‘Island More was really at the core of his heart’ - Paul Gill remembered 

Paul Gill, who passed away peacefully recently at St James' Hospital following an illness, was a man whose heart belonged to Island More in Clew Bay, even as his professional life flourished in Dublin.

It was the windswept island off the Mayo coast, where his father FX Gill and uncles once spent their summers, that truly captured his soul.

Paul's connection to Clew Bay and Island More ran deep through generations. His father had been sent there as a child, part of an old tradition where city youngsters were dispatched to live with aunts and uncles on the islands "to kind of toughen them up," as family friend Paul Michels recalled. Those stories and that connection passed directly to Paul, who would rebuild the family cottage around 2005-06 when electricity finally reached the island.

"Island More was really at the core of his heart," said Michels, who was born just two days before Paul and shared birthday parties with him on the island for the last twenty years of Paul's life. "We were born in two different places – him here, me in Chicago – but we both shared the love for Island More that was given to us from our parents and grandparents."

Paul's widow, Jacqueline, remembered how they seized the opportunity when electricity came to the island, enlisting Willie Quinn from Inishnakillew to help build their home. It became a gathering place where, as Michels noted, "people from around the world, and it doesn't matter how big or how important or how simple, everybody would come by the house."

"He loved just kind of messing around in boats," Jacqueline recalled. "He wasn't a sailor or anything like that. But he just liked boats and engines and just being in a boat gave him absolute joy. He just loved being out on the sea. Catching mackerel, tinkering with various boats, welcoming streams of friends and family – this was where Paul was truly himself.

"He was just a likable person, a really good person, with deep Mayo roots,"  said Michels simply.

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Paul is survived by his dearly loved wife Jacqueline, his daughter Elizabeth, his brother John, in-laws, cousins, and wonderful friends and neighbours. He was predeceased by his sister Maire.

A founding partner at Dillon Eustace LLP, Paul was remembered by his colleagues as "one of a kind" – a popular solicitor with what friends described as "a twinkle in his eye all the time." 

The Partners and staff of Dillon Eustace LLP expressed their deep sadness at the passing of their former and founding partner, remembering him "with great fondness as a friend and colleague."

He will certainly be missed.