'The library men’ were 11 members of staff from Belfast Public Libraries who enlistedin various regiments of the British Army during WW1.
Between 1914 and 1919 over 200 letters were exchanged between these menand the Chief Librarian. The letters were written as a condition of employment, in orderto receive the half-pay that Belfast Public Libraries continued to pay to their staff duringwar service.
Through the unique collection of letters 'the library men' have given us their ownindividual accounts of the Great War, beginning with life in the training camps,the brutal reality of trench warfare right through to demobilisation and eventualreturn to civilian life.
Name
Born
Where they lived in the years before the war
Library
Robert James Alexander
Belfast
Edinburgh Street off the Lisburn Road
Lending Department, Belfast Central Library
William Brown
*killed in action*
Belfast
Lichfield Avenue, off the Bloomfield Road
Lending Department, Belfast Central Library
Matthew Butler
Dunstan Street, Springfield Road area, later Pisa Street, Grosvenor Road area.
Falls Road Branch Library
Thomas Coulson
South Shields, England
Springfield Parade, off the Springfield Road. During the war his pay goes to his sister in England and he doesn’t appear to come back to or have a link with Belfast again
Branch Manager Falls Road Branch Library
Joseph Frederick Eagleson
Greenville Road, off the Upper Beersbridge Road
Donegal Road Branch Library
Joseph Fitzsimons
Ballycastle
Clonard Gardens, near the Springfield Road/Falls Road
Samuel Freeland
Meadowbank Street, off the Lisburn Road
Museum and Art Gallery in Belfast Central Library
John McCausland
Dungannon (family where originally from Dunmullan, near Omagh)
Moorfield Street, off Ravenscroft Avenue.
Patrick O’Rourke
Co. Monaghan
Belfast Central Library
Alexander Stewart Roy
Canning Street, near North Queen Street
Oldpark Branch Library
Matthew Augustine Warren
River Terrace, near the Ormeau Road
Ballymacarrett Branch Library
Where they lived in the years before the war
George Hall Elliott
Newcastle-upon-Tyne
Holywood
John Bewick Goldsbrough
Fitzwilliam Street, off Lisburn Road
If you can supply any information about these men please email feedback@librariesni.org.uk
If you can supply any informationabout these men please email feedback@librariesni.org.uk