Background
Joseph Leonard was born in Sligo on the 29th of January 1877 to Patrick Leonard and his first wife Mary Fetherstone.
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Joseph Leonard
Edit Profilecaptain chaplain Vincentian priest
Education
He was educated at Castleknock College, in Dublin, part of the graduating class of 1895 and trained for the priesthood at Saint Joseph"s, the Vincentian seminary in Blackrock, Company Dublin.
Career
He served as a chaplain in the British Army during World War I, rising to the rank of captain. An incident while in Flanders left him partially deaf. Fr Leonard was a scholar of Saint Vincent De Paul, translating many texts from French into English, and taught in the Vincentian Saint Mary"s University College, and in his latter years in All Hallows College, Dublin, where he had returned to in 1939.
While teaching in London he was friendly with public figures such as George Bernard Shaw and Lady Laverly.
He befriended Jacqueline Bouvier, as she then was, in 1950 when she visited Ireland with her stepbrother, Father Leonard and Mistress Kennedy maintained a regular correspondence until his death, and in 1955 French
Leonard invited Senator Kennedy to address the students at All Hallows while he was on a trip to Ireland. Jackie asked French Father Leonard died in 1964 aged 87.
Flowers from Jackie Kennedy were sent to his funeral in All Hallows.
A number of letters from Jackie Kennedy to French Leonard were put up for sale at an auction scheduled for June 2014. However the auction was cancelled on May 21 by All Hallows in a statement which indicated the college were exploring ways with the Kennedy family of curating the letters.
Some letters from Fr Leonard to the former first lady are stored in the Kennedy archive in Boston.
Achievements
Membership
He became friends with member of the family of Jackie Kennedy in the 1920s.
