Former President's tribute to peacemakers at Boyne Bridge ceremony

The former President of Ireland, Mary McAleese, said we must keep persevering through the setbacks and difficulties that arise in the Northern Ireland peace process, as a bridge was named in her honour.

Mrs McAleese was speaking at the renaming ceremony of the Mary McAleese Boyne Valley Bridge after Meath and Louth county councils agreed to name the 10 year-old structure in honour of her and her husband, Martin’s,  contribution to the peace process. The cable bridge crosses the Boyne from Louth to Meath, where the former president lived for a period in the 1980s.

She was accompanied by her husband, Martin, and family, Emma, Saramai and Justin.

The ceremony took place at Oldbridge House, the site of the Battle of The Boyne in 1690, a battle Mrs McAleese described as “drawing wedges so great, it seemed bridging those gaps became impossible.”

The attendance included the Taoiseach, Enda Kenny, who had just returned from Helsinki and London, the Northern Ireland Deputy First Minister, Martin McGuinness, Minister of State Fergus O’Dowd, the Louth TD and Sinn Fein president, Gerry Adams, the Garda Commissioner, Martin Callinan and the PSNI chief constable, Matt Baggott.

Mrs McAleese said that those that were gathered were descendants of the Williamites and Jacobites who had fought over 300 years ago, were Catholic and Protestant, Unionist and Nationalist, Loyalist and Republican, but were now all “collaborators in peace”.

And what made possible what seemed so impossible over the ages was that the people present made a conscious decision to make a break with the past, and to respect each other’s beliefs and traditions.

She told a story of a letter she had received after the visit of Queen Elizabeth II to Ireland in 2011, from an elderly Republican lady, who wrote that she had ‘no time for monarchies, and in particular, the monarch next door’.

Mrs McAleese said that the lady wrote:  ‘Out of deference to you, I decided I’d watch the first five minutes on television. Four days later, I hadn’t turned off the television and had cried through the entire visit. I felt it had been choreographed by angels.’

The former president said that Saturday’s event in glorious sunshine was choreographed by angels, and the peace process was the work of angels, stripping away years of hate, fear, anxiety, contempt and distrust and sowing seeds of compromise and determination to end the toxic events of the past.

The Boyne Valley Bridge now takes us so easily on a journey North and South, she said, and opened up a whole new landscape of possibilities. She hoped that those who will pass by and see her name and the Boyne Valley, the site of such a divisive battle in the past, would realise that in all that we say, and all that we do, the opportunity we all have to be peacemakers.

Saturday’s ceremony was opened by the cathaoirleach of Meath County Council, Cllr Niamh McGowan, and closed by the cathaoirleach of Louth County Council, Cllr Finnan McCoy, and following an address by the Taoiseach, featured a performance by uileann piper Liam O’Floinn of ‘An Droichead’, a piece commissioned by Mrs McAleese for her first inauguration in 1997.

 

John Donohoe

 

Speech by the Taoiseach, Enda Kenny TD, at the official naming of the Mary McAleese Boyne Valley Bridge, Saturday 8 June 2013

Distinguished Guests, Ladies and Gentlemen, I’m delighted to have been invited to the naming of this bridge in honour of our former President Mary McAleese.
Through her two terms at Aras an Uachtarain she built so many bridges between hearts, minds, imaginations.
So it is fitting that, today, we gift her the real thing. Given her latest studies in canon law, it will not be lost on her that she was indeed a Pontifex — a woman who made bridges.
To those who have journeyed here today from Northern Ireland, and indeed further a field, you are very welcome. I want to extend an especially-warm welcome to all of you who come here today to represent proudly the Protestant Unionist and Loyalist tradition. We meet at the waters of the Boyne, on what is a sacred place for both traditions.
I know that you hope, as I do, that the bridge we name here today will remain a symbol of all we have achieved for our peoples of this island, north and south.
And indeed for the peoples of both islands, Ireland and the United Kingdom, who have embarked on a new era of understanding, respect and friendship
that is real, warm one that is deeply-felt and valued on both sides.
The Battle of the Boyne symbolises the history not alone of our peoples, our islands, but of Europe itself.
Here in July 1690 two English kings, a father-in-law and a son-in-law, fought at the head of their respective armies.
It was a Game of Thrones, involving temporal and spiritual power. Behind
King James II were French forces sent by Louis XIV, the Sun King. Assembled behind King William of Orange was a grand Alliance of several European countries. Irishmen, of ancient and newer stock, stood on both sides of a battle said to be the last of European significance fought on Irish soil. French dominance in Europe, the English throne, and religious power in Ireland all hung in the balance.
But history did as it does. It moved on, leaving human wreckage in its wake. This battle became one in a long list of similar encounters to follow.
On this island the Battle fought on this river took on an iconic status of triumph or defeat. Were we winners? Or were we losers?
Last month was important in the history of this river and our views of it.
When an ancient log-boat was found, one that could be five thousand years old, I believe the general interest was how did the boatbuilders live? How did they rear their families? How did they live, die? Who did they love? I doubt if the first thought of anyone here was were the precursors to Harland and Wolff, Protestant or Catholic, atheist or agnostic — would they have been for Billy or Jimmy...?
I think we all thought you know, they were us back then. Or, maybe more startlingly, we are them now.
We are human with the same human needs, hopes, emotions. All that separates us is time. This bridge over these troubled, and for too long troubling, waters comes at the right time.
It reminds us that our differences can be accommodated and respected, our wounds healed, our divisions can always be bridged.
That was Mary McAleese’s belief. She became President as the Peace Process was transforming how we saw ourselves and each other on this island of Ireland. She worked diligently to ensure that all communities were included, and felt included, in the transformation.
The work Mary McAleese and Martin McAleese did for people — on both sides — changed minds, attitudes and lives across the island and across the communities.
In her Presidency, for those of the Unionist community, Dublin became not an alien city to be feared and avoided, but a place of real and warm welcome particularly Aras an Uachatarain itself.
She made it that from the day she took office six months before the Good
Friday Agreement. The relationship between two islands and its peoples changed profoundly thereafter.
In 1998, President McAleese first met Queen Elizabeth II. They stood beside each other at the Peace Park at Messines, the President of a Republic and a monarch united in their remembrance and honour of the men who fought and died in the Great War.
This solemn occasion, symbolising a change and warming in the attitudes of both countries towards our difficult mutual history, has helped us in our
vernacular marking of events of the past we share. On 1 July, in the early-morning birdsong,men and women from all over this island stand together at the crater at Lochnagar, La Boisselle, to remember those men who fought and died and went missing at the Battle of the Somme.
I know that Mary McAleese was proud to go to the battlefields to honour those who fought for the greater good, alongside those who others would have considered, and for too long retained in their hearts, as adversaries.
Her welcoming of Queen Elizabeth II to Dublin on the first State Visit to Ireland of a British monarch was for all of us a la d’ar saol. A day in the life. She ensured that what was a productive and respectful relationship between the Governments of Ireland and Britain became a warm friendship between the peoples of Ireland and Britain.
Ladies and Gentlemen, That relationship is precious. And like all precious relationships we must mind it, nurture it, cherish it.
As we meet at the waters of the Boyne my hope and desire for us all is that we not be divided by our history but be united in our humanity. That we be true to our respect for all the traditions — North and South. I wish for us all, and all our children in the long and hopefully happy generations to come, that this bridge will stand as a reminder of what is always possible always desirable.
Understanding, beginnings, transformation, peace, joy, hope.

 

Council chairpersons' remarks

Cllr Niamh McGowan, Cathaoirleach, Meath County Council, said: “Bridges are, by their very nature, designed and built to provide a passage over an obstacle and a connection for people. So, the decision to name this truly impressive and unique piece of architecture reflects and marks a Presidency that removed obstacles, promoted engagement and encouraged respect for differences.

“The McAleese Presidency acknowledged the community volunteers and the good neighbours. It also recognised that the Irish people, at home and abroad, have the characteristics of caring for and sharing with each other, whenever and wherever possible. Our former President believed in bridging gaps, the gaps that exist between poverty and affluence, and the gaps that exist between communities. Mary McAleese believed that the caring nature of the Irish people, if nurtured, could bring the most divisive communities together in a spirit of peace and reconciliation.”

Cllr Finnan McCoy, Cathaoirleach, Louth County Council, added: “The Presidency of Ireland obviously involves many high-profile and prestigious occasions. In this respect, we were very fortunate to have such an excellent officeholder for the momentous days in May 2011 when Queen Elizabeth II and President Obama both visited Ireland within a short space of time. However, for me, there is even greater credit due to the woman we honour today for her unsung work out of the media spotlight meeting with people in cities, towns and villages right across Ireland.

“Without fail, meeting the President will have been a major event for these people and – without fail – the then President McAleese made them feel special, listening attentively to their stories and responding with great warmth. This valuing of people and respect for every individual is, to my mind, as important a part of her legacy as the Trojan work she did on the national and international stage.”