Society Members: Frank Murray, Deirdre Larkin, Donal McCartney, President Mary McAleese, David Kenny (rose breeder), and Eunan McKinney.

These images were captured at the Parnell Society's presentation of a special white rose, to be named 'Katharine Parnell' to Mary McAleese, President of Ireland
This rose has been specially bred by an Irish rose breeder, David Kenny, from Tullow in County Carlow for the Parnell Society who have sought to immortalise the memory of Charles Stewart Parnell and his relevance to modern Ireland.

A rose was central to Katharine’s memory of her first meeting with Parnell, when they met in the Palace yard at Westminister:

“In leaning forward in the cab to say goodbye, a rose I was wearing in my bodice fell out on to my skirt. He picked it up and, touching it lightly with his lips, placed it in his buttonhole. This rose I found long years afterwards, done up in an envelope, with my name and the date, among his most private papers, and when he died I laid it upon his heart.”

Katharine O’Shea (Mrs Charles Stewart Parnell),
Charles Stewart Parnell: His Love Story and Political Life (2 vols, London, 1914.)