Madeline French Mullen and her Tuam links

THERE has been some momentum over the last year or so to have the new children’s hospital in Dublin named after Dr Kathleen Lynn, not least because of her involvement in the founding of St Ultan’s Hospital for Infants in Charlemont Street, Dublin, in 1919.

Dr Lynn is a worthy candidate but what of her great friend and life partner, Madeline French Mullen, also a founding member of the hospital and who acted in an administrative capacity and advisor to the board until her death in 1944.

Madeline was the daughter of a Tuam-born man, St Laurence ffrench Mullen, a fleet surgeon in the Royal Navy and one of six Mullen brothers who qualified as doctors and served with distinction in the army medical service.

Their father, Laurence Mullen was the first manager of the National Bank on Dublin Road in Tuam from 1837 to 1856. He was the son of Thomas Mullen, a landed proprietor of Ardmullen in Meath, a townland close to Clonard.

Read the full feature in this week's edition of The Tuam Herald, on sale in shops and online www.tuamherald.ie