Mother-of-seven Emma Scott lost her husband John in a house fire in February.
His death leaves behind a grieving young widow, their small children without a father – and the family without a house.
Loved ones have now set up an online fund to help them rebuild their destroyed home so they have at least a place to live.
“I would live down in the ditch if I could have John back,” says a bereft Emma, as she steps through the rubble of what was once her family’s cosy sitting room.
Emma, 41, stops in front of the large fireplace next to where firemen found her husband on the sofa when they were called out to a raging inferno at the Tipperary bungalow at around 11am on Sunday, February 22.
She said: “When you hear a family has lost everything on the news – material things are one thing. My John – you couldn’t explain him unless you met him.”
Burnt wires and layers of peeling, scorched wallpaper hang from crumbling walls as the wind whips through blackened, empty window frames and up, out of the roofless house, into the blue sky above.
On Emma’s hip is “Baby John”, age three, who points up at the sky a lot and says: “Daddy! Up.”
The Scotts were a big, happy family before the fire destroyed their lives. When Emma started dating John – who she knew all her life – in 2009, they both had three children from previous relationships.
“I’d no intention of having more kids, but when I met John we said we’d have the one – and that turned to four,” says Emma.
“Everyone was drawn to John. He’d give you the shirt off his back. When it comes to children, all kids, he was unbelievable. He reared all mine as his own and was the best father.”
The run-up to 45-year-old labourer John’s death was a hard blow at an otherwise good time in the Scott household.
Emma’s daughter Lauren, 20, had just had her baby Layla Grace at Sligo Hospital the Wednesday before the fire.
Emma minded the roost, moving younger kids Emily, nine, Saoirse, five, Baby John and one-year-old Shona down to Lauren’s place, 11km away in Drangan village, to mind Lauren’s older children Lily and Devon.
John popped up and down for meals and to help with the children.
“On Saturday night, John said to my daughter Emily on the phone he’d be up at 12 the following day to meet the baby,” says Emma.
New mum Lauren was on her way home from hospital with the baby on Sunday morning when Emma got a phone call just as she was getting out of the shower to say her house was on fire.
Her home was still burning when Emma arrived that rainy Sunday and was met by Cashel fire brigade chief Arthur Fitzell.
She said: “Arthur is a family friend and knows me personally. He told me to talk only to him and I asked him is John gone and he said, ‘They’re working on him’.
“They wouldn’t let me into the ambulance for 45 minutes and then I saw the fireman and the Garda walking towards me. They didn’t have to say anything. I got in then with John. I sat with him and John’s eldest daughter came in too and Peter Tynan, John’s best man at the wedding, and other friends.
“I kissed him, I rubbed his head, I gave out to him – the usual. I thought if he was going, I wanted him to hear my voice.”
It is believed the fire was caused by an electrical fault, but the details will not be established until the inquest. A date has yet to be set for it.
Since John died, Emma has been living out of black bags and boxes in a small bedroom with Emily, Saoirse, Baby John and Shona at Lauren’s house.
The fire destroyed everything; teddy bear George – Emily’s favourite one from her Uncle Shane – toys, tablets, clothes, furniture, photos and Emma’s wedding dress.
With eyes glistening, Emma rolls up her sleeve to show a tattoo on the inside of her upper arm. In John’s hand-writing, it reads: “To Emma, You Are The 1.”
She said: “I used to keep everything – cards, concert tickets, birthday cards, Valentine’s cards up in the attic, but I’d a couple of cards left in the drawers in the bedside lockers.
“I’d only moved them into the shed as the lockers didn’t go with the new bed. If I didn’t do that, I’d have nothing. There are some photos, my wedding ring. I had John’s wedding band.
“I lost 10 years’ of photos but I can reorder recent ones I did online. The photographer who did our wedding said he’ll do me up a new album.”
Then, on Emma’s birthday on April 3, came an unexpected gift.
Emma said: “Peter Tynan was helping with the clear-up and he found my eternity ring in the rubble in the bathroom.
“He handed it to Emily and she came out with it. I thought: ‘It is eternity now, John, isn’t it?’.”
Emma visits her old home every day, adding: “My routine is I bring the girls to school, go up to the house and check the post and then I visit John’s grave. I’ve my mind set on being in the house. I let the kids play in the playhouse. It keeps me going.”
On our way back to Drangan, we stop at Ballingarry church and follow Baby John as he skips down to John’s wreath-covered grave, where he was buried on Lauren’s 20th birthday, on February 24. Back in Drangan, Emma sits with friends Ann Scott and Tara Corbett while baby Shona grabs at Emma’s phone constantly, squealing, “Daddy!”
Emma said: “Shona had meningitis and septicaemia at 11 days old.
“She had a lumbar puncture and we were up and down to Our Lady’s Hospital in Dublin.
“We thought we were going to lose her when she was in the incubator with all the wires.
Ever since, John says to everyone, ‘Leave her alone, she was sick’.
“We call her our Lucky Number 7. It kills me to think how hurt and worried and sick John was every day seeing her sick and now he’s not going to be here to see her grow up anyway.”
Behind the scenes, Emma’s friends including Tara, Ann and Lynda Kirwan have set up a GoFundMe page and have organised a fundraiser on June 3, when Lynda will shave her head.
Singer and friend Ciara McCormack – who sang at Emma and John’s wedding three years ago, and John’s funeral three months ago – will perform.
Local lads have cleared out the house and an army of volunteer builders, carpenters, painters, plasterers, roofers, tilers and electricians are waiting in the wings to give their time to rebuild John and Emma’s home.
“I’m so blessed,” says Emma. “Everyone’s been incredible.”
You can see the GoFundMe and donate here: https://www.gofundme.com/f/help-emma-scott-rebuild-her-home
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