First of all, my thanks to Mr Ó Cinneide for sharing his memories of his FCA service (HI 20.2, March/April 2012, Letters). All too few former members of the force have done so, and official records are quite sparse. The FCA did indeed wear a slightly shorter jacket than their regular army counterparts, but any hypothetical enemy would more probably have identified a captured FCA man by his 1937 pattern webbing and Lee-Enfield rifle.
As a member of the Mullingar FCA, Mr Ó Cinneide was in a happier position than the average reservist. From 1959 to 1979 the 20th FCA Battery had a regular parent unit (the 4th Field Artillery Regiment), which explains his access to equipment more modern than his counterpart in an FCA regiment. The original FCA artillery unit in Mullingar (the 46th Field Artillery Battery) was equipped with Civil War-vintage 18-pounders as recently as 1957, while in fact the 15th FCA Battery (also based in Mullingar) was equipped with pre-1914 75mm artillery on its formation in 1959.
—Yours etc.,
TERRY O’REILLY