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Volume 9 1948~1951

Doc No.
Date
Subject

No. 508 NAI DFA/5/335/118

Letter from Leo T. McCauley to Seán Nunan (Dublin)
(17/5/10)

Madrid, 16 October 1950

  1. I wrote on the 29th September1 recommending that Miss MacEntee should receive a special dress allowance to enable her to outfit herself appropriately for the ceremony of the presentation of my credentials as Ambassador. Now that the event is past I have the honour to report that I am more convinced than ever of the propriety of my recommendation.
  2. The enclosed photographs show the setting and circumstances for which Miss MacEntee had to prepare herself. I trust that the Department will realise that it was an occasion for which a woman officer would have to make a special effort in order to be dressed appropriately and for which, with a Second Secretary's salary and allowances, she could not be expected either to have a dress already available in her wardrobe, or to incur unassisted the cost of a new one.
  3. I have heard nothing but approval expressed for the manner in which Miss MacEntee presented herself. I may add that the photograph in which she is shown shaking hands with the Chief of State is being displayed in the Ritz, the leading hotel in Madrid.
  4. I hope that the Department will appreciate the nature of the problem with which Miss MacEntee was faced when she was required to dress for this occasion and will share my view that she should receive an allowance.

1 See No. 504.

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