Poet, nationalist, and cultural figure

Mary Eva Kelly (1829–1910), known as “Eva of The Nation,” was an Irish-born poet who settled in Queensland and became an important literary and cultural figure in the Irish community.

Born in Galway, Ireland, she gained recognition in the 1840s for her poetry supporting Irish nationalism, published in The Nation newspaper. She married Kevin Izod O’Doherty, a Young Irelander transported to Australia for political activity, and emigrated with him.

In Brisbane, Mary Eva Kelly continued to write and contributed to the intellectual and cultural life of the colony. She was respected both for her literary work and her role as a companion to O’Doherty, who became a physician and politician in Queensland.

Her poetry and her example as an Irish woman in exile connected Queensland’s Irish community with the wider cultural and political life of Ireland.

She is buried in Toowong Cemetery.

One of her best-known poems is “The Felons”:

They rose in dark and evil days
To right their native land;
They kindled here a living blaze
That nothing shall withstand.

Alas! that Might can vanquish Right—
They fell and passed away;
But true hearts yet shall bless their flight
And reap their sowing day.

The glory of their brave intent
Still nerves our feeble arm;
The memory of their suffering lent
Unto the cause a charm.

And not for them shall tears be shed,
Their names shall never die;
Though mouldering in the narrow bed,
They live in song and story.

The poem honoured Irish nationalist rebels and became closely associated with Irish patriotic remembrance in the 19th century.