#mountstbenedict

Mount St Benedict, Ireland.

Today, Friday 7th October, is the announcement of the winner of the 2016 Nobel Peace Prize winner. Coincidentally, this week one of our volunteers has found some information relating to this momentous occasion in our archives.

In the early and middle parts of the 20th century, Downside ran a school in Ireland for Catholics named Mount St Benedict in Gorey, Wexford. The school ran from 1907 to 1925, but this Downside foundation managed to produce a future winner of the Peace Prize.

Sean Macbride (1904-1988) was born in France and educated at Mount St Benedict after his father had been executed for his part in the 1916 Easter Rising. Whilst there he shared a room with renowned artist Cecil Salkeld and architect Simon Leonard.

At the age of 15 Macbride left the school and joined the Irish Volunteers during the Irish Civil War. He was imprisoned by the Irish Free State for the duration of this conflict. He went on to study law at University College, Dublin before being elected to the Irish government in 1947.

Macbride became increasingly involved with human rights issues and was also part of the creation of the Council of Europe in 1949. Macbride was one of the founder members of Amnesty International in 1961, and became United Nations Commissioner for Namibia in 1973.

In 1974 he won the Nobel Peace Prize 'for efforts on the behalf of human rights'. At this time he was chairman of the International Peace Bureau and Assistant Secretary General of the UN. Besides the Peace Prize, Macbride was also the recipient of the Lenin Peace Prize and the American Medal of Justice.

In 1980 he became chairman of UNESCO until he passed away in Dublin in 1988.