vessels flying the British flag or a flag of her allies 'are liable to destruction in those waters and that travellers sailing in the war zone on ships to Great Britain or her allies do so at their own risk'.

This warning was published next to a British Cunard Line advertisement for the sailing at ten o’clock that morning and again on May 29th, of the ‘Fastest and largest Steamer now in Atlantic Service,’ which was the Lusitania. On the 7th of May 1915, the Lusitania was sunk off the Old Head of Kinsale, Co. Cork, by the German U-Boat, U-20. The commander of the U-Boat was Captain Walther Schweiger. 1,198 men, women and children lost their lives in that terrible act of war. Many of the bodies were brought ashore at Queenstown (Cobh) in Co. Cork, where they were buried. On the 5th of September 1917, the German U-Boat, U-88 was sunk by British mines of Terschelling which is an island off the north west coast of Holland. Her captain was Walter Schweiger.

On October the 11th 1918, nearly one month to the day before the Great War ended, the City of Dublin Steam Packet Company ship, 'R.M.S. Leinster' was torpedoed by a German U - Boat, UB - 123 shortly after leaving Kingstown (Dun Laoghaire) Harbour, Co. Dublin. Out of 771 people on board, 501 died in the greatest ever loss of life in the Irish Sea. Those lost included crew members, postal sorters, civilians and a large contingent of military personnel, eight of whom were Dublin Fusiliers. They were:

Lieutenant Sydney George Crawford, 3rd Battalion, from Carrickbawn, Torquay Road, Foxrock, Co. Dublin, aged 21. His body was washed ashore on the Scottish coast and is buried at Kirkblan Parish Churchyard, Kircudbright, Scotland. His sister, Letitia Hill, also perished on The Leinster. 
Cpl. John Docherty, 13245 Royal Dublin Fusiliers and Labour Corps. His body was never recovered.
Boy 19976, Thomas Edward Felton, buried in Grangegorman Cemetery, Dublin.
Pte. John Loughnane, aged 42.
Pte. G. Lynch, buried in Grangegorman, Dublin.
Pte. Philip O’Brien, 24677, 6th Battalion Royal Dublin Fusiliers, born Fethard, Co. Tipperary, buried at Portpatrick Cemetery, Wigtownshire. 
Lance Cpl. William Francis O’Mahony, St. Brigid’s, 180 Oxford Road, Dublin. 1st Battalion Royal Dublin Fusiliers, aged 33. Buried in Glasnevin Cemetery, Dublin.
Pte. Thomas Thompson, 20747 from Melrose Terrace, Derry City. Buried in Derry City Cemetery.

UB - 123 did not make it back to Germany; she was presumed lost with her crew of thirty six in a mine field off the north of Scotland.