The Canal Bridge: A Novel of Ireland, Love, and the First World War

by Tom Phelan

  Kilmainham Jail: Dublin jail where the rebels of 1916 were executed.

  king’s shilling: during the Napoleonic Wars when “press gangs” touched a man’s flesh with a shilling, that man was “inducted” (pressed) into the king’s army or navy. Hence, glass bottoms became common in pewter mugs so the drinker could see if a shilling had been dropped in to make contact with his lips.

  lashings: an overabundance.

  lepping: leaping.

  Liffey: river on which the city of Dublin is built.

  Lord Nelson: 121-foot pillar with 13-foot statue of Horatio Nelson, the hero of the 1805 Battle of Trafalgar, on top, in O’Connell Street, Dublin; it was destroyed by militant Irish republicans in 1966.

  Marbra: corruption of the name of the County Laois town of Maryborough; now called Portlaoise.

  mare’s nest: extraordinarily confused situation.

  May altar: in the Catholic Church, May is the month of Mary, mother of Jesus. In May, in many Irish homes, a table was covered with a white cloth on which a statue of Mary was placed and surrounded with spring flowers; the family prayed at the altar.

  McCormick, Cyrus: American inventor (1809−1884) who refined a primitive mechanical reaper. He patented his reaper in 1834 and changed the production of grain worldwide.

  Mercator’s projection: Gerardus Mercator (1512−1594) was a Belgian cartographer. His “projection,” presented in 1569, was a huge step forward in the attempt to proportionally represent the map of the world on a flat surface.

  nappy: diaper.

  Newfoundlanders: the First Battalion of the Newfoundland Regiment, which was all but wiped out in the first half hour of the Battle of the Somme on July 1, 1916. A baying caribou dominates their memorial park in Beaumont-Hamel in Picardy, France.

  Ocean Villas: soldiers’ pronunciation of Auchonvillers, tiny village in Picardy, France, scene of great death and destruction during the War.

  Oisín: poet and traveler in mythological times; son of Fionn Mac Cumhail (Finn McCool), a mythical giant.

  Old Contemptibles: Kaiser Wilhelm’s dismissive description of the British regular army that was rushed to Europe in 1914 to halt the German advance toward France.

  orderly room: room in military barracks used for administrative purposes.

  Owen, Wilfred: soldier-poet (1893−1918) who spent time in Craiglockhart Hospital in Edinburgh. He returned to the trenches and was killed on the last day of the war. (He may have been the soldier, Owen, who briefly joined Matthias Wrenn in a shell hole with a dead horse.)

  pancakes, Shrove Tuesday: pancakes were a culinary treat on Shrove Tuesday, the eve of the penitential season of Lent.

  Pearse, Padraig: Pearse (1879−1916), leader of the Easter Rebellion in Dublin in 1916; executed in Kilmainham Jail.

  peasonlee: corruption of the French for dandelion, pissenlit (piss in the bed). In Ireland the dandelion, which has diuretic properties, is also called piss-the-bed.

  Peggy’s Leg: bar of caramel.

  Pine Haven Hospital: this fictitious hospital is based on Craiglockhart Hospital in Edinburgh, which treated mentally distressed soldiers. See Owen, Wilfred above.

  piss on me hanky: a wet handkerchief over the face, to some degree, kept the poison gas used in World War I from getting to the lungs. Soldiers resorted to urine when water was unavailable.

  quare: queer, meaning odd.

  racked my hair: combed my hair.

  railway sleepers: railway ties.

  Redmond, Mister: John Redmond (1856−1918), leader of the Irish M.P.’s. in Westminster, encouraged young Irishmen to join the British army when World War I broke out. He believed Irish support of England would ensure Ireland’s home rule at the end of the European hostilities.

  Russo: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712−1778), philosopher born in Geneva.

  Sackville Street: former name of O’Connell Street in Dublin.

  Sarajevo: Bosnian city where the visiting Archduke Franz Ferdinand, heir to the Austrian Empire, was assassinated on June 28, 1914. His murder sparked World War I.

  scald: featherless baby bird.

  scut: a troublesome boy.

  scuttered: in an alcoholic stupor.

  shagging: milder expletive than “fecking”; has no sexual overtones.

  shilling: twelve pennies; there were 20 shillings in a pound, which was worth 240 pennies. In 1915 a shilling equaled 24 U.S. cents.

  singletree: a wooden bar with a hook in the center of one side for attaching to a farm implement, and with hooks near the ends of the other side for attachment to a horse’s traces; the horse walked in a frame composed of the singletree, two traces and the collar. See draughts.

  sloe: smaller than a blueberry, this wild plum grows on the blackthorn bush; it is enticingly plump and purple, has a large pit, and is extremely bitter. Used in the drink “sloe gin fizz.”

  Spanish ale: codeword used in the 1600s for military assistance from Spain to Ireland; from “Roísín Dubh” (Dark Rose, meaning Ireland), translated from the Gaelic as “My Dark Rosaleen” by James Clarence Mangan.

  sword in the rock: Excalibur, sword pulled out of a rock by the boy who eventually became King Arthur.

  thicker than a double ditch: very, very stupid.

  Tilley lamp: named after its inventor John Tilley, it uses pressurized fuel and burns much brighter than conventional oil lamps.

  Tipperary side: describes a peaked cap worn at an angle, projecting a devil-may-care attitude.

  Tír na nÓg: the land of youth; never-never land; pronounced “teer na nogue.”

  twelve bastards: the Easter rebels of 1916 in Dublin.

  War is hell: saying attributed to the American Civil War general William Tecumseh Sherman.

  wheenshie: tiny.

  whist: be quiet!

  wicket gate: usually built into a wall beside a large gate, it allows for easy, one-person entry without the trouble of opening the larger gate.

  Wipers: British army soldiers’ mispronunciation of Ypres (“eep”).

  Woodbines: strong cigarettes nicknamed “Coffin Nails.”

  workhouse: established throughout Ireland beginning in 1838, the workhouse offered minimal relief and horrifying living conditions for the destitute.

  Selected Bibliography

  Arthur, Max. Forgotten Voices of the Great War: A New History of WWI in the Words of the Men and Women Who Were There. London: Ebury, 2003.

  Barker, Pat. The Regeneration Trilogy: Regeneration, The Eye in the Door, The Ghost Road. London: Viking, 1996.

  Brittain, Vera. Testament of Youth. New York: Seaview, 1980.

  Brooke, Rupert. The Collected Poems of Rupert Brooke. New York: Dodd, Mead, 1980.

  Cave, Nigel. Hill 60. London: Leo Cooper, 1998.

  Cuttell, Barry. One Day on the Somme: 1st July 1916. Peterborough: GMS Enterprises, 1998.

  Dungan, Myles. Irish Voices from the Great War. Dublin: Irish Academic Press, 1995.

  ———. They Shall Grow Not Old: Irish Soldiers and the Great War. Dublin: Four Courts, 1997.

  Edwards, Ruth Dudley. Patrick Pearse: The Triumph of Failure. Dublin: Poolbeg Press, 1990.

  Faulks, Sebastian. Birdsong. London: Hutchinson, 1993.

  Graves, Robert. Good-bye to All That. Rev. 2nd ed. Garden City, New York: Doubleday, 1957.

  Gregory, Adrian, and Senia Pašeta, eds. Ireland and the Great War: “A War to Unite Us All”?. Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2002.

  Holt, Tonie, and Valmai Holt. Major and Mrs. Holt’s Battlefield Guide to the Ypres Salient. London: Cooper, 1997.

  Jeffery, Keith. Ireland and the Great War. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000.

  Johnstone, Tom. Orange, Green and Khaki: The Story of the Irish Regiments in the Great War, 1914-18. Dublin: Gill and Macmillan, 1992.

  Keegan, John. The First World War. New York: Knopf, 1999.

  Lewis, C. C., ed. The Collected Poems of Wilfred Owen. New York: New Directions, 1963.

  MacDonald, Lyn.
1914-1918: Voices and Images of the Great War. London: Penguin, 1991.

  ———. They Called It Passchendaele. London: Penguin, 1993.

  McGuinness, Frank. Observe the Sons of Ulster Marching Towards the Somme. London: Faber and Faber, 1986.

  Middlebrook, Martin. The First Day on the Somme: 1 July 1916. London: Penguin, 1984.

  O’Shea, Stephen. Back to the Front: An Accidental Historian Walks the Trenches of World War I. New York: Robson, 1998.

  Prior, Robin, and Trevor Wilson. Passchendaele: The Untold Story. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1996.

  Reed, Paul. Walking the Somme. London: Pen and Sword, 1997.

  Sassoon, Siegfried. Memoirs of an Infantry Officer. London: Faber and Faber, 2000.

  ———. The War Poems. London: Faber and Faber, 1983.

  Simkins, Peter. Chronicles of the Great War: The Western Front 1914-1918. London: Bhb Distribution, 1997.

  Stedman, Michael. Guillemont. London: Pen and Sword, 1997.

  Trumbo, Dalton. Johnny Got His Gun. New York, Citadel Press: 1991.

  Tuchman, Barbara W. The Guns of August. New York: Ballantine, 1994.