The historian Dr Shane Kenna, who has died aged 33, from stomach cancer, was one of the foremost authorities on the Fenian movement. UCC historian Gabriel Doherty, who knew him well, regarded him as "one of the best young historians in the country, a superb author and a highly engaging speaker. There are very few academics, of any age, who could speak with total authority on all aspects of the IRB, right the way through from the 1850s to the 1920s, from O'Donovan Rossa through to Michael Collins, in the movement's Irish, American and British dimensions."
He was born and reared in Old Bawn, Tallaght, Dublin, the younger son of Jimmy Kenna, an antique dealer and Olive Sherlock, a model and sales rep. His great-grandfather was in the 3rd Battalion, Dublin brigade of the IRA, fought in the War of Independence, joined the Army and was killed in the Civil War. He is buried beside Michael Collins in the Army plot in Glasnevin.
Shane attended Loreto Boys’ National School and the Old Bawn Community School, where he was student of the year in transition year and became one of the school’s most successful graduates. Dublin County Council held a local schools’ competition where 10 boys were chosen from each school to write a book on the millennium. The other boys in his school dropped out and he wrote the book himself, for which he received £100 from the council; the book was published and placed in Dublin’s public libraries.
He attended Trinity College Dublin through the Trinity Access Programme, taking a BA in politics and history and completing his PhD in 2012. He worked as a tour guide in Dublin Castle, Castletown House, the Pearse Museum in Rathfarnham and Kilmainham Gaol, in that order, and in 2013 began work for Lorcan Collins’s 1916 Rebellion Walking Tour. “He was one of the best guides that ever walked the streets of Dublin. He was passionate, articulate, personable, erudite and funny,” said Collins in his funeral eulogy.
International symposium
His extensive teaching experience included lecturing in Trinity College, Saor Ollscoil na hÉireann (voluntarily) and designing modules in Irish history for Arcadia University in Philadelphia.
He also spoke at more than 30 national and international academic conferences. In May 2013, he organised a very successful international symposium on late Victorian Ireland, The Irish National Invincibles and Their Times: Perspectives on Late Victorian Irish Nationalism.
Between 2013 and 2015, he achieved the remarkable feat of having four books published in such as short time. These were: War in the Shadows: The Irish-American Fenians Who Bombed Britain (November 2013), Thomas MacDonagh (October 2014), Conspirators: A Photographic History of Ireland's Revolutionary Underground (May 2015) and Jeremiah O'Donovan Rossa: Unrepentant Fenian (August, 2015). In addition, he wrote two of the Kilmainham Tales series: Resistance and Rebellion (on the Fenians) and The Invincibles (the story behind the Phoenix Park assassinations in 1882).
He had been writing a biography of Michael Collins before he became ill. He was determined to take a completely new approach to the study of Collins and, despite his illness, had completed six chapters. In keeping with his wishes, this work will be published.
A favourite hobby was photography, for which he won prizes. Star Trek was another great interest and he was famous for his impression of William Shatner. But above all else, his abiding passion was Irish history and "he dedicated his short life completely to it," said his close friend and fellow historian Liz Gillis. He planned to marry his fiancée Edel Quinn in December 2016 but his illness intervened. Fortunately, they had shared many happy times travelling the world together.
He is survived by Edel, his mother Olive, brother John, sister-in-law Lisa and nieces Darcy Mae and Lily Mae.