Vincent P Martin (Green Party) | Oireachtas source

Cuirim fáilte roimh an Aire Stáit chuig an Seanad. Tá mé ag lorg an scéal is déanaí maidir leis na pleananna do chathaoir Sheáin Uí Dhubhaí, an Finín mór le rá, a thabhairt do chontae Chill Dara. Deirtear gur scríobh Seán a chuid cuimhní cinn agus é ina shuí sa chathair sin. D'fhill sé go dtí a chontae dúchais 100 bliain ó shin agus tá candle ar leith ag muintir Bhaile Eoin, Kill, agus muintir Chontae Chill Dara agus muintir na hÉireann ar fad freisin, le John Devoy.

On 17 April 1876, a whaling ship, the Catalpa, spirited away six Fenian prisoners from a desolate prison on the other side of the world, in Fremantle, Western Australia. The jailbreakers arrived in New York city on 19 August 1876. There were wild celebrations there and back home in Ireland. Professor Joe Lee called it one of the greatest prison escapes of world history. It was the Fenian John Devoy from County Kildare, who was in exile in New York and who had the great help of John Boyle O'Reilly of Dowth, County Meath, who secured the approval of Clan na Gael in America to plan and undertake this audacious jailbreak. Incredibly, they pulled it off with no loss of life. For many, Clan na Gael effectively became Ireland's government in exile and John Devoy its leader. He was not afraid to depart from republican orthodoxy, as can be seen from his adoption of the new departure with Charles Stewart Parnell and Michael Davitt in 1878. The new departure was, of course, a model for the peace process in the North over a century later. Every Republican leader from James Connolly to Joseph Plunkett made a pilgrimage to Devoy in New York, and there is now a wonderful statue of him in the centre of Naas.

In 1924, when Devoy was 82 years old and in deteriorating health, Clan na Gael asked two Irishwomen from Castleblayney, Alice Carragher Comiskey and Lily Carragher, to look after Devoy and allow him to live with them in their apartment in Manhattan. In that apartment, Devoy wrote his memoirs, Recollections of an Irish Rebel, and did so in a chair bought for him. That chair has been in the continuous possession of the collateral descendants of Alice Comiskey since. Before she died, she gave it to her grand-nephew, Irish lawyer Frank MacGabhann. Frank and his family have kindly agreed and are willing to donate it to Ireland. The State, through Kildare County Council, has expressed a desire that the chair rightfully go to Devoy's birthplace in County Kildare. Mr. Frank MacGabhann hopes Kildare children will be able to sit in the same chair that this heroic Kildareperson sat in and from which he wrote his memoir. It would be appropriate to have a national, as well as a County Kildare, celebration to commemorate the historic Catalpa prison rescue, to be held in 2026. Right now, our concern is to get the chair home safely to Ireland.

Official preparations for the 150th anniversary of the Catalpa jail escape are beginning in Australia. Ideally, the two countries could do something together. One hundred years ago this year, in 1924, after many years in exile, the then elderly John Devoy returned to his beloved Kildare to visit friends and his childhood sweetheart, Mrs. Kilmurry. She and the people received him with open arms.It was very well received by W.T. Cosgrave's Free State Government. It would be wonderful to get this chair safely to Ireland. I ask for an update on its current status and whereabouts, and whether we are on course to have the chair back in its rightful place in Naas. John Devoy was very proud man from the Johnstown-Kill area of Kildare.