Sir, - It is deeply regrettable that Dublin's leading newspaper, which is supposed to keep the public informed about historic as well as ephemeral events, has not a word in print today about a moving ceremony that occurred on board LE Emer on May 10th at Dun Laoghaire.
Commander James Morris (Seamus O Muiris) was a direct descendant of the first Irish Catholic to receive a Commission in the Royal Navy when the Penal Laws were relaxed in 1794. Henceforward in every generation till this century one or more of the family served with distinction in that navy. Seamus was at the Battle of Jutland in 1916, in which his brother Charles was killed, and had in 1920 had a great career before him, when, learning of the repression being exercised by the British government in his native land, he resigned his commission in protest, an act of conscience of rare purity. At home in retirement he regularly admonished our various early governments to provide us with a small navy if we were to behave as a genuinely independent state - in vain till the 61st minute of the eleventh hour, in summer 1939, when he was hastily summoned to Dublin, and became our wartime government's naval adviser and director of our improvised Marine Service, which kept our coasts clear of mines and spies throughout the "Emergency". His practical suggestions for a permanent navy after the war were ignored, and he was allowed to go back to retirement forgotten.
Seamus was active in the Maritime Institute, whose Research Department, after his death in 1953, got full details of his career, and had for many years been urging that belated recognition be given for the services of this illustrious seaman. At last, on board Emer, Minister for Defence Barrett, with a gracious speech, accepted from the Morris family a magnificent portrait of the Commander, to be hung permanently in the Officers' Mess at Naval Headquarters, Haulbowline. And The Irish Times had nothing to say. Yours. etc.,
Hon Research Officer,
The Maritime Institute of
Ireland,
Grosvenor Terrace,
Dalkey,
Co Dublin.