At 1,752 acres, the Phoenix Park in Dublin is the largest enclosed city park in Europe and is full of secret spots.
Hidden in plain sight, a small cross in the grass, tells the story of one of Ireland’s most infamous crimes of the 19th century known as The Phoenix Park Murders.
Cut into the grassy verge on the side of a busy road opposite Áras an Úachtaráin, the simple cross made with gravel stones has existed there for nearly 140 years.
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Thousands of joggers, walkers and cyclists pass it every day without realising it is there. But even if they do happen to see it, it comes with no description so it’s likely they don’t know the story behind it.
The site of a road accident, perhaps? The grave of a beloved pet? A spot for prayer?
In fact, the cross marks the site of the brutal murders of Lord Frederick Cavendish and Thomas Henry Burke who were stabbed to death on a sunny Saturday evening on May 6, 1882.
The two men were walking in the park before sunset when a group of four assassins got out of a passing hackney cab and walked past them.
Suddenly, the four men turned and pounced and in a few short minutes they had knifed Cavendish and Burke repeatedly with long, 12-inch surgical knives and escaped in a getaway cab leaving the two men sprawled on the road, gasping their final breaths.
It was a political assassination by a new secret society, the Irish National Invincibles, a radical splinter group of the Irish Republican Brotherhood, whose aim was to kill the authorities in Dublin Castle.
On the night of the attack they sent an anonymous card to Dublin newsrooms that read: ‘This deed was done by the Irish Invincibles’.
The group was targeting Burke, a senior Irish civil servant working as permanent undersecretary, a Galway man who was one of the main operators of British administration in Ireland.
His walking companion, Lord Cavendish, had only arrived in Ireland hours earlier as the new chief secretary, the British Cabinet minister with responsibility for Irish affairs, and was caught up in the attack by unfortunate coincidence.
Cavendish had been taking a stroll in the park alone when Burke got out of a passing cab to join him - meaning the two men were killed together.
Their screams were heard from Áras an Úachtaráin, then the Viceregal Lodge, which overlooks the spot and the attack was partially witnessed by the security but they initially dismissed it as a drunken brawl.
The news of the murders was so shocking it reportedly caused Irish women to faint with shock at mass the next day. It also had huge political ramifications and shortly afterwards, Parnell strongly condemned the act as a ‘cowardly and unprovoked assassination of a friendly stranger’. The following year five men swung from the gallows in Kilmainham Gaol for the crime.
I had heard about this mystery cross marking the notorious incident that had made worldwide news at the time, though given the large scale of the Phoenix Park I was sceptical that I would be able to find it.
Based on the history of the story, I knew it was located on Chesterfield Avenue, the main road opposite Áras an Úachtaráin, between the Phoenix Park Monument and Castleknock Gate - a stretch almost 2km long.
With the help of Google Maps, I found the exact coordinates of the spot (N 53.3574° W 6.3194°) from the Irish War Memorials website, which led me directly to the spot.
I set out from the Phoenix Park Monument roundabout, walking carefully along the cycle path near the road, looking down at the grass and five minutes later there it was.
The cross measures about 70cm long and is on the grassy verge between the main road and the cycle path. A stone mile marker lies a couple of metres away and a white bench in the near distance.
As I stood there, the Hop-On Hop-Off Dublin sightseeing tour bus pulled up directly opposite the site - though the tourists’ attention was fixed firmly on the Áras, which is visible between the trees.
But next time you find yourself in the Phoenix Park, take a wander down Chesterfield Avenue and instead of looking over at the grand white walls of the Aras, look down and see if you too can spot the simple cross hidden in the grassy verge.
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