99 years since his death in World War One, the memory of Pte John Mills lives on through medals presented to his late wife, Mary Mills, of Fermoy. A Memorial Plaque, a British War Medal and The Victory Medal was issued to him following the end of the war.

A member of the Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers' 7^th Battalion, Pte Mills was wounded while serving in Europe and was brought to England for treatment. He later died of his wounds on April 15, 1915, and was accorded a military funeral. He is interned in Hastings Cemetery, Sussex.

Born in Cork, John Mills was a resident in Fermoy where he trained locally in the military barracks prior to heading off to war. On Saturday, April 29, 1916, a newspaper report in the Hastings and St Leonards Observer carried the following report after his funeral in Sussex.

“Full military honours were accorded the funeral of Pte John Mills, Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers, last week. He came to Hastings with a batch of seriously wounded soldiers from the Front, and had been in the East Sussex Hospital only three days before death.

“The escort was supplied by the Devon Regiment. Owing to the fact that the deceased’s home was in Ireland, none of the family mourners were able to be present.”

According to local historian, Paudie McGrath, Pte Mills is commemorated in the book 'A Great Sacrifice', which contains the names of nearly 4,000 native Cork city and county people who lost their lives in the Great War.

The Memorial Plaque awarded to his next of kin shows Britannia bestowing a laurel crown on a rectangular tablet bearing the full name of the dead in raised lettering. In front stands the British Lion, with dolphins in the upper field, an oak branch lower right, and a lion cub clutching a fallen eagle in the exergue.

The inscription round the circumference reads 'HE DIED FOR FREEDOM AND HONOVR'. A parchment scroll was issued with each plaque giving the deceased's name and unit.

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