Ger welcoming all to launch of latest medal guide

An important record of the various medals awarded over the years by Irish state organisations has been assembled by Mullingar historical writer Ger O’Connor and is to be launched this Thursday June 29 at 6pm The Atrium of the Westmeath County Buildings.

‘Irish State Awards – Emergency and Commemorative Medals’ is a follow-on to a previous publication by Ger recording the medals that have been awarded by the Irish army.

Speaking at the launch – to which all are welcome – will be Siege of Jadotville author and defence analyst Declan Power, who wrote the intro to the book.

“The book is basically about medals from 1916, the War of Independence, the Emergency medals, and then the metals that commemorated 1966 – the 50th anniversary of the Easter Rising – and then 1971, the 50th anniversary of the War of Independence,” said retired An Post employee Ger.

“Go on further from that, and there was a garda medal brought out for the millennium. And since that there was a few different organisations brought out Jubilee medals for 50 years of existence – the Civil Defence, the Red Cross, and the gardaí.

“Then in 2016, the army brought out a medal and another 10 or 11 different groups brought out medals to commemorate their own organisations. So it’s photographs of those medals and explaining the different meaning of the colour of the ribbon and the different meaning of the inscription on the front and the reverse of the metals.”

A timely book, it ties in with the Decade of Centenaries currently ongoing as Ireland marks the various anniversaries associated with the foundation of the Irish state.

Ger has been doing the work and research for this book for approximately three year and it has required some degree of detective work on his part: “On some occasions I have had to travel miles to get pictures of the front and the back, because the back is as important as the front.”