A lady approached us as we stood on a grave. She was wearing an Office of Public Works (OPW) uniform with a badge telling us her name. And she was giving us a curious look. Which was fair enough considering that my four daughters and I were standing on a grave at one of Ireland’s most visited tourist attractions, the Rock of Cashel.

“I’m just introducing my daughters to some family,” I explained to the lady. For the people buried beneath this soil, the Ryans, were relatives. Their mother was a McCarthy, the eldest sister of my grandfather.

Interred in this grave with Mrs Ryan are three of her sons who died in the Irish armed forces. Tom was drowned in Fermoy crossing the Blackwater River on manoeuvres. The other two were killed in aeroplane crashes.

As the Rock of Cashel is one of Ireland’s National Monuments, permission had to be obtained to be buried there

Michael got an engine failure in his plane off of Laytown Strand. The beach was packed, so he couldn’t land on it. He ditched at sea and lost his life. His older brother Billy was killed in an air crash in poor visibility around the Dublin Mountains.

Many years later, Billy’s wife Maeve called to see me. She was a charming woman and she told me a love story. But before I was told the story, she had a bit of business to conduct.

It was her wish to be buried with Billy. And as I am an undertaker, and family, she wanted me to carry out the task when her time came. As the Rock of Cashel is one of Ireland’s National Monuments, permission had to be obtained to be buried there. This she had already received.

Now at the time, most young men would hop on a bike or jump in a car to woo the girl of their dreams. But Billy did it from the air

Once the business was taken care of, she told me how she had met and been romanced by Billy. She was a teacher in a village in Co Clare and he was a pilot in the air corps, based in Rineanna, a few miles away.

Now at the time, most young men would hop on a bike or jump in a car to woo the girl of their dreams. But Billy did it from the air. He flew his aeroplane over her school, swooped down and dropped messages from the plane to her. This was in 1940s Ireland.

Of course this caused consternation in the locality, so Maeve was summoned by the principal of the school and the parish priest to know what was going on. This swooping business had to stop. It was frightening the locals and the animals.

But what Maeve didn’t know that day, until I told her, was that I too was a pilot

So she met Billy and told him to stop the swooping, and then she agreed to marry him.

But what Maeve didn’t know that day, until I told her, was that I too was a pilot and on a date one day, I took a young girl for a spin in a plane.

We flew over the Rock of Cashel and I pointed to a grave and told her that interred in the grave were two cousins of mine who had been killed in plane crashes. And believe it or not, she still married me.

And a few years later, Maeve and Billy were re united at the Rock of Cashel.

Jasper Murphy is a publican and undertaker from Fethard, Co Tipperary.

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