3-078-288 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

The Father Mathew Centenary: grave of Father Mathew in the cemetery at Cork, 1890. In February 1853, '...the famous "Apostle of Temperance" fell into a fit in his bedroom, and was insensible until the next morning. In October 1854 he left for Madeira, staying there until August 1855. The autumn of 1856 he spent at Queenstown, but early in the winter the final stroke came. He lingered some days, speechless, all his faculties dim. Yet he recognised everyone, and even managed to make the sign of the cross on those who, by his death-bed, took the pledge. He intimated his desire to be buried under the cross he had erected in the cemetery at Cork, and passed away, Dec. 8, 1856, lamented by a whole nation. His corpse, placed in his church at Cork, was visited by crowds of the poor, who came to look on the face of their friend, full of traces of suffering and sorrow. Fifty thousand mourners attended the funeral, which was a procession two miles long. Not only the cemetery but the roads outside were thronged, and when the remains were deposited in the tomb a convulsive sobbing broke forth from the vast crowds, telling how deep and strong and uniting was the love the people bore to one who had given his life for Ireland'. From "Illustrated London News", 1890.