Local history research

I have had a lifelong fascination with reference books.  From an early age these compendiums of facts and figures fascinated me.  Haydn’s Dictionary of dates was one such book and although last published in the late 19^th Century it was commonly available in many public and school libraries in the 1950’s.  The dictionary had particularly grandiose titles.  The 1881 edition enjoyed the title “Haydn’s dictionary of dates and useful information relating to all ages and nations containing the history of the world to the Autumn of 1881”.  Not many publications would make such claims today!

As a young historian first dabbling in history of his hometown, books such as Michael Kavanagh’s Bibliography of County Kildare were an invaluable resource as I worked my way through the records in the National Library in Dublin in the early 1970’s.  When I first began working on Athy’s history the immediate difficulty I faced was trying to identify where I could extract information relevant to this history of the town.  Michael Kavanagh’s book was a great starting point as it identified all publications in both books or periodicals relating to the County of Kildare and thanks to Michael’s meticulous research I was able to extract much information on the town.

For an amateur researcher such as myself there was quite a great deal of trial and error, sometimes chasing a reference down a blind alleyway, but invariable there was always the joy of finding some nugget of information long forgotten about the town.  I can recall long hours in the reading room of the National Library hunched over the microfiche readers while I carefully read through old issues of the Nationalist!

What I didn’t truly appreciate and only really did when my family and I moved to Athy in 1982 was that much information still remained within the living memory of the inhabitants of the town.  Sometimes there was a story retold from father to son or perhaps a document preserved carefully in the family’s possession but all this information has gradually informed my writings and research into the town’s history over the last 40 years.

There is no doubt that the advent of the internet has allowed local history studies to blossom in a way that I could not have foreseen more than 40 years ago.  The modern researcher can access census records, valuation office records, army records at the touch of a button.  The recent release from the military archives of the records of those who served in the War of Independence has been an absolute boon, not only for professional historians, but for the families who now have a greater sense of what their grandparents and great grandparents did more than a century ago.

At the same time this commitment to the digitisation of our records has its downside.  The accessibility of the internet also makes it very ephemeral.   How many of us have gone on holidays with a digital camera, taken a multitude of photographs and have yet to print one off? How often have we viewed a picture in a family album of relations long dead and now unknown to us for the sake of a label?  This is something we must bear in mind for future generations.  I am aware that the National Library has a policy of “harvesting” websites to be stored digitally but like all technology time overtakes it and there is always a fear that the technology of today will not be recognised by the technology of tomorrow and these records may no longer be accessible to us. 

With the introduction of the e-book many years ago, we were led to believe that it sounded the death knell for the printed book, but I am confident that the dictionaries, anthologies, bibliographies and encyclopaedias which grace my shelves and punctuate my research will assist me in many years to come.    

Few communities are as fortunate as we are in having a full time museum in our town which has been assiduous over the last 20 years in collecting and recording the town’s historical development.  It is something that is very easy to take for granted but it is important that we continue to support the museum.  I am often surprised that the first time many of our towns inhabitants cross the threshold of the museum is when they are showing it to a friend or relation from abroad.  It is an important resource that we must not neglect and I would encourage both young and old to use the museum as often as possible.  The museum’s latest exhibition “By Endurance We Conquer – Shackleton’s Men” will be opened at 2.30pm on the 30^th of August next, just after the unveiling of the statue of Ernest Shackleton at Emily Square, Athy.  All are welcome to attend.

Danny Flood

One of the great sporting heroes of my teenage years passed away last week.  Danny Flood was one of several young Athy men who lined out with the Kildare County Senior football team during the 1950s and 1960s.  A towering figure over 6 foot tall with the physique to match, Danny manned the full back position on the county team for a period of 10 years from 1954.  His first game as a Senior Kildare player was against Wexford in a National League game played in Ferns on 10^th October 1954.  Ten years later he made his last appearance on the county team, this time against Meath in a game played in Croke Park on 7^th June 1964.

Danny was a key member of the county team during the course of the 1956 Leinster Championship when the Shortgrass county won the Leinster Championship for the first time in 21 years, only to lose to Cork in the All Ireland semi-final.  I remember those matches and the enormous goodwill that victory in the Leinster Final of 1956 generated amongst young and old alike within our local community.  Daniel Flood, a local man from Leinster Street, was assuredly Athy’s footballing hero after the success of the 1956 Kildare team.

As a young teenager I have vivid memories which I have never lost of a giant of a man whose spectacular fielding of the ball on the full back line was hugely impressive.  Equally impressive was his athleticism which seemed magnified by his huge frame and the energy with which he defended the Kildare goal.  I recall a match in Geraldine Park where the Kildare defence led by Danny were defending the goal nearest to the dressing rooms.  I was on the terrace looking across to the goal and can still see Danny charging from the penalty area across towards the side line where the ball was being gathered by a member of the opposing team.  When he was a few feet away from his opponent Danny launched at his opponent and sent him sprawling over the side line.  It had all the hallmarks of a foul, but I cannot recall if it was given as such.  What I remember is the athleticism of the man who appeared to me as a giant of a player. 

Youthful memories accumulated when one is 13 or 14 years of age always tend to magnify and unintentionally perhaps distort.  When I was a young follower of G.A.A. matches I looked upon Danny Flood and his county colleagues such as Seamie Harrison and Larry McCormack as a generation ahead of me.  Now that I have gathered in the years I find to my amazement that as a young teenager of 14 years of age I was watching and admiring Danny Flood, a young man of just 22 years of age.  The age gap between us was a mere 8 years. 

Danny Flood died last week, his wife and one son having predeceased him.  He retired many years ago as a Lieutenant Colonel in the Irish army and lived just outside Kilkenny city.  He is survived by a daughter and four sons.  My sympathy goes to his children and to the members of his extended family.

With the passing of my footballing hero of 60 years ago I am left with memories which can no longer be diluted or exaggerated.  They remain fashioned by six decades of intermittent recall to remind me of a time when Gaelic football and footballers were an important part of a young lad’s life.  Thanks for the memories Danny.

Memorial, plaques and signs in and around South Kildare

Kildare County Council has recently embarked on a survey of memorials, plaques and signs throughout the County of Kildare.  They are part of our cultural heritage, marking as they do people of the past, historic events or heritage landmarks of town and countryside.  This is the first attempt to collect this information and when the project is completed it is intended to make its results available to the general public.  In turn the public’s help in identifying and recording local memorials, plaques and signs is sought.

The Heritage Officer of Kildare County Council has prepared guidelines for the survey.  While advising that graveyard memorials are not included almost every other form of commemorative memorial or plaque is deemed worthy of recording.  Even what the guidelines describe as ‘significant street names and laneways’ are to be included.  Interestingly bench marks, armorial plaques and mile markers also come within the ambit of the survey.  The Council’s Heritage Officer Bridget Loughlin who is overseeing the survey would like to get the following information.  The memorial/plaque name, where it is located, a brief description with any background information and a photograph, although I suspect the latter while helpful is not essential. 

In recent years probably more plaques have gone up in or around Athy than in any other time in the past.  Nelson Street has a plaque to Johnny Lynch, musician, while the Dominicans are honoured with a plaque on the entrance wall to the former Dominican Church.  The Christian Brothers are remembered with a handsome memorial in Edmund Rice Square, while the Sisters of Mercy have the riverside car park opposite the Parish Church dedicated to their Order.

Until recent years the Town Hall had a large plaque commemorating the founding of Macra na Feirme and its founder Stephen Cullinane but it was removed when the Macra monument was unveiled by President Robinson some years ago.  I wonder where that plaque is today?  The impressive Town Hall has in more recent years received plaques honouring the local men who fought in the 1914-18 war, as well as a plaque honouring Ernest Shackleton, the polar explorer.  This year as part of the centenary commemorations of the 1916 Rising a plaque was affixed to the west wall of the Town Hall. 

A few years ago the Enterprise Centre arranged for tourist plaques to be placed on the more important buildings in the town.  Whites Castle, Canal Harbour, Crom a Boo Bridge, St. Michael’s Church of Ireland church, Methodist church, St. Vincent’s Hospital are but some of the buildings highlighted in this way.

Bench marks will be seldom recognised but offhand I can recall bench marks on the Town Hall, Crom a Boo Bridge and St. Vincent’s Hospital.  There are a few more around the town awaiting to be identified.  Memorials are less scarce and in the main square of the town we have the water fountain presented to the people of Athy by the Duke of Leinster.  Just behind it is the more recently unveiled memorial to the men and women from the locality who in 1798 sought religious and civil liberty. 

Would the stone archway taken from the ruins of the cavalry barracks in Barrack Lane and reassembled in Woodstock Street come within the definition of a memorial?  I would think so, as undoubtedly will the superb canal lock gate which adorns the roundabout on the Dublin Road.  The various pieces of sculpture provided by Kildare County Council under the percentage scheme for major capital projects must also be included in this survey.  Examples are to be found at the Flinters Field site, at Butlers Row and the Fairgreen housing site.

What the Council refers to as ‘significant street names’ may pose problems when it comes to their inclusion or exclusion from the survey.  I cannot imagine that any one street name is any less or more significant than another.  Our principal street names commemorate members of the Duke of Leinster’s family, while many of the laneways bear the names of long forgotten property owners.  The building boom of the Celtic years which came somewhat later to Athy than elsewhere resulted in the creation of a lot of housing estates with names which do not resonate historically or otherwise with the ancient town on the River Barrow. 

If you can help the County Council in its countywide survey of memorials, plaques and signs do contact Bridget Loughlin, Heritage Office at the Council Offices, Naas, ph. (045) 980791 or email Bloughlin@kildarecoco.ie. 

Another project recently initiated by Kildare County Council is a building survey of the county which seeks to identify buildings of historical interest or architectural merit.  Athy has a wealth of such buildings and indeed in the opinion of many is the most interesting town in the county of Kildare in terms of its layout and architecture.  If you are contacted by the team involved in the building survey do give them every help in identifying and recording the building which may be your home or your business address.  It is purely an architectural survey and is in no way connected with property tax, rating systems or anything that is detrimental to your interests.  Your cooperation with the survey team would be much appreciated and will undoubtedly be reflected in the quality of the survey teams final report

Local benefactors to Athy's Christian Brothers

During the week I received a query relating to Mark Hill from County Clare, a Christian Brother whose teaching career ran from the late 1860s to 1919 when he died.  His name was not familiar to me and so I referred to the Annals of the local Christian Brothers monastery which I was allowed to copy some years ago.  The Annals provide useful, if somewhat sporadic details relating to the affairs of the Christian Brothers in Athy.  Unfortunately for extended periods the designated annalist failed to keep the record up to date but nevertheless what remains is helpful for an understanding of what happened in the Christian Brothers schools in Athy from 1861.

An entry in the Annals for 1863 noted that at the beginning of the year Michael Lawler ‘who showed himself a warm friend from the commencement’ offered to pay for the gas consumed in the Brother’s Monastery and to continue doing so during his lifetime.  It was a commitment Michael Lawler, by then a Justice of the Peace, renewed on 5^th November 1885.

Another generous benefactor was Patrick Maher of Kilrush, whose daughter was for a time Superioress of the local Convent of Mercy.  He donated the sum of £400 to help finance the building of the school rooms in St. John’s Lane prior to the arrival of the Christian Brothers in August 1861.  Patrick Maher, who was also a generous benefactor to the local Sisters of Mercy, made many other financial contributions to the Christian Brothers over the years for various improvements to the schools and the monastery. 

In 1865 the local G.P. Dr. Thomas Kynsey paid for the provision of a house library for the Christian Brothers.  In April 1880 J. Delaney of Market Square died and left the sum of £100 to the Christian Brothers.  Strangely a week later his own son Denis also died and in his will he left the Christian Brothers the sum of £20.

An interesting entry for March 1901 referred to the sale of a property in Duke Street by Miss Ferris of Woodbine Cottage to a sitting tenant, John E. Duncan.  Apparently she had willed the property to the Christian Brothers but shortly before she died the property was sold for £200, a price considered to be excessively low, thereby depriving the Christian Brothers of a valuable bequest.

For a period of five weeks starting in November 1918 the Christian Brothers schools were closed due to the influenza epidemic.  Brother Alipius Cummins, a novice in the monastery, fell victim to what we now refer to as the ‘Spanish flu’.  Having failed to get a trained nurse in Athy or Dublin the Brothers turned to Minnie Murphy who had served in France during the First World War.  Referred to in the Annals as ‘Sr. Flora of the Square’ Ms. Murphy took charge of the patient for 4 nights.  He eventually recovered and the Annals noted ‘she took no fee, though a professional trained nurse.  For this charitable act the Brothers are deeply grateful.’

In 1925 the Annals recorded the success of Edward Behan at the examinations for executive officers and he was subsequently appointed to the Customs and Excise.  It noted ‘his success was of considerable advantage to the community, adding as it did to the prestige of the schools and demonstrating the efficiency of the teaching.  He was at the time of his appointment nearly 20 years of age.  His education had been to a great extent ruined through his having been interned for over 12 months in the troubled times.’  This is the first reference I have found to the internment of Edward Behan.  Was that internment during the War of Independence or the Civil War?  Can anyone help me identify Edward Behan?

John Bealin, formerly of Stanhope Street, died in New York on St. Stephen’s Day 1924.  In his will he left the sum of £200 to his former school in Athy.  His father Mark Bealin had a bakery business at 2 William Street and was secretary of the local committee set up in the town to build the original school premises for the Christian Brothers.  He died in 1866 and on the subsequent remarriage of his wife, his three sons, including the 14 year old John, emigrated to America.

These are just some of the persons who over the years helped the Christian Brothers to maintain a presence in Athy.  There are many more unnamed and forgotten individuals without whose assistance the early Christian Brothers schools in Athy could not have continued.  As to the original query regarding Brother Mark Hill I discovered that he came to Athy in 1892 and five years later was appointed Director of the local Christian Brothers community.  He moved to Kells, Co. Meath in July 1900.  The only other entry in the annals concerning Brother Hill noted how he organised a bazaar in Easter week 1900 to help pay the cost of building a new oratory in the Christian Brothers monastery.

Sir Roger Casement

August 3^rd marks the 100^th anniversary of the execution of Roger Casement in Pentonville Prison, England.  As a student many years ago in the Kings Inns I passed every day on my way into lectures John Lavery’s monumental painting of Casement’s appeal hearing in the Court of Criminal Appeal.  Lavery attended the hearing on the 17^th and 18^th of July 1916 on the invitation of the Presiding Judge, Mr. Justice Darling and being one of the foremost portrait painters of his time produced a stunning painting of the court scene.  Lavery, who died in 1941, gifted the painting to the National Portrait Gallery in London but when that august body declined to accept the gift it passed after a number of years to the Kings Inns in Dublin. 

The painting shows Casement’s defence counsel, A.M. Sullivan, himself an Irishman, addressing the five red robed Judges who presided at the appeal hearing.  Sullivan, who made a fine closing speech on behalf of Casement, was censored by the Kings Inns benchers when he revealed in 1956 a professional confidence told to him by his client Casement during the trial.  This was an admission by Casement that he was a homosexual.  That same issue had caused much controversy following the publication of Brian Inglis’s biography of Casement in 1973 in which Inglis pronounced himself satisfied that the Casement diaries which referenced his homosexual activities were not forgeries put together by the British authorities to resist public pressure to save Casement from the gallows.  Undoubtedly the indefensible use of Casement’s diaries to prejudice his appeal was inexcusable and reflects badly on the British establishment of the time.  Now on the centenary of his death it is expected that all of the files held by the British Authorities relating to Casement will be made available for examination by historians. 

The Casement ‘Black Diaries’, as they have come to be described, were for many years the subject of controversy with the late Dr. Herbert Mackey publishing several books alleging they were forgeries.  Interestingly his brother Frank in a letter to the Irish Independent in June 1973 wrote ‘about a week after Casement’s remains were interned in Glasnevin President De Valera invited my late brother Herbert and his wife to lunch at Aras An Uachtarian.  In the course of lunch he informed my brother that he need not expect any help whatsoever from the Irish Government in his efforts to recover the Casement Diaries from the British Government.’  The message was clear.

In September 2001 Roisin McAuley in a letter to the Irish Times wrote ‘Eight years ago for the BBC series “Document” I investigated the charge of forgery against the British government in relation to the “Black Diaries” of Roger Casement ….. having started with an open mind I found compelling circumstantial evidence of forgery and began to believe the forgery theory ….. however, after an examination by a forensic expert there was no doubt in our minds that the diaries were genuine.’

In conclusion she claimed ‘surely the point to be made about Roger Casement is that he belongs to all of us.  The debate about the diaries kept him too long anchored to the Republican cause.  He is still a Republican hero.  But he couldn’t have been Sir  Roger Casement, humanitarian hero, if he hadn’t believed in an enlightened role for the British empire.  He wouldn’t have been Roger Casement, Republican hero, if he hadn’t seen the oppression by that Empire abroad.  And if he hadn’t been homosexual, knowing what it was like to feel oppressed and marginalised, he might not have been a hero to anyone.’

Roger Casement played an important if somewhat peripheral role in the Easter Rising of 1916.  For that his place in Irish history is secure as indeed is he in his role as a humanitarian for his work as a British civil servant in the Putumayo Peru in 1910/1911.   His personal life is of little relevance, even though his biographers over the years have sometimes thought otherwise. 

Some weeks ago I wrote of the attempt by Irish Volunteers from County Laois to disable the rail link between Carlow and Athy on the eve of the Easter Rising in Dublin.  The men involved, Eamon Fleming, Michael Grey and Michael Walsh travelled to Athy and cut down a telegraph pole which they laid across the railway track to prevent troops travelling to Dublin.  A subsequent statement from Eamon Fleming located the action at Maganey, while a contemporary press report referred to a local man named Nolan from Ardreigh who came across the incident and reported it to a nearby signal box attendant.  I am trying to pinpoint whether the Irish Volunteers activity took place as claimed at Maganey or nearby Ardreigh. 

Was there a signal box in Maganey station in 1916?  If not given Nolan’s address as Ardreigh it is likely that the Volunteers attempted to block the track at Ardreigh.  Anyone with any thoughts on the matter might contact me or indeed anyone in Ardreigh or Maganey who might have heard where the Volunteers operated that Sunday morning.

Local history research

I have had a lifelong fascination with reference books.  From an early age these compendiums of facts and figures fascinated me.  Haydn’s Dictionary of dates was one such book and although last published in the late 19^th Century it was commonly available in many public and school libraries in the 1950’s.  The dictionary had particularly grandiose titles.  The 1881 edition enjoyed the title “Haydn’s dictionary of dates and useful information relating to all ages and nations containing the history of the world to the Autumn of 1881”.  Not many publications would make such claims today!

As a young historian first dabbling in history of his hometown, books such as Michael Kavanagh’s Bibliography of County Kildare were an invaluable resource as I worked my way through the records in the National Library in Dublin in the early 1970’s.  When I first began working on Athy’s history the immediate difficulty I faced was trying to identify where I could extract information relevant to this history of the town.  Michael Kavanagh’s book was a great starting point as it identified all publications in both books or periodicals relating to the County of Kildare and thanks to Michael’s meticulous research I was able to extract much information on the town.

For an amateur researcher such as myself there was quite a great deal of trial and error, sometimes chasing a reference down a blind alleyway, but invariable there was always the joy of finding some nugget of information long forgotten about the town.  I can recall long hours in the reading room of the National Library hunched over the microfiche readers while I carefully read through old issues of the Nationalist!

What I didn’t truly appreciate and only really did when my family and I moved to Athy in 1982 was that much information still remained within the living memory of the inhabitants of the town.  Sometimes there was a story retold from father to son or perhaps a document preserved carefully in the family’s possession but all this information has gradually informed my writings and research into the town’s history over the last 40 years.

There is no doubt that the advent of the internet has allowed local history studies to blossom in a way that I could not have foreseen more than 40 years ago.  The modern researcher can access census records, valuation office records, army records at the touch of a button.  The recent release from the military archives of the records of those who served in the War of Independence has been an absolute boon, not only for professional historians, but for the families who now have a greater sense of what their grandparents and great grandparents did more than a century ago.

At the same time this commitment to the digitisation of our records has its downside.  The accessibility of the internet also makes it very ephemeral.   How many of us have gone on holidays with a digital camera, taken a multitude of photographs and have yet to print one off? How often have we viewed a picture in a family album of relations long dead and now unknown to us for the sake of a label?  This is something we must bear in mind for future generations.  I am aware that the National Library has a policy of “harvesting” websites to be stored digitally but like all technology time overtakes it and there is always a fear that the technology of today will not be recognised by the technology of tomorrow and these records may no longer be accessible to us. 

With the introduction of the e-book many years ago, we were led to believe that it sounded the death knell for the printed book, but I am confident that the dictionaries, anthologies, bibliographies and encyclopaedias which grace my shelves and punctuate my research will assist me in many years to come.    

Few communities are as fortunate as we are in having a full time museum in our town which has been assiduous over the last 20 years in collecting and recording the town’s historical development.  It is something that is very easy to take for granted but it is important that we continue to support the museum.  I am often surprised that the first time many of our towns inhabitants cross the threshold of the museum is when they are showing it to a friend or relation from abroad.  It is an important resource that we must not neglect and I would encourage both young and old to use the museum as often as possible.  The museum’s latest exhibition “By Endurance We Conquer – Shackleton’s Men” will be opened at 2.30pm on the 30^th of August next, just after the unveiling of the statue of Ernest Shackleton at Emily Square, Athy.  All are welcome to attend.

Dominican Church bell and the Dominican Church Athy

Our former Dominican Church has been in the news recently.  Under the front page banner headline “For Whom Will The Bell Toll”, this newspaper recounted the story of Kildare County Council’s efforts to restore the church bell which the Dominican Fathers had removed some months ago.  They did so in the expectation that the bell would find a home in another church and continue to be used to summon worshipers to church services.  It was not to be.  What one Council official described as ‘an important part of our heritage’ had to be returned to the belfry from which it was removed.

The bell was cast by M. Byrne of Fountain Head Foundry, James’s Street, Dublin and his name also appears on the rotary mountings from which the bell hung.  The bell was inscribed ‘Presented to the Dominican Church, Bridgeview, Athy – Rosary Confraternity and other kind friends A.D. 1898.’  The account books of Athy’s Dominican Priory, which are held in the Dominican archives in Tallaght, indicate that the bell weighing 21cwt was brought to Athy from the foundry in Dublin by canal boat.  It was blessed in July 1898 and christened by the local Dominicans as ‘Dominick’. 

The Kildare Nationalist in the same issue which reported the supposed tug of war over the church bell carried an advertisement concerning Kildare County Council’s proposed conversion of St. Dominic’s Church to a public library.  The public are asked to submit comments or observations on the proposed development to the County Librarian before 4p.m. on Monday 19^th September.  The proposed change of use will undoubtedly be welcomed locally, even if some may quibble over the Council’s failure/refusal to countenance the occasional use of the building for the holding of concerts.  I believe this was the original suggestion made in the expectation that modern mobile library furniture would allow such usage, with little inconvenience or difficulty.  It’s a pity the idea was not followed through as the Dominican Church has proved over the years to be a wonderful venue for the occasional concerts which were held there.  Would it be possible, I wonder, for the County Council to revise its plans for the former church to allow its usage as a library as well as an occasional concert venue?

While the Dominican Church was in the course of construction the members of Athy Urban District Council at its meeting in June 1964 decided to honour the Dominican Order.  Tom Carbery in proposing that the new 42 house scheme off Woodstock Street be named ‘St. Dominic’s Park’ said that it was a fitting way of showing the public’s appreciation of and gratitude for the great work of the Dominican fathers over the previous 700 years.  Joe Deegan in seconding the motion said the church under construction was the wonder and admiration of people not only in different parts of Ireland but in other countries as well.  M.G. Nolan and the Councils Chairman Michael Cunningham also spoke in favour of the motion as did Jim Fleming who however asked that the Council’s next housing scheme be named after the late Deputy William Norton ‘in recognition of the outstanding work he has done for the working classes.’

Reading press reports in the aftermath of the opening of the church in March 1965 I am not at all sure if we locals fully appreciated how important the church was in terms of its architectural style.  Headlined as a church of the 21^st century it attracted thousands of visitors in the months after its dedication.  The church was designed by 39 year old French born architect Adrien Pache who incorporated a number of Continental ideas into his design.  Speaking at a news conference while the church was still in the course of construction he said ‘the Church will be the first of its kind in Ireland.  Nothing like it has been attempted before and the fact that it is completely different in design to all other Irish churches makes it somewhat revolutionary.’ 

The modern design of the Dominican Church would no doubt have found favour with James Johnson who writing from 1055 Manhattan Ave., Brooklyn following the opening of Athy’s Parish Church in 1964 claimed that the dedication of the Parish Church pointed to a regrettable and avoidable failure to join the movement towards contemporary forms in ecclesiastical architecture.  He regarded the Lombardy style of St. Michael’s Church as a tragic anachronism.

Unlike the Parish Church the former Dominican Church, soon to be the town library, is truly a magnificent example of contemporary architecture.  It will make a first class library, with or without the ancient church bell but imagine what a huge additional contribution it could make to the cultural and musical heritage of the town if its use for occasional concerts was also allowed. 

Memorial, plaques and signs in and around South Kildare

Kildare County Council has recently embarked on a survey of memorials, plaques and signs throughout the County of Kildare.  They are part of our cultural heritage, marking as they do people of the past, historic events or heritage landmarks of town and countryside.  This is the first attempt to collect this information and when the project is completed it is intended to make its results available to the general public.  In turn the public’s help in identifying and recording local memorials, plaques and signs is sought.

The Heritage Officer of Kildare County Council has prepared guidelines for the survey.  While advising that graveyard memorials are not included almost every other form of commemorative memorial or plaque is deemed worthy of recording.  Even what the guidelines describe as ‘significant street names and laneways’ are to be included.  Interestingly bench marks, armorial plaques and mile markers also come within the ambit of the survey.  The Council’s Heritage Officer Bridget Loughlin who is overseeing the survey would like to get the following information.  The memorial/plaque name, where it is located, a brief description with any background information and a photograph, although I suspect the latter while helpful is not essential. 

In recent years probably more plaques have gone up in or around Athy than in any other time in the past.  Nelson Street has a plaque to Johnny Lynch, musician, while the Dominicans are honoured with a plaque on the entrance wall to the former Dominican Church.  The Christian Brothers are remembered with a handsome memorial in Edmund Rice Square, while the Sisters of Mercy have the riverside car park opposite the Parish Church dedicated to their Order.

Until recent years the Town Hall had a large plaque commemorating the founding of Macra na Feirme and its founder Stephen Cullinane but it was removed when the Macra monument was unveiled by President Robinson some years ago.  I wonder where that plaque is today?  The impressive Town Hall has in more recent years received plaques honouring the local men who fought in the 1914-18 war, as well as a plaque honouring Ernest Shackleton, the polar explorer.  This year as part of the centenary commemorations of the 1916 Rising a plaque was affixed to the west wall of the Town Hall. 

A few years ago the Enterprise Centre arranged for tourist plaques to be placed on the more important buildings in the town.  Whites Castle, Canal Harbour, Crom a Boo Bridge, St. Michael’s Church of Ireland church, Methodist church, St. Vincent’s Hospital are but some of the buildings highlighted in this way.

Bench marks will be seldom recognised but offhand I can recall bench marks on the Town Hall, Crom a Boo Bridge and St. Vincent’s Hospital.  There are a few more around the town awaiting to be identified.  Memorials are less scarce and in the main square of the town we have the water fountain presented to the people of Athy by the Duke of Leinster.  Just behind it is the more recently unveiled memorial to the men and women from the locality who in 1798 sought religious and civil liberty. 

Would the stone archway taken from the ruins of the cavalry barracks in Barrack Lane and reassembled in Woodstock Street come within the definition of a memorial?  I would think so, as undoubtedly will the superb canal lock gate which adorns the roundabout on the Dublin Road.  The various pieces of sculpture provided by Kildare County Council under the percentage scheme for major capital projects must also be included in this survey.  Examples are to be found at the Flinters Field site, at Butlers Row and the Fairgreen housing site.

What the Council refers to as ‘significant street names’ may pose problems when it comes to their inclusion or exclusion from the survey.  I cannot imagine that any one street name is any less or more significant than another.  Our principal street names commemorate members of the Duke of Leinster’s family, while many of the laneways bear the names of long forgotten property owners.  The building boom of the Celtic years which came somewhat later to Athy than elsewhere resulted in the creation of a lot of housing estates with names which do not resonate historically or otherwise with the ancient town on the River Barrow. 

If you can help the County Council in its countywide survey of memorials, plaques and signs do contact Bridget Loughlin, Heritage Office at the Council Offices, Naas, ph. (045) 980791 or email Bloughlin@kildarecoco.ie. 

Another project recently initiated by Kildare County Council is a building survey of the county which seeks to identify buildings of historical interest or architectural merit.  Athy has a wealth of such buildings and indeed in the opinion of many is the most interesting town in the county of Kildare in terms of its layout and architecture.  If you are contacted by the team involved in the building survey do give them every help in identifying and recording the building which may be your home or your business address.  It is purely an architectural survey and is in no way connected with property tax, rating systems or anything that is detrimental to your interests.  Your cooperation with the survey team would be much appreciated and will undoubtedly be reflected in the quality of the survey teams final report.

Danny Kane and Mary Fleming

Danny Kane and Mary Fleming came from a similar rural background in South Kildare.  Danny was from Oldgrange, while Mary was from the nearby townland of Fontstown.  In age they were a generation apart but both passed away within weeks of each other.  Mary was an extremely devout person whose commitment to her church never waivered, while Danny’s work ethic was an essential part of his approach to life. 

Mary left Ireland as a young girl in 1937 at the height of the economic war.  She would spend the next 67 years of her life in England where she qualified as a nurse and midwife.  Even in retirement she continued working as a health visitor in Northampton, near to the home place of the great English poet John Clare.  She was however never lost to Ireland or to the extended Fleming family and she returned to Athy 12 years ago.  Here in Athy she renewed her commitment to the local parish in the same way as she had committed herself as a volunteer in her UK parish over many years.

Danny Kane, who was one of the most agreeable persons one could meet, left school like so many of his peers at an early age.  His lack of formal education did not in any way impinge on his ability to relate to people and he enjoyed an excellent relationship with everyone as he passed through life.  While working on local farms at an early age he developed an extraordinary work ethic which he maintained all his life.

In or about 1971 Danny purchased a small grocery shop at 32 Woodstock Street.  I am told that the enterprising young man from Oldgrange found that the mortgage repayments exceeded his income and so with friends Syl Bell and Eddie Ryan he purchased a chip van.  Travelling to various functions in the area selling chips proved profitable and prompted Danny to open a chipper in part of the existing grocery shop in Woodstock Street.  In time Danny gave over the entire premises to the fish and chip business and it flourished while Danny was the proprietor before selling it on in 1998. 

Legion are the stories I have heard of Danny’s thoughtfulness and generosity during his time as the shop proprietor in Woodstock Street.  It was the same spirit and thoughtfulness which saw him working later in his life as a volunteer driver for the Cancer Society.  After retiring from the business he had built up over 26 years Danny worked for a time as a driver for his brother-in-law Fergal Blanchfield.  This was followed by a spell as a driver with local hardware firm Griffin Hawe Ltd. and later as a taxi driver for Vals Cabs and Ernest O’Rourke-Glynn.

Sadly in more recent years Danny was troubled by a heart complaint brought on unquestionably by a life of hard work and long hours.  He was scheduled to have heart surgery for some time past but health cutbacks caused the operation to be postponed several times.  When at last the call came it was via a text message while Danny was attending 12 mass at St. Michael’s Parish Church.  He was admitted to St. James’s Hospital the following morning but tragically following a 14 hour operation died shortly after being transferred to the intensive care unit.

Danny is survived by his wife Fidelma who on their marriage in 1972 brought together two families, Kanes and Blanchfields, who are long associated with this part of the county of Kildare.  Fidelma and their 8 adult children have lost a wonderful caring husband and father and a man for whom the local community came out in their hundreds to honour on the occasion of his funeral. 

The contrasting lifestyles of both Danny Kane and Mary Fleming, both from rural backgrounds, were founded on commitment, one to the church, the other to the family.  Mary, who remained single throughout her whole life, found contentment and purpose in the Catholic Church and in her later years on returning to Ireland found great happiness with the extended family members, young and old, with whom she spent her final days.  Danny found great happiness in his family life and the life stories of Danny and Mary while different in so many ways show that their passages through life were marked by dedicated commitment to life’s true values.  Our sympathies go to the families and friends of Mary Fleming and Danny Kane. 

Sir Roger Casement

August 3^rd marks the 100^th anniversary of the execution of Roger Casement in Pentonville Prison, England.  As a student many years ago in the Kings Inns I passed every day on my way into lectures John Lavery’s monumental painting of Casement’s appeal hearing in the Court of Criminal Appeal.  Lavery attended the hearing on the 17^th and 18^th of July 1916 on the invitation of the Presiding Judge, Mr. Justice Darling and being one of the foremost portrait painters of his time produced a stunning painting of the court scene.  Lavery, who died in 1941, gifted the painting to the National Portrait Gallery in London but when that august body declined to accept the gift it passed after a number of years to the Kings Inns in Dublin. 

The painting shows Casement’s defence counsel, A.M. Sullivan, himself an Irishman, addressing the five red robed Judges who presided at the appeal hearing.  Sullivan, who made a fine closing speech on behalf of Casement, was censored by the Kings Inns benchers when he revealed in 1956 a professional confidence told to him by his client Casement during the trial.  This was an admission by Casement that he was a homosexual.  That same issue had caused much controversy following the publication of Brian Inglis’s biography of Casement in 1973 in which Inglis pronounced himself satisfied that the Casement diaries which referenced his homosexual activities were not forgeries put together by the British authorities to resist public pressure to save Casement from the gallows.  Undoubtedly the indefensible use of Casement’s diaries to prejudice his appeal was inexcusable and reflects badly on the British establishment of the time.  Now on the centenary of his death it is expected that all of the files held by the British Authorities relating to Casement will be made available for examination by historians. 

The Casement ‘Black Diaries’, as they have come to be described, were for many years the subject of controversy with the late Dr. Herbert Mackey publishing several books alleging they were forgeries.  Interestingly his brother Frank in a letter to the Irish Independent in June 1973 wrote ‘about a week after Casement’s remains were interned in Glasnevin President De Valera invited my late brother Herbert and his wife to lunch at Aras An Uachtarian.  In the course of lunch he informed my brother that he need not expect any help whatsoever from the Irish Government in his efforts to recover the Casement Diaries from the British Government.’  The message was clear.

In September 2001 Roisin McAuley in a letter to the Irish Times wrote ‘Eight years ago for the BBC series “Document” I investigated the charge of forgery against the British government in relation to the “Black Diaries” of Roger Casement ….. having started with an open mind I found compelling circumstantial evidence of forgery and began to believe the forgery theory ….. however, after an examination by a forensic expert there was no doubt in our minds that the diaries were genuine.’

In conclusion she claimed ‘surely the point to be made about Roger Casement is that he belongs to all of us.  The debate about the diaries kept him too long anchored to the Republican cause.  He is still a Republican hero.  But he couldn’t have been Sir  Roger Casement, humanitarian hero, if he hadn’t believed in an enlightened role for the British empire.  He wouldn’t have been Roger Casement, Republican hero, if he hadn’t seen the oppression by that Empire abroad.  And if he hadn’t been homosexual, knowing what it was like to feel oppressed and marginalised, he might not have been a hero to anyone.’

Roger Casement played an important if somewhat peripheral role in the Easter Rising of 1916.  For that his place in Irish history is secure as indeed is he in his role as a humanitarian for his work as a British civil servant in the Putumayo Peru in 1910/1911.   His personal life is of little relevance, even though his biographers over the years have sometimes thought otherwise. 

Some weeks ago I wrote of the attempt by Irish Volunteers from County Laois to disable the rail link between Carlow and Athy on the eve of the Easter Rising in Dublin.  The men involved, Eamon Fleming, Michael Grey and Michael Walsh travelled to Athy and cut down a telegraph pole which they laid across the railway track to prevent troops travelling to Dublin.  A subsequent statement from Eamon Fleming located the action at Maganey, while a contemporary press report referred to a local man named Nolan from Ardreigh who came across the incident and reported it to a nearby signal box attendant.  I am trying to pinpoint whether the Irish Volunteers activity took place as claimed at Maganey or nearby Ardreigh. 

Was there a signal box in Maganey station in 1916?  If not given Nolan’s address as Ardreigh it is likely that the Volunteers attempted to block the track at Ardreigh.  Anyone with any thoughts on the matter might contact me or indeed anyone in Ardreigh or Maganey who might have heard where the Volunteers operated that Sunday morning.