Hugo MacNeill (Irish soldier)
Lieutenant General Hugo MacNeill was a twentieth-century Irish soldier.
Life and military career
Born in 1900, MacNeill was an officer of the National Army during the Irish Civil War. In 1923 he was promoted to Colonel after an intelligence windfall allowed him to prevent a series of Irish Republican Army (IRA) attacks in Dublin. In 1924 he was promoted to Major General and appointed assistant Chief of Staff of the National Army. In 1926 MacNeill attended the US Army Command and Staff Course in Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. He was appointed commander of the Irish Army's Second Division during The Emergency.
He was promoted to Lieutenant General in 1946, although without appointment.
MacNeill's main activity following retirement was the co-ordination of An Tostal festivals in the 1950s. He died in 1963.
Controversies
He approached the German Legation in 1940 without apparent authorisation. Anti-British and a heavy drinker, he was academically very bright but lacked common sense. He accepted the covert aid of the British Army in training his division, notably in the establishment of the intensive "battle school" at Gormanston and the secret training of selected Irish troops in commando techniques in Northern Ireland.
References
- An Cosantóir
- John P Duggan, A History of the Irish Army, 1991
- Eunan O'Halpin, Defending Ireland, Oxford University Press, 1999