Patrick Mortimer
Pól's Grandfather


His death cert gave me the following information:

• Patrick drowned and was found in the Liffey at Eden Quay on 11 June 1918. I subsequently checked out the Coroner's report ( or rather the abbreviated version which survives in the register ) and this confirms that the coroner had no evidence as to how Patrick ended up in the water. I checked out some other cases to ascertain the style of reporting. It is clear that where the coroner has any grounds for how the victim came to be in the water this is stated in the report. So this one remains a mystery. Follow up in the national press revealed that he had been missing for a week.
• He was a canteen assistant and not a manager as passed down in the béaloideas. Follow up in the national press revealed that the location of his work at the time of his death was Richmond Military Barracks. Further follow up of the 1911 census in Birr, Co. Offaly, revealed that he had, in fact, been a manager of a grocery and provision store (possibly a branch of Lipton's) in 1911.
• It revealed he was living at Thirlstane Terrace. A perusal of Thom's suggested he was not many years there. He was married from Arnott St. in 1902 and lived in Mount Temple Road (Manor Street) from about 1903 to before 1911, when he turned up in Birr. It is not clear how long he was in Birr, but this may fill the gap between Mount Temple Road and Thirlstane.
• The cert puts him at 42 years of age. It is not clear where the coroner got this information. If he got it from Patrick's wife then the mystery thickens as he was really 48, and this was roughly the age given in contemporary newspaper reports of his death.