Volume 7 1941~1945


Doc No.
Date
Subject

No. 446  NAI DFA Secretary's Files A2

Minute by Joseph P. Walshe on the release of interned Allied airmen
(Secret)

DUBLIN, 13 June 1944

The Taoiseach instructed me at 1.10 today to convey to Sir John Maffey that, in view of the personal representations of Lord Cranborne and himself, and as a friendly gesture, he has re-examined the situation with the Government and they have decided to give the remaining internees the benefit of the doubt and to regard them as coming within the principle announced by the Taoiseach in the Dáil on the 3rd November, 1943.1

I immediately so informed Mr. Norman Archer.

1 The date of the reference is incorrect and is to an answer given by de Valera in the Dáil on 4 November 1943 that 'Those [aircrews] which were engaged on operational flights were detained and their crews interned. The others were released.' Dáil Debates, vol. 91, col. 1555.