True Irish Murder Mysteries His Own Silence Sent Him to the Gallows
| Published date | 01 October 1986 |
| Author | John J. Dunne |
| DOI | 10.1177/0032258X8605900408 |
| Date | 01 October 1986 |
| Subject Matter | Article |
JOHN J.
DUNNE
True Irish
Murder
Mysteries
HIS
OWN
SILENCE SENT
HIM
TO THE GALLOWS
It
is said
that
silence is golden, yet the inexplicable silence of one
Irishman cost him more
than
gold.
It
cost him his life. The
enigmatic victim of one of the most baffling of Irish murder
mysteries, because he stubbornly refused to open his mouth
and
shed light on his own identity, Edmund Pine was to die on the
scaffold.
The bizarre events
took
place in a small village in Co. Waterford
in the last century.
It
was a remote place where everybody knew his
neighbour
and
the
humdrum
monotony of everyday life was usually
punctuated only by Christmas, Easter, local fair days
and
the
periodic funeral or wedding.
In a place where nothing untoward ever- happened, a
neighbourhood romance was seized
upon
with enthusiasm and
gossiped
about
with gusto. One love story was to blossom in the
village
that
was destined, however, to have reverberations much
further afield
and
to send its ripples even to distant Dublin.
It
was
the trigger
that
eventually sparked off the explosion of one of the
most tantalising murder cases in the annals of Irish crime.
It
all started when a small, attractive local girl named Mary Healy,
who lived on a smallholding outside the village with her parents,
sisters
and
brothers, met and fell in love with a husky young farmer
named Michael Savage.
Despite all
that
was to happen afterwards to the ill-starred
couple, it would
appear
to have been love at first sight
and
the
romance seemed likely to flourish and endure.
"Mary
and
Michael are ideally suited to each other!" approved
the local gossips, eyeing the budding love affair sagely. And for a
long time it appeared
that
they had summed up the situation
accurately. The young couple, as anybody
around
Co. Waterford
could see, appeared to be deeply in love with each other.
"They're in a deep rut of bliss
that
can lead only to the altar," one
local pundit pontificated. Nobody doubted
that
he was right
and
there was no surprise when Michael Savage set the date.
The wedding was a simple, friendly affair, a small gathering of
close relatives and friends on a sparkling day
that
seemed to auger
well for the happy young couple. They settled down on their
smallholding, fitting comfortably into the everyday life of the little
village
and
from all appearances ideally happy in each other's
company.
338 October 1986
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