Robert Emmet Statue

The bronze statue before you captures Robert Emmet in his final, defiant moment. The sculptor, Jerome Connor, designed the figure to show the young Irish revolutionary delivering his famous speech from the dock after being sentenced to death for treason in eighteen hundred and three. Emmet holds his right hand out in a gesture of persuasion, while his left hand remains tightly clenched, embodying the revolutionary spirit that fueled his short but impactful life. Senator James D. Phelan, a former mayor of San Francisco and a passionate supporter of Irish independence, commissioned this work and donated it to the city. Its unveiling on July twentieth, nineteen hundred and nineteen, was a major political event. The Irish revolutionary leader Eamon de Valera himself presided over the ceremony here in Golden Gate Park during his tour of the United States to raise funds and political support for the newly declared Irish Republic. The statue stands as one of only four such castings in the world, with others located in Washington, District of Columbia, Emmetsburg, Iowa, and Saint Stephen's Green in Dublin.