[Leica] IMG: Russian cannon

[Douglas Barry]

Ireland during WW2 was "neutral" so we didn't melt down anything. As a 
result, we still have a lot of the metal architectural flourishes that 
vanished from British cities during the war. We didn't even call it WW2 
here, but rather "The Emergency" and, while we were ostensibly 
intransigent in our neutrality, we were secretly supporting the Allies 
with covert information, quick repatriation of crashed aircrew and 
sailors, and, of course, many Irish fought for them during the war.

Funnily enough, my mother's brother Griffith ran away from home with a 
friend to join the RAF in 1942. Both of them were 17 at the time and 
they headed up from Dublin to Northern Ireland on their bicycles. They 
made it to just outside Dundalk when they were stopped and returned home 
by the Gardaí.  My grandfather who was a Chief Superintendent in the 
Gardaí at the time and head of the Local Security Force during the 
Emergency had eventually extracted their plans from my mother and her 
sisters, and made a couple of quick phone calls to cut off the obvious 
routes.  My uncle was "returned" home in a police van and was promised 
he could fly instead for the Irish Air Corps once he had finished 
school. Sadly, he was killed in May 1944 when he crashed his Miles 
Magister trainer (serial no. 37) just after going solo when he looped 
the loop for friends and clipped a tree.

Douglas



On 07/08/2018 22:53, Jim Nichols wrote:
> Looks as if it belongs there.  You are lucky.  All of the old cannon 
> in my home town were turned in to the salvage drive to support WWII !
>
> Jim Nichols
> Tullahoma, TN USA
>
> On 8/7/2018 4:41 PM, Douglas Barry wrote:
>> Local wags have placed a Burger King crown to decorate a cannon on 
>> Dun Laoghaire pier. The cannon overlooking Scotsman's Bay and the 
>> James Joyce Tower at Sandycove, is a Russian one captured during the 
>> Crimean War in the 19th century - probably at the siege of 
>> Sevastapol. It has the Romanov coat of arms embossed on it. Sony A7ii 
>> with kit zoom.
>>
>> http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/DouglasBray/Dublin/Dun+Laoghaire/DL+11062018+Burger+King+Cannon+East+Pier.jpg.html 
>>
>>
>> Douglas
>>
>>
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