(Martin Joseph McDonnell, a law student in Dublin, son of the Landlord and Merchant of the same name who resided in Dunmore, died tragically in Mercer’s Hospital, aged 24, on 10th May 1879, from injuries sustained in a fall from a side-car. He was interred in the family vault in Boyounagh Cemetery)
Dunmore you are in mourning and all around through Tuam,
For Martin McDonnell died in his youth and bloom.
If he had lived amongst us, a lawyer he would be
And like the great O’Connell fight to set his country free.
But sad it was for to relate, for dismal was his fall.
I hope it was a message from the great Almighty call.
God help his aged parents who raised him tenderly,
And like-wise his loving brothers and sisters who never will him see.
When they heard of his downfall with speed they did come o’er,
And take the last farewell of him to the town of sweet Dunmore.
The day of his sad funeral it was a dreadful sight
To see four and twenty young men all dressed in white.
The west’s a-throng as they moved along would grieve your heart full sore,
And his brothers’ cries rained the skies since his body left Dunmore.
The men of Glan came to a man, likewise old Cloonfad,
From around Kilmaine and Ballindine with hearts both grieved and sad.
From Milltown too, great numbers came in mourning to Dunmore.
May the Lord have mercy on his soul, his earthly toil is o’er.
Now he is confined to Boyounagh, that consecrated ground,
Awaiting his eternal day till the last trumpet sound.
Our Saviour will come forward on the eternal day.
The sons of men as well as him the summons must obey.
Source: Recited from memory by Mary Finnegan, née Canney, Lisheenaheltia
.