大象传媒

This story is taken from an interview with Derek McAuley, and has been added to the site with their permission. The author fully understands the site's terms and conditions. The interview was by Deirdre Donnelly, and transcription was by Bruce Logan.
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My father, Michael McAuley, better known as 鈥淢ac鈥�. He was one of 12 of a family, 7 boys and 5 girls who all lived at number 3 Alma place on the Foyle Rd. My father and 3 of his brothers were in WW1. The youngest one, being 15 at the time, Hubert, went against his mother鈥檚 wishes. So she had to go to the authorities to bring him back. But, being determined, when he was 16, his 16th birthday, he headed off to the first World War.
My father was a baker by trade, and anyway 鈥� he went to the Second World War along with 2 of his brothers. He was in the Royal Army Service Corps. During the Second World War, My mother and my 2 brothers, we were left.
Colin was the eldest, then Desmond, and myself, I was the youngest.
In 1941 my eldest brother took ill with Lukemia. It wasn鈥檛 called Lukemia then, it was called 鈥淕erm in the blood鈥�. It was a v rapid form of Lukemia. My Father, who was in France during the war, got Compassionate leave near the time for my brother to die. He got Compassionate leave for 2 weeks. For the first week he sat on the edge of the bed and watched his son die.
After the burial, in the second week, my Mother sat in a chair and my brother and myself stood beside her. Her crying, as my Father went down the Foyle road with his pack on his back and his Helmet bouncing up and down. I watched, not knowing if he was coming back or not.

When he went hack to the war he was injured and came home on disablement pension.
Before that time he was at Dunkirk, during the Evacuation of Dunkirk. The story goes that he was on a lorry and they were roaring out of the country. He gave this chap a pull-up onto the lorry. He happened to be a man from the Fountain estate in Derry, by the name of Sammy Larmer. They became great pals for the rest of the time he was in the war.
I was only a boy then at school. My Father came home and started work in Stevenson鈥檚 bakery. He was at work one day when Mr Larmer came to our home. He had a small brown paper bag with him. He said 鈥淚鈥檝e just come to see Mac鈥� as they had become good friends, and he had a wee memento for him that he鈥檇 found in the rubble in France.
When he opened the bag he took out a pewter crucifix with a Rose crown of thorns and a font for holy water at the bottom. This was a gift from a Protestant man from the Fountain to a Catholic man in the Foyle Road.

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