Discovering the truth in the GAA’s war effort

Acknowledging that many of its members fought in the British army does not diminish the GAA’s contribution to Irish society or the fact that many others of its members fought in 1916 and in the War of Independence, writes Paul Rouse

For many years, the GAA sought to paint a portrait of its own history that was a false one. This portrait imagined that the members of the GAA had nothing to do with the First World War because they were too busy freeing Ireland.

It is a portrait that was perfectly rendered by the anonymous author of Sixty Glorious Years: The Authentic Story of the GAA (1946), who claimed that “efforts were, indeed, made to recruit GAA men for the British army, an especial appeal being made to the hurlers and footballers of Munster, but there was no response.”