Negotiating New Ross – Frank McNally on an argumentative weekend in Wexford

Even if it were not the ancestral home of the Kennedys, New Ross would be well qualified to host a summer school on history and politics. The very streets of the place seem to be engaged in debate – lively and permanent – on both subjects.

Consider the Town Hall, built by British loyalists in 1769 with a foundation stone laid, according to the inscription, on an anniversary of “ye Glorious Battle of the Boyne”.

This motion is now vigorously opposed by the statue of a 1798 Pikeman, erected just opposite during the centenary commemorations and ever since raising a fist in the Town Hall’s direction.

But even the building’s own front is a forum for argument. To the left of the loyal plaque, there is now another paying tribute to 1916 leader Michael O’Hanrahan, second-in-command at Jacob’s and subsequently executed.

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To the right, meanwhile, is a plaque to Fr James Aloysius Cullen (1841 to 1921), who dedicated his life to another of Ireland’s great struggles: the war against drink.

Founder of the Pioneers, he was born nearby. And yes, almost inevitably, his former home is now a pub, although he may yet triumph over that embarrassment. The current owners plan to relocate the bar farther up the street to make room for an extension of the shop next door.

Fr Cullen died with poignant timing on December 6th , 1921, hours after the Anglo-Irish Treaty brought the Irish War of Independence to an end.

That his war remains unresolved was evident each night of last weekend’s Kennedy Summer School, as the political anoraks crossed the street from St Michael’s Theatre to continue debate in the Theatre Tavern. Pioneers were scarce there. Despite which, as they had been in the venue opposite, the arguments remained mostly civilised.

It struck me that, in New Ross at least, Fr Cullen’s cause might benefit from the opening of another restaurant or two.

Driving down from Dublin on Thursday night, hungry, I postponed dinner to attend the (very entertaining) stage interview between Brian Murphy and former Ireland football manager Martin O’Neill.

Then I discovered that the sole restaurant nearby, an Italian bistro, had just closed for the night, as had the chipper. The Tavern staff were under too much pressure to deal with the complexities of a toasted sandwich when I asked.

So in the end, I achieved total abstinence for a night, if only from food, while adding to Fr Cullen’s suffering in purgatory by sustaining myself with pints instead.

On the plus side, food was central to the Kennedy weekend, eventually, thanks to the Speakers’ Lunch, which recreated some of the meals JFK enjoyed on the famous 1963 visit.

This felt like a political version of the Last Supper, although it wasn’t just Kennedy we were doing it in memory of – there was also Bob Mauro, a director of the school who died aged only 46 last year. And of course there was school founder Noel Whelan, former columnist of this parish, who also departed this world too soon in 2019.

I had the privilege at lunch of sitting beside Noel’s son Seamus, an extraordinarily articulate young man who, at 14, can already talk for Ireland and probably will, soon.

In the meantime, later Friday, he was introducing the now-annual Noel Whelan interview, conducted by his mother (Seamus’s mother, that is – Sinead McSweeney) with film-maker Lenny Abrahamson.

Like the Latin Quarter of Paris, New Ross is a left-bank town, divided by the broad, majestic Barrow from Co Kilkenny, with which it exchanges insults occasionally.

On a break from summer-schooling on Saturday, I was given a quick walking tour by Myles Courtney, a left-bank man in more ways than one (he spent 40 years in the Bank of Ireland before retiring).

The tour was quick partly because we avoided some of the steeper climbs for which New Ross is notable – “uptown” and “downtown” are no meaningless terms here.

But on Saturday night, I left the low-altitude comfort of the Theatre Tavern for a breath-taking ascent to the thinner air of the old Three Bullet Gate pub which our tour had passed earlier.

There seemed to be a party going on there, including a full-throated sing-song. Indeed, whereas the Theatre Tavern was full of photographs from musicals and pantos in the venue opposite, this one seemed to be full of living performers.

But it turned out to be a wake rather than a party – not that those things are mutually exclusive in Ireland.

They had just buried a famous local man, Victor Hennessy, who was centrally involved in the Kennedy visit 60 years ago and had since been a star in many of the pantomimes that filled the 300-seat theatre for a week at a time.

Now, as his daughter Yvonne told me, they were celebrating his life.

Even as she explained this, a chorus led by her brother launched into a raucous version of Summertime (and the Livin’ is Easy). “That was his song,” Yvonne added.