23rd May 2005
Labour women sponsored a lecture recently by Sinead McCoole, author of "No Ordinary Women" on "The Women of 1916". I was unable to attend it but the title reminded me of a query put to me after I had given a talk on Dr. Kathleen Lynn, a heroine of mine - "Why don't we hear more of the women of 1916?"
For decades Kathleen Lynn was neglected despite her military, political and medical contribution to life in Ireland in the last century. This has been somewhat remedied by works such as "The Politics and Relationships of Kathleen Lynn" by Marie Mulholland, published in 2002, and the entry on her in Women in Parliament - Ireland 1918:2000 by Maedhb McNamara and Paschal Money, which drew on "Ten Dublin Women" by Medh Ruane, published in 1991.
In the nineteen seventies, Margaret Waugh, wife of Dr. Desmond Waugh, a general practitioner in Sandycove, decided more women were needed in public life and she held a meeting in the Marine Hotel, Dun Laoghaire at which to expound on her theories. I was one of the lucky people she contacted and we launched ourselves as the Women's Progressive Association which transmogrified into the Women's Political Association to do something about the matter.
Thirty years later it is easy to forget the amount of legislation which was needed to put in place the equality Kathleen Lynn and her soulmates had sought for Irish women.
Dr. Lynn was born in Cong in 1874, the daughter of Canon Robert Lynn, the Church of Ireland rector there and his wife Katherine. She had two sisters, Muriel and Nan, and a brother, John. The family was quite well off and she was educated in England, Germany and subsequently Alexandra College.
When she decided to study medicine I regret to say she was unable to attend Trinity, my Alma Mater, because women were not allowed to enter Trinity until 1904. We celebrated the centenary last year and part of the celebrations included such distinguished women graduates of the Medical School as Dame Beulah Bewley, Professor Deirdre Kelly of Birmingham University, Dr. Fiona Mulcahy of St. James Hospital and Professor Fiona Graeme-Cooke of Harvard.
Graduating from the Royal University of Ireland in 1899 she was elected to the position of House Surgeon in the Adelaide Hospital, but her male colleagues there refused to allow her to work with them. This had a profound effect on the unemployed female doctor who later, when she founded St. Ultan's Hospital, employed only women medics.
Sir Patrick Dun's took her in and she worked there and in the Rotunda for some years. The dreadful conditions in which her patients lived and died affected her profoundly. The Infant Mortality rate at the time was 164 per 1,000, the same as many sub-Saharan countries now. She became involved in the Women's Suffrage movement, feeling that public life would be helped if there were more women in it. (Lady Aberdeen of Peamount and T.B. campaigners felt the same at that time).
During the 1913 workers' lock-out, Dr. Lynn ran a soup kitchen with Countess Markievicz and joined the Citizens' Army at the invitation of James Connolly. Connolly was a committed feminist and the women in the Citizens' Army served under the same terms as men, drilling and learning to shoot.
Many doctors, both men and women, have become involved in politics because of the appalling conditions in which they found their patients existed. Even today most of those doctors in Leinster House were influenced to enter politics in the hope of making life a little better for their patients. It is a great pity that some sort of leave of absence for those of us working in the public service who go into either the Dail or Seanad is not possible, as happens with teachers, because losing contact with those who were the reason for entering politics is a pity.
Dr. Lynn served in the City Hall during the Easter Rising and following the shooting dead of Sean Connolly, the officer in charge of the unit there, as senior officer she presented the surrender when ordered to do so.
Her subsequent imprisonment in dreadful conditions in Ship Street and then in Kilmainham Gaol with other women who fought in the Rising continued until May, when she was to be sent to prison in England. Here, her family who strongly disagreed with her nationalist views intervened and because of the dreadful shortage of doctors in England due to the war she was allowed work near Bristol while on parole and continued during the flu epidemic of 1917/18.
In 1919 Kathleen Lynn and her close friend, Madeleine ffrench-Mullen, founded St. Ultan's Hospital at 37 Charlemont Street, for the treatment of children under one. Considering the infant mortality rate of the time they must have been very busy. The two friends used to visit St. Ultan's Well in Ard Braccan near Navan every year on the 4th September, St. Ultan's feast day. Ultan, by the way, was a Bishop of Meath who cared for children orphaned by the Yellow Plague.
The remarkable Dr. Lynn continued with politics as well as medicine and fund-raising for the hospital, being elected to the Dail in 1923 but refusing to take her seat. As a member of the executive of Sinn Fein she had insisted that the sentiments of the Proclamation be maintained when some members were getting wobbly about equality. She did serve on Rathmines Urban Council for many years, however.
Dr. Lynn fell foul of Archbishop John Charles McQuaid. Her establishment of St. Ultan's did not allow him have control over the appointment of staff and he was not enthusiastic about Protestant and Roman Catholic medical staff working side by side. She prevailed against him regarding staff appointments and also regarding the National BCG Committee, which was centred at St. Ultan's.
Is it any wonder I find her such an inspiring character? The social mores of the time did not favour women like Dr. Kathleen Lynn but her influence on health care in Dublin was profound. Her friendship with Dr. Maria Montessori influenced the education of children in Dublin, too, but to less an extent that one would wish. There were those in authority who did not approve of promoting children's civil and human rights. The child existed only within the family in the 1936 Constitution. It took until the Children's Act of 2001 , nearly sixty years after Maria Montessori came to Dublin where she met Kathleen, for the pioneering work of these great women to make the child a little person in their own right.
September 15th 2005 will be the fiftieth anniversary of the death of Dr. Kathleen Lynn. She is buried in Dean's Grange Cemetery with her mother Katherine. Will Dublin remember her?
Senator Mary Henry, MD
