Ashes of abuse survivor Mark Ryan laid to rest in Dublin Bay: ‘I’m doing my best to carry on’

It was, as David Ryan put it, “the final ending”.

Back on dry land in Dún Laoghaire, he was “relieved”. A short time earlier he had dropped his brother Mark’s ashes into the sea at nearby Scotsman’s Bay, followed by a trail of lilies laid by family and friends on the heaving waves. At the East Pier nearby other friends waved a farewell.

It was “what he wanted and I’ve done it. Tough, very tough. I do miss him,” David said.

He recalled that it was “Mark’s first anniversary, September 21st. Mark left for England from here. Took the Sealink boat over the Holyhead to start a new life and I thought it would be nice to send him off on his last journey [from here}.”

Mark Ryan was the inspiration behind the RTÉ Radio 1 Blackrock Boys programme, broadcast in November 2022 as part of the Documentary on One series. He, and younger brother David, outlined how they had been sexually abused at the Spiritan-run Blackrock College campus in the 1970s.

Their story opened the floodgates and soon hundreds of men were coming forward with similar allegations about their abuse as boys at Spiritan-run schools, including Blackrock College and its junior school Willow Park, as well as at other private fee-paying schools run by the Spiritans and other religious congregations in Dublin and elsewhere in Ireland.

It led to the Scoping Inquiry, led by Mary O’Toole SC, which reported earlier this month and recommended a Commission to investigate all such abuses in all schools.

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Mark Ryan died suddenly in London on September 21st last year. He was 62. At his memorial service in Dublin, on October 27th last, Minister for Education Norma Foley said he and David “showed enormous courage” in speaking out about the sexual abuse they suffered. “Their bravery has shone a light into a dark corner and has helped forge a path for others to come forward. That pathway forward is now part of Mark’s rich, rich legacy,” she said.

On Saturday he was taken to his final resting place in Scotsman’s Bay on the Dies Irae, a boat owned by the Rowans, friends of the Ryan family, with Nessa, Pádraig, and Caoihfhionn Rowan attending.

“They kindly offered their boat to send Mark’s ashes off. We waited a year. There was so much last year, too much going on after the service. So we said wait a year for his first anniversary,” said David.

The boat’s name is from a hymn in the requiem Mass, meaning “days of wrath”. Pádraig Rowan said it was chosen because of the angry seas you meet sailing around Ireland. On board also were Jonathan Ryan, brother of Mark and David, and his daughter Isabella, as well as Mark Brennan and Miriam Leech, close friends of Mark Ryan.

A tattered tricolour flapped above in the stiff breeze. It had been flown on every trip by Asgard, the Irish national sail training ship, before it sank in the Bay of Biscay in 2008. Mark Ryan had sailed on the Asgard.

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David spoke of this in an RTÉ interview and was contacted by a listener who “kindly rang up” with an offer of the Asgard tricolour. “Mark was on the Asgard so I just thought it would be a nice way to say his last goodbye from Dún Laoghaire,” said David.

He has not yet read the Scoping Inquiry report. He would, “in my own time”. Both he and Mark had spoken to the Scoping Inquiry itself, at length. He hoped the Commission of Investigation it recommended “would get to the truth.”

“Things are going forward and I know he’s looking down on us. I’d say he’d be very proud. I’m happy for him, but he’s a big loss in my life. I’m doing my best to carry on,” he said.