‘Mary Lou’s Mountbatten apology will be welcomed’
SINN FÉIN leader Mary Lou McDonald has apologised for the IRA assassination of the Earl Mountbatten of Burma during a visit to Classiebawn Castle in Mullaghmore over 40 years ago. And the castle’s current resident has said the apology will be welcomed by the families of those killed that day. In an interview on Sunday, she described the murder of Lord Mountbatten – who died along with 14-year-old Nicholas Knatchbull, the dowager Lady Brabourne and 15-yearold Paul Maxwell from Enniskillen, who worked as a boatboy for Lord Mountbatten – when the IRA exploded a bomb on his boat off Mullaghmore Head on August 27, 1979, as “heartbreaking”.
Her comments came the day after a funeral service was held for Prince Philip, Lord Mountbatten’s nephew, at Windsor Castle on Saturday.
When asked on Times Radio whether she would apologise to the Prince of Wales over the assassination – which her predecessor Gerry Adams reportedly refused to do – she said: “The army and the armed forces associated with Prince Charles carried out many, many violent actions on our island.”
But she added: “And I can say of course I am sorry that that happened, of course that is heartbreaking. And my job, and I think Prince Charles and others would absolutely appreciate this, is to lead from the front now in these times.
“And I believe it is all of our jobs to ensure that no other child, no other family, irrespective of who they are, face the kind of trauma and heartbreak that was all too common on all sides on this island and beyond. I’m happy to reiterate that at the time and on the weekend that your Queen buried her beloved husband.” Ms McDonald also told how Prince Charles had written her a “lovely letter” last year after she fell ill with Covid-19, and said: “I thought that was most decent and kind of him.”
She went on: “Whereas we are not obviously monarchists. We’re republicans, that’s our political view. We have the utmost respect for that family and for who they are and what they represent to British people and indeed to unionists and loyalists here.
“And interestingly, the conversations that you have when people like us meet people like the Royal Family are not conversations around recriminations or there’s never a demand for apologies.”
In another interview on Monday, she said her comments did not mark a change in position of expressing sorrow for all deaths during the Troubles. She said the comments were a reiteration of her “sorry and sadness” for all deaths and injuries inflicted during the Northern Ireland conflict. “I have never any difficulty whatsoever in expressing my profound sorrow and sadness for all death and injury in the course of the conflict,” she said. “That’s been my position, it’s a long-established position. And I have to say it wasn’t newsworthy that I reiterated that yesterday.”
Lord Mountbatten’s Sligo base was Classiebawn Castle in Mullaghmore. Speaking to the Sligo Weekender this week, the castle’s current resident, Caroline Devine, said: “I met Mary Lou a few years ago at an Armistice Day event at Sligo Grammar School. She and I share close friends from her early life in Dublin. She told me she would love to visit Classiebawn. Needless to say the apology was a long time coming and will be gratefully received by the Maxwell family and the Royal Family.”
One of the 30 mourners at Prince Philip’s funeral on Saturday was the Countess Mountbatten of Burma, wife of Norton Knatchbull, who is the 3rd Earl Mountbatten of Burma and a grandson of Lord Mountbatten. Caroline Devine attended the Earl and Countess’s wedding in October 1979. Caroline said: “I was delighted to see the Countess Mountbatten in attendance, especially when I was so privileged to have attended her wedding two months after the assassination in 1979.
“At the end of the day the Royal Family are no different to anyone else and the funeral was in keeping with everyone else’s funerals. That is exactly what Prince Philip would have wanted. He never stole the limelight from Queen Elizabeth. “He carved out his own projects for the good of his fellow man, as did his uncle the late Earl Mountbatten. In 1975, Prince Philip said: ‘If you have ability, it does not matter if you are a road sweeper. You are entitled to an education.’ As a follow-up to that, he set up the Duke of Edinburgh Awards.”