ZOZIMUS

THERE was a small frisson of amusement when the erudite Charles Lysaght described John Dillon, one of the great figures of Irish history, as “the kind of Irishman who it was difficult to get to the altar”, as there was a interlude of nine years between Dillon first meeting his wife Elizabeth Mathew and marrying her.

He was launching the 735-page book The Diary of Elizabeth Dillon, described as “the bard of the Dillons”, edited by Brendan O Cathaoir, and published by Currach Books.

Sadly, Brendan O Cathaoir was too ill to attend the launch of a project that was 10 years in the making.

“It has for Brendan been a labour of love, as he tells us, privileged to be in the company of such a beautiful mind,” said Charles Lysaght.

“He shared both her Irish nationalist ideals and her devotional Catholicism; mass in the college chapel was part of the many days he spent in the manuscript room reading and transcribing the diaries.”

‘Bessie’, as Elizabeth Dillon was known, was born in England, the daughter of a nephew of the temperance campaigner Fr Theobald Mathew.

After finally marrying Dillon she was involved in the great intrigues of the Parnell period, a piece of history largely forgotten in England until recent events in the House of Commons.

But she was also a woman of uncommon energy, as Victorian ladies often were, travelling all over Ireland and England encountering and befriending the great and the good and writing a graphic account of events and people that is still so readable today. Sadly, she died in 1907, at the age of just 42, giving birth to her stillborn seventh child.

“To paint a spectacle in words is very hard,” she wrote in one entry, but she left behind a voluminous social and historical document, which had to be cut by 100 pages just to get it into its present bulky form.

The event was attended by a distinguished group of academics and scholars, including James McGuire, editor of the Dictionary of National Biography; John Dillon, the TCD Greek scholar; John Blake Dillon, the son of Fine Gael’s John Dillon, of Co Roscommon; Bruce Bradley, editor of Studies, Frank O Cathaoir, a brother of the editor; Frank Callanan SC, author of a biography of another great Irish Party figure, Tim Healy; and various Dillon relatives from home and abroad.

Leaving ‘The Hub’ in Trinity College as the book launch wound down, we learned that Charles Lysaght’s earlier remarks about the difficulty of getting some Irishmen to the altar were regarded knowingly by one half of the room and ironically by the other half, aware that some weeks previously he and the lovely Alyson Gavin, had quietly married in Dublin.

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“WE can never rule out the significance of small events,” Presbyterian minister Purvis Campbell told a small, but significant congregation during his first visit to the Church of St Paul of the Cross, better known as Mount Argus, in Dublin.

Sitting in the front pew were Justice Minister Charlie Flanagan, the first Government minister to attend a service in memory of members of the Royal Irish Constabulary (RIC) and Dublin Metropolitan Police (DMP) “murdered” as one speaker put it bluntly during the War of Independence.

Comdt Caroline Burke, ADC to the Taoiseach, and Chief Supt Kevin Gralton, representing Garda Commissioner Drew Harris, also sat among the many descendants of police casualties from that era, and particularly those of 1919, who included Constables James McDonnell and Patrick Connell who were killed by Dan Breen’s Volunteers at Solo head beg, on January 21, 1919. The annual event is organised by the Harp Society, an association formed by ex-gardai to commemorate fallen comrades from all police forces.

Matt Gibbons told the grandchildren and greatgrandchildren of members of the RIC and DMP of the “steadfast loyalty” of their forebears in upholding the rule of law and how they had been “largely forgotten by official Ireland”. Not any more, it seems. “The policemen of yesteryear count for something, and their memory will receive due honour as we honour them today,” he said. “Amnesia is no longer an option.”

The interdenominational service opened with piper Joe O’Donnell playing Amazing Grace.