FITT, Hon Eileen (Hon Mrs Eileen GIBBS) 1951-2023

[Richard R]

From  the Times of 21 Feb 2023: FITT Eileen Fitt passed away peacefully on 15th February 2023, aged 71. She is survived by her loving daughters, Catherine, Ellie and Alice. May she rest in peace reunited with her beloved husband Paul Gibbs.

She was d of the LP Baron FITT 1926-2005 (known to British posters above a certain age as the Irish politician Gerry Fitt) and Susan Gertrude Anne DOHERTY 1921-96. She m 1989 the broadcaster Paul GIBBS d 2014, and had three daus as above.

[Richard R]

Guardian obit which shows her eldest dau Catherine is from her 1st m to Mick O'Gorman, and she has two sons, with a third child on the way.

From the Guardian online of 23 Feb 2023:

E X T R A C T

Eileen Fitt obituary

Award-winning editor of the BBC’s evening news programmes with a no-nonsense reputation among correspondents and presenters

… As a daughter of Gerry Fitt MP, leader of the SDLP (the Social Democratic and Labour party), her political acumen had been formed during the height of the Northern Ireland Troubles. Eileen was born in Belfast, the second of five daughters of Gerry and his wife, Ann (nee Doherty). A Catholic politician who supported the Union, Gerry had been a target both for loyalists and the IRA. He was open with his family about the risks he faced – including the possibility of being shot. The family experienced several attacks on their home, including one in 1976 when a mob broke into the house with cudgels. Gerry had to hold them off with a gun. By this time, Eileen had left Belfast, but her mother and her sister, Geraldine, were in the house.

…Eileen and her sisters were dubbed the “Miss Fitts” by the Belfast papers, famously appearing on five swings in a park to promote Gerry’s campaign to have play parks stay open on Sundays.

Eileen attended Dominican college in Fortwilliam, north Belfast, before reading history and politics at Trinity College Dublin, and then working in London. In Dublin she met Mick O’Gorman, tour manager of the Chieftains and later chief sound designer for Riverdance. They married in 1981 and had a daughter, Catherine. After Eileen and Mick separated, she and Catherine settled in London, where Eileen’s sister, Joan, was working as a nurse.

At the BBC, Eileen met Paul Gibbs, whom she married in 1989. They went on to have two daughters, Ellie and Alice. Their blended family of six children did not derail Eileen’s career and she managed the balancing act of work and home with the same vigour she brought to the newsroom…

… Paul’s early death from cancer in 2014 was a terrible blow, with Eileen nursing him through his last months. She weathered the loss with the unstinting support of her children and, after becoming a grandmother, she discovered a new and fulfilling role looking after Catherine’s two boys, and was delighted to know that a third grandchild was on the way. Eileen believed passionately that family should always come first.

Her legion of friends remember Eileen as a woman of huge intellect, modesty, warmth and humour. Since October, she had been undergoing treatment for a second bout of breast cancer.

Eileen is survived by Catherine, Ellie and Alice, her grandsons, Eddie and Danny, and her sisters, Betty, Patsy and Geraldine.

Eileen Fitt, news editor, born 12 October 1951; died 15 February 2023

https://www.theguardian.com/media/2023/feb/23/eileen-fitt-obituary?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other