Mary’s Valentine appeal for engagement ring

A HEARTBROKEN Mayo woman is making a special St Valentine’s Day appeal to the people of Clare after losing her precious engagement ring on a romantic weekend in the county last month.

 

Mary travelled to Ennis on Friday, January 12 for a getaway with her husband and to visit friends here. Unfortunately, she found after walking from The Temple Gate Hotel to Brogan’s Bar to the Old Ground Hotel, that her engagement ring, an eternity ring and a ring she had received as a birthday present were missing.

“I am very upset about it,” she told The Clare Champion.  “Since I lost them I have literally cried every evening when I come home from work.”

“We went to Clare for a long weekend and we stayed in the Temple Gate. We always go to Ennis, we love it there. The night was very cold so I think that the ring just slipped off my finger,” she explained.

The three rings are bonded together and, as such, are quite distinctive.

“It is a very unusual ring because I broke my finger before and had the three rings fused together. The engagement ring is yellow gold and has a four-diamond square setting. The middle ring is a seven-stone diamond eternity band. The third ring is a smaller version of the original ring that I received as a birthday present. It is a replica of the engagement ring and the three are fused together,” she explained.
Mary is so distraught that she is offering a reward to the person who reunites her with her rings.

“My heart is broken at the loss of it. It has huge sentimental value and it cannot be replaced and maybe someone knows where it is or has it and I would really appeal to anyone who has seen it to come forward with it.”

Despite not yet finding the ring, Mary had great support from people in Ennis during her search.

“The people of Clare have been brilliant on this issue. We have had such a good response from everyone we have spoken to about this. The staff in the Old Ground were great. They helped us look for it as soon as I noticed it was missing. I wasn’t overly upset on the Saturday night because I thought we would find it,” she said.

Mary said the staff felt it would turn up in the clean up but proved not to be the case. “That is when I got really upset. When I got home to Mayo, that is when it really hit me. I realised I was at home and I didn’t have it with me and I didn’t really have control over finding it.”

While the hotel and bar staff, along with the staff of the Friary and the Cathedral, have been very helpful and supportive of Mary, she singles out one person in Ennis Garda Station for particular praise.

“Everyone has been great but when I called the gardaí I was very upset and I was crying on the phone. I was speaking to a girl called Gillian Carroll there and she was brilliant.

“On her next day off she went to the Temple Gate, to Brogan’s and the Old Ground and even to Honan’s Antiques in case anyone might have gone in there with it but she had no luck. That said, she did it out of the goodness of her heart and my husband and I really appreciate it,” she said.

“I am hoping that now, as it is Valentine’s Day and a month on, someone might be able to reunite me with my engagement ring,” she concluded.

Inspector John Galvin said anyone who may have seen the ring, knows where it is or who finds it can hand it in to Ennis Garda Station.