Over 210,000 Irish enlisted in the British Army during World War I. Among them were doctors such as my grandfather who tended the wounded and saw the brutality of modern warfare up close. Waiting for the Wounded: “A British advance has just begun, and the surgeons of a Divisional Collecting Station near the Somme are awaiting the arrival of the first laden stretcher-bearers. … [Read more...] about My Grandfather’s War
World War I
Photo Album: On the Town
Cigarette in mouth and mates by his side, Corporal James L. O'Brien stands on a street in Paris in 1918. O'Brien and his friend, Pat Donovan (far left) joined "because we felt it was the right thing to do. Quite a few of our friends had been drafted." Assigned to recruitment duty in Washington D.C., O'Brien and Donovan would put up their friends who came down to enlist. "At … [Read more...] about Photo Album: On the Town
Hibernia: New O’Neill Play Makes New York Debut
In August, the Provincetown Playhouse in New York City hosted the very first production of Eugene O'Neill's play Personal Equation. The play was written in 1915, while O'Neill was a student at Harvard. Set at the onset of World War I, it is about characters who must decide whether to join the army or the anarchist cause, a choice that ultimately divides a father and son. The … [Read more...] about Hibernia: New O’Neill Play Makes New York Debut