Members of the First Dáil - Seán Etchingham

Seán Etchingham: Sixth Row: Right

Seán Redmond Etchingham (died 23 April 1923) was an Irish Sinn Féin politician. . Etchingham was a member of the Irish Volunteers, Sinn Féin, the Gaelic League and the Irish Republican Brotherhood (IRB). Etchingham was first elected as a Sinn Féin candidate for Wicklow East at the 1918 general election. As with the other Sinn Féin MPs, he did not take his seat in the British House of Commons, sitting instead in the revolutionary First Dáil, which met in the Mansion House, Dublin in January, 1919. He was later appointed to the government as Secretary for Fisheries.

It is interesting to note that Seán Etchingham, who was elected to the constituency of Wicklow East, was born at Ballinatray, Courtown, in 1870, and he died at Courtown Harbour on April 23rd 1923. In the official photograph of the first Dáil, Etchingham is the only Wexford man present on that auspicious occasion. Etchingham, the first Wexford-man to hold a ministry, was a journalist with THE ECHO newspaper.

He was re-elected in the 1921 election but retired from politics at the next election. He opposed the Anglo-Irish Treaty in the Dáil debates and again at the Volunteer Executive. He was arrested during the Irish Civil War. During his imprisonment his health deteriorated and he died later that year in prison.

This ends the Members of the First Dáil (from the official photograph).