Father Joseph Mallin, the last living child of one of the 16 executed leaders of the 1916 rising has died at the age of 104 this Easter Sunday in Hong Kong.
Father Malin was the son of Commandant Joseph Malin who was second in command of the Irish Citizen Army, founded by James Connolly, during the Easter Rebellion in 1916.
Father Malin a Jesuit priest had campaigned on behalf of his father to vindicate him after it became apparent that the British account of his court martial was fabricated propaganda designed to smear him.
It was his father’s dying wish to his wife who was pregnant with their fifth child at the time of his execution that Joseph become a priest.
Father Mallin had served in a missionary capacity in China since 1948. At the time of his death he was oldest living Irish Catholic priest in the world.