" To The Colours Of The Rangers "

You'll hang in the Castle of Windsor
And dust will enshrine every fold
On which are emblazoned the honours
We gained in the battles of old;
But none will write on you the legend
How we strove to be worthy your fame
You will fade, and our deeds - all forgotten -
Fade Quicker than even a name.

 Oh let the orange lilly be your badge
My patriot brother, the everlasting
Green for me, and we for one another.

  9th Platoon, A Company, 2nd Battalion Royal Ulster Rifles

  Hawick 1945

 

 

  The Royal Munster
Fusiliers
2nd Battalion

The Royal Dublin Fusilers

I saw the Connaught Rangers when they were passing by

On a spring day, a good day, with gold rifts in the sky.

Themselves were marching steadily along the Liffey quay

An' I see the young proud look of them as if it were to-day !

The bright lads, the right lads, i have them in my mind,

With the green flags on their bayonets all fluttering in the wind.

A last look at old Ireland, a last good-bye maybe,

Then the gray sea, the wide sea, my grief upon the sea!

And when will they come home, says I, when will they see once more

The dear blue hills of Wicklow and Wexford's dim gray shore?

The brave lads of Ireland, no better lads you'll find,

With the green flags on their bayonets all fluttering in the wind!

Three years have passed since that spring day, sad years for them and me,

Green graves there are in Serbia and in Gallipoli.

And many who went by that day along the muddy street

Will never hear the roadway ring to their triumphant feet.

But when they march before him, God's welcome will be kind ,

And the green flags on their bayonets will flutter in the wind.

 

  Winifred Mary Letts

The Dublin Fusilers
2nd Battalion

The Connaught
Rangers

The Royal Irish
Regiment

The Connaught
Rangers
2nd Battalion

 The Royal Irish
Rifles

The Royal Irish
Fusiliers

" It was no wonder wrote Father William Doyle SJ, chaplain, that an angry German Officer called the 16th ( Irish )Division

 

after the capture of Ginchy on the Somme September 1916.

Please note that all private photographs taken by the group and friends

Are subject to Copyright 2007.

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