403 
So, with such history in their pockets, John and Denis were determined to find this long-buried local landmark. Their painstaking work took a giant leap forward, of course, with the four-day gorse fire in July. Suddenly, there it was, bold as brass and larger than life – ÉIRE.
Shortly after the fire revealed Bray Head’s dirt-covered little secret, local historian and artist Ray Cranley posted on Bray Open Forum about the find, and its World War 2 history, with 82 signs created around Ireland’s coastlines to let those nasty fighter planes know that they were
There were 83 such signs planned, although, for reasons unknown, Skerries was later crossed off that to-do list. Might have been even more Brits there than even here. From Ballagan Point to Ballycotton, from Clogher Head to Helvick Head, the message was clear – drop your bombs just a
For Denis and John, the fire was both a blessing and a curse. Suddenly, all their hard work was paying off, but once the Irish Air Corps posted a shot from above in August, the clickbait gold rush began.
Dennis Slattery & John Byrne
ong before Maguire & Patterson came bursting onto the scene, there 
was another duo hard at work up on Bray Head, trying to uncover that now internationally-famous WW2 Éire sign.
A childhood discovery for Denis, the pair had been studying Michael Kennedy’s 2008 book Guarding Neutral Ireland: The Coast Watching Service & Military Intelligence 1939 – 1945 – available on Amazon 
The corporals looking after our local sign were J. McDonnell and P. McNeill, whilst the volunteers were listed as E. Byrne, J. Cleary, W. Cleary, C. Craney, C. Davies, M. Doyle, J. Garvey, N. Mulvey, J. McDonnell, J. Naylor, J. Nolan, J. Salmon, W. Walsh and E. 
Wheeler.
crossing over neutral little Ireland.
little to the east, beyond that small stretch of Irish Sea.