He rushed on like one possessed, never looking behind to see if his
comrades were following. A railway bank rose in front of him. He
cleared it, and went on, heedless of risks, toward a strong barricade
held by the Germans.
O’Leary paused at a little mound and looked around. In front of him
was a deadly machine gun, trained on the trench occupied by the second
company of Irish Guards. As already explained, their work was to
deceive the enemy and the maneuver had proved successful. Their rifle
fire had prevented the Germans from showing their faces, and they had
not seen that the British were racing toward them.
When O’Leary reached the mound the Germans became aware of their danger
and immediately prepared to turn the machine gun upon the advancing
First company. It was a critical moment. O’Leary did not hesitate; he
took deliberate aim with his rifle at the gun’s crew, five in number,
and one by one they dropped as his unerring finger pressed the trigger.
His bold move in a supremely dangerous situation had been successful.
The machine gun was his. The lives of his comrades were saved. For an
ordinary man this brave deed would have sufficed. But what O’Leary had
just performed whetted his appetite for more.
Another barricade farther on had caught his eye. With daredevil
audacity, he bounded toward it. The Germans then were prepared for him,
but he “got his blows in first,” and killed three more Germans. The two
remaining had no stomach for the “mad Irishman.” They promptly raised
their hands, and O’Leary secured them as his prisoners.
He confessed afterward that his second exploit was a hazardous one. He
had no bayonet at the time and had to trust solely to his marksmanship.
His rifle was loaded with ten rounds, and eight of the bullets found
a human billet. When the last two Germans surrendered he had no
ammunition left, and had they not been demoralized by his sudden and
audacious attack single-handed, the issue would have been different.
Sergeant O’Leary had killed eight Germans, captured a machine gun,
taken two Germans prisoner, and carried two strong positions, from
which the rest of the attacking party would have been heavily fired
upon. Some one has said that this exploit was thoroughly Irish in
method and execution, and that O’Leary deserves to rank as one of the
greatest heroes of modern warfare.
Describing what happened afterward, Company-Quartermaster-Sergeant J.
G. Lowry, of the Irish Guards, says:
“O’Leary came back from his killing as cool as if he had been for
a walk in the park, accompanied by two prisoners he had taken. He
probably saved the lives of the whole company. Had that machine gun
got slewed round, No. 1 Company might have been nearly wiped out. We
all quickly appreciated the value of O’Leary’s sprinting and crack
shooting, and when we were relieved that night, dog-tired as we were,
O’Leary had his arm nearly shaken off by his comrades.”
When on furlough O’Leary was fêted and cheered as no V.C. hero has
been. He received a splendid welcome in Cork and in his native
village. The greatest day in his life, however, was June 26, 1915,
when Londoners turned out in tens of thousands to acclaim him in the
streets. To honor him the London Irish organized a demonstration in
Hyde Park, at which over 60,000 persons were present. O’Leary drove
from the Strand to the Park in an open carriage, cheered all along
the route by an admiring throng. O’Leary was a proud man but, as he
afterward protested, he “didn’t know what all this fuss was about.
Faith, a bit of a shindy is no great matter at all, at all!”