07/11/2025
A great man
A forgotten patriot was laid to rest in the driving rain at Gurteen Cemetery, Rounstone, in August 1969.
Bulmer Hobson was born near Belfast in 1883. A member of a Quaker family, Hobson nevertheless took a huge interest in Irish culture, becoming secretary of Antrim GAA while also being a prominent member of the Gaelic League.
Hobson moved to Dublin in 1907 where his interest in nationalism grew. He quickly became involved with the Irish Republican Brotherhood.
Along with Countess Markievicz, he founded 'Na Fianna Éireann,' an Irish answer to the boy scouts which would grow to over 30,000 members.
He also wrote several Irish-themed plays and edited newspapers.
He was one of the most prominent nationalists in a time when it was less fashionable to hold such views and he worked to recruit members to the burgeoning Sinn Féin party while also opposing the British Army's recruiting tactics for World War I.
He also helped organise the Howth Gun-Running of 1914 and the head of Dublin Castle police once described him as 'the most dangerous man in Ireland.'
Hobson was against the 1916 Rising, however, believing that it was a suicidal mission. He preferred to fight only if attacked and believed a guerilla warfare campaign would be the only way Ireland could successfully go toe-to-toe with the might of the British Empire.
This opposition led to Hobson being shut out from decision making and he was lured to a meeting on the eve of the Rising and held until the insurrection began so he was not able to have it called off.
He was largely expunged from the Republican movement after the Rising, however, and he played no role in The War of Independence.
Hobson married Claire Gregan in the same year as the Rising and the pair had a son and a daughter.
Hobson lived a normal life after independence, working with the revenue commissioners until his retirement in the late 1940s while also maintaining an interest in Irish language, culture and the Arts. He wrote several books on Irish history also.
On his retirement, Hobson moved to Roundstone in Connemara where he built a house beside the sea, Bruach na Mara.
As the years went on, Hobson received many visitors to this house, interested in his perspective on the formative years of the Irish State.
Hobson was friendly but enjoyed his own company, once saying 'I enjoy the coming of my friends, and I enjoy their departure also.'
Hobson's sight was failing towards the end of his life and he died aged 86 in 1969.
His wish was to be buried in Gurteen Catholic Graveyard at the foot of Errisbeg, despite his Quaker roots.
Several religious denominations were present, something which would have pleased Hobson, a man who had wished to unite all creeds in Ireland.
There was no flag-draped coffin, no volley of shots and no government minister present, although there were at least 300 neighbours from Roundstone and a selection of friends from across the country.
The Kerryman newspaper stated: 'They huddled under a low stone wall in showers of rain as they waited for the patriot's last journey. Then the coffin was carried across the rocky, hilly ground by four local men.'
William Glynn, a friend of Hobson's, spoke over the grave, where he remembered Hobson when he, like Ireland, was young and full of hope and optimism.
Speaking of visiting Hobson's grave three decades later, novelist and family friend Brian Moore stated
"The past is buried until, in Connemara, the sight of Bulmer Hobson's grave brings back those faces, those scenes, those sounds and smells which now live only in my memory.
And in that moment I know that when I die I would like to come home at last to be buried here in this quiet place among the grazing cows."
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