The late Henry Mount Charles was born “with a silver dagger in his back”, mourners at his funeral were told.
His son Alex, who has succeeded his father to become the 9th Marquess Conyngham, quoted the joke first told by Frank Kelly to explain Mount Charles’s awkward relationship with aristocracy and the burdens that came with it.
“Dad initially struggled with his Anglo-Irish identity and described it as feeling like he had a leg either side of the Irish Sea with each side treating him as something of an outsider,” Conyngham said.
It was only when he went to Harvard and immersed himself in the study of Irish history that his father grew to be at ease with who he was.
Brothers behind Irish franchises of Starbucks and TGI Fridays banned from acting as company directors
Woman was abducted in Kildare after alleged threats to petrol bomb her house in row over dog
Natasha O’Brien: Being bullied in school made me determined to speak up for others
What comes next for Damien Duff could be as enigmatic as the man himself
“Then he came to realise through the writings and ethos of the likes of Wolfe Tone that Ireland was a country fed by many streams and that he, as an Anglo-Irish aristocrat, belonged to one of those streams.”
If he “applied himself”, he thought, he could “make a contribution”, something he was determined to do.
“Politically he was a passionate, constitutional republican, and he truly loved his country, its culture and people. He counted himself blessed to be an Irishman.”
One of the deceased’s early decisions on inheriting the financially straitened Slane estate, Conyngham also told mourners, was that he needed “to open the castle gates rather than keeping them closed”.
This led to the famous concerts, starting in the summer 1981 when, amid unprecedented tension surrounding the Maze hunger strikes, he pressed ahead with in the inaugural event, involving Thin Lizzy, with support acts Hazel O’Connor and U2.
During a simple funeral otherwise devoid of the presence of rock stars, a veteran of the 1981 concert, U2’s Adam Clayton, gave one of the readings – from St Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians - and was clearly moved at the ceremony’s conclusion.
The attendance in the tiny St Patrick’s Church of Ireland also included former Taoiseach Leo Varadkar and local TD and Minister for Education Helen McEntee. Chief celebrant Canon John Clarke was assisted in part of the service by the Catholic Parish Priest of Slane, Fr Richard Matthews.
It was otherwise a mostly family affair, with locals and the media watching on screens in the adjacent Lynch’s Bar and elsewhere.
Non-scriptural readings included one from Mount Charles’s brother, Simon Conyngham, from Oscar Wilde’s short story for children, The Canterville Ghost:
“Yes, death. Death must be so beautiful. To lie in the soft brown earth,
with the grasses waving above one’s head, and listen to silence. To have
no yesterday, and no to-morrow. To forget time, to forget life, to be at
peace. You can help me. You can open for me the portals of death’s
house, for love is always with you, and love is stronger than death
is."
An old friend of the deceased, Nick Koumarianos, paid tribute to his warmth and mischievous sense of humour, such as when he once secured him admission as a plus-one at a high-security event in the US, only to sign him in as “A. Gatecrasher”.
He also recalled, to more laughter, a piece of business advice his friend had once given him: “Always do your accounts in pencil and don’t press too hard.”
[ Henry Mount Charles: a life in picturesOpens in new window ]
In an appreciation entitled “Lessons from Dad”, Mount Charles’s daughter Tamara Conyngham listed principles she had learned from her father. These included “use your imagination”, “be generous with your time”, “never give up”, and “if you’re lucky enough to come from a place as beautiful as Slane, share it.”
Paying tribute to his love of life, she concluded: “All we can do is party on in his memory.”
The remains were carried from the church, for burial in the adjoining cemetery, to the accompaniment of U2’s Bad. Afterwards, in keeping with Mount Charles’s policy of opening doors, all those attending the funeral, in the church or elsewhere, were invited back to the castle for a reception.
