Gowna community raises almost €15K for Kevin Bell Repatriation Trust

The goodness, thoughtfulness and generosity of people manifested itself following the tragic death of Gowna man, Edward Reilly, in Holland three months ago. In the wake of the untimely loss of Edward, his many friends and acquaintances banded together to support the Reilly family in their time of sorrow and grief and also initiated a superb fundraising table quiz in the Pikers’ Lodge in Gowna.

Colin Bell founded the Kevin Bell Repatriation Trust in memory of his son Kevin, who died abroad nine years ago.

“Since then we have taken home in the region of 1,320 people to their families from diverse locations around the world. We could not continue to do this work, without the generous support we get from families and fundraising efforts.

“This is a wonderful cheque we have received today from the Reilly family and this money will now be there to assist the next family and the next family and that is how it works,” explained Colin.

“This amazing amount of money was raised by Edward's friends and his family and it is a great tribute to the late Edward Reilly... It is his legacy now to help other families in the future.”

One of the organisers of the fundraising event, Cormac Cassidy, explained how the table quiz came about. “Edward was very fond of tables quizzes - so we said the best way was to run a quiz and it took place here in the Lodge.”

There were 40 tables on the night and a raffle also took place and the spot prizes were donated by members of the community.

“The bulk of the money was raised from people coming in on the night, and also in the days before and after the event,” explained Cormac.

“Apart from myself, there were lot of people to the fore in the organisation of the fundraiser including Ciaran Dunne, my sisters Deirdre and Siobhan, Liam Caffrey, James Faughnan and Kevin McGahern did MC on the night, Christine here in the Lodge for giving us the venue free of charge and gave a donation as well,” said Cormac, thanking everyone who helped to make the fundraiser a success and all who supported it.

Edward's father, Martin, said that they were expecting around €2,000 to come in online.”We received over €4,000 - it was unbelievable. The amount of support that came in for the raffle was truly amazing - we had no less than 38 prizes.

“I would like to thank everyone from the bottom of my heart for the generosity.”