NOMINEE FOR IRISH PRESIDENCY?

Hawke's Bay Herald-Tribune, Volume 81, Issue 64, 8 December 1937, Page 5

NOMINEE FOR IRISH PRESIDENCY?

-Pre»s Aaan,-

Man Whose Father Lost Title DuringWjar REFUSES TO COMMENT

IBjr Telegraph-

-Oopyright.)

(Eeceived 8, 8.45 a.m,) DUBLIN, Dec. 7. Count Edward Taaffe, a descendant of a noble Welsh family which settled in Ireland in the tenth century and then, 300 years ago, settled in, Bobemia, arrived in Dublin to-day. Connt Edward refused to comment on the ssggestion that be wiii be Mr Eamon de Valera's nominee for the Presidency of the Irish Eree State. He is applying immediately for Eree State citizenship, and is resigning from the Czechoslovakian Army. Connt Edward said that he was not at present petitioning the British Government for the regtoration of the peerage, of which his father was deprived for flghting against Britain in the war, The father, who died in 1928., was the 12th holder of the title of Viseount Taaffe in the peerage of Ireland. There are few families with so romantic a history and one which has brought them to play a leading part in events in so many lands. A Taaffe held the family castle at Ardree. County LO'Uth, for Queen Elizabeth. *A Taaffe wa§ §taunch for the Stuarts in the Civil MaT§. 0n6 gave his li'fe for James II. at the Battle of the Boyne. The Taaffe wlio migrated to Bohemia became a Marshal and Count of the Austrian Empire. The grandfather of the present Count rose to flrst plaee in Austrian politics, being Premier from 1879 to 1893. Count Edward, who is 39,' married at Dunboyne, Meath, in 1931 Miss Graue McLaughlin. She i's a granddaughter of the late Chief Justice Meredith, Irish Master of the Bolls. From his father Count Edward lcarnad one of the closest sccrets of the Eoyal Houses of Europe — thq circumstances of the deaths in the shootingbox near Vienna iff 1389 of Crown Prinee Eudolf of Hapsburg and Baroness Mary Vetgera.