The chances of recovering the Napoleonic crown jewels nabbed by a burglary gang from the Louvre are limited, if the story of the Irish crown jewel heist is anything to go by.
On June 6th, 1907, the jewels, associated with the knightly Order of St Patrick, went missing days before a visit by British King Edward VII. They consisted of a star decorated with diamonds, an emerald and a ruby, another diamond badge and five gold jewel-encrusted collars, amounting to 394 jewels in total.
Who took them? How did they snatch them from a Dublin Castle tower which was “constantly and systematically occupied by soldiers and policemen”? Did they wear a high-vis like the Paris thieves? We still don’t know.
It made global headlines, and no less a personage than Arthur Conan Doyle, inventor of Sherlock Holmes, volunteered himself to help solve the mystery. Sir Arthur Vicars, who had the keys to the safe as part of his job as “Ulster King of Arms”, was ruined in the affair, but later pointed the finger in his will at “the real culprit and thief Francis R Shackleton, brother of the Explorer (Sir Ernest) who didn’t reach the South Pole”.
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Despite various tipoffs over the years, the jewels have never been found.
“It does seem clear that the case was hushed up – either to cloak a deeper scandal or to protect some of the people involved,” says Conor Mulvagh, lecturer in Irish history at UCD.
A report which allegedly named a suspect was suppressed by the Dublin Metropolitan Police, and the National Archives of Ireland reported in 2007 that the report is “no longer extant”.
Looking too closely into where the jewels went might have exposed “potentially corrupt practices and excesses in Dublin Castle,” which was “the bigger scandal in the eyes of some”, Mulvagh says.
So they got away with it. The Paris crooks, lost in the wind, may not even need such a cover-up.
No need for Eircodes
Ten years on since the introduction of Eircodes and, despite the mandatory national hue and cry against ever trying anything, they have been a success.
Research shows that 97 per cent of people know theirs, and the most granular postal system in the world helps many people find many addresses, be they north-facing hill farm or city-centre infill apartment. Delivery men use them. Ambulances use them. Pest control operatives you might call to come look at the wasp situation in your chimney use them (don’t ask how we know).
But does An Post use them? It was reported some years ago that they didn’t, for local delivery, so we went to check whether anything has changed a decade after they first appeared.
“An Post both promotes the use of Eircode and our automated mail facilities are all equipped to read and process Eircodes as part of a full postal address,” a spokesman said.
“The response back in 2017 referred to the use by local postal operatives on the ground (going door-to-door) using Eircodes on a practical basis. Hence the quote ‘Eircodes were never intended or designed for use at local delivery level’.”
Which is to say no, they still don’t use them on a local level – don’t need ‘em, never did.
It’s an “issue of scale”, the spokesman said. A pizza-carrier only needs to find one address; a postman visits many. And Eircodes are not sequential, so delivering locally by address makes more sense rather than looking up each code one by one.
Druid’s magic spell
Maureen Kennelly, late of the Arts Council, is settling in to her new job as chief executive of the Druid Theatre Company in Galway, where costing bespoke IT solutions is likely to be lower down the to-do list.
One of her main jobs will be to secure the pipeline of funding for the celebrated drama troupe for the coming years. Druid received €1.06 million in so-called strategic funding in 2025, as well as another million, plus €119,000 in tour support, in 2024. It has gathered various other grants in previous years, transforming taxpayer funding alchemically into critically celebrated versions of Beckett, Synge and O’Casey plays.
Is it worth it? The Arts Council certainly thought so when it announced its latest funding grants earlier this year.
“Grant supports are vital to the continued growth and development of the arts in Ireland. These funding decisions will help ensure that organisations throughout the country are empowered to realise compelling visions across all artforms. This financial support will allow people of all ages and backgrounds to engage with and experience the very best of the arts in our country,” commented Maura Kennelly, then-director of the Arts Council.
She will be well-positioned to make Druid’s case to her old colleagues.
80 per cent quizzical looks
Wherever in the world you find yourself, there’s a good chance you’ll encounter an Irish person in the town square with a keffiyeh and a placard.
It’s certainly the case in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, nestled in a valley in the Grand Teton Range of the Rocky Mountains. The town of Jackson, population 10,000, is 1,901m above sea level – nearly twice as high as anywhere in Ireland. Buffalo roam nearby.
There, since November 2023, Irish writer Dan Sheehan has spent many Saturdays protesting. “Our numbers rarely make it into double digits,” he tells Overheard, “and I have found myself protesting solo in a snowstorm on a couple of occasions.”
Why bother? As well as reminding US taxpayers of what their congress is funding, Sheehan says, the protests can reach a specific class of people who use the town as a holiday haven. “Jackson is home to a small but extraordinarily influential constituency of bad actors: retired ‘war on terror’ politicians, Maga mega donors, weapons tech and mass surveillance oligarchs,” he says. “No small town in America can boast as many powerful ghouls (even if most of them only spend a few weeks out of every year here).”
The response has been mixed in what is, ultimately, a very rural, very Republican state where First Amendment free speechers always have in the back of their minds the Second Amendment gun carriers.
“If I were to attempt to break it down, I would say it’s been about 80 per cent quizzical looks and averted gazes, 10 per cent honks and supportive comments, and 10 per cent outright hostility.
“We’ve had a lot of pretty vile abuse hurled at us – both from cars and face to face – but nobody has thrown a punch so far, which is something. A couple of months back, for the first time, we got through an entire demonstration without receiving any abuse whatsoever, which was nice.”
No point preaching to the converted.
