A donation from the Choctaw Nation of Native Americans to alleviate the hardship of Irish people during the famine has been marked with the dedication of a commemorative sculpture in Cork.
A delegation from the Choctaw tribe, including their chief, were among those in Midleton for the ceremony this afternoon.
At the height of the famine in Ireland, in 1847, the Choctaw Nation of Native Americans gathered what they could and sent it across the Atlantic to alleviate the suffering of the Irish nation.
Today, that generosity was marked with the dedication of a striking piece of sculpture, entitled Kindred Spirits.
The sculpture shows nine stainless steel eagle feathers reaching seven metres towards the sky, to represent a bowl of food for the hungry.
Kindred Spirits was commissioned in 2013 by the then Midleton Town Council, to honour not just a gesture to the starving Irish but to humanity as a whole.
Kindred Spirits marks the generosity of the Choctaw Nation's donation 170 years ago. Drawing on our past, it aims to encourage future generations to practice similar acts of kindness.
