[Seán MacEntee, Fianna Fáil politician and Tánaiste.] Typed Letter Signed ('Seán MacEntee') to T. J. Hickey, editor of 'The Statist', commending an article on Hilaire Belloc by Collin Brooks. With Autograph Note Signed from Hickey to Brooks.

Author: 
Seán MacEntee [Seán Mac an tSaoi] (1889-1984), Irish Fianna Fáil politician, Tánaiste [Thomas J. Hickey; Collin Brooks (1893-1959), Fleet Street journalist; Hilaire Belloc; Easter Rising, 1916]
Publication details: 
On letterhead of the Oifig an Aire Airgeadais, (Office of the Minister for Finance) Baile Átha Cliath. (Dublin). 27 July 1953.
£220.00
SKU: 20919

1p., 4to. In good condition, lightly aged, with punch holes at margin. MacEntee begins his letter to Hickey: 'In the tribute which “The Statist” pays to the late Hilaire Belloc a reference is made to his essay on usury. I read this some time ago but cannot recall the title of the volume in which it appeared. I should be grateful, indeed, if you would be kind enough to make good the lacuna by supplying the missing title.' He congratulates Hickey 'on the article itself'. In MacEntee's opinion 'it was quite the best and most balanced of all those that I have read – and I do not except the more voluminous and supercilious Eton and what-not articles in “The Tablet”'. He hopes that Hickey will holiday in Ireland that year, and 'will not forget to call'. At the head of the page is an ANS 'To C. B.' from 'Tom Hickey': 'As this letter from Sean MacEntee, then Irish Minister for Finance, was prompted by your article on Hilaire Belloc, which the Minister so enthusiastically praises, I think it only fair to pass it on to you'. Note: "Following his education MacEntee worked as an engineer in Dundalk, County Louth, and was involved in the establishment of a local corps of the Irish Volunteers in the town. He mobilised in Dundalk and fought in the General Post Office Garrison in the Easter Rising in 1916. He was sentenced to death for his part in the rising. This sentence was later commuted to life imprisonment. MacEntee was released in the general amnesty in 1917, and was later elected a member of the National Executives of both Sinn Féin and the Irish Volunteers in October 1917. MacEntee was later elected Sinn Féin Member of Parliament (MP) for Monaghan South at the 1918 general election."