Childers's death commemorated

The motorcade travelling through the Wicklow hills with pennants flying the symbol of the President of Ireland was an emotional reminder of times past, Mrs Rita Childers, widow of the former president, Mr Erskine Childers, said yesterday.

Speaking in Roundwood after the President, Mrs McAleese, laid a wreath at the grave of Mr Childers to mark the 25th anniversary of his death, Mrs Childers said it was a very emotional occasion for her and her family.

She recalled how, seven months pregnant, she had been brought hill-walking to the Sugar Loaf Mountain and how her husband's love for his childhood home, Glendalough House, had him returning there on every occasion he could. Mrs Childers said he was so determined to get there that on one occasion they were "preceded in the Government car by a snowplough".

Earlier a piper had played a lament as the President laid the wreath at Derralossery cemetery in the presence of almost 200 people. The cemetery and ruined church are about two miles from Roundwood and close to Glendalough House, where the former president grew up with his cousins, the Bartons. It was there that his father was arrested by Free State soldiers and taken to Dublin to be tried and executed.

In her address, Mrs McAleese recalled how the late president had made a point of seeking out those who had taken part in the execution of his father and forgiving them, as his father had done moments before his execution. He was, she said, a man of reconciliation and a bridge-builder.

Mrs Childers was accompanied by her son, Erskine. Minister of State Mr Joe Jacob represented the Government at the reception at Aras an Tochar, Roundwood.