This coming Sunday is Feb. 14, Valentine’s Day…when thoughts of love fill the hearts of people, the windows of the chocolate shops, and the card aisles at CVS. We’ll be performing again at The Port Tavern in Newburyport with Sligo Road, so in preparation, I’ve been going through the ol’ songbook to make sure we have a few choice love songs to play.
Not that Irish love songs end particularly well, mind you. Seamus Eagan from Solas once opined that the relationships in Irish love songs “either never get off the ground, or they end particularly badly.”
Anyway, we recently had a few requests for a particular love song that I hadn’t heard in years, called “Grace”…so I went ahead and learned it. Now that I’ve done a bit of research about the song, I thought I’d share the history of this lovely classic.
This isn’t some kind of sentimental saccharine of this Hallmark holiday…this song made famous by Jim McCann tells a true story of love that is directly tied to the fight for Ireland’s independence.
Grace Gifford
At the turn of the last century, there was a young Irish woman named Grace Gifford. A cartoonist by trade, she was engaged to a poet and journalist by the name of Joseph Plunkett. They were supposed to be married on Easter Sunday in 1916 in University Chapel on St Stephen’s Green in Dublin.
Now those who know about the Easter Rising in 1916 will recognize Plunkett’s name. He was one of the leaders of the rebellion and, at age 28, was the youngest to sign the Proclamation of the Republic that Patrick Pearse read at the General Post Office in Dublin.
In planning the revolt, the secrecy required meant that Joseph couldn’t tell Grace that their wedding plans would be replaced by the Easter Rising.
Joseph Plunkett
Following the failed revolt, Plunkett and the other leaders were sentenced to death by firing squad at Kilmainham Jail. When Grace learned that her darling Joseph was to be killed the next day, she bought a ring and rushed to the jail at night. She and Joseph were married in the chapel in the early morning of May 4 under guard from 20 soldiers and, as soon as the ceremony ended, Plunkett was taken back to his cell. Later that morning, he was marched to the courtyard and shot.
I can’t imagine what it would have been like for Grace to look into his eyes and pledge her undying love, knowing that he’d be taken from her in just a few hours. As the last line of the song’s chorus says: “There won’t be time to share our love, for we must say goodbye.”
Some people may point to Romeo and Juliet as a great love story, but that was fiction. The true story of Grace and Joseph takes my breath away. I don’t view the song a republican anthem, it’s a terrific reminder that we should always let those we love know how we feel every chance we get.
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