Memories and a memento as Senator Mitchell is honoured

Minutes after Senator George Mitchell received an honorary doctorate from Trinity College Dublin, he was approached by a small, elderly woman who wanted to present him with something.

Her name was Mrs Mary Traynor, and what she gave him was a memorial card for her son, Eddie, who was murdered by loyalist gunmen in a north Belfast pub last New Year's Eve.

Mrs Traynor had taken the train down from Belfast to see the senator honoured, having first written to him during the last days of the Stormont talks. "I wanted to thank him for taking the time to acknowledge my letter, which he did two days before Good Friday, as busy as he was."

The Provost of TCD, Dr Thomas Mitchell, had earlier paid tribute at the conferring to "a statesman, peace-maker and friend of Ireland" who had made a "truly enormous contribution to this country".

Then Mr Mitchell spoke emotionally of what the Belfast Agreement meant to him.

He recalled first the moment on October 16th last year when he held his new-born son in a New York hospital.

"As powerful and flexible as the English language is, I could not find words to express what I felt then," he said. But he had experienced a similar feeling on the late afternoon of Good Friday "when I had the privilege to announce that the participants had reached agreement".

On some of the "many lonely flights" across the Atlantic, he had wondered about the destinies of his son and of the 61 babies born on the same day in Northern Ireland if, by an accident of fate, their birthplaces had been exchanged.

And he spoke of the accident of fate which had once befallen his family.

His father's parents were Kilroys from Ireland, but after his grandmother died the children were placed in a Boston orphanage, from where they were adopted by Lebanese parents who took the "American-sounding" surname of Mitchell.

"As much as I regret to say so," he said, looking at the Provost, "we are not related."

However, he said he was determined to take the advice of someone who had once urged him to spend time in Ireland looking up his roots. "I am going to come back here because I feel the Irish blood coursing through my veins now."

These last words had a special poignancy for Mrs Traynor. "My son was a genealogist as well as a housing officer. He searched for many Irish families in America and Australia."

And perhaps also inspired by Mr Mitchell's reminiscences, she produced from her handbag a picture of herself and her son at his christening. "I didn't think when I was baptising him that I'd have to bury him at 31."

Mr Mitchell later went to University College Dublin, where he answered questions from students.