Col Eoghan O' Neill:Colonel Eoghan Ó Néill, who has died aged 88, led the 34th Infantry Battalion on United Nations peacekeeping duties in the Congo.
And following his retirement from the Defence Forces he embarked on a second career, as director of Chomhdháil Náisiúnta na Gaeilge.
One Congo veteran remembered him as a "rather strict commanding officer". Another recalled a good officer who "kept morale going" but was a "stickler". His battalion was based in Kamina, in the centre of the Congo. After the Katangese rebel government seized Elizabethville airport, he was ordered to retake it. His men caught the rebels off guard, and the airport was taken without a shot being fired.
"Our officers and men were not aggressive," he wrote of the operation. "[ But] we had to make them understand that we knew our job and if the job had to be done we would have no compunction in shooting."
Reflecting in 2005 on the Irish presence in the Congo, he said that it served a purpose at the time but he had doubts about what followed. "Handing it over to Mobutu did not seem, in the long run, to serve any purpose either. He was as corrupt as anybody else."
Born in 1919, he was the son of Conn O'Neill and Mai Leonie (née Quirke) of Lisronagh House, Clonmel. His people had come to Tipperary from Ulster in the 11th century and he could trace his own family back to 1460. His grandfather, a Young Irelander, was at Ballingarry in 1848.
He and his two brothers were educated in Knockbeg College, Carlow, under the provisions of the Dr James Quinlan bursary. (Quinlan was physician to the tsar of Russia, having been captured as a member of Napoleon's army in Moscow). A keen athlete, he excelled at Latin and Greek. In his Leaving he secured first place in Ireland for Irish.
Commissioned in 1939, he served with the 7th, 9th and 13th battalions, rising through the ranks, before taking up duty at the Military College. There he was attached to the Infantry School, and after becoming lieutenant colonel, took charge of the Cadet School, where he remained for three years. During that period he was sent to the Congo.
In 1962, after a stint with the chief-of-staff branch, he took charge of the Command and Staff School. By now a colonel, he took voluntary retirement in October 1966, remaining in the Reserve until he retired in 1979.
Joining an chomhdháil, Ó Néill put his military experience to good use; his experience in the education of army officers proved invaluable in training a new team of staff members. He lobbied government ministers in relation to language policy, and sought to enhance the role of Irish in broadcasting, education and in religion. He had a particular interest in the development of local folk schools such as Éigse Uladh, Éigse Charna and Éigse Chill Chainningh.
Much of the work of an chomhdháil was taken up with the promotion of Irish language literature. Other key areas of work were the promotion of An Fáinne Nua and Comórtas Ghlór na nGael.
Le linn na seachtain seo caite, cuimhnigh Seán Ó Cuirreáin, An Coimisinéar Teanga, ar an t-am a chaith sé ag obair mar oifigeach caidreamh poiblí na comhdhála. "Is ag ócáidí ar nós searmanas bhronnta na nduaiseanna ag Glór na nGael a thiocfadh cumas eagraithe agus riaracháin an Chol Uí Neill chun tosaigh. Uachtarán na hÉireann, mar phatrún an chomórtais, ag bronnadh na nduaiseanna agus gach céim agus casadh sa tsearmanais ullmhaithe agus pleanáilte go cruinn agus go coinsiasach. Bhíodh ord reatha na n-ócáidí chomh socraithe le haon fheachtas míleata agus fios ag gach duine cén cúram go díreach a bhí orthu le cinntiú nach mbeadh aon lúb ar lár i gceist."
A contributer to An Cosantóir, the journal of the Defence Forces, Ó Néill also wrote on local history. His Gleann an Óir: ar thóir na Staire agus na Litríochta in Oirthear Mumhan agus i nDeisceart Laighean (1988) is in the main an account of his own people in south Tipperary.
In 1951 he married Eileen Halstead who, with their daughter Anne and sons Conn and Eoghan, survives him.
Eoghan Ó Néill: born October 10th, 1919; died December 7th, 2007