I know most of you would have by now seen the film 'The Seige of Jadotville', where 155 men of A company , 35 Batallion of the Irish Army under the command of Comdt Pat Quinlan defended Jadotville against a force of over 3,000 Katangese for 6 days, killing over 300 with 1000+ casualties without a single fatality to his troops. I will not talk about the shameful way these men were ignored and branded cowards on return to Ireland by their own units and by the Government, instead I would like to share with you a true story.
I had the privilege of meeting a few of the survivors of the seige in Mullingar some time ago and apart from feeling so proud , I gained nothing but the highest respect for them. On to the story....... one told of when they were in captivity, they were allowed play the ould bit of hurling. After witnessing a fierce clash on the pitch, one of the guards asked what they were playing. On being told it was 'hurling' the Irish national game, the guard smiled and said 'If we knew you played a game like this - we never would have attacked you in the first placce!!