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Volume 3 1926~1932

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Date
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No. 293 NAI DFA EA 231/5

Handwritten Confidential Report from Count Gerald O'Kelly de Gallagh to Joseph P. Walshe (Dublin)

Paris, 24 October 1929

Dear Walshe,

Just a line to acknowledge your letter of the 23rd.1 I am putting up an official case - or rather I am letting Cawley put it up - to Dublin in connexion with the press cuttings and will send you a copy of my letter.2 Things are going along here quietly but satisfactorily. I am gradually working off an accumulation of arrears, but the office is frightfully handicapped through want of proper staff. I have again written to Dublin on the shorthand typist issue. It is impossible to get work done properly with our present staff.

I have received quite a number of letters of congratulation from various friends in France and from some strangers - notably from a Deputy, Comte de Warren, presumably the Father of the Raoul de Warren who wrote that Irish Thesis last year - a book I did not consider of any great value. He is a descendant of a genuine Wild Goose, and may I think, prove useful.

One of the first invitations I have received has been from old Adatci, the Japanese Ambassador, whom I used to know in Brussels. Without even waiting for my protocolaire call, he has invited us to an official dinner. Tyrrell has asked us to lunch on Tuesday next. On Thursday I am the guest of the American Club, to whom I gave a short address on the economic development of the I.F.S. and the week following I attend a lunch at the Circle Inter-Allie. I am not quite sure what it's all about, but Cahill3 is in the Chair.

Since taking over this job I've had a number of lady callers. They ask for the most diverse services. I will mention four to you to illustrate what an Irish Minister has to face.

A) The lady who wanted 200 francs. I wrote to you officially about that.
B) A girl who is in Paris herself in defiance of the French authorities, inasmuch as she has no permit de sèjour and is working as cashier in a hotel. She wanted me to put the office stamp on a Declaration made by her that a friend of hers - a Swedish girl of 16 - was not insane!
C) Mrs Bradley Dyne - the famous Mrs Bradley Dyne of the 'francs' case - called on me. She has a British passport but wanted a Free State Visa. She was going over to England. Before explaining to her that such a visa was unnecessary I elicited, after a good deal of fencing, the information that she thought that if she showed an Irish visa or her passport at Dover and stated she was going to Ireland, her trunks would not be opened!
D) A Canadian lady of 60 or so. She asked me if I was married. On getting an affirmative reply she informed me that her son was married to a girl who was half Irish. They were in India now, and had been married 3 years. So far there was no family. She thought her daughter-in-law didn't want babies. What would I advise her to do about it? And she gave me half an hours lecture on obstetrics!

I have an appointment tomorrow with the Spanish Ambassador who, in the absence of the Nuncio, is Doyen of the Corps Diplomatique, for the purpose of arranging the order etc. of my Diplomatic calls, which I expect will take up a good deal of my time next week. A lot of my time is taken up looking for houses. So far I have had no luck whatever. There is an extraordinary dearth of suitable accommodation for a legation. The agencies have hardly anything on their books. If I get no possible proposition within the next few days I propose putting in a big advertisement in the press. Little ads. are no good at all.

Cheerio, yours ever
Count G. O'Kelly de Gallagh

1 See No. 292.

2 Not located.

3 Commercial Secretary, British Embassy, Paris.

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