Death of Johanna Roice, mum of bomb victim Siobhan

THE death has taken place of Mrs. Johanna Roice, the mother of young Wexford woman Siobhán Roice who was one of 26 people brutally killed in the Dublin bombings of 1974.

Mrs. Roice of Thomas Street who was in her 90’s, passed away on Monday, March 26. She was predeceased by her husband Edward and is survived by her son Jim and daughters Aileen and Elizabeth and by her grandchildren and great-grandchildren and her extended family and friends.

Johanna’s daughter Siobhan was just 19 years old and working in the tax office in O’ Connell Street, Dublin having joined the Civil Service after leaving school. She was walking down Talbot Street to Connolly Station on a Friday evening to take a train home for the weekend when three bombs exploded without warning in the city centre.

When the Dublin train arrived in Wexford that night, Siobhan wasn’t on it. Her heartbroken family found her in the City Morgue in Store Street, Dublin the following day.

No-one was ever charged with the bombings. Over the years, members of Siobhan’s family campaigned for justice for the dead and answers to questions about alleged British collusion with loyalist paramilitaries in the atrocity which along with the Monaghan bombing on the same day, claimed the lives of a total of 33 people and injured many others.

Mrs. Roice passed away 44 years after the tragic death of her beloved daughter. Her funeral Mass took place in the Church of the Assumption, Bride Street last Wednesday with burial afterwards in St. Ibar’s Cemetery, Crosstown.

Her family asked that instead of flowers, donations could be made, if desired, to the Alzheimer’s Society.