Wynn's Dublin City Centre Hotel

Wynn's Hotel owes its origin and name to a Ms. Phoebe Wynn who opened a commercial boarding house at No. 33 Lower Abbey Street in 1845. For this enterprise she chose a house which previously had been the Church of Ireland rectory of the Parish of St. Thomas. It adjoined The Royal Hiber-nian Academy and was a mere stones throw from. Dublin's main thorough-fare then Sackville Street. Nothing else is known of Phoebe Wynn except her ownership of the establishment lasted only seven years.

 

But the busi-ness she had located so well prospered and grew under successive owners who enlarged the premises as the opportunity arose.Before the end of the century Wynn's Hotel already occupied numbers 35, 36, 37, 38, and 39 Lower Abbey Street and had become one of Dublin's most popular hotels. Although Ms. Wynn's association with the business was of short duration, her name lived on through several changes of own-ership. Despite the fact that for nearly twenty years (1878 -1897) the hotel was officially known as Telford's, the old name persisted and in 1897, when the hotel was acquired by its present owner, it became Wynn's once more. Phoebe Wynn herself long since been forgotten, but her name had gained a permanent place for itself in Lower Abbey Street.

Situated in the heart of Dublin close to many centres of social, political and business life, Wynn's Hotel, soon became a favourite venue for formal and informal gatherings. While the meeting of the 11th November 1913, had more far-reaching effects than any other meeting ever held there, the public rooms of the hotel provided hospitality for many other political meetings during the latter half of the nineteenth century and the early years of the twentieth century. It was at Wynn's too that 'Cumann na mBan', was founded to give the volunteers support of a body of courageous and determined women. Wynn's had always a link with the artistic life of Dublin through its proximity to the Royal Hibernian Academy. When the Abbey Theatre was opened nearby, the public rooms of the hotel became a favourite rendevous for playwrights, actors, and theatre-goers. During the 1916 Rising, Wym1's together with The Royal Hibernian Academy and the neighbouring buildings in Sackville Street was destroyed by fire. A member of the staff who was in the hotel at the time recalled in later years that a barricade erected by the Volunteers in front of Wynn's had been set on fire by incendiary bullets.

 

The fire spread from the barricade to the timber facings of the hotel. When danger threatened, the guests and staff found refuge in Clarence Hotel. They had succeeded in getting there by Butt Bridge and the South Quays under the protection of an improvised white flag. In 1926 when the hotel was re-built, the old tradition of hospitality and service which had been characteristic of Wynn's in the past was re-created in a new setting worthy of Dublin's capital and of a new Ireland.A full history of the Irish Volunteers will be found in "The Irish Volunteers 1913 -1915" edited by F.x. Martin o.S.A. and published by Duffy & Co.