Madam, - I was very interested in Paddy Agnew's Letter From Rome in your edition of February 27th. He wrote in some detail about the Irish College there. He wrote:
"Not for nothing does the College house the heart of the Liberator himself, Daniel O'Connell."
The Irish College in Rome (1989) by John J Hanly says: "The heart of Daniel O'Connell reposed for eight years in the crypt beneath the high altar until Benzoni's fine monument, commissioned by Charles Bianconi, was set into the side wall of the church in 1855. This is the monument now admired by so many in the cloister of the present College".
I had completed paying my respects at the monument, some years ago, when I met a clerical student, who took me on a tour of the rest of the college. He was from Mayo like myself.
As I completed my visit, he said, with some embarrassment, that though they usually did not enlighten visitors, he felt he should tell me that, in fact, the heart of Daniel O'Donnell was not where the plaque on the wall said it was.
According to him, when the College moved from the Church of St Agatha in 1925-6, to the present site on the Via S.S. Quattro, the valuable treasury containing the heart went missing, and the heart with it.
Neither was ever recovered. - Yours, etc.,
TONY JORDAN,
Gilford Road,
Dublin 4.