Posted by The men were hiding in the woods near Iron in the Aisne region of France. Brave locals secretly brought them food. However, with weather conditions worsening, they were taken in by the Chalandre and Logez families.
In those courageous civilians’ homes, they had evaded German capture, relying on local kindness to survive. But betrayal sealed their fate. Louis Bachelet, a Franco-Prussian War veteran in his sixties, informed the Germans of their whereabouts. This was not out of loyalty to the occupying forces but over a personal grudge.
His rival in love, a 16-year-old boy named Clovis Chalandre, had been seeing the same woman, Blanche Griselin, a young mother whose husband was at the front. In an act of jealousy, Bachelet’s tip off led German forces to the hidden men, who were captured, brutally beaten, and forced to dig their own graves.
The executions that followed were the largest of their kind on the Western Front. The soldiers stood together as the firing squad took aim. Vincent Chalandre, the French civilian who had sheltered them, was shot last.
His wife, Olympe, was sent to a German prison, where she remained until the war’s end, dying shortly after her release from tuberculosis meningitis. Clovis, haunted by the events, drank himself to death on Armistice Day in 1948.
For Ireland, the deaths of these men are part of a largely forgotten chapter in a war that saw Irish soldiers fighting in British uniform while nationalist sentiment was shifting toward republicanism. Despite making up only 10% of the British Expeditionary Force, Irishmen accounted for 40% of those executed (10 out of 24).
Their suffering underscored the contradictions of Ireland’s role in the war: while many fought in British ranks, Britain showed little mercy when Irishmen were accused of wrongdoing, whether on the Western Front or later, during the Easter Rising of 1916.
After the Rising, Germany attempted to court Irish prisoners of war, hoping to turn them against Britain. But despite anger at their treatment, few Irish soldiers defected. The story of the “Iron 12” remains a stark reminder of the often-overlooked sacrifices of Irish soldiers who found themselves trapped between two empires.
Private Denis Buckley
(34 years old, Irish).
Private Daniel Horgan
(19 years old, Irish).
Private Fred Innocent (English).
Private John Nash (Irish).
Lance Corporal James Moffatt (Irish)
Private George Howard (English). Private Terence Murphy (Irish) Private William Thompson (English) Private John Walsh (Irish) Private Matthew Wilson (36 years old, English) Lance Corporal John Stent (English) Monsieur Vincent Chalandre (French civilian) Source: https://westernfrontassociation.com/world-war-i-articles/the-iron-12-the-inauguration-of-the-iron-memorial-and-commemorative-plaques-in-guise
from Dublin City, Ireland
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Who Watches the Watchers? 