Maeve Hillery
Maeve Hillery was an Irish anaesthetist who was the wife of the 6th President of Ireland, Patrick Hillery.
Born Mary Beatrice Finnegan, she was educated at University College Dublin, where she studied medicine. It was here that she met her future husband, Patrick Hillery, who was also studying medicine. The couple married on 27 October 1955. Together they had a son, John, and a daughter, Vivienne, who died after a long illness in 1985, shortly before her eighteenth birthday. Patrick later served in a number of political roles, including Foreign Minister and European Commissioner. After the completion of his term as a European Commissioner in 1976, he contemplated leaving politics and returning to medicine. Instead, Hillery was asked to become the sixth President of Ireland. Patrick Hillery died on 12 April 2008. Maeve Hillery died in Dublin, on 10 January 2015.
