John Hume.

I am pleased to offer my support to the campaign to erect a monument to John Devoy.

John Devoy was born in 1842-on the cusp of the greatest disaster Ireland has ever experienced-the Great Famine.This catastrophy radicalised and politicised his life,part of which he tried to interest successive Washington administrations in the ,Irish Question.The life lived by John Devoy in Ireland and America,where he was editor of The Gaelic American,uniquely connects many strands and events of the history of Ireland and indeed that of the Irish diaspora;the Fenian traditoin,his journalistic campaigning,his involvement in the 1916 Rising,his address to the 1919 Dail Eireann,and in his support for the 1921 Treaty.

In the evolution of his political allegiance,mirroring the articulation of Ireland,s democratic wishes,he demonstrates the transition from Fenian to ardent supporter of Ireland,s newely established institutions.
Devoy was a man of his time.Given that he is a native of Naas,and given his major status in Historical terms,it is right and correct that he be commemorated by an appropriated monument in his native town.