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garda review Editorial May 2010
Fallen members honoured in garda memorial day
Family, friends and colleagues of members who died on duty gathered this month to mark
the An Garda Síochána Memorial Ceremony and official opening of the memorial garden in the Dubhlinn Gardens of Dublin Castle. This was a very public tribute.
The protocols at this historic event were impeccable; enhanced by the creative talents of
the band of An Garda Síochána and the garda choirs, male and female. The ceremony was poignant and when the band’s lone bugle rendition of The Last Post accompanied the laying of commemorative wreaths and
as the final notes shimmered on the breeze of a summer afternoon in a garden there was a growing expectation, a need to take the pain of loss into a wider significance. The guests and onlookers were not left
empty when the dying notes heralded the first bars of the national anthem Amhrán na bhFiann with such gusto and hope that the congregation rose as one. The significance of association is plain.
Those who gave their lives on duty deserve this memorial; it has come at a time when
Irish society is changing and needs a garda memorial to tell us who we are. Those members of An Garda Síochána who put themselves on the line and made the ultimate sacrifice serving the people of Ireland deserve
a garda memorial that honours this, to reflect ‘life cut short’. Their 83 names are now carved in stone, laying down a marker saying that this is no longer subject to discussion; they gave their
lives in order to fulfil the laws of our community. The people of Ireland will understand exactly how many gardaí have lost their lives protecting our basic needs. It tells us about ourselves and our journey
here and gives our transforming nationhood the opportunity to understand itself and the risks it asks certain citizens to take when they become our referees in times of conflict.
The Garda Roll of Honour has previously only included those members who were killed by an
act of determined violence, but omitted those who went to work and never came home for many other reasons - including many tragic traffic collisions. The new Roll of Honour is inclusive of all those whose lives
were cut short. At this inaugural ceremony, citations were read for each life lost and a family member was presented with a Remembrance Medal. This paid particular recognition of the pain visited upon the loved
ones of those who paid the ultimate sacrifice and recognises their ongoing contribution.
The family of police officers always live in the shadow of heightened real and potential
risk; an inherent fear that both accompanies and counters the rewards of vocation. Our words will not alleviate the suffering of those who have lost a family member, friend or colleague, but as An Taoiseach
Brian Cowen said at the ceremony, it is our duty to tell them how much their sacrifice means to us.
The Garda Representative Association would like to thank all of the groups and
individuals who lent their shoulder to the wheel in making this solemn ceremony and fitting celebration of those lives cut short in the service of others. In particular, we would like to extend our deep thanks
to Garda Michael Duffy who, at his own effort and expense, initiated and completed a significant proportion of the research and held aloft an often solitary beacon to create a fitting memorial to colleagues
lost. His personal achievement is to be saluted for a job well done.
Ireland must never forget those gardaí who gave their lives on duty in service of their communities, but we must not remember them
for how they died, but for how they lived.
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