Patrick MacSwiney

Rev. Patrick J. MacSwiney

Rev. Patrick J. MacSwiney (frequently spelled McSwiney or MacSweeney,[1] 16 March 1885 – 16 November 1940) was an Irish Catholic priest, Gaelic scholar, antiquarian, historian, teacher, founder of the Kinsale Regional Museum, and benefactor of the people in the parishes in which he worked.

Life

Born and educated in Cork, he studied for the priesthood at St. Patrick's College, Maynooth and was ordained on 18 June 1911. Like all newly ordained Irish priests, he was sent to serve in Britain: he worked for three years in Liverpool. There, in addition to his pastoral duties, he studied at the university under the Celtic scholar Professor Kuno Meyer, and was awarded a master's degree in 1914.[2] He returned to Cork in 1914, became chaplain to Clifton Convalescent Home and convent in Montenotte, and was appointed to the staff of St Finbarr’s Seminary of Farranferris as professor of Irish, Greek and Latin. (In addition to these three languages, he was fluent in French, German and Italian).[2]

He joined the Gaelic League, was a member of the Cork Dramatic Society, which had been founded in 1908 by Daniel Corkery and Patrick MacSwiney’s cousin Terence MacSwiney. The priest was a founding member of the Cork Twenty Club, set up in 1915 by twenty citizens to provide a forum for local writers and artists;[3] he was on the council of the Munster Society of Arts, established after the civil war, as Daniel Corkery wrote: “for the purpose of developing and fostering the fine arts, now practically nonexistent in our midst”.[4]

Among his close friends were his cousins Annie, Mary and Terence MacSwiney, Daniel Corkery, William F.P. Stockley and his Munich wife Germaine, née Kolb, John Horgan, Arnold Bax, Aloys Fleischmann and Tilly Fleischmann. He studied the piano with the latter and gave lecture-recitals with her; he frequently delivered introductory talks before performances of Aloys Fleischmann’s Cathedral choir at broadcasts from the Honan Chapel of University College Cork.[5] He lectured regularly to the Cork Historical and Archaeological Society, the Cork Literary and Scientific Society, the Cork School of Art, the Cork Twenty Club, the Munster Society of Arts, and at the University.

In trouble with the bishop

Towards the end of 1922, MacSwiney’s time in Cork came to an abrupt end due to a conflict with his bishop, Dr Daniel Cohalan. Mary MacSwiney was the unwitting cause of her cousin being banished to act as chaplain to the workhouse and to a convent in the remote parish of Dunmanway.

During the civil war the MacSwiney sisters were on the republican, anti-Treaty side in opposition to the pro-Treaty Free State government. In the autumn of 1922, Patrick MacSwiney had, at Mary’s request, taken charge of a bag for a friend whose premises were in danger of being raided by government forces. MacSwiney did not examine the contents and deposited the bag in the Clifton convent of which he was chaplain, which was raided shortly afterwards by Free State government forces. The bag was found to contain ₤3,000. It was rumoured by government supporters that this was part of the ₤100,000 that had been robbed by republican forces from the Customs House in Dublin and that the priest had abused the nuns’ trust by hiding the stolen money in the convent on behalf of Mary MacSwiney.[6]

The incident led to his being removed from his clerical duties in Cork and sent to Dunmanway.[7]

Banished to Dunmanway

MacSwiney found his exile in Dunmanway difficult: he was now far from his friends, having to travel a considerable distance to hear their music, a luxury he could now only rarely afford. Sometimes duties were assigned to him which prevented him from attending concerts in Cork. On one such occasion, when he had been obliged to officiate at a funeral in the country, he had missed Tilly Fleischmann’s performance with the Brodsky Quartet. He wrote to her:[8]

"… you could not have felt my sense of loss: no musician could ever sound the depths of longing which a mere ignorant lover of music like I suffer from. I would have given kingdoms, yea the whole world (were I not alas, as I am, only a beggar) to have heard this music. To you and A[loys] music is a science, an ideal art, but to me it is the only thing in life that satisfies the gnawing of my soul-hunger, the terrible hunger of an untutored savage. Music alone makes me believe that even I have been moulded to ‘the image and likeness of God’ – as every Christian is supposed to believe."

His acute sense of deprivation illustrates the cultural stagnation of rural Ireland which Corkery spoke of when presenting the Munster Society of Arts, which Canon Sheehan had described with such feeling in My New Curate, and which George Russell had combated with his work for the cooperative movement and his journal The Irish Homestead. Like these three men, MacSwiney never faltered in his efforts to cultivate the wasteland. In Dunmanway he founded the West Cork Feis [festival].[9] and established a dramatic society, which put on numerous fine plays and cooperated with Fleischmann’s Bantry Choral Society.

Ministry in Kinsale

In December 1927 he was sent, to his great joy, to work as curate in Kinsale, County Cork, albeit under a very conservative archdeacon.[10]

The harbour town was at that period in an extremely depressed condition. Great damage had been done during the civil war, the fishing industry was dying, the railway line had been closed down, the British military bases had gone after Ireland won independence; there was great poverty, high unemployment and emigration and a sense of hopelessness.[11] MacSwiney spent the rest of his life working to alleviate the distress, his considerable organisational talents, his determination, dedication and kindly disposition leading to remarkable achievements.

The priest visited the poor regularly; he ministered to the orphans in the Convent of Mercy, putting on theatrical shows with them and taking them on annual excursions. He set about founding organisations for the development of the town: these included the Kinsale Development Association, the Kinsale Vocational Education Committee, the Creamery Committee, the Sea Fishing Association.

He worked for years for the establishment of a technical school which would offer vocational training to young people; it finally opened on 26 Sep 1940, less than seven weeks before his death. He campaigned for support for fishermen to revive the sea-fishing industry, which was in a dire state due to decline of stocks near the coast and lack of trawlers and adequate equipment.[12] He worked for the founding of a creamery, which opened on 1 Aug 1940,[13] for a housing scheme for the poor, for the provision of an adequate water supply for the town, for the promotion of tourism, for a new graveyard. He had much support from citizens such as Séamas Breathnach and Eamonn O'Neill, a local businessman and member of the Dáil who had brought electricity to Kinsale in 1920.[14]

MacSwiney aimed at creating a sense of civic pride among the townspeople, particularly the young, and campaigned to save historic buildings; he succeeded in having Desmond Castle classified as a national monument and restored,.[15] He promoted Irish through the Gaelic League, produced plays in English and Irish, was president of the local branch of the Gaelic Athletic Association GAA, he organised a pageant to commemorate the Battle of Kinsale of 1601. He researched the rich history of the town, published scholarly articles on the subject, established the Kinsale History Society, and worked for years with the Society collecting material in order to set up the Kinsale Regional Museum, which opened on 11 Sep 1940.[16]

He was indefatigable in his efforts to remove the causes of poverty, to enable people to lead lives worth living, to contend against indifference and lack of concern. His sources of strength were music and literature, conversations with friends on subjects close to his heart, and his scholarly research. He was to produce three fine essays on the history of Kinsale; his untimely death cut short both his historical research as well as his studies of the life and music of Chopin for a book he had planned to write.

Patrick J. MacSwiney c.1935

He died at Golding’s Private Hospital in Wellington Road, Cork on November 16, 1940, aged 55.[17]

MacSwiney's significance

The esteem in which he was held was manifested at his death. The Southern Star wrote that business in the town came to a standstill from the news of his death to the funeral.[18] Tributes came from all sections of the local community and from numerous organisations in Cork. He was buried in St Eltin’s Cemetery, the graveyard which he had helped to establish.

John J. Horgan wrote: “Those who were privileged to witness his last silent homecoming, when the men of Kinsale carried his remains through the twilight streets amidst a reverent and stricken people to the old Church where he had ministered so long, knew that this saintly cultured priest and true patriot had not worked in vain.”[19]

Terry Connolly said of him at a commemoration in 2012: “He found Kinsale on its knees and he raised it to its feet. The Vocational School, St Eltin’s Graveyard and the seat on the Low Road were all monuments to Fr McSwiney but it is the fact that so many people still remember and honour him after all these years that is the greatest memorial of all.”[20]

Ecclesiastical appointments

Activities

Published Writings

Tributes

Literature

References

  1. ↑ He himself used the form MacSwiney, and sometimes the Irish form of his name, Mac Suibhne
  2. 1 2 J.J. Horgan, "Obituary: Rev. Patrick McSwiney, C.C., M.A.", Journal of the Cork Historical and Archaeological Society Part 2, Vol. XLV, No. 162, July-Dec 1940, pp. 139-140
  3. ↑ See An t-Athair P. Mac Suibhne, Seán MacAonghusa, "The Cork Twenty Club", Cork n.d., and Patrick Maume, Life that is Exile: Daniel Corkery and the Search for Irish Ireland, Belfast 1993, pp. 21, 53–4.
  4. ↑ Daniel Corkery, "The Munster Society of Arts", Letter to the Editor, The Cork Examiner, 26 Jan 1924. See also: Joseph P. Cunningham, Ruth Fleischmann, Aloys Fleischmann (1880–1964; Immigrant Musician in Ireland, Cork 2010, p. 153.
  5. ↑ Joseph P. Cunningham, Ruth Fleischmann, Aloys Fleischmann (1880–1964; Immigrant Musician in Ireland, Cork 2010, p. 153.
  6. ↑ See "Bishop’s Letter, Reply: From Father P. MacSwiney", The Cork Examiner, 30 Nov 1923, in which MacSwiney describes the indicent, his role and that of Mary MacSwiney.
  7. ↑ On the website of the Diocese of Cork and Ross, section: Priests who served in the Diocese, the date given for MacSwiney’s removal to Dunmanway is 7 Dec 1923; but already on 30 Nov 1923 he signs his letter to the Cork Examiner as ‘Chaplain, Dunmanway’, so he was probably removed from his posts in Cork in December 1922 rather than in December 1923.
  8. ↑ Joseph P. Cunningham, Ruth Fleischmann, Aloys Fleischmann (1880–1964; Immigrant Musician in Ireland, Cork 2010, pp 170-171: MacSwiney letter of 11 December 1924 to Tilly Fleischmann. The MacSwiney-Fleischmann correspondence is among the Fleischmann Papers in the Archives of University College Cork. The Fleischmann letters to MacSwiney have not survived.
  9. ↑ The Cork Examiner 21 Nov 1940 p.3
  10. ↑ See Terry Connolly, "Rev. Patrick McSwiney", Kinsale Record 5.7., 1995 and W. Malachy Lynch, O. Carm. Pilgim’s Newsletter Aylesford, No. 113, Carmelite Priory Aylesford, Kent, May 1972, p. 1. Malachy Lynch was prior of the Aylesford Priory in England; he had been Master of Novices in the Kinsale monastery during MacSwiney’s time in the town.
  11. ↑ See Dermot Ryan on the history of Kinsale, http://www.kinsaleheritage.com
  12. ↑ Cork Examiner, 4 Aug 1931 p.4
  13. ↑ Irish Independent, 2 Aug 1940, p.7
  14. ↑ Tim Cadogan and Jeremiah Falvey, A Biographical Dictionary of Cork, Dublin 2006, p. 266
  15. ↑ Irish Press, 18 Oct 1937, p. 9
  16. ↑ Irish Independent, 12 Sep 1940 p. 8
  17. ↑ Terry Connolly, quoted on the website of the Diocese of Cork and Ross
  18. ↑ The Southern Star, 23 Nov 1940, p. 5
  19. ↑ John J. Horgan, "Obituary: Rev. Patrick McSwiney, C.C., M.A.", Journal of the Cork Historical and Archaeological Society Part 2, Vol. XLV, No. 162, July-Dec 1940, p. 140
  20. ↑ "Kinsale group restores seat honouring remarkable Fr. Patrick McSwiney", The Southern Star, 13 Nov 2012
  21. ↑ Website of the Diocese of Cork and Ross: Deceased priests of the Diocese, Rev. Patrick McSweeney. The information about his chaplaincy at St Mary’s Convent Dunmanway stems from the obituary by John. J. Horgan, Journal of the Cork Historical and Archaeological Society, Part 2, Vol. XLV, No. 162, July-Dec 1940, p. 139.
  22. ↑ Bernard B. Curtis, Centenary of the Cork School of Music 1878–1978, Cork 1978, p. 59.
  23. ↑ The Southern Star, 1 Nov 1941, "Pars from Kinsale/Museum Exhibit", p.3. Whereas the Museum brochure written by Michael Mulcahy in 1986 pays tribute to MacSwiney as the founder of the Museum, today there is no mention of the priest on the Museum website.
  24. ↑ The Southern Star, 7 Dec 1940, p.7.
  25. ↑ The Southern Star, 1 Nov 1941, p.3.
  26. ↑ See Leo McMahon, "Kinsale group restores seat honouring remarkable Fr. Patrick McSwiney", The Southern Star, 13 Nov 2012
  27. ↑ The Southern Star, "Courthouse Preservation", 7 June 1958, p.5.
  28. ↑ "Kinsale group restores seat honouring remarkable Fr. Patrick McSwiney", The Southern Star, 13 Nov 2012

External links

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Categories: • Irish Catholic priest • Gaelic scholar • Historian • 1885 births • 1940 deaths

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