How the Irish emigrant’s son Jim Donovan did a deal with the Cuban revolutionary leader

The stakes were high at the Cuban military airfield in San Antonio de los Baños, some 20 miles south west of Havana, two days before Christmas in 1962.

It was to have been the climax of an incredible Cold War achievement by the grandson of a man who had emigrated to the US from Clonakilty, Co Cork, some 92 years before.

His grandfather’s exact birthplace has yet to be established, but West Cork is a stronghold of the Donovan/O’Donovan clan for at least 1,000 years, and the name is still prominent in the region.