Mount Trenchard, Foynes

Mary Spring Rice came from Mount Trenchard demesne, Foynes. Her background, as an unmarried daughter of Ascendancy gentry, was somewhat unusual in the context of Cumann na mBan, where most of the members were middle class Catholics. Spring Rice was a member of the Glin branch of Cumann na mBan.

The Gaelic League occasionally held Irish language classes in Mount Trenchard.

Spring Rice was centrally involved in the organisation and operation of the Howth gun running in July 1914 with the Childers – Erskine and Molly, Sir Roger Casement and Alice Stopford Green. Together with Molly Childers, Mary Spring Rice raised £2,000 towards the purchase of the 900 Mauser rifles from Germany, many of which were used in the 1916 Rising.

Spring Rice sailed on the Asgard with the Childers. In September 1914 she lectured on first aid for the injured, hygiene and emergency nursing and ambulance work in the Volunteer Hall in Glin. She made Mount Trenchard available to the West Limerick Brigade of the Irish Republican Army during the War of Independence.

Molly Childers (left) and Mary Spring Rice