A Book Launch is always a treasured memory and for a man evokes perhaps some of the emotion felt by a woman following a birth. I jest of course, but arguably the comparision can sometimes be made more justifiably in some cases than in others.
Last week I was in the happy position of watching Volume 2 of Eye on Athy’s Past slipping down the launch pad helped along by the gracious words of Athy born Senator Brendan Ryan. I was particularly pleased that Brendan, who also wrote a Foreword to the book, did the honours on the night as I owe more than perhaps I acknowledge to his late Father Liam. A teacher of generous qualities, Liam Ryan shared his knowledge and above all his enthusiasm with his young charges in the Christian Brothers Secondary School in Athy where he taught for over forty years. Liam O’Riain was the name which would undoubtedly have been included on the School Syllabus if same was printed in those days but to his pupils he was known simply as Bill Ryan. There was no nickname applied in his case unlike the other teachers whose behind the back but never face to face, nomeclatures, gave a hint of their standing of or lack of it in the eyes of their students.
Bill Ryan was an enthusiast in every thing that he did and in the allegiances he bestowed. Faint hearted allegiances or half hearted efforts were foreign to the Tipperary County man who spent his adult life in Athy. By the time I joined the Secondary School, Bill Ryan was already part of the folklore of scholars and teachers who had passed through the gates of St. John’s. He was still a relatively young man (certainly from the chronological time span which I now occupy) but for so long had been part of school and town life that he was accorded a venerability and a status seldom if ever, reserved for persons today.
I remember the five years spent in the Secondary School in Athy for a variety of reasons, most better than some and Bill Ryan was, and remains, a substantial part of the good things remembered from those days. He thought us gawky youngsters with the enthusiasm of a man who delighted in his role as a teacher and a mentor. For him, the learn by rota system held no attraction but instead he brought his own personal experiences to bear on the subject, whether, it was English, History or Latin. I can still visualize him standing at the top of the class, his right hand in his pocket with his glasses focused on his young audience watching, monitoring and constantly noticing the reaction of his listeners. His voice carried across the room almost always to the accompaniment of the clicking sound of coins which he constantly turned over in the pocket of his trousers. He spoke of every day things of the Reports in that morning’s papers, which for a man of his political allegiances was always the Irish Press. For Bill Ryan was a follower of De Valera and his political convictions were assured and steadfast. Nevertheless, he never allowed himself to politicise in a party political sense, his remarks to his students and the overriding theme of all his asides was the importance of our national and political independence and the realisation that what we had achieved owed much to the sacrifices of previous generations.
Bill Ryan figures large in the school boy memories of several generations of Athy men who negotiated each morning and afternoon the iron staircase which lead to the academy of excellence which was Athy Christian Brothers School. I owe an enormous debt to the teachers who taught me over the years but particularly so to the late Bill Ryan whose son Brendan did the honours in launching my book during the week. I was delighted to see among those attending the book launch, Brendan’s mother Mrs. Noreen Ryan who apart from a few years spent in Spain during the years of the Spanish Civil War has lived her life in her native town of Athy.
A short time ago, I had made arrangements to interview Kevin Fingleton of Grangemellon with particular reference to the ballad he composed during the Kilkea Farmers strike of the 1940’s. Unfortunately Kevin died before the planned interview took place. I first met Kevin when he was a senior member of the Local Nights of Malta and I was a member of the Malta Cadets. It was only in recent times that I became aware of his authorship of the Ballad which I first heard from Michael Delaney formerly of Kilkea and now of Dunquinn in County Kerry. I learned at Kevin’s funeral that his first rendition of the ballad in public was on the back of a lorry used as a platform in conjunction with what was presumably a strikers meeting in Emily Square. With Kevin’s passing, I missed the opportunity to record an important aspect of local history but hopefully someone, somewhere, will be able to recover the voices of almost sixty years ago and the events in which those forgotten men and women were involved.
It would be remiss of me not to take this opportunity to thank those people who in so many ways helped to give Volume 2 of Athy’s Eye on Past such a good send off during the week. Fiona and Liam Rainsford were particularly helpful in preparing for printing the manuscript which had been typed and retyped for me by my secretary Eithne Wall. My thanks to them and to Brian Rowan and his Transport Company who sponsored the Wine Reception at the Book Launch.
A special thanks to you the readers of this column who have persevered through 478 weekly columns, some of which have now been reprinted in book form. My gratitude to every person who has allowed me to reproduce and print the interviews with which I tried to record the lives and events of times past in this part of our little country.
Thursday, November 29, 2001
Thursday, November 22, 2001
Castlecomer / Aran Island Funeral
Last week I returned to Castlecomer to give a talk to the local history society. It was for me a unique occasion as I was born in Castlecomer and lived the first few years of my life in part of a big rambling house next door to the Garda Barracks. Indeed that was the sum total of my knowledge about the town of my birth until after my lecture last week when I spoke to 82 year old Michael Ferris. He greeted me with the welcome if somewhat improbable claim, “I’d know you from your father”. Nobody has ever before claimed that my father and I bore anything other than a fleeting resemblance to each other. Michael knew my father in the days when they were both relatively young men, one a Garda Sergeant, the other a hackney driver and garage man.
I was born, according to Michael, in what was one time a British Army Barracks but which under the Irish Free State housed the Garda Barracks and accommodation for the Superintendent, the Sergeant and a number of the local Gardai. Nurse O’Mahony of Florentine Terrace was the local midwife and she apparently must take the responsibility for bringing a second red-head into the Taaffe family all those years ago. A formidable woman she was, so my informant told me last week, with the strength of two men and a thirst to match. Michael Ferris told me how my father had wanted to stay in Castlecomer but sought a transfer to Athy so that his five sons could attend secondary school. “You’ve Canon McNamara to thank for that” said Michael, referring to the man who was Parish Priest of Castlecomer between 1926 and 1957. As a former Rector of St. Kieran’s College in Kilkenny, the Canon sought to ensure that local boys with ambitions for secondary education attended St. Kieran’s College. For that reason, or so it is claimed, the Canon resisted any attempt to start a secondary school for boys in Comer, thereby unwittingly or otherwise depriving many young fellows of the opportunity of a secondary education. For not everyone could hope to fund the fees for St. Kieran’s College, and certainly a Garda Sergeant could not do so and as Michael Ferris said, “we lost a good Sergeant as a result.”
Another Comer man to greet me after the lecture was Eddie Collins who served Mass with my eldest brother Jack. Jim Downey’s daughter laughingly told me of how her father’s coal allowance for his steam threshing machine was utilised during the War. Apparently the anthracite provided was not suitable for the threshing machine and word soon got around the neighborhood of the availability of a supply of badly needed coal. Inevitably approaches were made to Jim for a few bags of anthracite and one of the supplicants was the local Sergeant, who with an empty grate at home with a couple of young children to keep warm, could not be refused.
“Cactus” Brennan also made my acquaintance, renewing a contact first made between us by telephone some years ago after I wrote of the Athy Hurling Team’s success in the 1959 championship. “Cactus”, so-called because of his crew cut, was a member of that team and now retired from the ESB he regaled me with a story of how my father once came to his rescue. Apparently Michael was in charge of the gelignite store in Thurles at a time when the IRA campaign in the North was ongoing. He togged out for a hurling match in Geraldine Park with the Athy team one Sunday afternoon, but since he had previously transferred to the Thurles club he played under an assumed name. During the course of the match he got a few “belts” and next day on returning to work his face bore the marks of battle, so much so that his superior questioned where he had been. “Up north” came Michael’s flippant response whereupon the Garda on duty at the gelignite store brought him to the Garda Station where he was questioned at length. “Lucky for me” said Michael, “I remembered seeing Sergeant Taaffe at Geraldine Park and a phone call to the Athy Station confirmed my sporting involvement over the weekend.”
A few days later I travelled to the Aran Island to attend the funeral of an elderly island woman. Catholic funeral rituals are the same wherever you go, even if the local funeral traditions differ from place to place. I have written previously of a funeral in rural county Cork, but this was my first time to attend a funeral on the Aran Islands. The local cemetery, located on high ground overlooking the Atlantic ocean, was 2 ½ miles from the Church and was approached by a narrow undulating road which circled around the edge of the island. In the past, coffins were brought by horse and cart from the Church to the cemetery, but today this has given way to the Fordson tractor and trailer. The journey across the island was made in clear, calm weather and at the start and for a short time thereafter the tractor and trailer was followed by an orderly group of men, women and children with cars bringing up the rear. The tractor’s pace, geared to maintain a purchase on the approach hills to the cemetery, soon saw those following on foot stretching back along the road for almost half a mile. As the hills steepened, those on foot fell further behind and the cars passed out the stragglers here and there picking up those for whom the journey was proving too much. Everyone assembled at the gate to the cemetery to await the last of the mourners before the coffin was carried shoulder high and placed beside the open grave which had been dug earlier that day by family and friends. Prayers were said and two of the deceased’s sons stood down into the grave to receive the coffin which was placed into their hands and which they reverently placed into position in the bottom of the grave. Then those same men took up shovels and while the rosary was being said filled in the grave. As a final act one of the deceased’s sons played the haunting tune “Se Fath mo Bhuartha” [The Cause of my Sorrows] on a tin whistle over the grave of his mother.
As I looked around at the nearby gravestones I could not but notice names in Gaelic script for those who died up to the 1940’s, but thereafter more often than not the inscriptions were in English. The O’Flaherty’s, the Conneely’s, the Costello’s were represented here by many generations and included references to service in the USA Army in World War II. Clearly the call of emigration found a ready response among the Aran Islanders.
What I wondered was the story behind the burial of Art O’Lundy, K.M. of Lisburn, Co. Antrim here among the islanders of Inis Mór. I was reminded of a conversation I had earlier that morning with a 70 year old islander who on hearing I was from Co. Kildare pointed to an elderly man in a distant group, “He’s a Kildare man too”. Seemingly the “Kildare man” was born to an Aran Island mother and a Kildare father, but despite having spent all his life apart from his early childhood on Inis Mór he was still regarded as “a Kildare man”.
Inis Mór graveyard had no more poignant reminder of the tragedies of life than the gravestone erected by Bridget McDonagh to commemorate her husband Coleman who died in 1956, aged 84 years of age, which also noted the deaths of her children Mary on 25th December 1918 aged 4 years, John on 27th December 1918 aged 3 years and Catherine on 28th December 1918 aged 2 years. The flu epidemic which ravaged the European mainland at the end of the Great War had obviously reached the Aran Islands and decimated a young family in the space of three days.
No matter where we live life and death are our constant companions.
I was born, according to Michael, in what was one time a British Army Barracks but which under the Irish Free State housed the Garda Barracks and accommodation for the Superintendent, the Sergeant and a number of the local Gardai. Nurse O’Mahony of Florentine Terrace was the local midwife and she apparently must take the responsibility for bringing a second red-head into the Taaffe family all those years ago. A formidable woman she was, so my informant told me last week, with the strength of two men and a thirst to match. Michael Ferris told me how my father had wanted to stay in Castlecomer but sought a transfer to Athy so that his five sons could attend secondary school. “You’ve Canon McNamara to thank for that” said Michael, referring to the man who was Parish Priest of Castlecomer between 1926 and 1957. As a former Rector of St. Kieran’s College in Kilkenny, the Canon sought to ensure that local boys with ambitions for secondary education attended St. Kieran’s College. For that reason, or so it is claimed, the Canon resisted any attempt to start a secondary school for boys in Comer, thereby unwittingly or otherwise depriving many young fellows of the opportunity of a secondary education. For not everyone could hope to fund the fees for St. Kieran’s College, and certainly a Garda Sergeant could not do so and as Michael Ferris said, “we lost a good Sergeant as a result.”
Another Comer man to greet me after the lecture was Eddie Collins who served Mass with my eldest brother Jack. Jim Downey’s daughter laughingly told me of how her father’s coal allowance for his steam threshing machine was utilised during the War. Apparently the anthracite provided was not suitable for the threshing machine and word soon got around the neighborhood of the availability of a supply of badly needed coal. Inevitably approaches were made to Jim for a few bags of anthracite and one of the supplicants was the local Sergeant, who with an empty grate at home with a couple of young children to keep warm, could not be refused.
“Cactus” Brennan also made my acquaintance, renewing a contact first made between us by telephone some years ago after I wrote of the Athy Hurling Team’s success in the 1959 championship. “Cactus”, so-called because of his crew cut, was a member of that team and now retired from the ESB he regaled me with a story of how my father once came to his rescue. Apparently Michael was in charge of the gelignite store in Thurles at a time when the IRA campaign in the North was ongoing. He togged out for a hurling match in Geraldine Park with the Athy team one Sunday afternoon, but since he had previously transferred to the Thurles club he played under an assumed name. During the course of the match he got a few “belts” and next day on returning to work his face bore the marks of battle, so much so that his superior questioned where he had been. “Up north” came Michael’s flippant response whereupon the Garda on duty at the gelignite store brought him to the Garda Station where he was questioned at length. “Lucky for me” said Michael, “I remembered seeing Sergeant Taaffe at Geraldine Park and a phone call to the Athy Station confirmed my sporting involvement over the weekend.”
A few days later I travelled to the Aran Island to attend the funeral of an elderly island woman. Catholic funeral rituals are the same wherever you go, even if the local funeral traditions differ from place to place. I have written previously of a funeral in rural county Cork, but this was my first time to attend a funeral on the Aran Islands. The local cemetery, located on high ground overlooking the Atlantic ocean, was 2 ½ miles from the Church and was approached by a narrow undulating road which circled around the edge of the island. In the past, coffins were brought by horse and cart from the Church to the cemetery, but today this has given way to the Fordson tractor and trailer. The journey across the island was made in clear, calm weather and at the start and for a short time thereafter the tractor and trailer was followed by an orderly group of men, women and children with cars bringing up the rear. The tractor’s pace, geared to maintain a purchase on the approach hills to the cemetery, soon saw those following on foot stretching back along the road for almost half a mile. As the hills steepened, those on foot fell further behind and the cars passed out the stragglers here and there picking up those for whom the journey was proving too much. Everyone assembled at the gate to the cemetery to await the last of the mourners before the coffin was carried shoulder high and placed beside the open grave which had been dug earlier that day by family and friends. Prayers were said and two of the deceased’s sons stood down into the grave to receive the coffin which was placed into their hands and which they reverently placed into position in the bottom of the grave. Then those same men took up shovels and while the rosary was being said filled in the grave. As a final act one of the deceased’s sons played the haunting tune “Se Fath mo Bhuartha” [The Cause of my Sorrows] on a tin whistle over the grave of his mother.
As I looked around at the nearby gravestones I could not but notice names in Gaelic script for those who died up to the 1940’s, but thereafter more often than not the inscriptions were in English. The O’Flaherty’s, the Conneely’s, the Costello’s were represented here by many generations and included references to service in the USA Army in World War II. Clearly the call of emigration found a ready response among the Aran Islanders.
What I wondered was the story behind the burial of Art O’Lundy, K.M. of Lisburn, Co. Antrim here among the islanders of Inis Mór. I was reminded of a conversation I had earlier that morning with a 70 year old islander who on hearing I was from Co. Kildare pointed to an elderly man in a distant group, “He’s a Kildare man too”. Seemingly the “Kildare man” was born to an Aran Island mother and a Kildare father, but despite having spent all his life apart from his early childhood on Inis Mór he was still regarded as “a Kildare man”.
Inis Mór graveyard had no more poignant reminder of the tragedies of life than the gravestone erected by Bridget McDonagh to commemorate her husband Coleman who died in 1956, aged 84 years of age, which also noted the deaths of her children Mary on 25th December 1918 aged 4 years, John on 27th December 1918 aged 3 years and Catherine on 28th December 1918 aged 2 years. The flu epidemic which ravaged the European mainland at the end of the Great War had obviously reached the Aran Islands and decimated a young family in the space of three days.
No matter where we live life and death are our constant companions.
Castlecomer / Aran Island Funeral
Last week I returned to Castlecomer to give a talk to the local history society. It was for me a unique occasion as I was born in Castlecomer and lived the first few years of my life in part of a big rambling house next door to the Garda Barracks. Indeed that was the sum total of my knowledge about the town of my birth until after my lecture last week when I spoke to 82 year old Michael Ferris. He greeted me with the welcome if somewhat improbable claim, “I’d know you from your father”. Nobody has ever before claimed that my father and I bore anything other than a fleeting resemblance to each other. Michael knew my father in the days when they were both relatively young men, one a Garda Sergeant, the other a hackney driver and garage man.
I was born, according to Michael, in what was one time a British Army Barracks but which under the Irish Free State housed the Garda Barracks and accommodation for the Superintendent, the Sergeant and a number of the local Gardai. Nurse O’Mahony of Florentine Terrace was the local midwife and she apparently must take the responsibility for bringing a second red-head into the Taaffe family all those years ago. A formidable woman she was, so my informant told me last week, with the strength of two men and a thirst to match. Michael Ferris told me how my father had wanted to stay in Castlecomer but sought a transfer to Athy so that his five sons could attend secondary school. “You’ve Canon McNamara to thank for that” said Michael, referring to the man who was Parish Priest of Castlecomer between 1926 and 1957. As a former Rector of St. Kieran’s College in Kilkenny, the Canon sought to ensure that local boys with ambitions for secondary education attended St. Kieran’s College. For that reason, or so it is claimed, the Canon resisted any attempt to start a secondary school for boys in Comer, thereby unwittingly or otherwise depriving many young fellows of the opportunity of a secondary education. For not everyone could hope to fund the fees for St. Kieran’s College, and certainly a Garda Sergeant could not do so and as Michael Ferris said, “we lost a good Sergeant as a result.”
Another Comer man to greet me after the lecture was Eddie Collins who served Mass with my eldest brother Jack. Jim Downey’s daughter laughingly told me of how her father’s coal allowance for his steam threshing machine was utilised during the War. Apparently the anthracite provided was not suitable for the threshing machine and word soon got around the neighborhood of the availability of a supply of badly needed coal. Inevitably approaches were made to Jim for a few bags of anthracite and one of the supplicants was the local Sergeant, who with an empty grate at home with a couple of young children to keep warm, could not be refused.
“Cactus” Brennan also made my acquaintance, renewing a contact first made between us by telephone some years ago after I wrote of the Athy Hurling Team’s success in the 1959 championship. “Cactus”, so-called because of his crew cut, was a member of that team and now retired from the ESB he regaled me with a story of how my father once came to his rescue. Apparently Michael was in charge of the gelignite store in Thurles at a time when the IRA campaign in the North was ongoing. He togged out for a hurling match in Geraldine Park with the Athy team one Sunday afternoon, but since he had previously transferred to the Thurles club he played under an assumed name. During the course of the match he got a few “belts” and next day on returning to work his face bore the marks of battle, so much so that his superior questioned where he had been. “Up north” came Michael’s flippant response whereupon the Garda on duty at the gelignite store brought him to the Garda Station where he was questioned at length. “Lucky for me” said Michael, “I remembered seeing Sergeant Taaffe at Geraldine Park and a phone call to the Athy Station confirmed my sporting involvement over the weekend.”
A few days later I travelled to the Aran Island to attend the funeral of an elderly island woman. Catholic funeral rituals are the same wherever you go, even if the local funeral traditions differ from place to place. I have written previously of a funeral in rural county Cork, but this was my first time to attend a funeral on the Aran Islands. The local cemetery, located on high ground overlooking the Atlantic ocean, was 2 ½ miles from the Church and was approached by a narrow undulating road which circled around the edge of the island. In the past, coffins were brought by horse and cart from the Church to the cemetery, but today this has given way to the Fordson tractor and trailer. The journey across the island was made in clear, calm weather and at the start and for a short time thereafter the tractor and trailer was followed by an orderly group of men, women and children with cars bringing up the rear. The tractor’s pace, geared to maintain a purchase on the approach hills to the cemetery, soon saw those following on foot stretching back along the road for almost half a mile. As the hills steepened, those on foot fell further behind and the cars passed out the stragglers here and there picking up those for whom the journey was proving too much. Everyone assembled at the gate to the cemetery to await the last of the mourners before the coffin was carried shoulder high and placed beside the open grave which had been dug earlier that day by family and friends. Prayers were said and two of the deceased’s sons stood down into the grave to receive the coffin which was placed into their hands and which they reverently placed into position in the bottom of the grave. Then those same men took up shovels and while the rosary was being said filled in the grave. As a final act one of the deceased’s sons played the haunting tune “Se Fath mo Bhuartha” [The Cause of my Sorrows] on a tin whistle over the grave of his mother.
As I looked around at the nearby gravestones I could not but notice names in Gaelic script for those who died up to the 1940’s, but thereafter more often than not the inscriptions were in English. The O’Flaherty’s, the Conneely’s, the Costello’s were represented here by many generations and included references to service in the USA Army in World War II. Clearly the call of emigration found a ready response among the Aran Islanders.
What I wondered was the story behind the burial of Art O’Lundy, K.M. of Lisburn, Co. Antrim here among the islanders of Inis Mór. I was reminded of a conversation I had earlier that morning with a 70 year old islander who on hearing I was from Co. Kildare pointed to an elderly man in a distant group, “He’s a Kildare man too”. Seemingly the “Kildare man” was born to an Aran Island mother and a Kildare father, but despite having spent all his life apart from his early childhood on Inis Mór he was still regarded as “a Kildare man”.
Inis Mór graveyard had no more poignant reminder of the tragedies of life than the gravestone erected by Bridget McDonagh to commemorate her husband Coleman who died in 1956, aged 84 years of age, which also noted the deaths of her children Mary on 25th December 1918 aged 4 years, John on 27th December 1918 aged 3 years and Catherine on 28th December 1918 aged 2 years. The flu epidemic which ravaged the European mainland at the end of the Great War had obviously reached the Aran Islands and decimated a young family in the space of three days.
No matter where we live life and death are our constant companions.
I was born, according to Michael, in what was one time a British Army Barracks but which under the Irish Free State housed the Garda Barracks and accommodation for the Superintendent, the Sergeant and a number of the local Gardai. Nurse O’Mahony of Florentine Terrace was the local midwife and she apparently must take the responsibility for bringing a second red-head into the Taaffe family all those years ago. A formidable woman she was, so my informant told me last week, with the strength of two men and a thirst to match. Michael Ferris told me how my father had wanted to stay in Castlecomer but sought a transfer to Athy so that his five sons could attend secondary school. “You’ve Canon McNamara to thank for that” said Michael, referring to the man who was Parish Priest of Castlecomer between 1926 and 1957. As a former Rector of St. Kieran’s College in Kilkenny, the Canon sought to ensure that local boys with ambitions for secondary education attended St. Kieran’s College. For that reason, or so it is claimed, the Canon resisted any attempt to start a secondary school for boys in Comer, thereby unwittingly or otherwise depriving many young fellows of the opportunity of a secondary education. For not everyone could hope to fund the fees for St. Kieran’s College, and certainly a Garda Sergeant could not do so and as Michael Ferris said, “we lost a good Sergeant as a result.”
Another Comer man to greet me after the lecture was Eddie Collins who served Mass with my eldest brother Jack. Jim Downey’s daughter laughingly told me of how her father’s coal allowance for his steam threshing machine was utilised during the War. Apparently the anthracite provided was not suitable for the threshing machine and word soon got around the neighborhood of the availability of a supply of badly needed coal. Inevitably approaches were made to Jim for a few bags of anthracite and one of the supplicants was the local Sergeant, who with an empty grate at home with a couple of young children to keep warm, could not be refused.
“Cactus” Brennan also made my acquaintance, renewing a contact first made between us by telephone some years ago after I wrote of the Athy Hurling Team’s success in the 1959 championship. “Cactus”, so-called because of his crew cut, was a member of that team and now retired from the ESB he regaled me with a story of how my father once came to his rescue. Apparently Michael was in charge of the gelignite store in Thurles at a time when the IRA campaign in the North was ongoing. He togged out for a hurling match in Geraldine Park with the Athy team one Sunday afternoon, but since he had previously transferred to the Thurles club he played under an assumed name. During the course of the match he got a few “belts” and next day on returning to work his face bore the marks of battle, so much so that his superior questioned where he had been. “Up north” came Michael’s flippant response whereupon the Garda on duty at the gelignite store brought him to the Garda Station where he was questioned at length. “Lucky for me” said Michael, “I remembered seeing Sergeant Taaffe at Geraldine Park and a phone call to the Athy Station confirmed my sporting involvement over the weekend.”
A few days later I travelled to the Aran Island to attend the funeral of an elderly island woman. Catholic funeral rituals are the same wherever you go, even if the local funeral traditions differ from place to place. I have written previously of a funeral in rural county Cork, but this was my first time to attend a funeral on the Aran Islands. The local cemetery, located on high ground overlooking the Atlantic ocean, was 2 ½ miles from the Church and was approached by a narrow undulating road which circled around the edge of the island. In the past, coffins were brought by horse and cart from the Church to the cemetery, but today this has given way to the Fordson tractor and trailer. The journey across the island was made in clear, calm weather and at the start and for a short time thereafter the tractor and trailer was followed by an orderly group of men, women and children with cars bringing up the rear. The tractor’s pace, geared to maintain a purchase on the approach hills to the cemetery, soon saw those following on foot stretching back along the road for almost half a mile. As the hills steepened, those on foot fell further behind and the cars passed out the stragglers here and there picking up those for whom the journey was proving too much. Everyone assembled at the gate to the cemetery to await the last of the mourners before the coffin was carried shoulder high and placed beside the open grave which had been dug earlier that day by family and friends. Prayers were said and two of the deceased’s sons stood down into the grave to receive the coffin which was placed into their hands and which they reverently placed into position in the bottom of the grave. Then those same men took up shovels and while the rosary was being said filled in the grave. As a final act one of the deceased’s sons played the haunting tune “Se Fath mo Bhuartha” [The Cause of my Sorrows] on a tin whistle over the grave of his mother.
As I looked around at the nearby gravestones I could not but notice names in Gaelic script for those who died up to the 1940’s, but thereafter more often than not the inscriptions were in English. The O’Flaherty’s, the Conneely’s, the Costello’s were represented here by many generations and included references to service in the USA Army in World War II. Clearly the call of emigration found a ready response among the Aran Islanders.
What I wondered was the story behind the burial of Art O’Lundy, K.M. of Lisburn, Co. Antrim here among the islanders of Inis Mór. I was reminded of a conversation I had earlier that morning with a 70 year old islander who on hearing I was from Co. Kildare pointed to an elderly man in a distant group, “He’s a Kildare man too”. Seemingly the “Kildare man” was born to an Aran Island mother and a Kildare father, but despite having spent all his life apart from his early childhood on Inis Mór he was still regarded as “a Kildare man”.
Inis Mór graveyard had no more poignant reminder of the tragedies of life than the gravestone erected by Bridget McDonagh to commemorate her husband Coleman who died in 1956, aged 84 years of age, which also noted the deaths of her children Mary on 25th December 1918 aged 4 years, John on 27th December 1918 aged 3 years and Catherine on 28th December 1918 aged 2 years. The flu epidemic which ravaged the European mainland at the end of the Great War had obviously reached the Aran Islands and decimated a young family in the space of three days.
No matter where we live life and death are our constant companions.
Thursday, November 8, 2001
Inaugural Shackleton Weekend / Remembrance Sunday
The inaugural Shackleton Autumn School was a rip-roaring success. Last weekend Athy’s Heritage Company played host to a lot of visitors, many of whom were spending their first time in the South Kildare town. All had arrived, some from as far away as Scotland and England, others from Kerry, Galway and Wexford, to participate in the events planned for the October Bank Holiday weekend. I have to say that all those involved with the Heritage Company were more than pleasantly surprised at the widespread response to the programme prepared in connection with the Shackleton School.
Right from the official opening on Friday evening it became apparent that there would be a large attendance at the various lectures on Saturday and Sunday and so it proved to be. Frank O’Brien’s was the scene of a unique coming together of local talent in the person of Brian Hughes, tin whistle player and Michael Delaney, balladeer on that Friday evening. The venue was packed to the rafters and both artistes performed to an appreciative audience. The next morning saw the lecture hall attached to the Library full to capacity as John MacKenna spoke on the Shackleton quaker legacy in South Kildare, while Jonathan Shackleton dealt with his relation’s early life and Kevin Kenny unraveled the story behind the arrival of a polar sledge harness in the Athy Heritage Centre. Dr. Bob Headland of the Scot Polar Research Institute of Cambridge was the first speaker in the afternoon when he lectured on Shackleton’s expeditions to the Antarctic. He was followed by Dublin man Frank Nugent who three years ago was part of the team which set out to retrace the famous journey of the James Caird from Elephant Island to South Georgia. Frank ended his lecture with a lovely rendition of a ballad written to commemorate the exploits of Kilkea-born Ernest Shackleton. The first day of lectures drew to a close when the audience dispersed to prepare for the concert in St. Dominic’s Church on Saturday night. For the first time ever, Ireland’s foremost uileann piper, Liam O’Flynn and his colleagues in the Piper’s Call Band, played in Athy and a great night was had by the large attendance.
More than 60 persons travelled on Sunday morning to various sites associated with Ernest Shackleton, including Ballitore Village, Moone High Cross and Kilkea House where he was born in 1874. Thanks are due to Mary Malone, Librarian, Ballitore, Eamon Kane of Castledermot, Mr. and Mrs. Richard Greene and Michael Delaney of Kilkea and Dún Chaoin, Co. Kerry for their contribution during that trip. The Shackleton Autumn School concluded on Sunday afternoon with an exceptionally finely delivered lecture by Michael Smith, a London journalist and recent biographer of Tom Crean. Understandably his subject was Tom Crean, the Annascaul, Co. Kerry man who had accompanied Shackleton on a number of his expeditions and whose story remained untold until taken up in Michael Smith’s recently released book.
The Ernest Shackleton Autumn School was a unique event representing the first time that the Kilkea-born explorer was honoured in this way in his own country. Everyone who attended had nothing but kind words to speak of Athy, a town which many of them had never previously visited. It is obvious that this is a venture which can and should be repeated in the future years. In the meantime congratulations are due and are extended to Margaret O'Riordan, Manager of the Heritage Centre who put an enormous amount of work into organising the event. Well done also to the local businesses and associations who provided sponsorship for the weekend.
Next Sunday, November 11th, is Remembrance Sunday, the one day which each year is set aside to remember the dead of World War I. No doubt you will recall my many previous references to the men of Athy and District who died tragically and needlessly in the bloody conflict which changed the world order. What did a man like James Dunne who lived with his father Peter Dunne at 3 Offaly Street, Athy expect to achieve when he enlisted in the Dublin Fusiliers. He went to France and died aged 20 years on Monday, 13th November 1916. His name is to be found on the Thiepval Memorial at the Somme in France which is a memorial to the missing soldiers of the Battle of the Somme and includes the names of more than 72,000 officers and men who have no known grave.
What did Frank Fanning of Convent Lane hope to achieve when he enlisted in the Dublin Fusiliers to fight in the war described as ‘the war to end all wars’. He took part in the landing at Cape Helles on 25th and 26th April 1915. He died on 12th July 1915 and is buried in Twelve Three Copse Cemetery which was opened at the end of the war when remains were brought in from isolated burial sites and small burial grounds on the neighbouring battle fields. There are 3,360 World War I soldiers buried or commemorated in the cemetery, but sadly 2,226 of those burials are unidentified.
These are two of the many local men who were destined never to return to their homes at the end of World War I. James Dunne and Frank Fanning have no known graves, unlike their six colleagues who are buried in St. Michael’s Cemetery. Michael Byrne, James Dwyer, Thomas Flynn, Martin Hyland, John Lawler and Michael O’Brien in a sense represent the 188 men from Athy and District who died during the 1914-1918 War. Next Sunday at 3.00pm we can pay our respects to the forgotten men of another time who once walked the same roads we now travel.
Another man who lived in Athy during the 1930’s and 1940’s died last week in England. He was Br. John Keane of the Christian Brothers who taught in the local CBS from 1935 to 1948. He was last in Athy in September 1994 when the townspeople celebrated the 150th anniversary of the birth of Edmund Rice, which celebration coincided with the departure of the Christian Brothers from Athy after a period of 132 years. Br. Keane who was based in Strawberry Hill, Twickenham came back to Athy for the celebrations and renewed acquaintances with some of his former pupils including Cha Chanders and Denis Smith. His death severs another link between the Irish Christian Brothers and the town of Athy.
Right from the official opening on Friday evening it became apparent that there would be a large attendance at the various lectures on Saturday and Sunday and so it proved to be. Frank O’Brien’s was the scene of a unique coming together of local talent in the person of Brian Hughes, tin whistle player and Michael Delaney, balladeer on that Friday evening. The venue was packed to the rafters and both artistes performed to an appreciative audience. The next morning saw the lecture hall attached to the Library full to capacity as John MacKenna spoke on the Shackleton quaker legacy in South Kildare, while Jonathan Shackleton dealt with his relation’s early life and Kevin Kenny unraveled the story behind the arrival of a polar sledge harness in the Athy Heritage Centre. Dr. Bob Headland of the Scot Polar Research Institute of Cambridge was the first speaker in the afternoon when he lectured on Shackleton’s expeditions to the Antarctic. He was followed by Dublin man Frank Nugent who three years ago was part of the team which set out to retrace the famous journey of the James Caird from Elephant Island to South Georgia. Frank ended his lecture with a lovely rendition of a ballad written to commemorate the exploits of Kilkea-born Ernest Shackleton. The first day of lectures drew to a close when the audience dispersed to prepare for the concert in St. Dominic’s Church on Saturday night. For the first time ever, Ireland’s foremost uileann piper, Liam O’Flynn and his colleagues in the Piper’s Call Band, played in Athy and a great night was had by the large attendance.
More than 60 persons travelled on Sunday morning to various sites associated with Ernest Shackleton, including Ballitore Village, Moone High Cross and Kilkea House where he was born in 1874. Thanks are due to Mary Malone, Librarian, Ballitore, Eamon Kane of Castledermot, Mr. and Mrs. Richard Greene and Michael Delaney of Kilkea and Dún Chaoin, Co. Kerry for their contribution during that trip. The Shackleton Autumn School concluded on Sunday afternoon with an exceptionally finely delivered lecture by Michael Smith, a London journalist and recent biographer of Tom Crean. Understandably his subject was Tom Crean, the Annascaul, Co. Kerry man who had accompanied Shackleton on a number of his expeditions and whose story remained untold until taken up in Michael Smith’s recently released book.
The Ernest Shackleton Autumn School was a unique event representing the first time that the Kilkea-born explorer was honoured in this way in his own country. Everyone who attended had nothing but kind words to speak of Athy, a town which many of them had never previously visited. It is obvious that this is a venture which can and should be repeated in the future years. In the meantime congratulations are due and are extended to Margaret O'Riordan, Manager of the Heritage Centre who put an enormous amount of work into organising the event. Well done also to the local businesses and associations who provided sponsorship for the weekend.
Next Sunday, November 11th, is Remembrance Sunday, the one day which each year is set aside to remember the dead of World War I. No doubt you will recall my many previous references to the men of Athy and District who died tragically and needlessly in the bloody conflict which changed the world order. What did a man like James Dunne who lived with his father Peter Dunne at 3 Offaly Street, Athy expect to achieve when he enlisted in the Dublin Fusiliers. He went to France and died aged 20 years on Monday, 13th November 1916. His name is to be found on the Thiepval Memorial at the Somme in France which is a memorial to the missing soldiers of the Battle of the Somme and includes the names of more than 72,000 officers and men who have no known grave.
What did Frank Fanning of Convent Lane hope to achieve when he enlisted in the Dublin Fusiliers to fight in the war described as ‘the war to end all wars’. He took part in the landing at Cape Helles on 25th and 26th April 1915. He died on 12th July 1915 and is buried in Twelve Three Copse Cemetery which was opened at the end of the war when remains were brought in from isolated burial sites and small burial grounds on the neighbouring battle fields. There are 3,360 World War I soldiers buried or commemorated in the cemetery, but sadly 2,226 of those burials are unidentified.
These are two of the many local men who were destined never to return to their homes at the end of World War I. James Dunne and Frank Fanning have no known graves, unlike their six colleagues who are buried in St. Michael’s Cemetery. Michael Byrne, James Dwyer, Thomas Flynn, Martin Hyland, John Lawler and Michael O’Brien in a sense represent the 188 men from Athy and District who died during the 1914-1918 War. Next Sunday at 3.00pm we can pay our respects to the forgotten men of another time who once walked the same roads we now travel.
Another man who lived in Athy during the 1930’s and 1940’s died last week in England. He was Br. John Keane of the Christian Brothers who taught in the local CBS from 1935 to 1948. He was last in Athy in September 1994 when the townspeople celebrated the 150th anniversary of the birth of Edmund Rice, which celebration coincided with the departure of the Christian Brothers from Athy after a period of 132 years. Br. Keane who was based in Strawberry Hill, Twickenham came back to Athy for the celebrations and renewed acquaintances with some of his former pupils including Cha Chanders and Denis Smith. His death severs another link between the Irish Christian Brothers and the town of Athy.
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