Mary MacSwiney
| Mary MacSwiney | |
|---|---|
| Teachta Dála | |
|
In office December 1921 – June 1927 |
|
| Constituency | Cork Borough |
| Personal details | |
| Born | 27 March 1872 London, England |
| Died | 8 March 1942 County Cork, Ireland |
| Nationality | Irish |
| Occupation | Politician and educationalist |
| Religion | Roman Catholic |
Mary MacSwiney (pronounced 'MacSweeney'; Irish: Máire Nic Suibhne; 27 March 1872 – 8 March 1942) was an Irish politician and educationalist. In 1927 she became leader of Sinn Féin when Éamon de Valera resigned from the presidency of the party.
Born in London to an Irish father and English mother, she returned to Ireland with her family at the age of six and was educated at St Angela's School in Cork.
At the age of twenty, she obtained a teaching post at a private school in England. After receiving a loan from the Students' Aid Society in Ireland, she studied for a Teaching Diploma at Cambridge University, which was normally reserved for men. She worked at Hillside Convent, Farnborough, and considered being a nun beginning a one-year noviciate with the Oblates of St Benedict, Ventnor.
On the death of her mother in 1904 she returned to Cork to look after the younger members of her family and took a post at St Angela's where she had been a pupil. She attended the first meeting of the Munster Women's Franchise League becoming a committee member. She opposed militancy within the Irish suffrage movement and her nationalist views caused irritation to other members.
Influenced by her younger brother Terence MacSwiney's staunch Irish republicanism she joined the Gaelic League and Inghinidhe na hÉireann. She was a founder member of Cumann na mBan when it was formed in 1914 in Cork and became a National Vice-President of the organisation. She led the denunciation of British rule at the Convention of November 1914. In 1916 she was arrested and imprisoned following the Easter Rising and also was dismissed from her teaching position for her republican activities. Several months later, upon her release from prison, she and her sister Annie re-founded Scoil Íte, a sister school to Patrick Pearse's St. Enda's School, and she remained involved with the school for the rest of her life.
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