Gardai have seized 18 love letters written by Eamon de Valera to his wife, Sinead, which emerged recently when they were brought to auction in Dublin.
Detectives in Blackrock Station seized the letters and are holding them as evidence. It is understood they were stolen in the mid-1970s during a burglary at the de Valera family home, Herberton in Cross Avenue, Blackrock.
The latest owners of the letters, who had planned to sell them at auction in Dublin last week, were unaware they had been stolen. They had bought them in England several years ago in an effort to ensure their return to Ireland.
Gardai have spoken to the owners and believe they were unaware the letters had been stolen.
The letters were to have been auctioned by Mealys. It was expected they would have fetched between £15,000 and £20,000.
De Valera wrote the letters to his young wife Sinead between 1911 and 1920. Seven came from various prisons, Irish and British. They include the letter he wrote from Mountjoy Jail on the morning of May 11th, 1916, to inform her that his death sentence for armed rebellion had been commuted. Four letters are from Lincoln Jail, one each from Lewes and Maidstone and two from Washington, written during his US mission of 1919-20. There are also five letters from 1911 to 1913, when he was on summer holiday on a small island off the Galway coast where he ran a Gaelic League college.
It had been believed the letters had been separated at an early stage from the main body of de Valera papers now in the care of the Franciscan Library. It had also been speculated that they had been lost when the family were without a permanent home while he was on the run from the British. The letters show signs of water damage, suggesting they had been kept for a long time in damp conditions. According to Mealys, it appeared the letters had passed through several hands before coming to the present owners.
The auctioneers said there was no doubt about their authenticity. The handwriting was recognisable, and there is further proof of their authenticity in detail of the letters.