1914: one hundred years on

Exactly one hundred years ago today, on June 28th 1914, Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria was assassinated in Sarajevo by Yugoslav nationalist Gavrilo Princip. It was an event that quickly precipitated the start of the First World War (1914-1918).

I shall be taking a short summer break from my series of blog posts commemorating the 17 CONDR*Ns who gave their lives serving in that war. I have seven more still to write about.

On a happier note, I see from my database that there were 30 CONDR*Ns born in the British Isles in 1914: 15 in Ireland, 11 in England, 3 in Scotland and 1 in Wales. Of these, two were CONDRENs (one each in Northumberland and in County Kilkenny) and 28 were CONDRONs. The greatest concentration was in Dublin, with two born in Dublin North and three in Dublin South. The most popular boys' name was James (3) and the most popular girls' name was Margaret (3). Other names included Cecil, Herbert, Hubert, Irene, Ivy, Jessie and Olive.

24941 Private Thomas CONDRON (1880 – 1917)

On 9 April 1917 the British armies in northern France embarked on what they hoped would be the decisive, final campaign of the war. On that date, British forces (including Canadian and Australian forces) attacked the German defensive lines to begin the Battle of Arras.

The shaded area shows the ground gained during the Battle of Arras. Courtesy of www.1914-1918.net .

The first day was a great success for the Allies. The Canadians attacked and captured a large part of Vimy ridge. Elsewhere, almost the whole of the German first-line front was captured. In particular, the 4^th Division of the Third Army pushed forward and captured Fampoux, about 3 miles to the east of Arras.

The early successes were not sustained. From 10 April onwards, the Allies came up against renewed German resistance, and initially the artillery of the Third Army was too far back to support its infantry. Tanks were deployed but were too few in number to be effective. The 1^st Battalion of the Royal Irish Fusiliers, with a fighting strength of 20 officers and 617 men, was part of the 4^th Division. The Battalion’s war diary notes that 11 April was a snowy morning. On that day, the Battalion was to push forward from a point north of Fampoux in an advance of over 2000 yards. However, the troops came under heavy fire and suffered severely. The Battalion lost 11 officers and 307 men in the action.

By the time the battle officially ended, the British had made significant advances but had failed to make the decisive breakthrough.

Private Thomas CONDRON (service 24941) died on 11 April 1917 in the Battle of Arras.

Thomas CONDRON was born in Dublin in about 1880 (possibly early 1881), the fourth child of Thomas and Anne (née WHELAN) CONDRON. In the 1911 census of Ireland, Thomas is recorded as a coal labourer and is living at home in Dublin with his widowed father, one brother and a married sister. Thomas moved to Scotland and married Susan COURTNEY in 1914 in Glasgow. The couple had three children: Thomas (born 1914), Michael (1915) and James Patrick (1917). Thomas joined the Royal Irish Fusiliers and was subsequently transferred to the 1^st Battalion.

Thomas’s father was Thomas CONDRON, born in about 1853 in County Wexford. Thomas (senior) married Anne WHELAN in 1873 in the registration district of Gorey. The couple had seven children: Anne (1873) who married Patrick MITTEN, Michael (1876), Julia (1878) who married Denis McGRATH, Thomas (1880), Mary (1884) who married Michael CONNOLLY, Peter (1888) and Sarah (1891). Thomas (senior) was listed as a general labourer in the 1901 census and a brewery labourer in the 1911 census.

Thomas CONDRON is buried in Brown’s Copse Cemetery, Roeux, in northern France.

(Note that the Commonwealth War Graves Commission has him wrongly listed as J. CONDRON and has his date of death as 16 April, though other sources give 11 April).

For other blog posts about CONDR*Ns in the First World War, click on "First World War" in the Labels list on the right of the blog web page. Comments and corrections welcome, either by leaving a comment below or by email to me: CONDRAN[AT]ONE-NAME.ORG .

A/7579 Private Patrick CONDRON (1894 - 1916)

The Battle of the Somme (1 July – 18 November 1916) still has a particular resonance, especially in the United Kingdom. It was one of the costliest battles of the First World War in human lives, with more than one million casualties and more than 300,000 killed or missing. On the first day alone, British forces suffered 57,000 casualties including more than 19,000 men killed.   

The location of the Somme offensive in northern France was chosen in large part because it was planned as a join French-British action where the forces of the two allies were both engaged on the front line. It was not ideal militarily, since the German front line was strong there and commanded the high ground. British Commander-in-Chief General Haig would have preferred to mount an attack further north in Belgium. In fact, the Somme offensive was largely a British military action because the German offensive of 1916 against Verdun drew French efforts away to defend against that.

The area of the Battle of the Somme, showing the Allied front line on 1 July 1916 (solid line) and on 19 November (dashed line). Image courtesy of Cruttenden Connections.

The initial battle plan was founded in the optimistic conceit that the bombardment of the German lines by Allied artillery would cut the barbed-wire defences and leave no-one alive in the opposing trenches, meaning that the infantry troops of the British Fourth Army would be able to cross no-mans land and take the German trenches unopposed. In fact, many German troops saw out a week of artillery bombardment sheltering in dug-outs. Thus on the fateful morning of 1 July 1916, as the British infantry advanced from their trenches at 7.30am and walked across no-mans land, they were assailed by machine-gun fire from the German front line. The British battalions advanced at a slow walk, wave after wave in slow formation, their rifles held aslant in front of them with bayonets upwards. By the end of the day, many of the battalions (initially one thousand men strong) were left with hardly one hundred men.

Although the British barely made any advance around Thiepval, on the left and right flanks they had greater success. The British commanders were slow to capitalize on those successes in the coming days, but General Rawlinson leading the Fourth Army subsequently formed a plan to break through the German defences on the right in the area of Longueval. Advancing under cover of darkness after a brief artillery bombardment, the British troops started an assault early on 14 July against the Bazentin Ridge, and eventually captured Longueval on 18 July. The 33^rd Division, including the 1^st Battalion of the Cameronians (Scottish Rifles), were part of that action and the attack on High Wood on 20 July.

I shall write more of the Battle of the Somme in my next posting.

Private Patrick CONDRON (service no. A/7579) was killed in action on 20 July 1916 in the Battle of the Somme.

Patrick CONDRON was born in Queen’s County, Ireland, in late 1894, and baptised in Doonane Roman Catholic parish. His parents were Michael and Catherine (née KELLY) CONDRON. He moved with his family to Scotland, where he is listed in the 1901 census for New Monkland, Lanarkshire. In the 1911 census he is a coal miner (hewer) living in New Monkland with his father, two brothers and four sisters. Patrick enlisted in Maryborough, Queen’s County, with the Leinster Regiment (service no. 3157). At the time of his death he was serving in the 1^st Battalion of the Cameronians (Scottish Rifles).

Michael CONDRON and Catherine (Kate) KELLY married on 22 October 1893 in Mayo church in the parish of Doonane, Queen’s County, Ireland. Michael is recorded as a miner in the 1901 Scottish census and as a coal miner (hewer) in the 1911 census. Catherine, who was born in about 1874, died in the first months of 1911. The couple had the following children: Patrick (1894), Mary (1896), Elizabeth (1898) and Bridget (1900), all born in Ireland; and Catherine, John and Michael, all born in New Monkland, Scotland.

Patrick CONDRON’s grandfather was also a Michael CONDRON. It seems likely that Patrick’s father Michael was baptised in Doonane in 1870. In that case, Patrick’s grandmother was Mary KEATING. Michael CONDRON and Mary KEATING married in Doonane in 1857. They had a number of children, including Mary (1858), John (1859), Michael (1870), Alicia (1872), James (1874), John (1876), Catherine (1878) and Bernard (1882). Michael CONDRON senior was a farmer, according to Michael CONDRON junior’s marriage certificate.

Patrick CONDRON is buried in the London Cemetery and Extension, Longueval, northern France.

The London Cemetery and Extension, Longueval (courtesy http://www.cwgc.org)

For other blog posts about CONDR*Ns in the First World War, click on "First World War" in the Labels list on the right of the blog web page. Comments and corrections welcome, either by leaving a comment below or by email to me: CONDRAN[AT]ONE-NAME.ORG

7401 Private Martin CONDRON (1889 - 1915)

I wrote last time about the Gallipoli Campaign. For more details of the origins and first days of that campaign, click here.

Private Martin CONDRON (service no. 7401) was killed in action on 26 April 1915 at Cape Helles, Gallipoli. Martin Andrew CONDRON was born on 26 November 1889, at Newarthill Bridge, near Holytown, Lanarkshire, in Scotland. He was the son of Patrick and Mary (née LAWLOR) CONDRON.

Martin came from a long line of coal miners. His father died in the Holytown registration district when Martin was 7 years old, and his mother remarried in 1899, to a James O’NEILL. In the 1901 census for Holytown, Martin is living with his mother and stepfather, two sisters and a half-sister. Two years later, when Martin was 13, his mother died. In the 1911 census for Prestonpans, near Edinburgh, Martin is boarding in the household of a Michael Corrie and his occupation is given as “coal miner – hewer”. It was in Prestonpans that Martin enlisted in the 1^st Battalion, King’s Own Scottish Borderers.

Martin’s parents, Patrick CONDRON and Mary LAWLOR, were married in Cleland, Lanarkshire, on 30 October 1886. Patrick’s occupation is given as coal miner, both in the 1881 census and on his marriage certificate. The couple had three children: Martin Andrew (1889), Maria (1895) and Catherine (1897).

His grandfather, Patrick CONDRON, was born in about 1837, probably in Ireland. He married Maria GORMLY on 21 February 1859, in Linlithgow, Scotland. The couple had at least two children: Mary (born 1859) and Martin’s father Patrick (1861).

Martin’s great-grandparents were Patrick CONRAN and Dorothia (alternatively Dora, Dolly) BYRNE. Patrick was a coal miner in Doonane, Queen’s County, Ireland, and the couple were married there in 1816. Patrick died sometime before 1859; his widow, Dolly, died in Shotts, Lanarkshire, in 1874. (Her maiden name is recorded as BURNS, more familiar than BYRNE in Scotland.) Several of their children moved to Scotland and lived in the mining community of Shotts.

The 1^st Battalion, King’s Own Scottish Borderers, sailed from Avonmouth, England, on 18 March 1915 and landed at Cape Helles on Gallipoli on 25 April 1915. Martin CONDRON was killed in action there on 26 April 1915, and is memorialized on the Helles Memorial, Turkey.

For other blog posts about CONDR*Ns in the First World War, click on "First World War" in the Labels list on the right of the blog web page. Comments and corrections welcome, either by leaving a comment below or by email to me: CONDRAN[AT]ONE-NAME.ORG

Coal-mining CONDR*Ns in Ireland

Mines in Ireland - courtesy of the Northern Mine Research Society.

Sometimes we get a fixed idea that turns out to be unfounded. Until recently I thought that there were no coal mines or coal miners in Ireland: that’s why the Irish traditionally burned peat for cooking and heating. But there were CONDR*Ns in the censuses for England, Scotland and the USA who were coal miners. Indeed, there were also a few coal miners in the Irish censuses of 1901 and 1911.

I then obtained the marriage certificates of two CONDRONs getting married in the 1850s, near the coal-mining area of Shotts in Scotland. On 3 December 1855, Michael CONDRON/CONDRAN (a coal miner) married Bridget STAPLETON, both of Cleland, parish of Shotts. Michael gave his date and place of birth as 1830 in Queen’s County, Ireland, and his parents as Patrick CONDRON, coal miner (deceased) and Dolly CONDRON. On 21 February 1859, Patrick CONDRON/CONDRIN (an iron miner) of the parish of Shotts married Maria GORMLY: he too gave his parents as Patrick CONDRON, coal miner (deceased) and Dolly CONDRON. Clearly Michael and Patrick were brothers, and their father Patrick was a coal miner, presumably in Queen’s County, Ireland.

My erroneous assumption about coal mining based on the use of peat is perhaps understandable.. Samuel Lewis, in ‘A Topographical Dictionary of Ireland’ (published in 1837) writes: “The coal at Newtown and Doonane is equal to the best Kilkenny coal, and sells at 20s. per ton at the pits; that of the other collieries, though somewhat inferior, never sinks below the price of 17s. per ton. Hence the poor people, even in the immediate vicinity of the pits, cannot afford to use it, and it is entirely purchased by maltsters, brewers, distillers and smiths … .” So the common people did burn peat rather than coal for cooking and heating.

The map above, which shows locations of coal mines in Ireland through the last two hundred years, indicates from the clustering of symbols where coal mining was most abundant. (A few of the symbols, such as the one in County Wicklow south of Dublin, indicate mining of materials other than coal.) There are three main areas: a major cluster in the central midlands (north of Kilkenny) denoting the rich coalfield of Castlecomer, County Kilkenny, which extended north into Queen’s County around the area of Doonane; a distributed coalfield in the south west of Ireland, located west of Limerick and extending down into County Cork near Mallow; and a cluster in the northwest, east of Sligo, in County Tyrone. There is also a smaller cluster west of Kilkenny, in mid County Tipperary, and less significant occurrences in the northeast in County Antrim.

The coal mining area where CONDR*Ns were to be found in some numbers is in Queen’s County. Indeed, the six CONDR*N coal miners in the 1901 Irish census are in Doonane (4 men), Ballylehane, and Newtown, all in the southeast corner of Queen’s County. Doonane is in Rathaspick civil parish, Ballylehane and Newtown are in the next-door parish of Killabban. So, if you are looking for where a coal-mining CONDR*N ancestor came from in Ireland, this corner of Queen’s County is a good place to start.