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Francis Arthur was the only surviving son of Patrick Arthur, a prominent wine and timber merchant in Limerick city and developer of the new suburb, Newtown Pery. Patrick also built Arthur’s Quay on the Shannon and laid out a number of streets which he named after members of his own family. Francis was in partnership with his father on these projects from about the mid-1770s. By the early 1790s, Francis Arthur was one of the leading Catholics of Limerick City and doing successful business not only in Limerick but also in the neighbouring counties, most notably Cork and Kerry.

In 1796, Francis Arthur raised and trained a corps of yeomanry artillery at his own expense as protections against a feared French invasion. In May 1798 he was accused of treason for concealing weapons and advancing money to Lord Edward Fitzgerald, the leader of the United Irishmen. At his trial, which took place a month later, Francis was refused counsel and most of his witnesses were excluded from the court. He was sentenced to transportation for life to Botany Bay and fined £5,000. After a petition by his wife to the Lord Lieutenant, Francis was liberated on condition that he leave Ireland. He moved to England but retained his business interests in Limerick and made sporadic visits to the city. He died on 17 June 1824 in Dunkirk, France, where he had been living for some years prior to his death.

Francis Arthur married Ellen née Sexton in 1779 and by her had a son, Patrick Edmond (1783-1814), who qualified as a barrister and married Susanna Grainger in 1812; and at least four daughters: Catherine (1780-1867) who became a nun; Alicia (1785-1859), who married Jeremiah Scully in 1809; Margaret (b. 1789) who married Daniel Leahy in 1818; and Ellen (1793-1842), who became a nun. Some records identify a fifth daughter, Maria, who married Patrick Greene in 1806, while other records state that Patrick Greene was Margaret Arthur’s first husband.

The Armstrongs were a Scottish border clan, prominent in the service of both Scottish and English kings. Numerous and feared, the clan is said to have derived its name from a warrior who during the Battle of the Standard in 1138 lifted a fallen king onto his own horse with one arm after the king’s horse had been killed under him.

In the turbulent years of the seventeenth century, many Armstrongs headed to Ireland to fight for the Royalist cause. Among them was Captain William Armstrong (c. 1630-1695), whose father, Sir Thomas Armstrong, had been a supporter of Charles I throughout the Civil War and the Commonwealth rule, and had twice faced imprisonment in the Tower of London for his support for Charles II. When Charles II was restored to power, he favoured Captain William Armstrong with a lease of Farneybridge, county Tipperary, in 1660, and a grant of Bohercarron and other lands in county Limerick in 1666. In 1669, William was appointed Commissioner for Payroll Tax, and over the next ten years added to his holdings in the area, including the former lands of Holy Cross Abbey and the lands of Ballycahill. He established himself at Farney Castle and married Alice, daughter of Sir Thomas Deane. Of his children, a son, John, married Juliana, daughter of Robert Carew of Castle Boro’, county Wexford, and became progenitor of the Heaton-Armstrong branch of the family. A younger son, Thomas Armstrong, married Juliana’s sister, Mary, and established the Moyaliffe branch.

Thomas Armstrong (1671-1741), High Sheriff of county Tipperary, acquired the lands and castle of Moyaliffe (originally Mealiffe) at around the time of the death of his father, and settled in a small stone house built close to the ruins of Moyaliffe Castle. The birth of seven sons and seven daughters necessitated the construction of the first of the many extensions which characterize the former family seat, also named Moyaliffe Castle. Of his sons, five survived infancy. The eldest, William, succeeded to the family estate; Andrew was apprenticed to a Cork mariner and set up as a merchant; John and Robert became clergymen; and George was apprenticed to a banker. Of Thomas’s daughters, five also survived infancy and married into the Ellard, Dexter, Smyth, Lloyd and Bettridge families, becoming wives of attorneys and clergymen.

William Armstrong (1704-1768), Thomas’s eldest son, never married. Described as a man ‘who seldom refused a request’, William entered into a number of ill-advised bonds and low-rate leases and left his financial affairs under the dubious management of his brother-in-law, James Dexter. The catastrophic state of these affairs did not come to light until William’s death, when his brother and successor, the Reverend John Armstrong (1708-1781), found himself burdened with heavy financial responsibilities. Many of the complicated legal cases into which John was forced to enter as a result dragged on for two generations.

Ordained in 1734, the Reverend John Armstrong served as Curate of Kilfaird from 1734 to 1737 and as Rector of Tipperary from 1737 to 1753. He also acted as headmaster of the local Erasmus Smith Grammar school. He married Frances, daughter of schoolmaster John Garnett of Tipperary, and had issue seven sons and four daughters, of whom two boys died in infancy. Of the surviving sons, Thomas, Edward and Alfred entered the army, while William and Robert followed in their father’s footsteps and became clergymen. Only one of the daughters, Anne, ever married, taking as her husband in 1793 William Bagwell of Shanrahan, county Tipperary.

The Reverend John Armstrong bore witness to a dramatic event during morning prayers on 6 June 1753, when a gang of armed men burst into St Mary’s Church in Tipperary and abducted Susannah Grove. The clergyman’s courageous conduct in an attempt to prevent the abduction was witnessed by Lord Townsend, then Viceroy of Ireland, and impressed him so deeply that he promoted the Reverend John Armstrong’s eldest son, Thomas, to the rank of captain.

Captain Thomas Armstrong having predeceased his father in 1774, the Moyaliffe estate was in due course inherited by his younger brother, the Reverend William Carew Armstrong (1752-1839), known to his family and friends as Billy. Educated at Trinity College, Dublin, he graduated in 1778, and was appointed first Vicar and later Rector (1789-1797) of Moyaliffe. He also held the rectorship of Moylough in the diocese of Tuam, and the chancellorship of the diocese of Cashel. His interest in architecture manifested itself in the construction of a new parish church on a medieval church site in nearby Killvalure, and a Georgian wing to Moyaliffe Castle, running at right angles to the main block. He is also credited with some of the landscaping on the estate, including the planting of a parkland of oaks and beeches, and the establishment of a beech walk overlooking the Clodagh River (which was cut away in the 1960s).

In 1789, the Reverend William Carew Armstrong married the Honourable Catherine Eleanor Beresford (d. 1837), eldest daughter of the Most Reverend the Honourable William Beresford, first Baron Decies, Archbishop of Tuam, and granddaughter of Sir Marcus Beresford, first Earl of Tyrone. Their three younger sons followed the by now familiar family tradition: Marcus Beresford and Alfred Thomas became clergymen, while George De la Poer secured a commission in the army (which he was later obliged to resign on account of drunkenness). The three daughters, Elizabeth, Frances and Clara never married. The Reverend Marcus Beresford Armstrong was the progenitor of the Ballydavid branch of the family in county Waterford, where his eldest son, William, settled. William’s only male child, Captain Marcus Beresford Armstrong, was later to succeed to the Moyaliffe estate.

William and Catherine’s eldest son, John Armstrong (1791-1846), led the life of a gentleman as a landed proprietor and magistrate for Sligo and Tipperary. Through his marriage in 1815 to Catherine Somers, daughter and heiress of Thomas Somers, he came into possession of estates in Mayo and Sligo, most notably the Somers family seat, Chaffpool, where he took up residence and set up improving the estate, which included the demolition of the old house and construction of a new one, complete with out-offices and landscaped grounds. He also became involved in local politics, serving as Justice of the Peace and Deputy Lieutenant for Sligo and, in the parliamentary elections of the 1830s, acting as agent for the Tory candidate, Edward Cooper of Markree Castle. John was well respected as magistrate, and during the famine was unanimously elected as chairman of the Upper Leyny and Tubbercurry Relief Committees. He died prematurely on 2 December 1846 of typhus fever, which he is said to have contracted by getting caught in a downpour on his way to the committee meeting at Tubbercurry and sitting through the meeting in half-dried clothes. The Sligo Journal paid tribute to him as a man who ‘fell a victim of his sense of devotion to the cause of charity.’

Like the previous generations, John and Catherine Armstrong had a large family of eight sons and two daughters. The eldest son, William (b. 1816), was a Captain in the 47th regiment and served in the War of India. He married in June 1848 a French woman, Mathilde Rose, daughter of Count de la Brosse, but died just eight months later in March 1849. His only son, John, was born posthumously in May of that year. The second son, Thomas (b. 1822), also served in India, where he died unmarried in 1847. The third son, George (b. 1823), died unmarried in 1864. The family estate then evolved upon the fifth son, James Wood Armstrong (b. 1827), Captain in the Royal Navy. Like his father, James acted as both landlord and magistrate in Sligo but, although well-liked by his tenants, was considered harsh in the latter role. In Tipperary, he improved the Moyaliffe estate and enlarged the family home by the addition of the Victorian façade. The plans for its design were drawn up in 1864, the year James succeeded to the estate. He became ill while attending a shooting party at the Templehouse demesne as a guest of the Perceval family in late November 1889 and died in the care of that family three weeks later. To honour his memory, the Select Vestry of Tubbercurry Parish Church built the Armstrong Memorial Chancel as an addition to the church. The family estates evolved on James’s younger brother, Captain Edward Marcus Armstrong (b. 1829), who as Lieutenant had fought in the Crimean War and was wounded in the Battle of Alma. Having returned from the front, he married Frances Steele in 1863 and made Moyaliffe Castle his main home, dying there without issue in 1889.

As all but one of Edward’s siblings were unmarried or had died without issue, and as his only nephew, John, had died in 1853, the property evolved on Edward’s first cousin once removed, Marcus Beresford Armstrong (1859-1923). The eldest (and the only son) of the five children of William Armstrong (1826-1889) of Ballydavid, county Waterford, Marcus chose a military career and rose to the rank of Captain in the 8th Brigade of the Northern Irish Division of the Royal Artillery. In 1888, he married Rosalie Maude (1868-1956), second daughter of Maurice Ceely Maude (1820-1904) of Lenaghan Park, Enniskillen, county Fermanagh. Rosalie’s paternal grandfather, the Reverend John Charles Maude (1792-1860), rector of Enniskillen, was the fifth son of Cornwallis Maude, first Viscount Hawarden (1729-1803) of Dundrum, County Tipperary, from his marriage to his third wife, Anne Isabella Monck, sister of first Viscount Monck.

Captain Marcus and Rosalie Armstrong had four children. The eldest, William Maurice Armstrong (b. 1889), known in his childhood and early youth as Maurice and later as Pat, followed the distinguished military tradition of his family, rising to the rank of Captain in the 10th Royal Hussars (the Prince of Wales’s Own). He served in India until the outbreak of the First World War, when he joined the Expeditionary Force as part of the 2nd Cavalry Brigade. On staff of Major-General Sir Beauvoir de Lisle at Mons and at the landing and evacuation of Gallipoli in the famous 29th Division, and later serving in Egypt, Captain Pat Armstrong was awarded a Military Cross in 1916 for gallant and distinguished service in the field. He was killed on 23 May 1917 by a sniper while inspecting his troops in a front-line trench at Arras, France. Following his death, the General commanding the Cavalry corps wrote: ‘I do not know of anyone of his age who had a more promising future before him, as not only did he love his profession, and show most of the qualities needed for him to shine in it, but he had such a charming personality that all he came in contact with loved him, and were able to show their best work when working with him or under him.’

Pat Armstrong’s eldest sister, Cornelia Ione Kathleen Armstrong (1890-1967) married in 1918 Sir William Lindsay Everard (1891-1949) of Ratcliffe Hall, Leicestershire, a brewer, pioneer aviator, founder of the Ratcliffe Aerodrome and MP for Melton from 1924 to 1944. They had two children, Bettyne (1919-1989) and Patrick Anthony William Beresford (‘Tony’) (1922-2011), of whom the latter died unmarried. Bettyne married as her first husband Major Denis Butler, ninth Earl of Lanesborough (1918-1998) and by her had two daughters, Georgina (1941-1947) and Denyne (b. 1945). The marriage was dissolved by divorce in 1950. She later married Richard Peter Michael Spencer and by him had a daughter, Serena, and a son, Richard.

The middle daughter, Winona Rosalie Armstrong (1893-1982), known to her family as Jess, married in 1927 Captain William Daryl Olphert Kemmis (1892-1965) of Ballinacor, county Wicklow. The youngest daugher, Lisalie Maude Armstrong (1897-1990), also married in 1927. Her husband, Odo George Henry Russell (1899-1980) of Broadmead Manor, Folkestone, Kent, was Major in the Black Watch (Royal Highland Regiment). He retired from the army in 1936, but on the outbreak of the Second World War re-joined his regiment and was sent to France in October 1939. He was wounded and reported missing in May-June 1940 and spent the remainder of the war in German prison camps, mostly at Spangenberg. He was released from captivity in the last days of March 1945.

Following the death of his only son, Captain Marcus Beresford Armstrong made the decision to pass the Moyaliffe estate to his second daughter, Jess. (The Mayo and Sligo estates had been sold to the Congested Districts Board in 1904.) She and her husband divided their time between Moyaliffe and Ballinacor until the death of Captain Kemmis in 1965, when through a series of events Jess Kemmis lost ownership of both Ballinacor (which was inherited by her husband’s maternal cousin, Major Richard Lomer) and Moyaliffe, which was offered for sale to the Land Commission. She was later able to regain possession of Moyaliffe Castle and 12 acres of the demesne, but not the surrounding farm.

As she had no children, and as the marriage of her younger sister was also childless, Jess Kemmis bequeathed Moyaliffe Castle and grounds to her distant relation, Robert George Carew Armstrong (1911-1983), of Natal, South Africa. They were related through Jess Kemmis’s great-great-grandfather, the Reverend William Carew Armstrong, whose younger brother, the Reverend Robert Carew Armstrong, was Robert’s great-great-grandfather. Following Robert’s death, the property passed to his eldest son, Graham Carew Armstrong (b. 1946). It remained in the hands of the Armstrong family until July 1999, when it was sold to John Stakelum.

This distinguished family of solicitors and army officers was of Anglo-Norman origin and had arrived in Ireland from Wales in the seventeenth century. One of its early representatives in Ireland, Thomas Kemmis (1753-1823), held a number of distinguished positions, including Crown Solicitor to the Treasury, Deputy Keeper of the Seals of the Chancellor of the Exchequer in Ireland, and Solicitor to Civil and Military Departments of the Ordnance in Ireland. He was succeeded by his third son, William Kemmis (1777-1864), a Crown Solicitor for the Dublin and Leinster Circuit. William married Ellen, second daughter of Nicholas Southcote Mansergh of Grenane, county Tipperary, in 1805, and in the same year commenced the building of Ballinacor, which partly incorporated an old dwelling house known as Drumkitt Lodge. His eldest son, William Gilbert Kemmis (1806-1881), died unmarried, and bequeathed the estate to his nephew, Colonel William Kemmis (1836-1900). A Professor of Artillery at the Royal Military College, Woolwich, Colonel Kemmis was the author of several instructional text books. He married in 1862 Ellen Gertrude de Horne Christy, eldest daughter and heiress of George Steinman Steinman of Priory Lodge, Peckham, and Sunridge, Kent. Their eldest son, William, succeeded to Ballinacor, while the second surviving son, Marcus (1867-1945), became heir to his maternal grandfather and assumed the surname of Kemmis-Steinman.

Like his father, William Henry Olphert Kemmis (1864-1939) followed a military career, rising to the rank of Lieutenant-Colonel in the Artillery Militia. He retired on the death of his father to take on the management of the Ballinacor estate, and married in 1888 Frances Maude, second daughter of the Reverend Charles Beauclerk. Captain William Daryl Olphert Kemmis was the eldest of their three children. Having joined the Inniskilling Dragoons in 1912, he served in the First World War and retired from active service in 1923.

In 1927, Captain Kemmis married Winona Rosalie 'Jess' Armstrong (1893-1982), the second daughter of Captain Marcus Beresford Armstrong of Moyaliffe House, county Tipperary. When Captain Armstrong died in 1923, he bequeathed the Moyaliffe estate to Jess. Following the death of his only son, Captain Marcus Beresford Armstrong made the decision to pass the Moyaliffe estate to his second daughter, Jess. She and her husband divided their time between Moyaliffe and Ballinacor until the death of Captain Kemmis in 1965, when Ballinacor passed to his cousin, Major Richard Lomer.

Field Marshal Douglas Haig was a decorated military officer and commander of the British Expeditionary Force during the First World War. He was created Earl Haig in 1919.

Former member of the Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA) and one of the kidnappers of the industrialist Tiede Herrema in Limerick in 1975.

Ferenka Limited was a steel-cord manufacturing plant located in Annacotty, Limerick. Its managing director, Dr Tiede Herrema, was kidnapped in October 1975 by members of the Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA) to secure the release of three republican prisoners.

Stephen O'Mara was born on 26 December 1844 as the eldest son of James O'Mara, founder of O'Mara's Bacon Company in 1839. Stephen became managing director of the company in 1919, following the death of his brother John O'Mara who had taken over the reigns when their father retired from business. Under Stephen's charge, the family business became one of the most prominent commercial enterprises in Limerick city. Stephen O’Mara was also a prominent figure in local politics. He became a Town Councillor on Limerick Corporation in the 1880s and was elected Mayor of Limerick in 1885. He was the first Mayor of Limerick to be elected on a Nationalist ticket. He also served as High Sheriff of Limerick city in 1888, 1913 and 1914. In national politics, he was a strong supporter of Isaac Butt's Home Rule movement. He later developed a close association with Charles Stewart Parnell and was elected Member of Parliament for Upper Ossory in Kilkenny South for the Irish Parliamentary Party in February 1886. When the Irish National League split from Irish Parliamentary Party in December 1890, O’Mara took the Parnellite side. Towards the end of his life, his moderate political views became more radicalised. He supported the Sinn Fein party in the 1918 General Election and took the pro-Treaty side in 1921, but remained on friendly terms with Eamon de Valera.

Stephen O’Mara married Ellen Pigott in 1867, and the couple had 12 children. From c. 1909 onwards, the family lived at Strand House, where Stephen O'Mara died on 26 July 1926.

The Irish Press was a national daily newspaper founded by Éamon de Valera from money collected during a series of fundraising drives to finance the first Dáil. The drives were terminated following the signing of the Anglo-Irish Treaty. The trustee of the funds, Stephen O'Mara (1884-1959) considered himself as the exchequer to the Irish Free State and refused to hand over the funds to the pro-Treaty administration, which resulted in his imprisonment in 1922-1923. The bulk of the money was left in various banks in New York and remained untouched until 1927, when a court in New York ordered that money outstanding to bond holders must be paid back. Having anticipated such a ruling, de Valera’s legal team invited bond holders to sign over their bonds, for which they were paid 58 cents to the dollar. The funds thus accumulated were used as capital to launch the Irish Press, with Frank Gallagher as its first editor. The paper remained under the control of de Valera and his family and as a consequence its views followed closely those of the FIanna Fáil party. At its peak, the paper had 200,000 subscribers. The paper was wound down in 1995, following several years of financial difficulties.

John Daly was born in Limerick City on 18 October 1845 as the son of a labourer. At the age of 18, he became a member of the Irish Republican Brotherhood (IRB), founded in 1858 to crusade for the establishment of an independent Irish Republic. Its sister organisation in the United States was known as the Fenian Brotherhood. Fenianism was particularly strong in Limerick where John Daly emerged as one of the leaders of an ill-prepared Fenian Rising in 1867. When the attack was repelled, Daly was forced to flee the country. After a period of exile in America, he returned home to reinvigorate the IRB and to promote its aims among the general public. In 1883, John Daly was arrested for his involvement in the so-called Dynamite Campaign, a transatlantic conspiracy directed by Clan na Gael, the rebranded Fenian Brotherhood in America. He was sentenced to penal servitude in Chatham and was later moved to Portland Prison in Dorset. Here he met and befriended a fellow-Fenian, Thomas Clarke, who was serving a sentence for his involvement in a failed attempt to blow up London Bridge as part of the Fenian Dynamite Campaign. Born on 11 March 1858 as the son of a sergeant in the British Army, Clarke had joined the IRB in 1878 and become one of its leading figures.

John Daly was released from prison on health grounds in 1896. His brother Edward having died in 1890, Daly was now responsible for the support of his widow and ten children. After a year of fundraising in America for Clan na Gael, he returned to Limerick and established a bakery in May 1898 at 26 William Street, where several of his nieces worked. John Daly became a figurehead for Limerick nationalist politics and, in spite of efforts to disqualify him, won a seat on the City Council. He was elected Mayor of Limerick City on three occasions (1899-1901) and became known as the Fenian Mayor. The spectacular elevation to civic office of a convicted felon was indicative of the appeal of the republican message to the artisans and labourers of the city.

When Thomas Clarke was released from prison in 1898, Mayor Daly arranged to have the Freedom of the City bestowed upon him as a mark of respect for his contribution to the pursuit of Irish independence. It was during this time that Clarke became acquainted with Daly’s niece, Kathleen (1878-1972). They later married in America, where Clarke joined Clan na Gael and became highly regarded among its leadership. His return to Ireland in 1907 proved a catalyst for the reinvigoration of the IRB. A new generation of Fenians emerged in Ireland, promptly imposing their militancy on the aging upper political structures of the organization. Among the key figures of this movement alongside Clarke were Seán Mac Diarmada, Patrick Pearse and John MacBride, all friends of the Daly family.

The IRB influenced the formation of the Irish Volunteers, a military organization established in 1913 to lend nationalist support to the Home Rule Bill then going through parliament. The Limerick branch of the Irish Volunteers was founded on 25 January 1914 and located its offices at No 1 Hartstonge Street. Among its most prominent members were Con Colbert and John Daly’s nephew Edward (Ned) Daly. When an auxiliary branch of the women’s nationalist organisation Cuman na mBan was established in Limerick on 5 June 1914, John Daly’s nieces became heavily involved in its activities. As the Irish Volunteers grew in strength, they made a significant declaration of intent by landing rifles at Howth and Kilcoole in July-August 1914. In 1915, the Irish Volunteers displayed their organisational capabilities by mounting the Dublin funeral of the celebrated Fenian hero Jeremiah O’Donovan Rossa. Patrick Pearse’s impassioned oration at Rossa’s graveside, in which he extolled a continuation of the Fenian tradition, was effectively a declaration of war on the British presence in Ireland. Both Thomas Clarke and Edward Daly were key figures in Rossa’s funeral arrangements, the latter as the Officer Commanding Irish Volunteers. Kathleen Clarke assisted by helping to manage the transport of Volunteers to and from the capital.

The determination of Clarke, Pearse and Mac Diarmada to advance the republican cause led to the Easter Rising in 1916. In the weeks prior to it, Roger Casement oversaw a German shipment to Ireland of rifles and ammunition. However, his ship was intercepted by British warships and failed to land its cargo. The Rising commenced in Dublin on 24 April, when Volunteers seized control of strategic buildings in the city centre and numerous detachments secured an outer defensive ring. The Military Council established headquarters in the General Post Office on O’Connell Street, where Pearse read aloud the Proclamation of the Irish Republic. Commandant Edward Daly led the Four Courts garrison where some of the most prolonged and intensive combat occurred. Éamon de Valera was Commandant of the Boland’s Mills garrison. Con Colbert headed a detachment at Watkin’s Brewery and later fought at nearby Marrowbone Lane. Sean Heuston commanded a small force at the Mendicity Institute. Proclamation signatories Clarke and Mac Diarmada remained in the GPO as members of the Provisional Government.

The military phase of the Easter Rising ended on 29 April 1916. Central Dublin was heavily shelled by British artillery, reducing much of the city centre to rubble. Following the Volunteers’ surrender, the British reacted swiftly and executed fourteen Volunteer leaders, including Patrick Pearse and Thomas Clarke on 3 May, Edward Daly on 4 May, Con Colbert and Sean Heuston on 8 May and Seán Mac Diarmada on 12 May. Roger Casement was hanged in England on 3 August for his part in the failed gun-running. Many others were arrested and interned indefinitely in British detention facilities. John Daly, devastated by the loss of his nephew and many close friends, died on 30 June 1916 aged 70. His influence and legacy was marked by the volume of good wishes the Daly family received from organisations and individuals alike. His and his Fenian comrades’ deaths in 1916 marked the beginning of a more organised and effective military campaign against British rule in Ireland.

Among those who fought in the Easter Rising was Edward Thomas Dore, a native of Glin, county Limerick, who had joined the Irish Republican Brotherhood while a student at Rockwell College. He was arrested and interned at Frongoch until the end of 1916 with many of the noted Irish freedom fighters of the time. In 1918, he married Commandant Edward (Ned) Daly’s sister Nora (1889-1977) and took over her family’s bakery business at William Street, Limerick, which he continued to operate until his retirement in August 1971. In 1931, he co-founded the Limerick Memorial Committee to fundraise for a monument on Sarsfield Bridge in Limerick city to honour those who died in the Easter Rising. The sculptor Albert Power (1881-1945), who was invited to design the monument, submitted his proposal in November 1936 and its construction began in 1938 with a view to unveiling the statue on the 25th anniversary of the Easter Rising in 1941. However, the outbreak of the Second World War, the death of Albert Power and a shortage of funds stalled the project, and it was not until 27 May 1956 that the memorial was unveiled. Edward Dore died at his home on 17 June 1972.

Edward Dore’s son Edward Francis Dore was a devoted nationalist and adopted the Irish spelling of his name. Born in 1921, he studied at University College, Dublin and gained an MA degree in Modern Irish in 1941. While at UCD, he was active in An Cumann Gaelach and in the Language Movement. After some further postgraduate work he joined the translation department of the Dáil. In 1957, he was appointed director of the office of the Ordnance Survey. During his tenure, he upgraded and expanded the work of the Placenames Commission and became the country’s leading authority on place names. In 1964, he founded the Placenames Association (An Cumann Logaimneacha) to inform the public of the Commisson’s work and established the Association’s journal, Dinnseanchas, which he continued to edit until his death. De hÓir gave several lectures annually, wrote a number of articles on Irish language subjects and in 1963 published a book in Irish on the lives and work of Eugene O’Curry and John O’Donovan, his nineteenth-century predecessors in the Placenames Office. De hÓir also had a deep interest in archaeology and was a long-standing member of the Royal Society of Antiquaries. He died on 20 December 1975 at Meath Hospital, Dublin, aged 54.