At 1.25pm on May 7th, 1945 Germany surrendered to the Allies in the town of Reims in France, the headquarters of Allied supreme commander Dwight D Eisenhower.
The second World War in Europe was over. It had lasted six years and left much of the continent in ruins.
The news was greeted with jubilation across the world and even with some relief in vanquished Germany.
The news reached Ireland at 2pm via BBC radio. By 3pm students at Trinity College Dublin (TCD) climbed on to the roof of the building and raised the flags of the victors, the hammer and sickle of the Soviet Union, the French tricolour and at the top, and largest of all, the Union flag. This led to clashes between pro and anti-British students at the time.
The edition of The Irish Times published on Victory in Europe (VE) Day, on May 8th, 1945, proved to be one of the most celebrated in the history of the newspaper.
The editor, Bertie Smyllie, was strongly pro-British and bridled against the strict Irish government censorship of newspapers, especially The Irish Times which was minutely scrutinised by censors.
He got his revenge by rearranging the front page of the newspaper to make a V for victory sign using photographs.
[ Europe marks 80 years since VE day as Continent faces new security realitiesOpens in new window ]
“There was nothing the censor could do about it,” wrote Tony Gray, then a junior leader writer in the paper, in his book, Mr Smyllie, Sir. “In the final moment of victory, Smyllie had played the trump card.”
Three days after VE Day, Taoiseach Éamon de Valera lifted all censorship and Smyllie vented his spleen at the government’s censorship regime.
In an editorial published on May 12th, 1945 in The Irish Times, he wrote: “Ever since the war broke out, the Irish newspapers have been subjected to an official discipline in some respects as draconian and irrational as anything that ever was devised in the fertile brain of the late Joseph Goebbels. This newspaper was singled out for particular attention.“
Yet 80 years on, Smyllie’s revenge is better known for his famous front page than the years of censorship that preceded it.
