Athy's Tenants Defence Association

The passing of the Land Act in 1870 was the first success of the Irish tenant farmers in their long struggle against Irish landlordism. This Gladstonian enactment gave the tenant farmers the right to be compensated in the event of eviction and for improvements carried out during their tenancy. However it did not secure for these hard pressed people the security of tenure which they had so long sought. Moreover the much heralded Land Act enabled Landlords to contract out of its provisions, thereby leaving their tenants without even the limited benefits of Gladstone’s measure. The Athy and County Kildare landlord, the Duke of Leinster, was amongst the first of the Irish landlords to attempt to defeat his tenants’ rights under the 1870 Act. The Leinster Lease, as it became known, a model of legal ingenuity was presented by the Duke’s agents to his various tenants. Prepared with the Duke’s interest in mind, it totally and cruelly side-stepped the 1870 Act which the tenant farmers had so recently welcomed. Local opposition to the terms of the Leinster Lease saw the foundation of the Tenants’ Defence Association in Athy. This was the first such association formed in Ireland after the original Tenant’s Defence association declined following the passing of the 1870 Land Act of Isaac Butt’s Tenant League of 1868. The Athy Tenants’ Association held its first meeting on Tuesday, 19 November 1872 with Captain Morgan of Rahinderry in the chair. Local man Thomas P. Kynsey J.P. acted as Secretary to the meeting. In the years immediately following the foundation of the Tenants’ Defence Association in Athy, the Duke of Leinster succeeded in overcoming local opposition to the terms of the Leinster Lease. Some of the Association’s leaders were themselves to accept the terms of the Lease, undoubtedly under the threat of eviction. One such signatory was James Leahy, Chairman of Athy Town Commissioners, who admitted signing the Leinster Lease for his farm at Ardscull. In 1878 the Duke submitted the Lease to Athy Board of Guardians in respect of some land held by them as tenants of the Leinster estate. At a special Board meeting on 1 January 1879, the Guardians declined to execute the Lease indicating “that this Board, as the representatives of the people decline to give their signatories to a document directly opposed to the provisions of the Land Act of 1870.” Opposition to the Leinster Lease was maintained at a low key throughout 1879 and 1880 but evictions in September 1880 of tenants of the Verschoyle Estate prompted the formation of a local branch of the Land League. Public agitation in Athy took on a new and more fervent pitch under the guidance of local land league organiser Michael Boyton. On Sunday, 10 October 1880, the first Land League meeting was held in Athy. Addressed by Michael Boyton, the assembled crowd was told that he had come to Athy “commissioned by Charles Stewart Parnell to establish the Athy branch of the Land League.” The Athy Land League had Dr. Patrick O’Neill as Vice President, Timothy Byrne as Treasurer and John Cantwell as Secretary. On 8 January 1881 The Kildare Observer reported a Land League meeting in the Market Square, Athy during which Michael Boyton burnt a copy of the Leinster Lease. However, within a few weeks local public support for the Land League was seriously undermined by a clerical instigated tenants’ agreement to accept a 20% rent reduction offered by the Duke of Leinster. The Land League was not mentioned at the meeting chaired by Rev. Dr. Kavanagh which accepted the new rents and Dr. Patrick O’Neill, the League’s Vice President, resigned because “the acceptance of the Duke’s offer had broken the backbone of the local Land League.” During the period of the Tenants’ Defence Association and the Land League one finds no evidence in the minutes of Athy Town Commissioners of support for the tenant farmers. The Commissioners silence probably owed much to the servile attitude adopted by successive Commissioners over many years to the town’s landlord – the Duke of Leinster. The first indication of their deviation from the subservience of their predecessors was the passing of a resolution on 6 June 1881, requesting the extension of the provisions of the Land Bill to Leaseholders as well as yearly tenants. This innocuous enough request was to be followed on 2 January, 1882 by support for Charles Stewart Parnell in a resolution which called on the Government to release Parnell “and the other prisoners confined under the Coercion Act.” Further evidence of the more independent and nationalistic line adopted by Athy Town Commissioners was given on Sunday, 5 Jul 1885 with the presentation to Michael Davitt of an address by the Commissioners Chairman, Michael Doyle, on the occasion of Davitt’s visit to Athy. While Land League activity throughout the country went on a pace throughout the 1880’s, Athy, which in 1872 had given Ireland the first of the new wave Tenants’ Defence Associations, was little concerned with the nation’s struggle. All was to change with the advent of land problems in the little village of Luggacurran in 1886.

Concrete Bridge across River Barrow

Foundations for what was the then longest reinforced concrete bridge in Ireland were laid in June 1917. It was part of the work on the Athy Wolfhill railway line which had been authorised by the British government under the 1871 Defence of the Realm Act to relieve wartime scarcity of fuel. Work had started on extending the railway line to the Wolfhill coalmines from months previously. Men from Dublin and Belfast were brought to Athy to join the local workers with the promise of 30 shillings per week and free bed for a 60 hour week. The Dubliners soon went on strike, seeking a wage increase of 8 shillings per week and a reduction in the working hours. The Athy men did not join the strike which was eventually settled when the workmen agreed to terms of 5 shillings and 6 pence per day, with some reduction in the work hours. By September 1917 with so many local men, encouraged by the generous separation allowances, having enlisted in the British Army, the local Urban District Council petitioned the chief engineer on the railway project to release 200 men for a short period to help farmers during the harvest. The bridge across the River Barrow was nearing completion in January 1918 but as the entire railway line extension project neared completion on 14th February 1918 the workers went on strike again. Up to 200 men marched through Athy in what was an unsuccessful attempt to get the Athy workers to join the strike. Following the intervention of Denis Kilbride M.P. and his colleague P.J. Meehan of Portlaoise the strike was called off in order to allow the Board of Trade to decide on the workers’ demands. The work continued in time for the Athy Wolfhill line to be opened on 24th September 1918. Operated by the Great Southern and Western Railway Company, the Wolfhill line was in constant use for only a few months as the 10 mile long railway line gave access to the coal pits at Gracefield and Modubeagh. With the end of the Great War the anthracite from the Wolfhill pits and from the Deerpark colliery in Castlecomer, which latter coalmine was served by a newly built railway line from Kilkenny became less commercial to mine. The Castlecomer railway line which opened approximately one year after the Wolfhill line, was the last substantial standard gauge branch line to be built in Ireland. Both railway lines were in charge of the English Board of Works until 1921 when British Government control of the Irish railways ended. In 1924 the Irish Free State government required the different Irish railway companies to amalgamate and the Great Southern and Western railway company which operated the Dublin Waterford line and its various branches became the largest partner in the newly formed Great Southern railway. The railway line to Wolfhill was taken out of use on 12th July 1930, while rail services to Ballylinan continued until 1st April 1963. With the opening of the cement factory in Mullery’s field in 1936 a small branch line was opened to serve the factory which was supplied with material from its sister factory in Drogheda. This branch line closed a few years ago on a date which I would like any of my readers to confirm. Last week the new bridge over the River Barrow as part of the outer relief road began to take shape. Two massive steel girders were moved into place on the south side of the old railway bridge 104 years after the workmen of 1919 had completed their work. It created an enormous amount of interest, with photographs and videos appearing on Facebook and elsewhere recording what is a local historic event. It made me think back to the Planning Appeal hearing in March 2005 to consider objections to Kildare County Council’s plan to erect a bridge across the River Barrow at the rear of the Courthouse as part of the inner relief road project. I engaged with the Planning Inspector and the County Council’s expert witnesses for more than a week during the hearing as I presented a case for the outer relief road, rather than the inner relief road planned by the Council. The County Council inner relief road proposal was to many people in Athy, but not to all, a hopeless attempt to solve the increasingly difficult traffic problems in the town. The outer relief road was the preferred option of the majority of people in Athy, but the County Council would not listen to the local people and with the assistance of a slim majority on the Urban District Council insisted on pressing ahead with a road which would have left all traffic including huge HGV’s travelling through the centre of our town. An Bord Pleanala accepted the strength of the arguments regarding the preference for the outer relief road and for the first time in planning history rejected a local authority’s road plan. It has taken almost 50 years to get the relief road in place and with it comes an opportunity for local businesses to make Athy’s town centre an attractive place to visit and to shop. Writing of bridges reminds me that it is almost 30 years since the issue of a pedestrian bridge from Woodstock across the Barrow to its east side was first raised. Since then the Athy schools on the east side have increased to include all the schools, primary and secondary, in the town. There is an urgent pressing need for a pedestrian bridge to be put in place. Can we look forward to having this essential structure put in place before too long.

Anna Edith Duthie

Anna Breakey was 24 years old when she came to live and work in Athy 74 years ago. She was a native of Ballybay, Co. Monaghan, the third of four children born to farmer James Breakey and his wife Edith. Anna would spend all but the last three years of her life in the south Kildare town. She arrived in Athy three years after the ending of World War II to work in Shaws Department store in Duke Street and lived over the store with the other female assistants until she married in 1953. She had met local man, Albert Duthie, whose late father, William Thomas Duthie, had taken over the watchmaking and jewellery business of William O’Connor in 1905. That business, located at 30 Leinster Street, would continue to operate under the name W.T. Duthie & Son until Anna Duthie, formerly Anna Breakey, retired in 2013. One of my many treasured memories of Athy in the 1950s was the nodding Santa Claus figure high up in Albert Duthie’s shop window in the weeks prior to Christmas. As youngsters my friends and I approached the window in the darkening gloom of winter evenings to bask in the simple belief that anything we asked for would somehow magically appear on Christmas morning. As we grew older and innocent beliefs disappeared, the nodding Santa Claus still attracted our attention, but now as a reminder of the forthcoming Christmas festivities and the school holidays which we looked forward to with eager anticipation. I left Athy in January 1961, spending years in several different towns including Monaghan town, not too far away from Ballybay. I found Monaghan folk to be friendly and helpful and on my return to Athy 21 years later I found Mrs. Anna Duthie displaying the same qualities. During the 1960s and the 1970s I returned to Athy on a regular basis and got to know Anna’s husband Albert. I shared with him an appreciation of all that is good in Athy and Albert shared with me his efforts to highlight the story of his native town. He did this by frequently photographing events and buildings in Athy and also by commissioning the town’s coat of arms which he used on various items sold in his shop. Albert sadly passed away in 1979 at 54 years of age and Anna who had celebrated with him their silver wedding jubilee a year previously would spend the next 45 years without her loving partner. Anna Duthie, like her late husband Albert, always exhibited a great interest in and appreciation of all things Athy. She was a wonderful help to me in relation to unravelling the history of the Presbyterian Church in Athy and always displayed a willingness to share with me information on different aspects of Athy’s story in which generations of the Duthie family once played a prominent part. Anna was particularly helpful in the making of arrangements which saw the first performance of John MacKenna’s Oratorio ‘Still and Distant Voices’ in the Presbyterian Church in the early 1990s. This work which remembered and commemorated the young Athy men who died in World War I was perhaps one of the first times that this long-forgotten aspect of Athy’s history was brought to the public’s attention. Following her husband’s untimely passing Anna Duthie continued the business at 30 Leinster Street. Duthie’s, as it was known by the local people, was an important part of the commercial streetscape of Athy, presided over by the ever friendly and kind lady behind the counter. Anna Duthie continued in business until she retired in 2013 at 89 years of age. I believe that the Duthie family name first appeared in Athy when William Thomas Duthie’s parents arrived here from Perthshire, Scotland with other Scottish families in the early 1850s. It was William Thomas Duthie’s brother James who partnered with Harry Large of Rheban to establish the firm of Duthie Larges. That firm, once a substantial employer in Athy, is no more and the final Duthie link with Athy has now been severed with the sad passing of Anna Edith Duthie. Last Tuesday family and friends gathered in the Presbyterian Church on the Dublin Road for Anna’s funeral service conducted by Rev. Stephen Rea. Anna’s son Alistair and daughter Heather spoke fondly of their mother and father reminding us of a happy family life and Anna’s passion for nature, especially flowers. Anna Duthie and her husband Albert will be remembered with fondness, especially by the older generations in Athy until as John Ellerton wrote ‘The day you gave us, Lord, is ended’.

Rev. Nicholas Ashe and Athy in time of Rebellion 1798

In August 1782, the Irish antiquarian Austin Cooper, following a visit to Athy, wrote “Athy is a small town situated on the River Barrow over which there is a bridge of arches with a small square castle adjoining on the east side. Here is a market house, church and county Courthouse, nothing remarkable in elegance of building. On the north west side of the town is a plain horse barracks and near it another castle”. Two hundred and forty years later all that remains of the buildings mentioned by Cooper is a much altered town hall (then the courthouse) Whites Castle and Woodstock Castle. Also gone are the many small private schools which were a common feature of Irish towns in the 18th and early 19th centuries. One such school was that of Nicholas Ashe where we find a mention in 1791 of one of his pupils, Thomas Lefroy, who would become the Lord Chief Justice of Ireland. Nicholas Ashe was a Church of England Minister who served as Sovereign of Athy following his election to that position in 1797. I am uncertain as to whether Ashe was a member of Athy Borough Council in 1792 when a measure of relief for Irish Catholics from some elements of the penal laws was proposed in the Irish Parliament. Those measures which eventually culminated in the Catholic Relief Act of 1793 were supported by the Duke of Leinster which prompted the Protestant members of Athy Borough Council to instruct their two parliamentary representatives to oppose the relief Bill. Rev. Nicholas Ashe appears from all accounts to have been a man of peace who found himself the subject of harsh treatment by the local yeomanry. Local yeomanry corps were formed after 1796 with membership confined almost exclusively to Protestants. Athy had two yeomanry units, the infantry and the cavalry. The Athy cavalry was formed in 1796 and was officered by Thomas Fitzgerald, a Catholic from Geraldine House, Athy although the corps was largely comprised of local Protestant gentry. The cavalry unit was disbanded in 1798 following the arrest of Thomas Fitzgerald and a humiliating standing down ceremony in Emily Square. This was done during Nicholas Ashe’s time as the town Sovereign. Some months earlier in January 1798 Ashe had written to the Duke of Leinster expressing his concerns at a possible rebel outbreak following claims of an ammunition plot. He expressed the hope that Athy would not be proclaimed and reported how he had liberated boat men arrested and detained by the local army commander. He wrote “Athy proved it’s loyalty last year by entertaining 1100 men over night and giving them money and provisions to assist them on their march to Bantry”. In that same letter Ashe recounted some of the acts of terrorism by members of the 9th Dragoons who were stationed in the local calvary barracks and also by the Cork Loyal Militia who had recently arrived in the town. A few weeks later Ashe forwarded a further letter to the Duke of Leinster expressing shame that while standing alone “against a most virulent party I suffer more than I can express”. In his attempts as town Sovereign not to have Athy proclaimed he had directed that all shops were to shut at 9.00pm. However a Mr. Willock who he claimed “pretended great loyalty to the King and aversion to papists kept his shop open in defiance”. He expressed annoyance at Willock’s action and that of his co religionist Carey – “two Protestants I never saw in church”. Ashe having discovered that Willock sold without licence had him committed to the local jail whereupon Willock hung out his hat with a paper on it which read “Willock was put in jail for his loyalty”. Ashe was extremely upset at what he described as the atrocities committed by the soldiers and having complained about their behaviour found himself “a victim to their malice”. The Duke of Leinster passed on Ashe’s complaint to Sir Ralph Abercromby, Commandeering Chief of the army, who promised to send another regiment into County Kildare. In the meantime Nicholas Ashe complained that his school was destroyed but despite this he continued to seek a peaceful resolution to the ongoing conflict between the authorities and the Irish rebels. Because he was successful in securing the surrender of a large number of pikes in the Athy area the local army commander felt that Ashe must have had links with the rebels and so quartered sixty soldiers with him. As a result the Reverend gentleman was so impoverished that the Duke of Leinster claimed “Ashe was obliged to do his duty as the magistrate in the streets in his slippers”. The brutal and systematic suppression of the people of Athy during 1798 was not confined to one religious group. Reverend Nicholas Ashe, Anglican churchman, first citizen of Athy in 1798 and a man of peace was victimised by local loyalists because of his attempts to advance what he described in his letters as “truth and humanity”. FRANK TAAFFE

Quakers and the Quaker Meeting House in Athy

This year we celebrate the centenary of the establishment of the civic guards later named the Garda Siochana. The new Irish police force was founded following the disbandment of the Royal Irish Constabulary and in its early years by and large followed the RIC organisational structure. Like the RIC the early civic guards were armed. On the 17th of August 1922 the last RIC men left Dublin Castle to be replaced by civic guards. The first recruits to the civic guards were paid three pounds and three shillings per week and even as they entered the service they were regarded with suspicion by the anti treaty side. Indeed Austin Stack, the former minister for home affairs stated that the setting up of the force was not calculated to promote order but rather suspicion, discontent and disorder. Recruits to the civic guards had to have specific height and chest measurements and most significantly had to have a reference from a clergy man. This latter requirement must have continued for some years as my father, a farmers son from north County Longford when he joined the gardai in 1925 did so on foot of a reference given by his Parish priest, Fr. . By 1924 they were 6,300 members of the force which by virtue of the Garda Siochana (temporary provisions) Act 1923 were now officially called “Garda Siochana”. When the first contingent of the newly appointed civic guards arrived in Athy was until recent times uncertain. The late Sergeant John Shaw who joined the civic guards on the 17th of August 1922 wrote to me from Portarlington in September 1980. In that letter he wrote that on the 15th of August 1922 civic guards were sent to Portarlington, Monasterevin, Rathanagan and as far as he knew Athy in order to protect the railway lines and the canal routes to Dublin. He also referenced an incident in Athy on the 26th of August of that year when armed civil guards disarmed C.I.D. men in the town. Another piece of information he passed on to me in that letter was that Sergeant Duggan, who was then the local Sergeant charged three men in a special Court on the 23rd of September. The nature of the offence was not stated but it may have arisen as a result of an armed attack on the premises which was then occupied by the civic guards. I also have a copy letter written by the same Sergeant William Duggan in 1950 which confirms that the civic guards took up duty in Athy on the 15th of August 1922 but he also explains that prior to that a party of 16 armed civic guards were stationed at a protection post in Bert. This I assume resulted from ongoing land disputes in the area resulting from evictions on the versicle estate. Sergeant Duggan’s letter names the 16 men as Michael O’Connor, Peter Curley, Thomas Concannon, Joseph Walton, John Kelly, Joseph McNamara, John Ryan, Michael Summers, Patrick Fitzgerald, John O’Neill, James Dwyer, John Hanley, Peter Tracey, Thomas Kirwan, Michael Hassett and Sergeant William Duggan. The police records once retained at divisional level at An Garda Siochana showed that the first Sergeant in Athy was Coriolanus Lillis who was replaced by Sergeant Ed. O’Loughlin on the 1st of May 1924 who in turn was replaced by Sergeant William Duggan (the letter writer) on the 1st of August 1924. When the civic guards first arrived in Athy they were accommodated in the Town Hall before transferring to the old RIC barracks off in Barrack Lane after it was vacated by the free state army. When the barracks was attacked and damaged during the civil war the police men moved to a hotel in Leinster Street. Sergeant Duggan claimed that it was the Leinster Arms Hotel. However I have a note of being informed many years ago that the hotel in question was the Hibernian Hotel which is now Bradbury’s premises. This year the centenary of the founding of An Garda Siochana is being marked by various events throughout the country. Athy’s Art Centre will be the venue for a lecture on the history of An Garda Siochana with particular reference to Athy as part of a history lecture series which starts on Tuesday, 20th September. Details of that lecture will be published later. The first lecture on the 20th of September will be given by Nessa O’Mara Cardiff on the Barrowhouse ambush in which James Connor and William Lacey lost their lives. This lecture and all the future lectures are free and will be held in the Arts Centre at Woodstock Street.

Early years of Garda Siochana in Athy

This year we celebrate the centenary of the establishment of the Civic Guards later named the Garda Siochana. The new Irish police force was founded following the disbandment of the Royal Irish Constabulary and in it’s early years by and large followed the RIC organisational structure. Like the R.I.C. the early Civic Guards were armed. On the 17th of August 1922 the last R.I.C. men left Dublin Castle to be replaced by the newly appointed Irish police men. The first recruits to the Civic Guards were paid three pounds and three shillings per week and even as they entered the service they were regarded with suspicion by the anti treaty side. Indeed Austin Stack, the former Minister for Home Affairs stated that the setting up of the force was not calculated to promote order but rather suspicion, discontent and disorder. Recruits to the Civic Guards had to have specific height and chest measurements and most significantly had to have a reference from a clergy man. This latter requirement must have continued for some years as my father, a farmers son from north County Longford when he joined the gardai in 1925 did so on foot of a reference given by his Parish priest, Fr. E. Mahon. By 1924 they were 6,300 members of the force which by virtue of the Garda Siochana (Temporary Provisions) Act 1923 were now officially called “Garda Siochana”. When the first contingent of the newly appointed Civic Guards arrived in Athy is still uncertain. The late Sergeant John Shaw who joined the force on the 17th of August 1922 wrote to me from Portarlington in September 1980. In that letter he wrote that on the 15th of August 1922 Civic Guards were sent to Portarlington, Monasterevin, Rathanagan and as far as he knew Athy in order to protect the railway lines and the canal routes to Dublin. He also referenced an incident in Athy on the 26th of August of that year when armed Civic Guards disarmed C.I.D. men in the town. Another piece of information he passed on to me in that letter was that Sergeant Duggan, whom he claimed was then the Athy Sergeant charged three men in a special Court on the 23rd of September. The nature of the offence was not stated but it may have arisen as a result of an armed attack on the premises which was then occupied by the Civic Guards. I also have a copy letter written by the same Sergeant William Duggan in 1950 which confirms that the Civic Guards took up duty in Athy on the 15th of August 1922 but he also explains that prior to that a party of 16 armed Civic Guards were stationed at a protection post in Bert. This I assume was because of ongoing land disputes in the area resulting from evictions on the Verschoyle estate. Sergeant Duggan’s letter names the 16 men as Michael O’Connor, Peter Curley, Thomas Concannon, Joseph Walton, John Kelly, Joseph McNamara, John Ryan, Michael Somers, Patrick Fitzgerald, John O’Neill, James Dwyer, John Hanley, Peter Tracey, Thomas Kirwan, Michael Hassett and himself. The police records once retained at divisional level in the An Garda Siochana showed that the first Sergeant in Athy was Cornelius Lillis who was replaced by Sergeant Ed. O’Loughlin on the 1st of May 1924 and who in turn was replaced by Sergeant William Duggan (the letter writer) on the 1st of August 1924. Sergeant Lillis was accompanied by Civic Guards John Hanley, John Kelly, Patrick Fitzgerald and Joseph McNamara. The records retained by the Garda Siochana, particularly relating to its early years are not as complete as one might expect. The records from which I gleaned the information relating to Sergeant Lillis and his successors were compiled in 1930. When the civic guards first arrived in Athy I understand they were accommodated in the Town Hall before transferring to the old RIC barracks off in Barrack Lane after it was vacated by the Free State army. It has been claimed that the policemen left the old R.I.C. barracks after it had been attacked by anti-treaty forces. I have been unable to verify this although I have an unverified note of an I.R.A. active service unit being caught up in crossfire in August 1922 during an attack on the police barracks in Athy. The police men later moved to a hotel in Leinster Street. Sergeant Duggan claimed that it was the Leinster Arms Hotel. However I have a note of being informed many years ago that the hotel in question was the Hibernian Hotel which is now Bradbury’s premises. This year the centenary of the founding of An Garda Siochana is being marked by various events throughout the country. Athy’s Art Centre will be the venue for a lecture on the history of An Garda Siochana with particular reference to Athy as part of a history lecture series which starts on Tuesday, 20th September at 8pm. Details of the Garda Siochana lecture will be published later. The first lecture on the 20th of September will be given by Nessa O’Mara Cardiff on the Barrowhouse ambush in which James Connor and William Lacey lost their lifes. This lecture and all the future lectures are free and will be held in the Arts Centre at Woodstock Street. FRANK TAAFFE

Grave Memorials in St. Michael's Cemetery Athy

It’s almost 40 years ago when with the assistance of FAS, the Industrial Training Authority, I organised a project intended to record all the headstones and grave memorials in the original St. Michael’s Cemetery. Regretfully it was a project which was not completed until many years later. The mammoth task of recording and mapping all the memorials in St. Michael’s Cemetery was eventually done by Michael Donovan, who is one of the unsung heroes of Athy and South Kildare. Michael has devoted many years of his life to recording cemetery memorials, not only in and around the immediate environs of Athy, but also further afield. To date he has completed 42 graveyard surveys, the results of which will be handed over to Kildare County Council to be made available to the general public. For many years tombstone inscriptions were an untapped source of Irish genealogy. They were largely unnoticed, except by those looking for obituary details. The work of copying tombstone inscriptions requires patience and attention to detail and Michael Donovan has spent years in recording memorial inscriptions and by doing so preserving for future generations details of families whose names are no longer familiar to us. He has also photographed the memorials and to date for the 42 cemeteries surveyed he has amassed a collection of almost 6,000 photographs. These, together with the mapping and numbering of graves in the cemetery surveys, ensure the ready identification of the location of every memorial. Grave memorials are an important part of a community’s heritage. They record lives from the past and the various types of monuments or memorials represent in many cases Irish folk art which has survived over the years. A headstone is the only piece of sculpture that most people will ever commission. In Victorian times cemeteries for the rich were gardens of stone, while the buried poor were seldom marked or noted. The local iron foundries provided metal crosses, many of which can still be seen in St. Michael’s Cemetery. The most common iron memorial comprised a cross within a circle with space for a painted inscription. Unfortunately these memorials tend to lose their painted inscription after some years. St. Mary’s Cemetery, where the remains of Workhouse inmates were laid, had quite a number of metal crosses, all of which regrettably were in recent years removed from the graves they marked. In St. Michael’s Cemetery and St. John’s Cemetery, which Michael has also surveyed, there are many fine examples of altar tombs and chest tombs. In St. John’s Cemetery he discovered a small gravestone, previously unrecorded, marking the grave of William Watson who died in 1637. Tankardstown graveyard, which surrounds the original Tankardstown Parish Church, has two 17th century memorials. Throughout St. Michael’s Cemetery can be found many elaborate monuments, mostly the work of 19th century carvers and stone masons. The practice of erecting headstone memorials did not develop until the latter part of the 18th century. Before that many graves were not marked, or if they were it was by footstones, so called as they were small plain stones placed at the bottom of graves. The Shackleton Museum holds two medieval grave slabs, believed to be of the 14th century, which were removed from St. Michael’s Cemetery for safekeeping some years ago. Monumental inscriptions to be found in St. Michael’s cemetery are generally of the genealogical epitaph type where family relationships and dates of birth are outlined. Michael has also recorded interesting supplementary details, generally quotations of a religious nature. One interesting grave memorial located within the medieval church, known locally as ‘the Crickeen’, reads:- ‘This venerable and justly loved Christian died in the 82nd year on 25th November 1849. She closed her edifying life by the fervent practice of those religious duties that ever marked her holy career. Her remains were accompanied to this earthly dwelling by an immense number of every class and creed of the entire neighbourhood which she so long adorned by her eminent and unostentatious virtue. She expired, consoled by her cherished text, from the 6th chap. 55th V of St. John. He that eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood had everlasting life and I will raise him up on the last day.’ In addition to his survey and recording work Michael Donovan, together with Clem Roche, have just completed recording the names of the 3,891 inmates who died in Athy Workhouse or the Fever Hospital between 1871 and 1921. Theirs is a work of great importance, rivalled only by Michael’s extraordinary solitary work in mapping and recording so many cemetery memorials in and around this area. Michael Donovan’s plans for this year are to survey cemeteries in Ballybracken, Kileen Cormac, Kildangan, Timogue, Harristown and Crookstown.

Athy's Wallboard factory

One of my earliest memories is of walking with my older brothers to the huge fire which broke out at the Wallboard factory in April 1949. I was a month short of my seventh birthday when like so many other Athy folk we all gathered on the roadside at Barrowford to watch ricks of straw on fire. The Athy Fire Station master made the following entry in the station records; ‘I received a call to fire at Wallboard Factory on 14th April 1949. All members of the Brigade were present. When we arrived we discovered three ricks of straw on fire. We remained working until Saturday 16th May. The Curragh and Carlow Brigades were also there.’ A later entry for the month of May listed as fire members R. Webster, P. Delahunt, Thomas Fleming, Jas Fleming, J. Webster, P. Cowman and P. Doyle who attended a fire at Mrs. Quinn’s house in St. John’s Lane. The Wallboard Mills were located on a 17 acre site approximately one mile north of Athy. Irish Wallboard Co. Ltd. had been formed in 1939 to manufacture hardboard from straw but did not commence production until 1949. Two years later it began to use native timber as the basic raw material for the manufacture of the oil tempered hardboard which was marketed under the trade name ‘Lignatex’. The Irish company had become closely associated with the Bowater organisation in 1950. The timber used in the manufacturing process consisted of forest thinning, while steam power was generated by machine won turf supplied by Bord na Mona. Over 12,000 tons of turf was used each year while 3 or 4 weeks turf supply was always kept in reserve. A major expansion programme in 1957 increased the mill’s production capacity by almost 60% and a further expansion scheme, completed in 1966, trebled the capacity of the Wallboard factory in the space of fifteen years. A report in the Nationalist and Leinster Times of 15th January 1949 noted that while equipment installation work in the new factory was nearing completion two local men, Pat Doyle and Ed Hicks, spent some days at Clondalkin Paper Mills studying the working of the various machines in preparation for their duties at Athy’s new factory. I am uncertain as to whether the factory was in production when the fire started on 14th April 1949. Despite that early setback, with the use of timber rather than straw, and the expansion programmes initiated in 1957 the factory was able to produce 60 million square feet of board annually. Two thirds of the factory output was exported. A press report of the 1960s outlined the steps taken at the Wallboard factory to ensure the production of a high-quality product. The factory laboratory where samples from every part of the production process were tested was managed by Jim Flanagan, assisted by John Murphy, Terry Doyle and many others. Three quality controllers were constantly sampling during every stage of the manufacturing process. This was a responsibility of Pat Daly, John Murphy and Michael Ahern, while Kevin McNulty kept an eye on the quality of the turf and the finished board. In the chemical mixing department Arthur Kavanagh was employed in the preparation of approximately ten tons of aluminium sulphate solution each week. Another laboratory man was George Robinson who assisted the chief chemist Jim Flanagan in research and development. The first manager of the Wallboard factory was Richard Shackleton, while the initial production managers employed were Swedish, the fifth production manager was Andy Coughlan whom I understand was a former RAF flight engineer. With many other local factories the Wallboard staff participated in the annual parochial variety festivals which were initiated by the local curate, Fr. Joe Corbett. In 1964 the Wallboard Variety Show was reported in the local press as ‘a pleasant and colourful presentation which won loud applause from the audience.’ The performers included Ena, Joan and Frances Coughlan, Connie Stafford, M. Dooley, P. Dunleavy, N. Wright, M. Holohan, K. McNulty, T. Dooley, S. Fanning, P.J. Loughman, Tim Ryan, M. Rainsford, F. Ryan, S. Finnerty, B. Finnerty and B. Robinson. The laughter, songs and work stopped in December 1978 when the Wallboard factory closed down. Approximately 220 workers were made redundant when production of wallboard transferred to Sweden where it is today still carried on. When corresponding with my good friend Liam Kenny, doyen of Kildare local historians, I invariably refer to Athy as being in the deep south of the county. For a change this Eye comes from the deep south of the island of Ireland to where I have travelled to greet my latest grandchild, Hannah Rose, born just a few days ago in Cork city. Hannah was the name of her maternal great grandmother who was born and reared in Doneraile, Co. Cork. The circle has now been completed.

A look back over the past 1500 Eyes on the Past

It is close on 29 years ago that I penned my first Eye on the Past. This week the 1500th article is printed and I want to take the opportunity to reflect on past articles, the people and events that formed the subject of those articles and to acknowledge the help given to me by so many people over the years. The first article was a short piece of approximately 400 words in which I mentioned the publics growing interest in local history and the opening of what I referred to as “the new vastly improved library service in the Town Hall”. Subsequent articles grew in wordage to 800 words then 1,200 words and that latter figure was maintained until the Kildare Nationalist changed to tabloid form. Prior to my first article I had been researching the history of Athy and 29 years later that research is still ongoing and my long promised history of the town is still not ready for publication. As a “blow in” to Athy from just down the road in Castlecomer but having all my remembered youthful life experiences here in Athy it is understandable that my interest in history should be centred on Athy. It was an interest first encouraged by my teachers in the local Christian Brothers school, especially the late Bill Ryan who was a gentleman, a scholar and an encourager. While I was out of Athy for 22 years my interest in history saw me researching Athy’s past. That research opened up many unknown and some forgotten elements of the town’s story. Even while I had attended the local secondary school and studied history for my Leaving Certificate I had never encountered any significant references to Athy’s involvement in Irish national events. Nothing was ever related to me or my school mates of how the Great Famine affected the local people. We learned of the famine tragedies of the West and the South West of Ireland such as that reported in the United Irishmen newspaper of the 19th of February 1848 which quoting a correspondent of the Mayo Constitution claiming “we had been informed that within the last week upwards of 20 deaths have taken place from starvation in Ballintubbert”. We now know that our local workhouse was the last place of residence for hundreds of local men, women and children who died during the famine and whose remains were brought by cart across Lennons Bridge to be buried in paupers graves in St. Mary’s cemetery. As students we never learned of the young men from Athy who enlisted to fight overseas in World War or the great number of those men whose broken bodies disappeared into the blood-soaked soil of France and Flanders. I had never heard of John Vincent Holland whose act of bravery during that same war resulted in him being awarded the Victoria Cross. These were some of the towns past stories which had escaped the memory of later generations, and which were awaiting to be discovered, for without these stories and the many other stories of local events and local men and women our community’s shared past would be incomplete. In my first article I wrote “Eye on the Past will each week deal with a topic of interest from the history of South Kildare when we will delve into the rich vein of local history which remains to be discovered”. I didn’t know then what an overwhelming rich vein of history awaited to be discovered. I have been fortunate to be contacted personally, by phone, by letter and in more recent times via email by hundreds of persons interested in Athy’s history. Many have sought information of ancestors who once lived in the town or South Kildare while others had generously shared memories and knowledge of past events with me. Eithne Wall who first joined my office in 1982 has typed, with very few exceptions, the Eyes since 1992 and Noreen Day has provided the proof reading necessary to correct my mistakes. The availability of the Eyes on the Past on the internet has led to enquiries from many countries particularly America, Australia, New Zealand and as might be expected Great Britain. Those enquiries have brought home to me how generations of Athy folk can spread throughout the world and how information regarding the past of such a small town as Athy can be gleaned from sources throughout the globe. Our local history mirrors in many ways the national events of the time and we can get a better understanding of our country’s own history by knowing the history of the generations who have gone before us. I am pleased to acknowledge that today Athy people have a better understanding of their own history and this is reflected in a cultural reawakening which was not readily observable a few decades ago. We have a proud history whether it is recounting the men, women and events of the War of Independence or the story of those who went to war overseas during 1914/18. Part of that history is knowing that an international figure such as Polar Explorer Ernest Shackleton was born in nearby Kilkea and undoubtedly walked the same streets we walk today. But above all our towns history is the story of the local men and women, many of whom lived in the back streets and alleyways in Athy in houses which were demolished during the slum clearance programmes of the 1930’s. They were the workers in the brickyards and the foundries and the farm labourers who with their wives and children gave life to the Anglo Norman town founded over 800 years ago. I was privileged to have been able to share some of their stories even if at times I might have unintentionally offended someone’s delicate sensibilities. Yes, there had been a few occasions over the past 29 years when someone has objected to something I wrote or made a point of seeking a correction when none was justified. I remember one reader who sought to correct my research findings regarding the location of the Quaker Meeting House in Meeting Lane on the basis that her mother told her it was elsewhere. I couldn’t persuade her otherwise or indeed ameliorate the fury of the woman who felt I had insulted the former tenants of the soldiers houses in the Bleach by reciting the accommodation details as outlined in the War Office files of the 1920s. However it was not all conflict. The readers have been more than complimentary and I am ever grateful for the continued help afforded to me by so many with my research. A special thanks to one individual who has been writing to me for years with the most beautiful handwriting always drawing my attention to items or persons of interest. He has constantly provided me with additional information but always on the strict understanding that his name is never mentioned. I started off by stating my intention to reflect on past articles but my pen has galloped away without doing what I intended. I hope you have enjoyed the past 1,500 Eyes on the Past and here is hoping that time will be given to me to write some more Eyes and more importantly finish and publish my long promised history of Athy.

When Athy was the largest town in County Kildare

In 1841 Athy had the largest population of any town in County Kildare. With 4,980 persons living within the town boundaries, it exceeded the population of Naas by over 300. Newbridge was only a sizeable village with a population of 1,177 while nearby Portlaoise fell short of Athy’s population with 3,702 inhabitants. Ten years later Athy’s population had increased to 5,263 as a result of the workhouse numbers which masked an actual fall in the towns native population over the course of the Great Famine. Naas in the meantime had begun to match Athy in terms of population numbers with 5,184 inhabitants. Both towns were to show substantial population losses by 1911 when Athy was recorded with 3,535 inhabitants with Naas overtaking Athy as the largest town in the County with 3,842. In fact, the first time Naas showed a higher population figure than Athy was in 1871 with approximately 100 more residents than the South Kildare town. The ups and downs of urban population figures no doubt were reflected in the range and extent of local commercial activity. Here in Athy, we have witnessed even within the past two or three years several businesses which have changed hands or gone out of business. As I write this article, I can only recall two local business still operating in Athy as they were 100 years ago. Indeed, O’Brien’s of Emily Square was the name over the shop as early as two or three decades before the new century arrived, while Doyle’s of Woodstock Street opened many years later. Both pubs operated at a time when Athy with less than half the population it has today, was home to 44 public houses. One of their commercial colleagues at that time was A. Duncan & Son, Drapers and Outfitters of Duke Street which business was bought out by Sam Shaw in or about 1914 and which business is still the anchor tenant in Athy’s main shopping street. Many other firms now long forgotten once traded in our town. Who remembers James Reid & Son, Family Grocers and Publicans of Leinster Street or William Triston, Solicitor of Duke Street. Both carried on business in Athy in 1916 as did Henry Hannon & Sons, Millers of Duke Street and Columb Geraghty, Grocer and Publican of Market Square. Thomas Lumley merchant tailor worked in his workshop in Athy until he retired on the 23th July 1917. Amongst those who continued in business for some time after that were P.J. Corcoran, principal of the Athy Auctioneering Company and Daniel Toomey, Builder and Contractor. Many of today’s older generation will recall Glespens Carriage Builders who carried on business in 1917 and much later. In the 1950’s Glespens occupied premises in Duke Street but has anyone heard of John P. Glespen who in 1917 advertised himself as “Carriage Builder and Designer, Wheelwright, Harness Maker and Motor Car and Cycle Agent” with premises in Nelson Street and Offaly Street. Edward Vernal was plying his trade as a General Smith and Horseshoer in Leinster Street in 1907. The Vernal forge was located in St. John’s Lane immediately behind Mrs. Haslem’s house when I was attending the Christian Brothers School in the 1950’s John Blanchfield operated out of 26 Leinster Street as a pork butcher and sausage maker in 1916. Was he, I wonder, related to the saw milling Blanchfield family at the top end of Leinster Street. A business not previously known to me was that of the Miley Brothers who had the General Supply Store in Duke Street in 1916. Names still remembered today and found over business premises in Athy over 100 years ago include Duthies of Leinster Street. W.T. Duthie, Watchmaker, Jeweller and Optician had been in business for several years prior to 1917 and his son, Albert, would later take over the business. On the far side of Crom a Boo Bridge in 1917 was the Grocery Tea, Wine and Spirits Stores of Cantwell’s of Duke Street while George Dillon of 19 Leinster Street advertised Spiced Beef as a speciality to order. Michael Murphy carried on business in the Commercial House facing the Market Square as a Clothier, Hatter offering “ boots and shoes in great variety”. Around the corner in Stanhope Street was another Murphy, this time with the forename Patrick who ran a General Grocery and Provision Business. David Walsh, Family Grocer, Hardware, Seed and General Merchant “with a variety of Guns and Ammunition always in stock” had his premises at the corner of Chapel Lane and Leinster Street. Other businesses in Athy in the early years of the 20th century included Athy Gas Company, Hibernian Bank, Duthie Large Foundry and Iron Works, Leinster Arms Hotel, D&J Carbery Builders and Athy Tile and Brick Company. These firms are no longer in Athy and their absence reminds us that the ever changing needs of new generations require new and improved commercial outlets to serve their needs. 100 years ago the market town of Athy with a population of less that 4,000 boasted of 44 public houses. Today our main streets show a monopoly of hairdressing salons, betting shops, charity shops and fast food outlets. Times indeed are a changing.

Athy in the 1840s

The worst effects of the famine which had ravaged Ireland following the failure of the potato crop in 1845 had abated by the time 1853 arrived. William Byrne was then station master in Athy, a position he held for the previous four years and where he would remain for the next six years. Athy boasted many trades in 1853, including a Fack and Hook Maker, a trade practiced by Michael Cushian who found himself on the wrong side of the law on assault charges. Julia Bradley, dressmaker, was summoned by her mistress, Mrs. O’Neill, for leaving her indentures without fulfilling her term. She was ordered by the Court to return to her ‘master’, otherwise she would be jailed for the remainder of her apprenticeship. Also in trouble were the four paupers brought before the local petty sessions by the Master of the workhouse for refusing to work and disobeying the Master’s orders. They each got one month’s imprisonment with hard labour. Early in the year eight locals were summoned by order of the Town Commissioners for exhibiting turf for sale in a place other than that designated for such sales by the town fathers. Athy resident Mrs. Walsh was one of sixty passengers who drowned when the steamer, ‘Queen Victoria’, sank in Dublin Bay on Tuesday 15th February of that year. Forty passengers survived, including her husband. The Presbyterian families who had arrived the previous year from Perthshire Scotland to take up tenancies of the Duke of Leinster’s lands in the Athy area, gave public notice that their meeting house was a place of religious worship and registered for solemnising marriages. Controversy arose when the vacant position of Coroner for South Kildare prompted an advertisement to be inserted in the Leinster Express expressing ‘regret that the election of Coroner has endeavoured to be made a political and religious question’. The contest was between James Butler who although an Anglican had the support of the Roman Catholic voters and Dr. Carter, another Anglican, who was eventually appointed. Two years after the abolition of Athy Borough Council the newly elected Town Commissioners for Athy, numbering 21 in all, whose numbers included the Catholic Parish Priest Fr. John Lawler and the Anglican Rector, Rev. Frederick Trench, agreed to have a certain number of Catholics and Protestants as Town Commissioners and to have a Catholic and Protestant chairman on alternate years. Michael Lawler, who was Chairman of the Town Commissioners in 1853, wrote to the press in July 1858 stating that ‘we have never deviated from our original compact’. Michael Lawler was one of the 21 Town Commissioners who was sworn into office before Lord Downes and John Butler on 18th February 1842 at a ceremony held in Athy’s Courthouse which was then part of the Town Hall. During his long service as a Town Commissioner he was elected Chairman on three occasions, 1853, 1876 and 1890. Lawler who died on 20th October 1900 and was buried in Barrowhouse, started in business in Athy in and around 1840. He had a licenced premises in Leinster Street immediately adjoining Whites Castle which was subsequently purchased by Edward T. Mulhall in November 1900 for £500. Edward Mulhall was described in the press reports of the time as having worked in Lawlers licenced premises as ‘the foreman and manager’. Michael Lawler gave what the local press described as ‘a sumptuous entertainment to upwards of 60 persons on the advent of his inauguration to the chairmanship of the Town Commissioners. The dinner was given in a spacious room in Mr. Lawler’s private residence.’ Michael Lawler lived at Park House in Duke Street which was later acquired by McHugh’s chemist. Alexander Duncan, a local trader, in a speech to the dinner guests said ‘those gentlemen who had but lately seen the town, could not well appreciate the progress it had made in the last 20 years. If they were to know the sanitary conditions then and compare it with the present appearance, they would in the fullest acceptance of the word admit that Athy had progressed.’ Four months later an extraordinary meeting of Athy Dispensary Committee was held to consider the medical officers report regarding the filthy state of the town. It was an issue which Michael Lawler returned to the following October when he claimed ‘Athy is a different town to what it was 21 years ago. Then the streets were in ruts, the homes were falling, the best streets were interspersed with thatched houses ….. now we have a flourishing town ….. the houses and establishments second to none to any inland town in Ireland.’ Twenty years later an editorial in the Leinster Express under the heading ‘The water supply of Athy’ noted ‘we are now paying for our past neglect and for the carelessness of former generations ….. the water we have been consuming all our lives turns out to be polluted ….. our dwellings have been constructed without any regard to the health of the inhabitants ….. the sanitary conditions of the town are very bad.’ The editorial noted that a special meeting of the sanitary committee had been convened for that day to consider whether a pure water supply could be brought from a distance into the town by means of pipes. Thirty years were to elapse before a piped water supply was provided for the people of Athy. By comparison fifty-five years have passed since Athy’s outer relief road was first suggested in a consultants report presented to Athy U.D.C.

The naming of Athy's streets

Emily Square named after Emily Duchess of Kildare is undergoing for the second time in recent years a major redevelopment. There is uncertainty as to how it will turn out, if the comments regarding the recent tree planted in the front of the square is anything to go by. Athy’s main streets all bear the names of an earlier Duke of Leinster’s family members. I am uncertain when the street names were changed, a process which was carried out by Athy’s Borough Council sometime before it was abolished in 1830. I am fairly confident that Augustus Bridge over the Canal built in 1790/91 was named after Augustus Fitzgerald, the first child of William, 2nd Duke of Leinster who officially opened the bridge. The 2nd Duke was to have his name forever remembered when the main streets running through Athy were renamed William Street, Duke Street and Leinster Street. When that was done, I can only speculate. Perhaps soon after his death in October 1804 when his earlier mentioned first son became Duke of Leinster. Duke Street was previously known as St. John’s Street while Leinster Street was called High Street. Interestingly, St. John’s Lane which was linked with St. John’s Street still retains its pre medieval name. Preston’s Gate was renamed Offaly Street as within the Fitzgerald extended family, the name Lord Offaly was a common feature since Gerald Fitzmaurice was succeeded in that title by Maurice Fitzgerald in the 13th Century. James, the 1st Duke of Leinster, was known as Lord Offaly before he was raised to the Dukedom. On the opposite side of the main street lies Stanhope Street, possibly named after the family name of the wife of the 2nd Duke. Athy’s Plaza is known as Emily Square in memory of Emily, Duchess of Kildare who married James, the 1st Duke of Leinster in 1747 when she was aged 15 years and 4 months. Emily was the goddaughter of George II. She was the second of seven surviving children of Charles Lennox, 2nd Duke of Richmond an illegitimate descendant of King Charles II. Her mother was Sarah, daughter of Earl Cadogan. James the 1st Duke of Leinster contracted to build Carton House before he married and when the work was incomplete as he brought his young English bride to Ireland, the couple lived for a few weeks at Leinster Lodge, Athy. During her married life, Emily also lived in Carton House, Frescati House in Blackrock and in Leinster House where the 1st Duke died in 1773. During their married life, Emily gave birth to 19 children including Edward Fitzgerald, the Irish Patriot. Emily’s last child of the 19 was generally believed to have been fathered by her lover, the children’s tutor William Ogilvie. When her husband died, Emily married Ogilvie the following year and had three more children with him. She died in London in March 1814. I am speculating when I put forward the 3rd Duke of Leinster as the person who with the cooperation of Athy Borough Council prompted the renaming of Athy’s main street and the town’s plaza. Emily was the 3rd Duke’s grandmother and there may have been a conscious effort to delete Lord Edward Fitzgerald from popular memory by highlighting the names of those who were faithful to the crown. I do not have documentary evidence to hand to back up my speculative claim as unfortunately I cannot presently access my archival records. However, I cannot recall any reference to street name changes in the Athy Borough minute books which I examined many years ago. Our local history was for centuries bound up with that of the Earls of Kildare and the Dukes of Leinster and as they were proprietors of our town, it was inevitable that the people’s allegiances followed those of the occupiers of the great castles of Kildare. Times have changed and Athy people are now more intensely aware of their history and appreciative of those local men and women who played their part in helping to secure some measure of freedom for our country. Should they be remembered by a further renaming of Athy’s streets? As I ask that question, I am reminded of an attempt some years ago by a member of Athy Urban District Council to have Emily Square renamed Mandela Square following Nelson Mandella’s release from a South African prison. Congratulations to David Daly on his election as Chairman of Athy Photographic Society. David, a dedicated and skilful photographer, is wished well as he heads up one of Athy’s important cultural societies.

County Home Athy

‘The first phase of the construction of the 92-bed nursing unit for St. Vincent’s Hospital Athy is set for early 2025’. So announced the HSE almost a year ago. The first phase of the construction work aims to deliver 48 beds with subsequent phases to follow. Detailed design work was, in February of last year, underway for the proposed nursing units. We were advised that efforts were focussed on finalising tender packages to be presented to the market for contractors’ selection. Construction activities for the project were then anticipated to commence in the first quarter of 2025. The last time additional accommodation was provided at the former County Home was in 1969, almost twenty years after an interdepartmental committee’s recommendations were adopted by the Irish Government. The committee set up in 1949 to examine the future of County Homes found that many of the former workhouses including Athy’s was still accommodating the chronically sick, the aged and mentally unstable while lacking appropriate accommodation. However, the report recognised that the old workhouse buildings could be refurbished to provide accommodation for the aged and chronically sick while the mentally unstable, unmarried mothers and their children should be accommodated in separate institutions. The Report’s recommendations were accepted by the government in 1951, but it was not until 1969 that Kildare County Council approved a scheme of improvement for Athy’s County Home by replacing patient accommodation then located on the ground floor and the first floor of the original workhouse building. The County Architect, Niall Meagher, was responsible for the planning, design and construction of the new buildings assisted by Eric Wallace, staff member in the County Architect’s Department working closely with the Department of Health Architect Cecil Dowdall. The administration of the project and commissioning, equipping and staffing of the new building involved the then Matron, Sr. Dominic. Work on the construction of the new building by Bantile Limited of Banagher commenced on the 27th July 1966 and took almost three years to complete. The new hospital buildings which cost €250,000 contained two hospital blocks for 100 female patients, three hospital blocks for 168 male patients and 14 maternity unit and delivery rooms. The new building was occupied on the 3rd April 1969, 125 years after the workhouse was first opened. In 1971 the newly established Eastern Health Board took over responsibility for the County Home and they named it St. Vincent’s Hospital. The first visiting committee of the Board under the chairmanship of Councillor Paddy Hickey met in the hospital on the 20th May 1971. The following year, the Department of Health gave approval for the construction of a new convent building, a nurses’ home and a mortuary. The Sisters of Mercy had retained a presence in the former workhouse since 1874 and on their first arrival they had occupied rooms at the back of the main building. Later they moved to the front of the building occupying rooms on the first floor and where they remained until they moved into the new convent. The contractors for the new building were Messrs. M. Turley and Co. and in late 1974 the work was completed with buildings officially opened on the 25th June 1975. In the 1940s, the County Home employed three Sisters of Mercy and three nurses and in 1952 the first attendants were employed. In 2002, despite a reduction in the number of patients in the hospital compared to 50 years previously, the staff employed included seventy-three nurses, ninety-seven attendants and ten administrative and support staff. The Sisters of Mercy who first arrived in Athy in 1851 to teach in the newly opened convent school soon arranged weekly visits to the workhouse and were eventually invited by the Board of Guardians in 1874 to provide nursing sisters for the workhouse. Thus commenced the Sisters of Mercy’s work in the workhouse, later the County Home and then St. Vincent’s Hospital. Several members of the Sisters of Mercy were appointed Matrons of the County Home/St. Vincent’s Hospital. Many of us will remember with fondness the legendary Sr. Dominic who was appointed Matron in 1957 and succeeded in that position by Sr. Peg in 1981. Sr. Peg was the last Sister of Mercy to be Matron and the last Sister of Mercy to work as a nurse in St. Vincent’s Hospital was Sr. Catherine who retired on the 31st March 2002. The dark forbidding building which George Wilkinson had designed in the 1840s has changed beyond recognition in the intervening years. The corridors which once echoed to the shuffling sounds of bare footed men, women and children, have been replaced by modern wards where the elderly and the sick are comforted and cared for with compassion and skill.

Big Wind of 1839

Storm Éowyn has come and gone, leaving behind a devastated countryside. So far as records show Éowyn was the biggest wind storm ever to cross this country and surpassed the generally accepted ‘Night of the Big Wind’ of 6th January 1839. The winds of 1839 brought a different type of devastation on the Irish people of that time. While there was less destruction of buildings than one might expect following the recent wind storm, the misery experienced as a result of electricity outages and the absence of water supply is shared by many thousands of households. On the Monday three days after the storm 240,000 houses remained without electricity, while about 109,000 customers were without water supply and a further 126,000 households were classified as ‘at risk’. The big winds of 1839 destroyed thousands of the poorly constructed dwellings occupied by cottagers and unemployed labourers. Fire was a particular hazard because of the prevalence of thatched roofs. In Loughrea it was reported that 103 houses were destroyed, of which 71 were burned to the ground. This was a common enough occurrence, particularly along the Western seaboard. Near Athenry in County Galway a house collapsed and went on fire, resulting in the tragic death of the mother of the house and four of her children. Subsequent reports in the local Press gave details of the wind storm destruction across the country. The ‘Galway Weekly Adviser’ claimed that Portarlington suffered more than any other town for its size. That same newspaper reported that large ricks of corn and hay were blown away a mile from the haggards and that rivers and lakes were full of corn and straw. The ‘Dublin Evening Post’ confirmed this when it reported that many farmers whose haggards were full with unthrashed corn the day before the storm found themselves without a sheaf of grain in the morning. While the ‘Clonmel Herald’ reported ‘upwards of 300 lives were lost in Ireland by the late hurricane’, it is generally accepted that this was an over estimation. The actual figures for those who died was nearer 100 and included 12 men of the Roundstone Coast Guard who were drowned during the storm. I cannot access my archival material at this time but so far as I can remember I never came across any Athy references in relation to the 1839 wind storm. There is no reason to believe Athy escaped the ravages of the storm, but the lack of reporting in the minute books of the Borough Council is surprising. Perhaps not so surprising when one considers the composition of the Council and its obvious lack of interest in the town. The 1839 wind storm came to the forefront when the English Chancellor Lloyd George introduced the Old Age Pension Act of 1908. This introduced a non-contributory pension of thirteen pounds a year for eligible persons aged 70 years and older. Many Irish applicants had no documental evidence of their date of birth as the registration of births, marriages and deaths did not become a statutory requirement until much later. Catholic Parish Priests were in many cases compiling baptismal records for several years prior to 1839 and if I remember correctly baptismal records in St. Michael’s, Athy, were compiled from some time in the middle of the 18th century. In the absence of such records the Old Age Pension Committees charged with implementing the Pension Act, decided that the claimants’ pension application would be approved if he or she remembered the night of the Big Wind. Last week’s storm, stronger than any previous storm, caused less structural damage than that of 1839. However, it created huge difficulties for so many households without electricity and without water. The electricity network team have been working hard since the storm and deserve our gratitude without criticism. The lady who tackled the Taoiseach some days ago in relation to the alleged failure of the electricity company would no doubt be surprised to read that in 1985 the Jansen Report on the ESB found that the semi-state body was overstaffed to the tune of 3,000 workers. I am not sure if the water treatment authority, Uisce Eireann, which failed to provide a safe and secure water service following the storm cannot be criticised. Surely every water treatment plant dependent on electricity should have a backup turbine system in place. The absence of turbines meant that with electricity cut off water could not be supplied. The remedy is straightforward. It is not only Uisce Eireann who fell down on the job for last week when writing of Athy’s Gaelic Football Club players who captained the Kildare county senior team I omitted to mention Colm Moran and David Hyland. Colm was captain of the Kildare county senior team in 1988 following Athy’s victory in the 1987 Kildare Championship final. David was captain of the Kildare senior team in 2020 and 2021. Colm and David were therefore the second and third Athy players to captain the senior county team, the previous player being Paul Matthews who captained the Kildare All-Ireland losing team of 1935. As mentioned in last week’s article Paul Matthews and Kevin Feeley, like myself, are not Athy natives, while Colm Moran and David Hyland are. They are therefore the first Athy natives to captain the Kildare senior football team for more than one game.

Kevin Feely Footballer

The announcement of the Athy Gaelic footballer, Kevin Feely, as the County Kildare Senior captain for 2025 is so far as I can ascertain only the second occasion that a player from the South Kildare town was captained the Senior County team. We have to go back as far as the Kildare All Ireland Final losing team of 1933 to identify the last Athy player who captained the County team. He was Paul Matthews, employed as a local bar man in Andersons, who came to Athy from County Cavan. On that All Ireland Final Day, Paul who like Kevin played centre field was joined on the County team by another Athy player Tommy Mulhall. On the substitute bench that day was Barney Dunne, Jim Fox and Cuddy Chanders. Cuddy had been sensationally dropped for the final by it is said the County Board executives who overconfident of victory gave the goalkeeping role to a Naas player. Cuddy was restored as goalkeeper for later league matches but the controversial decision marked a dark period in the relationship between Tim Clarke’s County Board and the Athy Club. Strange isn’t it to reflect that the two Athy County Captains came not from the short grass county but in Paul Matthews case from Ardee, Co. Louth and in the case of the present holder of the title, Kevin Feely who was born in Brussels. However, Kevin has links to County Kildare of which I have only now become aware as his paternal grandfather Roddie Feely Snr. was born in The Curragh. Other great footballers who played for Athy and County Kildare Seniors include George Comerford, a Clare man stationed as a Garda in Athy and who captained the Athy Club team to win the 1937 Championship. The 1937 County Final was played on the 17th July of the following year. The delay resulted from the Athy Club’s elimination at the quarter final stage following a walkover granted to Raheens. Athy appealed and the replay was ordered which took place on the 1st May 1938 which Athy won. The Final winning team was captained by George Comerford. George had won Dublin Championship titles with the Garda team in 1933, 1934 and 1935. He transferred to the Athy club in or around 1936 and played for the County Senior team on five occasions between March 1938 and February 1939. Comerford, who won a provincial medal with Munster, was regarded as one of the finest footballers of his time but I cannot find out whether following his captaincy of his 1937 Championship team if he took over the captaincy of the Kildare Senior team. Other Athy players who have featured in the County Team Seniors in the past include the legendary Mick Carolan, Danny Flood and Tommy Mulhall. Mick Foley was of course the only club member to receive an All Star Award during his time as a County Senior player. There were many other Athy players who played on the Senior County Team but their stories are for another day. To return to Kevin Feely, apart from the honour of captaining the County Senior Team this year, he was also recently declared as the County Footballer of the year. This is a well deserved honour for the young player whose style of play reminded me so much of the legendary Mick O’Connell. His superb overhead catching of the ball and his subsequent distribution is so typical of the legendary Mick O’Connell who played his football in the 1950’s. Kevin’s talents as a Gaelic footballer were put to good use when I saw him recently on TG4 as one of three analysts discussing a recent club championship semi- final. He spoke easily, convincingly and with ease as he outlined the involvement of the two teams and the tactics they employed. His was a television performance par excellance and I expect to see him on the principal channel before too long. As to the County Senior Team Panel for 2025 with Kevin Feely are Athy Club players Niall Kelly, James McGrath and David Hyland. I wish them well and hope that the County can have some measure of success in this year’s Championship. I was surprised to get notice on Facebook of Athy G.F.C. function in a local pub when announcements of players of the year in different grades were to be made. I thought it was strange that the Clubhouse was not used for the night until I realised that for some time past the Club Licence which would allow alcohol to be served was not renewed. Whatever about the alcohol element, it is a pity that a fine Clubhouse which Bobby Miller and others were responsible for building is no long longer part of the club members social scene. It is something that needs to be addressed as a matter of urgency as the Clubhouse is the heart of the Club. As I wrote this article, I became aware that Kevin Feely and his fiancée Patriona Bolger married just before Christmas. I take the opportunity of wishing them many years of happiness. Finally, congratulations to Claudia Reeves for the very successful film festival which was held last weekend. The Athy Film Club which she started some time ago is a wonderful addition to Athy’s Cultural scene.

Private James Barber of Athy and his part in the Zulu War

Early on the morning of 11th January 1879 British and colonial forces crossed the Buffalo river into Zululand (part of modern day South Africa) at Rorke’s Drift. This marked the commencement of what became known as the Anglo Zulu War between the British empire and the Zulu nation. From the British perspective the purpose of the invasion of Zululand was to protect the settlers in Natal and Cape Colony but in reality the grounds for the invasion were concocted by the British Colonial authorities in order to advance their territorial ambitions in the kingdom of the Zulus. The British Forces were a combination of regular British troops, colonial volunteers and native levies. One of the British army regiments comprising these forces was the 2nd Battalion of the 24th Regiment of foot which recruited in Brecon, South Wales where a regimental depot had been established in 1873. While now regarded as a Welsh regiment, in reality, like much of the British army, almost twenty percent of its number would have been Irish men. Amongst their number was Private James Barber who WAS born in Athy in 1849. He was the son of Michael Barber and Catherine Byrne and it is likely that his father was a recent resident in Athy and possibly even stationed in the Barracks in Woodstock Street as a soldier. It was an inauspicious time to be born in Athy. 1849 marked the last year of the Great Famine and while Athy had suffered none of the losses of the population as suffered on the Western Seaboard in the South of Ireland, deaths in the Athy Workhouse were approximately 1,205 men, women and children. The losses caused by the Famine were compounded by an outbreak of cholera in the town in June 1849. By 29th September of that year, 27 cholera cases were recorded and 11 local cholera victims had died. A temporary cholera hospital was opened in the town and funds intended for the relief of the Famine had to be diverted to deal with the cholera epidemic which would remain a threat to the public health until the following year. Barber must have been a fairly sturdy youth as he survived childhood, bearing in mind that in the year of his birth life expectancy in Ireland fell to just 14 years, having been 38 years in the early 1840s prior to the Famine. His army service record showed that prior to his enlistment in the British Army he served in the Kildare Rifles which were established in 1855 as successor to the Kildare Militia. His first period of service abroad with the 24th Foot found him in India from 1868-1873. After a number of years back in England the Regiment was despatched to Southern Africa in 1877 where it took part in campaigns against the Gaikas and other South African tribes. Fate was to be kind to James Barber. On the 22nd January while the 1st Battalion of the 24th Foot and one company of the 2nd Battalion of the 24th Foot stayed in the main camp in Isandlwana, the balance of the 2nd Battalion of the 24th Foot left the camp with the overall commander of the campaign, Lord Chelmsford to search for the Zulu army. Later that day a Zulu army of more than 20,000 warriors overwhelmed the British camp killing over 2,000 British troops, volunteers and native troops. Having left the camp that morning at 4am Barber returned at 7.45pm to find the camp overrun and every man dead. The battle of Isandlwana was followed by the more famous action at Rorkes Drift where about 150 men, many of them Irish, held off a Zulu force of 3,000 men for two nights. That action was immortalised in the 1964 movie ‘Zulu’. Ultimately by a force of arms and employment of artillery and machine guns the Zulu nation was overwhelmed by the invading forces by July of 1879. The Zulu King, Cetshwayo, went into exile but became such a celebrity internationally that he visited with Queen Victoria in London. Barber continued his service with the 24th Foot with further periods of foreign service in India from 1880-1886 and in Bermuda from 1886-1888. He spent much of his life after the army in Staffordshire where he died on 14th June 1925. He had four children with his wife Emma, being Bernard, Margaret, James and Arthur. His son Bernard followed him into the army, serving with the Royal Army Medical Corps from 1912-1915 with service on the Western Front in France but it appears that the Barber family never returned to Ireland.

Athy Photographic Society's Calendar 2024

For a historian there are many windows into the past. Sources such as letters, diaries, and newspapers give us good records of our predecessors, but for me photography can give a vivid and intimate link to the past that is difficult to replicate anywhere else. A simple image, whether in black and white or colour, gives us a direct connection to people or events long past. I was reminded of this with the recent opening of the exhibition ‘Here Comes Everybody’ at Arthouse which is described as an art gallery and exhibition space in 42a Leinster Street. It is part of an ongoing initiative as part of the Creative Places programme running in Athy. Though small, the exhibition was well presented with some fine reproductions of photographs of people and places in Athy over the last 80-100 years. Peering out from the photographs were faces of many people I had known in my youth who are now long gone, but their memory lives on in the photographic images which survive then. There was one thing lacking from the exhibition which I think could add to its interest. None of the images that I viewed were captioned and while I could happily identify many people and places from the photographs, from a historian’s point of view it would add immeasurably to the exhibition if there was some guide or captions to the images on display. It’s a worthwhile endeavour and the exhibition itself will run until the middle of January. It is intended that the venue will host further exhibitions and events throughout 2025. Athy Photographic Society, which from my reckoning is now running for almost forty years, has released their annual photographic calendar. The 2025 edition is an interesting digression from previous calendars as rather than just simply featuring images of the town and locality this year, rather imaginatively, the society have used local images to recreate twelve iconic music album covers. It was nice to see the juxtaposition between local people and local places paying homage to classic music albums. My musical heritage is grounded in the music of the ‘50s and ‘60s and so many of the album covers featured meant little to me but I particularly enjoyed the recreation of the British rock band Jethro Tull’s album cover, ‘Songs from the Woods’. One of the more curiously titled bands, their name derives from a pioneering English agriculturalist Jethro Tull who developed the horsedrawn seed drill in the early 18th century that revolutionised agriculture in providing farmers with a modern and economic method of sowing seeds in neat rows for tillage purposes. His master work on the subject ‘The New Horse Houghing Husbandry: or, An essay on the principles of tillage and vegetation’ was published in Dublin in 1731 and it was one of the earliest works on agriculture published in Ireland at the time. This invention had a huge impact on both the economic life and landscape of South Kildare surrounded as Athy is by some of the best tillage land in the country. This is reflected in a detailed report on the agriculture of Athy and district published in the Leinster Leader on 26th March 1898. Athy’s agricultural economy was prospering and it seemed to have avoided the agricultural depression which dogged much of the country at the time. The article focused on the mills run by Messrs H. Hannon and Sons. The reporter interviewed the manager of the mills, a Mr. Price, who treated the journalist to a detailed description of the milling process from the arrival of the raw product by barge on the Grand Canal to the final process of manufacturing. Mr Price paid particular tribute to the managing clerk, a Mr. Dobbin and mentioned that twenty men were employed in the three mills. The mills in Ardreigh and Prumplestown were focused on the manufacturing of flour, while the Athy Mills were solely devoted to the manufacture of Indian meal. Much of the land around the town at that time was devoted to the wheat growing industry. In 1897 the Prumplestown Mill produced 9,338 barrels of wheat which were manufactured into flour while the Ardreigh Mill produced 8,500 barrels of wheat which were manufactured into flours of various qualities with titles such as ‘Acme’, ‘Champion’, Rollo First’, ‘XL’, etc. The market for the produce was local and would have been sold in Carlow, Tullow, Baltinglass, Castledermot, Stradbally, Castlecomer, Monasterevin, Portarlington and Edenderry. Wheat from both mills was sold at one shilling and six pence per barrel. That price was apparently very good from a local farmers’ perspective insofar as it encouraged them to treble the area for wheat production the following year. Sadly this prosperity was not to last as by the early 1920’s imports of cheaper grain from the United States devastated the Irish grain industry to the point where none of the Hannon mills were operating by the late 1920s.

Pay parking and free parking for Christmas

For me Christmas is the season that marks the winding down of my working year. I look forward to the chance to rest and recuperate and catch up on those books which have eluded me during the year because of work and social commitments. Coupled with this quiet time is the chance to enjoy those long-established Christmas traditions. As a child, that was the opportunity to stand outside Duthie’s Jewellers Shop at No. 30 Leinster Street and gaze in wonder at the nodding Santa placed on the top shelf of the window display by Albert Duthie. And while that wonder did not outlive my teenage years, the nodding Santa was still a harbinger of the Christmas festivities and the school holidays to look forward to in eager anticipation. Our local authorities, be it the former Athy Town Council and Kildare County Council, have always been supportive of Christmas traditions such as the installation and funding of the Christmas lights all through the town which adds immeasurably to the season of good will. I am not quite sure how far back the Council’s endeavours in this regard go but certainly in Christmas 1962, the then Athy Urban District Council greed to provide an illuminated tree in Emily Square and contribute £120 (less the costs of the tree) towards the costs of the street illuminations which were provided by the Athy Illuminations Committee. Because of the current works in Emily Square, the Christmas tree has now been relocated to the back square near the Courthouse but still provides a lovely backdrop to the town during this festive season. I was more than disappointed to learn recently that another imbedded Christmas tradition had been dispensed with by Kildare County Council. During my time on Athy Town Council, I like many others was resistant to the idea of pay parking being introduced into the Town. While County Council Officials always dressed it up as a “traffic management measure”, I and many of my councillor colleagues were satisfied that it was a “revenue generating exercise”. Notwithstanding that, pay parking was introduced more than twenty years ago and I suspect that its benefits for traffic management are far more outweighed by its revenue gathering benefits for the County Council! One by-product of this regime was that for the four weeks around the Christmas period, pay parking was suspended in the town. This was an inducement to those who might do their shopping in towns such as Portlaoise, Naas, Newbridge and Carlow to stay in their hometown and contribute to local businesses at a very important time for local commerce. I was surprised and disappointed to understand that without any official announcement pay parking has not been suspended for the Christmas period. I understand that this was greeted very negatively by people in the town who voiced their dissent and disappointment to public representatives. I further understand that a limited exemption from pay parking in the afternoons between 2pm and 6pm in public car parks (only) has now been introduced belatedly but that is not good enough. Many people have been caught out by this limited exemption by being ticketed while parked on the street (and not in car parks), though why this distinction is necessary is unclear to me. Between the commercial rates paid by businesses in the town and the parking fees paid by the inhabitants of the town, there was no reason why a townwide suspension of paid parking should not be introduced over the four weeks of the festive period. It beholds our public representatives using their reserved function to ensure that this does not happen again in 2025. The town businesses need our support and any number of initiatives by Kildare County Council will not support those businesses if something as simple as pay parking cannot be suspended for a brief period. The encouragement of commercial development in the town requires a holistic approach and this will be compromised by a narrow-minded approach to prioritise revenue generation over town development. Let’s hope that a more forward-thinking approach to this issue is applied in December 2025. As many readers will know, I have been experiencing significant health challenges over the last six months which has unfortunately necessitated hospital visits and sometimes stays. I am hugely appreciative of the many cards, letters, emails and texts which I have received from people both far and wide enquiring after my welfare and I would like to thank people for those expressions of support, and I wish all of my readers a Happy and Peaceful Christmas.

Nicholas McDonogh

1822 was a tumultuous year in Ireland. A famine erupted in Munster and Connacht when the potato crop failed but it had nothing of the excess of mortality of the later Great Famine of 1845 to 1852. That same year also saw the introduction of the 1822 Constabulary Ireland Act which for the first time established a countrywide police force for the country. The Act established police in each of the four provinces with Chief Constables appointed by the administration in Dublin Castle. The First Chief Constable appointed to Athy was Nicholas McDonogh (1783-1864). We don’t know much about McDonogh’s time in Athy nor his service in the Town, but he was involved in a notorious shooting incident in November 1823 which, at the time, must have cast significant doubt over the authority of the Police in the town. Newspapers at the time reported that McDonogh was out ‘wildfowling’ near Stradbally with a friend by the name of Forbes. It was reported that when they were passing a local farmhouse, they were attacked by a large mastiff type dog which McDonogh in an act of self-protection shot dead. It appears that a farm labourer on hearing “the report of the gun and the yell of the expiring dog” rushed out to confront the shooter. Accounts differ as to what occurred next. The friends of the farm labourer would say that he went out to remonstrate with McDonogh over the shooting of the dog while Forbes claimed they were being pursued and threatened by the farm labourer. In any event, McDonogh raised his gun at the then unnamed farm labourer. The Farm labourer remonstrated and asked him not to fire his gun as he is merely seeking to see exactly what had happened with the dog. Notwithstanding this plea, McDonogh fired his gun hitting the man in the thigh and killing him. By this point another man appeared and incensed by the shooting of his companion pressed forward and in the words of the reporter cried out “villain you have murdered the man”. McDonogh then appeared to have fired a second time hitting the second man in his stomach who also died. Conscious, their actions would cause ructions in the locality they sought refuge in the house of a Mr. Montgomery where crowds soon gathered seeking to take Forbes and McDonogh prisoner. As matters were coming to a head, the Reverend Fr. Pelan, presumably a local catholic clergyman, arrived on the scene and urged calmness on the crowd. He negotiated for Forbes and McDonogh to give up their guns and under his protection conducted them to another house in Ballylinan. By this point events were moving fast. A party of soldiers from the 78th Foot , a Scottish infantry regiment, based in the barracks of Athy arrived in considerable force. Whether or not they had been summoned because of the shooting incident or whether they were just out on patrol is unknown but their presence immediately heightened tensions. The house in Ballylinan was attacked by a crowd. The Highland soldiers of the 78th Foot fired on the crowd but luckily no injuries were sustained. Before matters could descend into complete chaos, Mr. Clancy, the Chief Constable of the Stradbally Police arrived. A reporter wrote that Clancy “Upon reaching the village, he found not only that but every road leading to it thronged with the peasantry, infuriated to the last degree, and the act of pulling down the house in which the gentleman had taken refuge. Two of the Stradbally police were struck with stones as they passed – nevertheless – Mr. Clancy got off his horse and went among the outrageous populous. He soothed, threatened and pointed out the madness of their attacking armed men and the further loss of lives and consequent misery to many of their families, that there was likely to be the consequence of their doing so. He pledged himself no matter who the parties were who unfortunately killed the men, he would not stop until he lodged them in jail, after a considerable time spent in exertions of this kind, the peasantry became tranquil, threw away stones and other weapons they had provided, cleared a passage for him and showed every inclination to be guided entirely by his wishes, in fact, proved they only wanted some person to whom they could confide to secure and bring the prisoners to justice”. Clancy’s approach defused the situation and with two Constables he conducted the prisoners back to Stradbally. From there McDonogh and Forbes were committed to Portlaoise jail. Ultimately the two men would be tried and while I have been unable to establish the outcome of the trial of Mr. Forbes, McDonogh was convicted of manslaughter. The victims unnamed in the press report at the time were two brothers William and Joseph McDarby. McDonogh was sentenced to nine months imprisonment and rather extraordinarily after only serving four months in prison returned to his post as Chief Constable in Athy in 1824.

Winnifred Letts - Author

This Christmas the Athy Lions Club book shop, based in Duke Street, Athy, is offering two free books for any young boy or girl (of their choosing) as a Christmas gift from the Lions Club. You can call in to the Lions Club book shop at any time up to Christmas and collect your two free books. It’s a wonderful gesture from the Athy Lions Club, whose book shop has proved to be an important resource for the town over the last number of years. The members of the Athy Lions Club have made a huge contribution to the local community since it was established in 1971. Perhaps the most visible reminder of the club’s work is the Sheltered Housing Scheme in the grounds of St. Vincent’s Hospital. This was a project led by the Athy Lions Club and funded in part by government grants and fundraising locally by the Lions Club members. Christmas is the ideal time to gift books to your loved ones and particularly important for children to be encouraged to read from a very young age. We are very fortunate in this town to have a very fine public library in the old Dominican Church with a myriad of facilities available to young and old alike. Children’s literature is now very prominent in book shops, but that was not always the case. I was reminded of this when perusing a recent publication titled ‘Sing in the Quite Places of my Heart’ – the life works of W.M. Letts (1882-1972). Winifred Letts, a native of Salford, Lancashire, spent much of her life in Ireland and was distinguished as a writer of plays, poetry and prose. She probably first came to prominence with her poetry collections including ‘Songs of Leinster’ published in 1913, followed by ‘Halloween’ and ‘Poems of the War’ in 1916. Her war poems were inspired by her wartime service in a military hospital. In 1926 she married W.H.F. Verschoyle, a land agent who owned a farm in Kilberry and up to his death in 1943 she spent many of her summers, weekends and holidays in Kilberry. On 5th May 1932 she recorded in her diary her trip to Kilberry on her sixth wedding anniversary, ‘the birds are in fine song at Kilberry – chaff, mistle thrush, chaff finches and best joy of all, a pair of gold crest wrens very busy about the avenue singing and flitting and feeding all the time.’ She had a keen appreciation and love of nature which is recorded beautifully in Bairbe O’ Hogan’s new book just published by South Dublin Libraries. The book is a lovely record of a life joyfully lived through nature and through Letts’ own writings. She was a versatile writer who also had successful collaborations with Kathleen Verschoyle, the artist, who was her stepdaughter. One of their more attractive collaborations was a Cuala press print of St. Brigid with a poem by Letts (illustrated by Verschoyle), a copy of which I understand hangs in Government Buildings in Dublin at the present time. Kathleen also illustrated Lett’s memoir ‘Knockmaroon’ Her children’s books including titles such as ‘Diana Dethroned’ published in 1909, ‘Naughty Sophia’ (1912), ‘Pomonas Island’ (1931) and finally ‘The Gentle Mountain’ in 1938. She was not the first Kildare based writer to publish a children’s book. That accolade goes to the Ballitore based diarist Mary Leadbetter, who published in 1794 ‘Extracts and original anecdotes for the improvement of youth’, although anonymously which would have been quite common for women writers at the time. It is regarded as the earliest children’s book published by an Irish woman. After the death of her husband in 1947 Letts moved to Kent, but returned again to Ireland in 1953, spending the rest of her life in Killiney until her death in 1972. Letts is commemorated by a memorial plaque and sculpture at the Church of Ireland in Rathcoole, County Wicklow where she is buried with her husband. While there is no monument to her in Kilberry, there is a beautifully made stained glass window to the memory of her husband, W.H.F. Verschoyle in the Church of Ireland there. The local St. Vincent de Paul Society, aided by the Athy Lions Club, will be holding their annual Christmas Food Appeal at Pettitt’s Supervalu Athy from 9am to 8pm on Friday 6th December and from 9am to 5pm on Saturday 7th December. The people of the town have been hugely supportive of the appeal in the past and no doubt will be equally generous this festive season.

Dail Elections of the past and Paddy Dooley T.D.

In three days time we go to the polls in a General Election to elect the members to the 34th Dáil. It is an important part of the democratic process and the electors of Kildare South will return four TD’s to the Dáil. The first election in which I was able to vote in was the 1961 General Election which was held on a Wednesday, 4th October 1961. 1961 was an important year for me as that January I had left Athy to work in Naas in Kildare County Council. I stayed in digs in Naas but every weekend I returned to Athy for the comforts of hearth and home in 5 Offaly Street to my mother, Kathleen Taaffe and my father, John Taaffe, who was still serving as a Sergeant in the Garda Siochana in Athy. I invariably thumbed a lift from Naas to Athy as it was very much an accepted part of life for young people at the time. On many occasions I got a lift home from Naas from the late Paddy Dooley who was then a TD for Kildare. He was quiet and gentlemanly, to the point of shyness, who had been first elected to the Dáil for Fianna Fail in 1957. He was the son of Michael Dooley of Duke Street who played a significant role in the Republican Movement in Athy during the War of Independence and who later had the 1930’s housing scheme Michael Dooley’s Terrace named after him. Paddy Dooley first became involved in politics with his election to Athy Urban District Council in 1945 and remained on the Council up to and including 1974. One of my classmates in the Christian Brothers secondary school was his son, Enda Dooley and I can recall the superior of the Christian Brothers, Brother J. Brett, at the start of the morning classes extending congratulations to Enda Dooley on his father’s first election to the Dáil in 1957. I have always been fascinated by the minutiae and workings of elections both nationally and locally and my first experience of being involved in the election process, in a formal sense, was in Kells County Meath in 1967. It was a year in which my late friend, Frank English was standing for Athy Urban District Council while I had been newly appointed as a Town Clerk for Kells, County Meath just four weeks prior to the holding of the local elections. It was a daunting task for one such as myself, young and inexperienced but perhaps not so daunting as the role which Frank faced in his home town in putting his name before the electorate for the first time. Suffice to say that Frank was successful and went on to serve Athy on the Town Council for 42 years. It was the same Frank English who approached this uncommitted friend to join the Fianna Fail party. I did so without having a great ideological draw to the party of the Anti-treaty side while my natural allegiance was to Michael Collins and the men who supported the Anglo-Irish treaty. I cannot explain how my best friend exercised such an important influence in my choice of political party! The General Election of 1961 saw a changing of the guard to some extent. Fianna Fail was led by Sean Lemass, a veteran of the struggle for independence who took over from Eamon de Valera who had stepped back from the role as leader in 1959 to become President. Other members of the revolutionary generation departed from the Dáil prior to election including veterans of the 1916 Easter Rising such as Oscar Traynor and Richard Mulcahy. The county was then a single constituency and returned four successful candidates, Brendan Crinnion and Paddy Dooley for Fianna Fail, William Norton for Labour and Gerard Sweetman for Fine Gael. There was a later by-election in the county in 1964 occasioned by the death of William Norton who was succeeded by Terence Boylan for Fianna Fail. As a young man of 19 I wasn’t hugely focused or interested in politics in 1961 and I have stronger memories of the opening of the Dreamland Ballroom on the Kilkenny road, Athy in the Summer of 1961 and I recall travelling from Naas to the opening night of the Dreamland Ballroom courtesy of Carmel Fitzpatrick’s trusted Ford Prefect accompanied by several girls from the County Council offices. But whatever our concerns, young or old, participation in the democratic process is an important part of life and two of my grandchildren will be voting on Friday in the General Election for the first time, an important milestone for them both as adults and as citizens of this nation.