Michael McCorkell
Colonel Sir Michael McCorkell, KCVO, OBE, TD, JP (3 May 1925 - 13 November 2006) was a Northern Irish soldier and public servant, emulating the high level of public service of successive generations of the McCorkell family, being Lord Lieutenant of County Londonderry for 25 years.
Sir Michael, a descendant of King Edward III of England [1], was the son of Capt. B. F. McCorkell, of Templeard, Culmore, County Londonderry. He was born in Buncrana, Inishowen, County Donegal, in 1925 and was educated at Aldenham School, before the outbreak of World War II and the curtailment of travel caused him to finish his education at Campbell College.
Career
During the war, he served with the 16/5 Lancers (1943 - 1947). In 1943, he went straight from Royal Military Academy Sandhurst to Italy, landing on his nineteenth birthday. Commanding a tank troop, he fought from Monte Casino all the way up through Italy. His unit was one of the first into Venice. He was in Austria when the war ended and, as victors in Europe these were heady times for a young soldier. He shot chamois on Göring's mountain estate in Austria (the heads of the chamois were fine ones because the Luftwaffe had dropped hay to the beasts on the hill) and he kept the mess in trout with regular forays to the Alpine streams and lakes; and cavalrymen were in their element here, with the pick of the liberated Austrian and German horse flesh at the allies’ disposal. Sir Michael was involved in two enormous tattoos at the Schönbrunn Palace in Vienna and at the Olympiastadion (Olympic Stadium) in Berlin, where he and others performed cavalry trick rides.
He was a Major in the Territorial Army and North Irish Horse (1951). His long involvement with the North Irish Horse had already seen him commanding it in the 1960’s and, without hesitation, he became T & AVR Colonel, Northern Ireland, in 1971-1974, Aide-de-camp to Queen Elizabeth II (1972), Brevet Colonel (1974), Honorary Colonel of the North Irish Horse in 1975 and President of the T & AVR, Northern Ireland in 1977.
As a devout Christian, and a wholly ecumenical one, Sir Michael served all sides of the community, during some of the county's toughest times, without prejudice or favour, offering support or sympathy, but never doctrine: he was genuinely and wholly non-political as Lord Lieutenant of the County of Londonderry from 1975-2000. He was made High Sheriff of County Londonderry from 1961 and, like many of his ancestors before him, Deputy Lieutenant for the City of Londonderry from 1962; Justice of the Peace from 1980. He was appointed TD in 1954; OBE in 1964 and knighted with the KCVO, 1994, an honour in the very personal gift of Queen Elizabeth II . Like his uncle before him, Sir Dudley, he served on the Harbour Board Commissioners and as Chairmen of Wm. McCorkell.[2], who operated the McCorkell Line from 1778. Away from his hectic public life, at the family home at Ballyarnett, he built up a pedigree Jersey dairy herd. As an enthusiastic horseman, he whipped in for many years to the Strabane Hounds and in later life, he spent much of his time Snipe shooting in County Fermanagh and fishing in County Donegal.
Secret IRA Meeting at the family home
In extreme secrecy, what is now believed to have been the first meeting between the Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA) and senior officials of the British Government took place at Ballyarnett, Sir Michael’s family home, 20 June 1972. The IRA was represented at that meeting by Dáithí Ó Conaill and Gerry Adams, and the British government was represented by Frank Steele, believed to be an MI6 agent, and Philip Woodfield.
The meeting lasted four hours and the British side informed the IRA representatives that while Willie (later Viscount) Whitelaw refused to offer political status, he was prepared to suspend arrests of republicans and searches of homes. Both sides then agreed to call a ten-day ceasefire.[3]
Family
In 1950 he married Aileen Allen, OBE, daughter of Lieut-Col. E.B. Booth, DSO, of Darver Castle, Dundalk, County Louth, by whom he had 3 sons (John Barry Ernest, David William and Barry Michael) and 1 daughter (Mary Aileen). The McCorkell's, who are originally from Scotland, are part of the Clan Gunn. He was a nephew of Sir Dudley McCorkell. Upon his death, aged 81, a Memorial service was held in St. Columb’s Cathedral, Derry. [4]
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