Have you ever heard the story of how an Austrian empress came to land in a county Kildare field in the late 1870s? Born in 1837 Elizabeth, but better known as ‘Sissi’ or ‘Sisi’, was the daughter of the duke of Bavaria and married the Austrian emperor, Franz Joseph. In the spring of 1880 ‘Sisi’ and her entourage were staying at Summerhill House in county Meath when during a hunt with the Meath Hunt, by accident, the empress was suspended over the wall of Maynooth College in county Kildare.

Here the Sunday Independent in 1975 recalls the incident:

WHEN THE lovely Empress Elizabeth of Austria jumped her hunter over the demesne wall into Maynooth -College in pursuit of a stag, she leapt right into Irish legend. The story of Sisi, as she was known, and her escapades in the hunting field, is told in a new book, "The Sporting Empress," by Wexford based author,  John Welcome, to be published tomorrow. Details oi the Maynooth affair reveal that the Empress almost bowled over Dr. Walsh, President of the College, who then politely invited her to rest in the College until her carriage, arrived. They must have hit it off well for the following Sunday, she returned to Maynooth to attend a special Mass. On a subsequent visit to Ireland, Sisi renewed her contacts with Maynooth—partly, one guesses, to annoy Dublin Castle and Queen Victoria! This time she came bearing a gift. This gift was "a silver equestrian statue of St. George slaying the dragon, some three feet high and weighing four hundred and sixty ounces, mounted on an ebony pedestal embossed with the Austrian Imperial arms. St. George, mounted, is shown in the act of slaying the dragon with his sword." In spite of the embarrassing choice of saintly patron. Maynooth gratefully accepted the statue which is, today, still in the college. Later, realising her gaffe, the Empress made a further (and more appropriate) gift to Maynooth. This was an elaborately embroidered set of vestments in green silk bearing the arms of Austria, Bavaria and Hungary, surmounted by the Austrian  Crown and having the date (1880) and the name of the Empress embroidered on it…

For more information on the Empress of Austria in Ireland search the pages of the Irish Newspaper Archive (www.irishnewsarchive.com )