A SONG FOR MARY

This is a song I wrote about one of the most despicable cases in a country that has seen many. Here is the story;
Mary Boyle was a six-year-old Irish girl who disappeared in County Donegal on the 18th of March 1977. To date, her disappearance is the longest missing child case in the Republic of Ireland. The investigation into her disappearance has been beset by allegations of political intervention and police incompetence. Mary was last seen at 3:30pm on 18 March 1977 near her grandparents' rural farm in Cashelard, near Ballyshannon, she was playing outside with her siblings and two cousins when her uncle left to return a ladder to another farm, 370 m across the hillside.
She followed her uncle until they reached a small pool of water that was too deep for her to get through. Whether by her own decision or by her uncle's instruction, she turned around halfway into the journey saying she was going back to her grandparents' house. That`s the story the uncle told.
After discovering that Mary had disappeared, her family instituted searches of the local area and questioned passers-by if they had seen the girl. One fisherman was quoted as saying that he had seen her being put into a red car and then driven away, although he later corrected this in a BBC podcast by saying he had not actually seen her, but just a suspicious red car. Many of the bogs in the area were drained and scoured in an effort to find Mary to no avail.
The investigation into Mary's disappearance has attracted some publicity because of allegations of political interference which centred around the accusation that a politician (a local hotelier) phoned the Gardaí and told them to not question or detain their main suspect, a Fianna Fail member.
In 2018, relatives and supporters of Mary's family held a silent protest outside the coroner's office in Stranorlar. The protest was intended to pressure the coroner to hold an inquest into Mary's death which would allow key witnesses to be interviewed on public record for the first time. Mary's twin sister Ann was among the group, which handed in a petition containing more than 10,000 signatures demanding that an inquest be held.
In 2016, media personality Gemma O'Doherty produced a documentary titled Mary Boyle: The Untold Story, which explores several possible causes for her disappearance. In the documentary, Mary's sister Ann says she thinks Mary was sexually abused and then murdered. The film came under some criticism by the people interviewed for the programme. Both of the retired Gardaí sergeants who talked onscreen deny that any political pressure was brought to bear on their investigation, yet another officer said he was told to "ease off" when questioning one of the suspects in the case, but this was by a senior officer in the room at the time of the suspect's interview. The film led to O'Doherty being sued for defamation by Fianna Fáil politician Sean McEniff ( a local hotelier) for damages of €75,000, although McEniff was never mentioned by name in the film. In 2019, after McEniff's death, a judge granted his estate leave to continue the case.
Ann, Mary`s sister and several other relatives have publicly claimed they believe they know what happened to Mary and who is responsible for her disappearance. This has caused tension and a division within the family, with Ann's mother publicly admonishing her daughter in 2016; calling her public appeals "...the most ridiculous carry on I ever seen in my life.
So that`s the story and its not pretty. She followed her uncle and was never seen again. He`s dead now, the politician who allegedly called a halt to his questioning is dead too. Its been nearly fifty years, she is lying in a bog somewhere is my guess and apart from a few, nobody cares.
copyright @ padraig grimes 2025
all rights reserved.