The Refugees of Kashia, 1st Infantry Group, Congo 1961
There are some lines in an old military unit history that stop you.
Not because they describe a battle, an ambush or a famous military operation, but because in one short sentence they tell you what peacekeeping actually looked like on the ground.
In the history of the 1st Infantry Group in the Congo in 1961, one such line appears almost casually:
“At night time our patrols had to literally step over hundreds of sleeping men, women and children.”
It is difficult to read that sentence more than sixty years later without picturing the scene.
Irish soldiers moving through the darkness at Kashia, weapons carried as part of an operational patrol, but watching every step because the ground around them was filled with families who had nowhere else to sleep.
This was not the Ireland of barracks, training areas or familiar roads.
This was South Kasai in the Congo.
The 1st Infantry Group had deployed to the Congo as part of the United Nations mission in 1961. One of its principal tasks in South Kasai was the maintenance of peace in an area suffering political instability, tribal conflict, shortages of food and large movements of displaced people.
Among the Group's responsibilities were the prevention of fighting between rival groups, protection of refugees, protection of UN food-relief personnel and keeping important supply routes open.
For the men on the ground, however, those official descriptions quickly became something much more personal.
At Kashia, a Presbyterian mission station was being used as one of the Irish positions. Compared with some of the other posts occupied by the Group, it was considered relatively pleasant. The unit history describes green grass, palm trees and even enough room for some outdoor recreation. A garrison of approximately 50 all ranks from A Company was stationed there.
But circumstances changed rapidly.
A major gathering known as the Pan-Kanioka Conference was taking place at Kashia. Tribal chiefs and their entourages began arriving at all hours. The original account paints an extraordinary picture: chiefs accompanied by litter bearers, cymbal players, bell ringers and men waving fans.
At the same time another group of people began arriving.
Refugees.
And they came in large numbers.
The unit history records that the refugees soon became one of the garrison's biggest problems — not because they were considered a threat, but because they needed help.
They had to be reassured.
They had to be fed.
And they had to be helped onwards.
Two truckloads of refugee food arrived and the Irish garrison took responsibility for rationing it out.
The camp itself presented another difficulty.
Unlike a modern secure military base with defined boundaries, fences, lighting and controlled entry points, the Irish position sat in the middle of the mission. There was no clear perimeter separating soldiers, conference delegates, local people and refugees.
During the day, troops were trying to maintain some order around their position.
Then night fell.
Hundreds of displaced men, women and children simply lay down wherever they could find somewhere to sleep.
For the Irish night patrols there was no neat patrol route.
They walked among them.
The account written by the soldiers themselves says they were literally stepping over sleeping families as they carried out their duties.
There Was No Rest After Night Duty
There is another detail veterans will recognise immediately.
Normally, soldiers coming off night duty would expect some period of rest.
At Kashia that luxury disappeared.
The operational situation, the refugee population and the conference placed such demands on the small garrison that officers and senior NCOs were required to take their own two-hour turns on night patrol.
The unit history states plainly that they could no longer afford the luxury of personnel resting after night duty.
That one detail says much about the pressure being placed on a relatively small body of troops.
Elsewhere in South Kasai the same manpower problem appears repeatedly.
Irish soldiers were guarding camps, escorting trains carrying refugees, conducting road patrols, collecting water and rations, protecting airstrips and responding to outbreaks of tribal violence.
Train guards could remain away for 48 hours because trains frequently failed to run to timetable.
When duties overlapped, soldiers who had just completed guard duty sometimes found themselves immediately sent out again on water or ration details.
For anyone who has served overseas, there is something very familiar about that part of the story.
The operation might be described at headquarters level in terms of sectors, patrols, supply lines and tasks.
At ground level it usually becomes much simpler.
Who is on guard?
Who is getting the water?
Who is escorting the convoy?
Who hasn't slept?
And who needs help?
The People Behind the Mission
The refugee story at Kashia matters because it shows another side of Ireland's early involvement in UN peacekeeping.
The soldiers were armed.
The area could be dangerous.
Only shortly before the refugee crisis at Kashia, Irish troops had been involved in a tense confrontation at Lusuka where a local sergeant threatened to order his men to open fire on the UN patrol. The confrontation was defused without shots being fired.
Yet within the same operational environment the soldiers were distributing food and trying to reassure frightened families.
That combination — soldier, peacekeeper and humanitarian presence — would become familiar to generations of Irish Defence Forces personnel who later served in Cyprus, Lebanon, the Middle East, Africa and elsewhere.
But in 1961 Ireland's experience of overseas peacekeeping was still very new.
These men were learning it as they went.
There was no sophisticated humanitarian infrastructure surrounding them.
There were no fleets of purpose-built protected vehicles.
Communications, transport and manpower were frequently inadequate.
Much of the job came down to the professionalism and judgement of relatively junior commanders, NCOs and soldiers dealing with whatever appeared in front of them.
And at Kashia, what appeared in front of them were hundreds of people escaping fear and instability.
A Different Way to Remember the Congo
When we look at old Congo photographs today, we tend to see the obvious things.
The UN badge.
The uniforms.
The vehicles.
The weapons.
Young Irish soldiers standing in a country thousands of miles from home.
Families may have a photograph in a drawer, an overseas medal in a box or perhaps a story remembered from a father or grandfather who rarely spoke in any great detail about what happened.
The official unit history allows us to look behind those photographs.
Somewhere in Kashia in 1961, an Irish soldier began another night patrol.
Around him were hundreds of strangers.
Men.
Women.
Children.
Families who had lost the security of their homes and who, for that night at least, had found enough safety beside a United Nations position to lie down and sleep.
The Irish patrol continued through them.
Carefully.
Quietly.
Watching the darkness — and watching where they placed their boots.
That is also part of the story of the Irish Defence Forces in the Congo.
And it deserves to be remembered.
IDFVN UNIT HISTORY SERIES
The Men Behind the Blue Beret — 1st Infantry Group, Congo 1961
Based on the original 1st Infantry Group Unit History held in the Military Archives.