Memorandum from Joseph P. Walshe to Eamon de Valera (Dublin)
'Catholic Services for President Roosevelt'

Taoiseach, Minister for External Affairs.
On enquiry at Westminster Cathedral today, the High Commissioner was given the following information:

1. No service of any kind was held in Westminster Cathedral.
2. Benediction of the Blessed Sacrament was given in the Church in Spanish Place before an American military congregation. The precedent of holding a Benediction Service was initiated in Rome at the time of the assassination of the King of the Croats, Serbs and Slovenes.
3. Solemn Mass was celebrated in Notre Dame, Paris, and in the Cathedral in Buenos Aires.

Monsignor Scanlan, of Westminster Cathedral, said that the Masses could only have been said for American Catholic soldiers who died in the war, as the rule that Mass is not to be celebrated publicly for a Protestant admits of no exception.