HOPES HAVE been expressed that US president Barack Obama would visit the Daniel O’Connell memorial in Dublin’s Glasnevin Cemetery during his visit to Ireland.
“It would be very significant if he did,” said Minister for Heritage Jimmy Deenihan yesterday. “I would welcome it and recommend it.”
There has been speculation that Mr Obama will stop off at the O’Connell memorial, possibly on his way in from Dublin airport, to acknowledge the inspirational influence the Liberator had on former slave Frederick Douglass during his stay in Ireland in the mid-1800s. Douglass visited Ireland in 1845, as part of a two-year lecture tour following the publication of his book, Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass an American Slave.
Mr Deenihan told journalists that all he knew about Mr Obama’s itinerary was that the Cabinet might possibly meet him in Dublin’s O’Connell Street. “He will be here only for a day.”
The possibility of Mr Obama’s visit to the monument added a heightened sense of expectation to yesterday’s O’Connell commemoration at the cemetery, which was attended by the Minister.
Chairman of Glasnevin Trust John Green noted the visit by Douglass’s great-great-granddaughter Nettie Douglass and her son, Kenneth B Morris, to lay a wreath at the O’Connell crypt last week.
“It is hard to put into words how moved they were by their visit here, particularly the 10 minutes they spent in the crypt on their own,” said Mr Green.
Addressing the attendance, Mr Deenihan said that not only was O’Connell a son of an ancient Kerry family, a noted barrister, and former lord mayor of Dublin, but he was the foremost constitutional parliamentarian of his age.
“His mass peaceful mobilisation of the Irish people into the parliamentary process, resulting in Catholic Emancipation, was a template followed by many in later years,” he added.
The Minister said that while time had distanced us from the impact he had on his age, O’Connell’s importance can be judged from those whom he had influenced. William Gladstone, for instance, had described him “as the greatest popular leader the world has ever seen”.
Mr Deenihan said that perhaps the most eloquent comment on his life came from obscure Gaelic poet Séamus MacCuirtin, from Clare, who wrote of the Liberator: “The gentle O’Connell, the peerless leader/Who achieved the highest renown/A good man of Ireland who won every honour/Without a wound, without destruction, without spilling blood.”
The Minister, along with other dignitaries, laid wreaths.
Sgt Anthony Byrne played laments on the bagpipes and prayers were recited by Msgr Lorcan O’Brien. The attendance also included Geoffrey O’Connell, a descendant of the Liberator, and representatives of O’Connell Schools, Dublin.