File 36 - Robert Monteith Fund / Bound Document and Photographic Volume

254 pp; 33.5 cm x 20 cm; Bound volume, clipping, manuscript, typescript, photographic print and printed

A bound volume containing correspondence, photographs, newspaper clippings, and printed ephemera relating to the fund established by Fr. Senan Moynihan OFM Cap. to assist the veteran Irish republican Robert Monteith.

Born in County Wicklow, Monteith was a British Army soldier who saw service in the Boer War (1899-1902). He was discharged from the army in 1903 and later joined the Irish Volunteers. In 1915 he was asked to travel to Berlin to assist Roger Casement in recruiting a brigade from among Irish prisoners-of-war held in Germany. Monteith is probably best remembered for having accompanied Casement to Ireland on board a German submarine in April 1916. They were put ashore at Banna Strand in Tralee Bay, County Kerry, with Monteith pulling Casement (who was drowning in the surf) to safety. Casement was subsequently captured, tried, and executed, while Monteith spent six months on the run including a period when he was hidden by Capuchin friars in Rochestown in County Cork. He subsequently escaped to the United States working in disguise as a sailor on a merchant vessel. Montieth returned to Ireland in May 1947. Fr. Senan Moynihan, Fr. Gerald McCann, and other Capuchin friars later established and managed a public fund which enabled Montieth and his wife Mollie to purchase a house in Dublin. However, his residence in Ireland proved to be a short one (six years). Monteith returned to the United States in 1953, and he died there on 18 February 1956.

The volume includes numerous letters to Fr. Senan enclosing contributions to the Montieth fund. The file includes letters from Joe McGrath, Bishop John Dignan, Canon Patrick Rogers, Domhnall Ua Buachalla, D.L. Kelleher, Daniel Joseph O’Donohoe (Sefton, Stillorgan, County Dublin), Daniel Corkery, Germaine Stockley, Fr. Bonaventure Murphy OFM Cap., Eamon Dore, Richard Hayes, Seán Mac Giobúin, Michael J. Lennon, George Gavan Duffy, M.J. MacCabe, Bishop William MacNeely, Bishop Daniel Mageean, Joseph O’Connor (‘Jocandus’), John McHenry, An t-Athair Peadar Mac Loingsigh, Tom McEllistrim, Michael MacWhite (Irish Legation, Rome), Oscar Traynor, Patrick McCartan, Doran Hurley, Robert Brennan, John Joe Sheehy, Frank Gallagher, Joseph A. McCarthy, P.C. O’Mahony, Thomas D. Sinnott, Maud Gonne MacBride, Eihblín Ní Chróinin, John English, Margaret Mary Pearse, Major General Aodh MacNeill, Agnes O’Farrelly, Seamus Campbell, Seán Brady, and Joseph Rice (Outrath, County Kilkenny). The volume also includes photographs and clippings covering a presentation ceremony organised to honour Monteith and various legal documents relating to the purchase of the house for the Monteith and his wife in Sutton in County Dublin.

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For biographical information on Robert Monteith (1879-1956) see https://www.dib.ie/biography/monteith-robert-a5892