The Ghost of the Trenches

(as told by Martha Duffy)

Martha was reared with her brothers and sisters on a small farm in Faughanvale. When they were children coming home from school on the cold winter days, their mother would have a towel warming by the fire to rub heat back into frozen hands and toes.

When the children grew into adults, sadly the mother died. Eddie, her son went off to fight in the Great War of 1914-18. He was sent to the front where the fighting was fiercest. One bitterly cold day he and other soldiers were pinned down in the trench with very heavy shellfire bursting all around.

During a lull in the fire Eddie looked up to see his mother standing with outstretched arms holding a towel for him to warm his hands on. As he instinctively moved towards her, a shell burst with a great explosion just where Eddie had been standing. Although hurt with shrapnel he was nursed back to health and returned home.

He always maintained that it was the ghost of his dead mother who saved his life.