Gentle, playful, cherished - that's how his family remember Pat Joe Walsh. They talk to Kathy Sheridan
Even in times of grief, and with a shop to run, Marian Walsh has the family dinner on the table at 12.30pm every day. The big, warm house in Carrickmacross that was home to Marian, Francy and their six children was a home from home for Francy's brother, Pat Joe, the gentle, shy and funny six-footer who farmed the 30 acres in the old home place out the road in Killanny. He wore a Pioneer pin all his life, loved the television soaps and his daily paper and always had the fire lit, the kettle whistling on the Aga and iced buns for visitors.
But life had dealt him some cruel blows. He was just 16 when he found his father dying in a field during the Big Snow of 1947. Having left school at 13 to help on the farm, he remained at home as his siblings moved out, leaving only his mother and himself.
He was 36 when he met 25-year-old Renee McCarroll - another farmer in the same parish - at Marian and Francy's wedding and they got married in 1970. But barely a year later Renee contracted cancer. Their son Patrick was only six months old when she died in March 1972. It was agreed that he would be reared with Renee's mother and Pat Joe would visit him there.
Pat Joe never remarried. This week, in the old home, his sister Phyllis found wedding presents that had never been opened.
When his mother died in 1976, he moved in with Marian and Francy and stayed for 12 years, sowing the memories of playfulness and gentleness - collecting the children from school on rainy days, soothing the fear out of riding lessons, making hoola-hoops - that made him such a cherished focus for a new generation.
The family was already in mourning following Francy's untimely death last year, after an attack by one of his pedigree bulls.
The needless manner of Pat Joe's terrible passing has left them almost beyond anger.
"He was the warmest of us all," says his niece, Marian McCaughley, the principal of Mount Sackville Secondary School in Chapelizod, Co Dublin, and one of several teachers in the extended family. "Nobody could fight with Pat Joe. On the day of his funeral we all sat around trying to remember if anyone had ever heard him utter a cross word - and no one could."
THE WALSH FAMILY are not the kind to seek confrontation or publicity. They had no role in the initial reporting of the case nor had they any particular interest in the status of Monaghan General Hospital. In fact, as a family, they had always gravitated towards Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital in Drogheda, says Marian Carew, a daughter of Francy and Marian.
But when a loved one was seriously ill, they assumed, like most people, that once they reached a hospital, they were "safe".
Pat Joe was taken to Drogheda hospital with a broken hip. Every day he was there he was surrounded by family and friends. But again, like many people, when the family start to think through the experiences, what they most clearly remember is a desperation for information on the one hand, while not wanting to "bother" or "upset" doctors or busy nurses on the other.
"Our brother Edward was ringing Drogheda every day and never once got to speak to a doctor. He started to feel he was a bit of a nuisance", says Marian Carew. "There was that same feeling all the time . . . It got to the stage that we'd built up a rapport with one of the men in Pat Joe's ward and we'd be asking him questions like 'did he walk today?'."
Despite daily phone calls they weren't given any details about his transfer to Monaghan. When his son Patrick rang last Thursday week, Pat Joe was already on his way by ambulance.
When they went to Monaghan General Hospital and asked a nurse where he was, a nurse answered their question by saying irritably: "He's after spilling a jug of water on us". They found him laid uncomfortably half way down a bed, sharing a ward with a teenage girl and three elderly women.
Edward even apologised for the water, says Deirdre, his sister. "Then a lovely nurse came in and just mopped it up. Pat Joe was so happy when he was propped up and comfortable that he even tried to whistle. He was so undemanding. I wonder if he'd kicked up more . . .", she says, pausing. "But he would never have kicked up."
They left at around 9.30pm. Just after midnight, Edward got a call to say Pat Joe had taken a turn and he was told to ring back in 30 minutes. By then Pat Joe was being described as "critical". He was moved to the intensive care unit, where the nurses were described by Deirdre as "brilliant". During the night, half a dozen family members met four doctors of varying seniority. "We were led to believe that the facilities were not available to us but that they'd tried all the hospitals for a bed and would continue to try," says Deirdre.
MEANWHILE, PAT JOE Walsh's life-blood was literally ebbing away; those standing at his bedside came away with blood-stained clothes. "We knew he was losing blood quicker than getting it . . ." But he seemed to recognise his family and was able to indicate when and where he had pain.
He lost his battle at 7.25am on Friday morning. The family, frozen with shock, went home to organise his funeral, at which the priest would describe him as "one of nature's gentlemen". Only later would they begin to wonder - why was he moved from Drogheda with a bleeding ulcer? Why wasn't he transferred from Monaghan at midnight, when concerns were first raised. With time, the questions multiplied.
HSE representatives visited, saying that they were "ashamed", admitting that "the system failed", while offering to act as "facilitators" for the family with the investigation. "But their role has to be seen as an issue of trust too - whether you would want to put your faith in people who have already let you down," says Marian McCaughley.
The Walshes were listening closely to the news this week when Bertie Ahern told the Dáil, "There are no protocols or directions from the HSE, the Tánaiste, myself or the Department to prevent a doctor acting in the best interests of a patient in a certain set of circumstances. If the doctors were present and were challenged, I am confident they will explain that . . ." The Walshes looked at one another in stunned silence. "What does that mean? Is he saying that we should have challenged the doctors? Is it our fault now?" asked Marian Walsh fearfully. The implication is another horror piled on horror.