The infamous wife of an Irish nationalist hero has been honoured more than 80 years after her death.

Kitty O'Shea, the controversial wife of Charles Stewart Parnell, is buried in Littlehampton Cemetery.

Fans of the Irish Home Rule leader yesterday visited her grave to unveil a plaque and lay a wreath of white roses.

Parnell was committed to a self-governing Ireland but his infatuation with the married O'Shea proved to be his downfall.

The pair had a secret affair, much of which was conducted in Brighton and Hove. It is said a bundle of love letters from Parnell was placed under the headrest of her coffin.

The Press branded the politician the most infamous adulterer of the 19th Century and O'Shea a British prostitute.

For a while, after she was divorced and their eventual marriage, the couple lived in Kingsway, Hove, but Parnell died within a few months in October 1891 and was buried in Dublin.

O'Shea died in 1921 at the age of 75, in East Ham Road, Littlehampton.

Among those who remembered her yesterday were two of Parnell's great-nieces Mary Pat Butterfield and Caroline Smith.

Mrs Smith, from London, said: "Kitty was hardly ever talked about in the family, although we did know more about Parnell.

"It was seen as quite a shameful episode in the family's past and this is the first visit we have made it to Kitty's grave. I don't think our parents did and they lived just down the road at Angmering."

Don McCartney, president of The Parnell Society, said O'Shea had aroused more hatred than perhaps any other woman in Irish history.

He said: "She was unfortunate in the time she lived. If she had lived a century later it would have been very different.

"I hope what we have done today goes some small way to making amends for the great wrong inflicted on her by her husband's countrymen."

Cemetery supervisor Jim Hall said his staff had learned to be well versed in the Parnell-O'Shea tale. He said: "She is the cemetery's most famous resident."

Members of The Parnell Society also visited the site of the old register office in Steyning where the couple were married in June 1891.