When Yann Fouéré arrived in Aughrisbeg on the far west coast of Ireland in 1948 it marked, for him and his family, the end of a long road of uncertainty and forced moves. The Fouérés may not have known it at the time, but this remote place was to become their home base, their anchorage, their safe harbour. Yann, however, with the very essence of his beloved Brittany forming his thoughts and his tissues, could not have changed even if he’d wanted to – Brittany would always be his home, his only home. And, for the moment, he was exiled from it. However, I like to think that as he stood, that first evening, on the rocky shore and looked west over the great, restless Atlantic, he felt, as he narrowed his eyes against the setting sun, that here, at least, at last, was a landscape with which he was familiar, a reasonable substitute for Breizh.
Even with today’s good roads, universal car ownership and mass communications, there is a gulf between Ireland’s east and west coasts. The two populations might be from different races as regards attitudes, ambitions and aspirations; in the 1950s, they might have been from different planets. To keep in touch with a more Irish Ireland, most culturally aware inhabitants of the cosmopolitan east coast would make regular trips to the west. Tomás De Bhaldraithe, Professor of Irish in UCD and author of the eponymous dictionary, would move his family to the Connemara Gaeltacht (Irish-speaking area) every year for the entire summer holidays and, being active in the network that supported Breton exiles, would lend his large house in Dublin to the Fouérés for the duration. But strangely, despite the strong links of their friends, the De Bhaldraithes, to the area, the Fouéré’s move to Connemara actually came about via Brittany.
Two brothers, Marcel and Lucien Samzun, from Belle-Ile-en-Mer had long ago set up a business buying lobster and shellfish along the Irish coast and taking them back to Brittany for sale. Though the recent war had put paid to that business, they still owned a Lobster Holding Pond in Aughrisbeg. After the end of the war, Marcel wanted to revive the business but Lucien had no interest in doing so. Realising that he couldn’t run it on his own and knowing that Yann Fouéré was living in Ireland, Marcel approached Yann’s father, then Mayor of Saint Lunaire, with the suggestion that Yann might be interested in becoming his partner. As the business was, in fact, dormant, there would not be a large sum required to ‘buy in’. The matter was considered; Marcel met Yann in Ireland, and, shortly after, Yann Fouéré – or Seán Mauger, as he was now known (and would always be known in Aughrisbeg) – resigned from his teaching position in Glenstal ,a prestigious Benedictine school, and moved west. Then began a very, very intensive learning process, because Seán Mauger, political activist and international expert on the rights of cultural minorities, knew little about business and nothing at all about fishing.
Though his reputation in wider circles was established, in his new home, Mauger was known only for his involvement with the fishing industry.
There was little or no interest in where he came from, what his past was or why he was here. We Connemara people are used to all sorts of people fetching up in this magical cut-off place between the mountains and the ocean and settling down, and we never bother asking questions; we take people as they are. He was often referred to as ‘The Frenchman’ which would probably not have pleased him, or it was sometimes said that he was ‘on the run’ and once in a while someone would mention that ‘he had a death sentence hanging over him back in France, because of the war.’ But these vague inaccuracies roused little interest. People here are used to taking everything they hear with a grain of salt and, in the end, all that mattered was that Seán Mauger was a good man to do business with.
Local fisherman, Feichin Mulkerrin, remembers: ‘He [Seán Mauger] began to buy lobster by weight, a much fairer system than by the dozen as the price had been fixed on the basis of a dozen smallish lobsters. He would pay cash rather than cheques and that was preferred. He would also advance money for the purchase of fishing gear, boats or even fuel. This allowed us to make new pots in the winter, when we couldn’t fish, fish in rougher seas and go further out. So we increased our catches, and we would pay back the advances out of our increased earnings. He also secured larger markets abroad for us. Indeed, at one point, when disaster loomed [in the form of a French ban on imported shellfish,] Mauger not only saved the day but actually improved the situation by securing markets in other European capitals. His fairness made him a popular buyer all along the west coast from Kerry to Donegal. In my opinion, between the fishermen and the employment at the Pond [where the lobsters were held], Seán Mauger was responsible for saving many families in this area from the heartbreak of emigration.’
Another fisherman, the late Festy Mortimer of Rossroe, was even more forthcoming in welcoming the arrival of Seán Mauger. In Paul Gannon’s book, The Way It Was, Mortimer is quoted: ‘The lobster situation improved greatly, however . . . when a Frenchman named Mauger based in Cleggan became a buyer. He had proper storage facilities and we always got full payment. He paid us . . . three times better than we had been accustomed to.’ Festy went on to list grievances against the previous buyers, a sorry list of payments being withheld until the lobsters had been sold on the Dublin market, vastly reduced payments because of undocumented reports of bad markets, deaths en route, and other unsatisfactory but not uncommon events like lorries not turning up to collect lobsters or shellfish already packed for transport resulting in the loss of whole consignments.
The integrity shown by Sean Mauger when dealing with the local fishermen was typical of the man and of everything he did. He did it right and he did it thoroughly. The local communities which he served, both in Brittany and in Connemara, and the causes he espoused on the international stage will be the poorer for his passing.
Ar dheis Dé go raibh a anam/Doue da bardono d’an anaon.
Maurice O’Scanaill