Mayo to celebrate its French connections

VIVE LA FRANCE A special presentation was made to Catherine Gagneux, Honorary French Consul for Connacht after she launched Mayo Day 2017 and ‘Celebrating Mayo-French Connections’ Festival, from left: Peter Hynes, Chief Executive, MCC: John Condon, Head of Castlebar Municipal District, MCC; Cllr Michael Kilcoyne, Cathaoirleach, Castlebar Municipal District; Catherine Gagneux, Honorary Consul for Connacht, Embassy of France; Cllr Al McDonnell, Cathaoirleach, Mayo County Council and Joanne Grehan, Director of Services, Mayo County Council. Pic: John Mee Photography

Anton McNulty

Two-hundred-and-fifty years after the birth of General Humbert, the French will be returning to Castlebar to celebrate Mayo’s French connections for Mayo Day.
The third Mayo Day celebrations takes place over the May Bank Holiday weekend with the flagship events taking place in Castlebar to honour the Mayo-French connections. The highlight of the weekend’s festivities will be a battle reenactment of the famous Races of Castlebar on Sunday, April 30.
Lat Friday, the French Embassy’s Honorary Consul for Connacht, Catherine Gagneux, made the trip to Castlebar, where she officially launched the celebrations. Mme Gagneux, who is married to a Crossmolina man, foresees an even stronger relationship between Ireland and France post-Brexit.
“There are very strong connections between France and Ireland, from the past and present and even more so into the future. “Especially as we are now your next best neighbour, but I suppose that it is not news as we have always been your next-best neighbour.
“The more I come to Mayo, the more I learn about the history and from the French point of view, it is a fantastic idea to commemorate that event,” she told those gathered in Lough Lannagh for the launch.
“Ireland has always been a popular destination for French people. Of the French tourists who come to Ireland, three quarters of them come to the west of Ireland because of the landscape and scenery. This is something we wish will continue. We want to help as best we can to develop more exchanges between France and Ireland,” she said.
French Ambassador to Ireland Jean-Pierre Thébault will be present for the weekend’s festivities, along with up to 50 French people who will be reenacting the scenes from the Races of Castlebar.
A number of pikemen from Enniscorthy will also be making the trip west, to join the French and the Mayo people in the reenactment. The event will start on the Turlough Road before travelling to the Mall. Throughout, the town will be alive with the sound of 18th-century musket fire and the clash of steel and pikes.
The Saturday of the festivities will also include a Living History Village, where people can explore the sights and sounds of a traditional 1798 market on the Mall.

Conference
A conference exploring the origins of Republicanism and the historic links between France and Ireland will take place in GMIT Castlebar, while a historical talk on John Moore, the first and only President of the Republic of Connacht will take place in Moore Hall.
Director of Services, Joanne Grehan said Mayo Day was an opportunity to expose Mayo on an international stage to bolster tourism and business to the county.
The hashtag, #MayoDay had 11.5 million views on Twitter in 2016. Peter Hynes, the Chief Executive of Mayo County Council, pointed out that there is 3.5 million people with Mayo lineage throughout the world, and that Mayo Day is an opportunity to tap into that market.
“There are far more Mayo people not in the county than in the county … Not many counties have that opportunity. It is about those 3.5 million people with Mayo DNA coursing through their veins and reconnecting with them.
“The old thing of ‘Mayo God help us’ is gone. Mayo is now a can-do county and connected county. We are trying to invert the conversation from ‘Why Mayo?’ to ‘Why not Mayo?’. That is a little bit of what Mayo Day is about,” he said.