Friends of the Somme - Mid Ulster Branch  
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Date Information
05/06/2021 Private M Irwin, Royal Inniskillings, of Hexham (Killed). Image courtesy of the Newcastle City Library Photographic Collection.
05/06/2021
05/06/2021 From the Illustrated Chronicle dated 6th July 1916:
05/06/2021 Private Irwin is also commemorated on Hexham War Memorial Cross.
05/06/2021 Private Michael Irwin is commemorated on a plaque in the Priory and Parish Church of St Andrew, Market Place, Hexham.
05/06/2021 Michael Irwin was born in Benburb, County Tyrone, possibly around 1888, although no record can be found on GRONI.
29/05/2020 02506
17/09/2018
30/12/2015 Private Michael Irwin is buried in Authuile Military Cemetery, with the reference Special Memorial A-8. His inscription reads: THEIR GLORY SHALL NOT BE BLOTTED OUT
30/12/2015 "These troops had a purgatory to endure. For the most part in the narrow slit assembly trenches, with the rain pouring steadily down on them, they were under furious German bombardments that wreathed the wood in smoke and flame, and made the crashing of great trees the accompaniment to the roar of bursting shells."
30/12/2015 From the divisional history, the 109th Brigade spent the 22nd and 23rd June taking up its assault positions in the right section of Thiepval Wood.
30/12/2015 Private Michael Irwin was serving with the 9th Battalion of the Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers in the Somme when he was killed in action on 23rd June 1916.
30/12/2015 Michael Irwin was living in Hexham-on-Tyne, England when he travelled to Finner Camp, County Donegal to enlist.
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