Athy Urban District Council, as it was then called, commissioned a sculpture to be erected at Woodstock Street to commemorate the townspeople’s involvement in the 1798 Rebellion. I gather this sculpture has been completed but there is still no sign of it being displayed near to where a number of local men were hanged over 200 years ago.
During the 200th anniversary commemoration of the 1798 Rebellion many books were published in the North and South of this island, outlining the part played by local communities in the events of that period. The interest generated by these publications was gratifying and this has led to an amount of new information coming into the public domain for the first time.
An interesting cache of letters belonging to William the 2nd Duke of Leinster were acquired by the National Library about two years ago and amongst them were a number relating to Athy. Several local men wrote to the Duke at different times during 1798 and amongst them were Nicholas Ashe, Sovereign of Athy and the infamous Thomas J. Rawson of Glassealy, Athy.
Nicholas Ashe was an interesting character who operated a classical school for boarders in the town. By all accounts, he appears to have been a fair minded individual and a man who did his utmost to maintain peace in Athy. As the Sovereign he exercised some judicial functions but in doing so he fell foul of a number of his fellow loyalists as the following letter which he wrote to the Duke of Leinster on 17th April 1798 explains.
“The indictment of the solder against Conolon and Malone one of your Graces yeomen was quashed. This prevented the exposition of a wretch - who strove to take away the lives of two innocent men - for five guinea’s Blood Money.
I am sorry to add - a Clergyman - was averse to bailing them - tho’ every shadow of imputed guilt was cleared by the inconsistency and prevarication of the Soldiers’ testimony - the bills were thrown out by a shameful interference - had they been found I would have proved a perjury of a most dangerous and bloody tendency ……… I have since been very anxious to get the Soldiers off the town. An opportunity occurred on the Cork being removed by the Kings county. The Capt. expressed a wish to have his men in barracks - I immediately filled up the under part of the Session House - and in five days had an excellent barrack for one hundred men - which took off the town a tax of five hundred and brought in an advantage of three thousand expenditure. This A. Weldon himself cou’d not dispute the advantage, both to town and army - yet he and his party opposed it to the utmost and I with difficulty established it ……… The inhabitants offered to repay my expenses. To this I cou’d not submit to secure the barrack I offered to erect four large sheds and finished one - together with some paling to enclose a yard. But the interference of the party saved me the experience. One hundred and sixteen men are already accommodated. But have this instant received a note from Col. Campbell to provide Quarters for two hundred additional men to come in next Friday. Rawson has been addressed by a party calling themselves the Loyal Protestant Corporation of Athy to memorial Government for a Corps of Infantry. In consequence a number of Protestant boys came headed by Redshaw, to demand their freedom. They knew I refused Weldon Molony - therefore it was more impertinence. They were clamorous and your Grace may suppose I was resolute - Rawson wished to get my signature - and insinuated that it wou’d be dangerous to wait ‘til your Grace cou’d be consulted - It was extreme impudence to expect, I wou’d sign a Corporation Memorial without your advice or that I wou’d sanction the formation of a Corps to exclude our Catholic Brethern. I left them to themselves yesterday, Rawson show’d me the Memorial - it is sufficient to say, he drew it up himself - I saw a curious list of names annexed - I asked Capt. Thomas James Rawson who wou’d be Lieutenants. He cou’d not tell but I hear Ben Braddell first on the List. I hope the second contest shall be between Ben Willcock and Ben Redshaw. At my last Court I proved by testimony of both that Redshaw pointing at me, declared I was a papist at heart, and shou’d soon be counted out - I thought the expression deserved reprehension particularly as some people suspect an Orange Lodge in the town.”
Ashe’s letter gives an interesting insight into the local politics of the time.
The prime mover in the formation of a Loyalist Militia in the town was Thomas Rawson who was himself apparently in a spot of bother as indicated in his letter to the Duke of Leinster of 13 April 1799. The letter written by Rawson when forwarding the Grand Jury Presentments mentioned that the Duke had expressed doubts of some of the town Burgesses and had called on Rawson to resign. This undoubtedly resulted from complaints from the likes of Thomas Fitzgerald of Geraldine, a relation of the Duke who referred to Rawson as the “offal of a dunghill”. Rawson in defending himself to the Duke against the charge of seeking Grand Jury funds to build a house on the bridge of Athy gave the following account.
“The history of any and every barrier in the town of Athy is simply this and the truth can be proved by thousands. When Campbell commanded this garrison he caused barriers of hogsheads, sods and earth to be made on the different approaches and on the centre of the bridge - he was ordered to evacuate the town and it was left for a long time to the sole protection of the yeomanry - weak and threatened as the town then was a large body of rebels having the next night approached within 100 perches of it, I considered it absolutely necessary to put up temporary gates and a paling, at an expense of upwards of £50 out of my pocket - the town was protected. In November last Capt. Nicholson and a company of the Cork City Militia were sent here, he saw the sod work going to decay, he applied to General Dundas, and by the Generals special directions [the inhabitants at large having subscribed a larger sum] strong walls of lime and stone were added to my gates - two large piers and a strong wall and platform were erected on the centre of the bridge under the direction of Capt. Nicholson. In the beginning of May last Gen. Dundas inspected the Athy Inf. New made pikes had been recently found in the back house of a rebel Capt. of the town, several new schemes of insurrection were discovered, for which many have been since convicted by Court Martial - the large house in the Market Square was occupied by a noted rebel from the county of Carlow, and it appearing to the General that the Barrier on the bridge could be commanded from the house, he was pleased to approve of the building a second wall to cover the men - I neglected it for some time - on the account arriving, that a French fleet was out, and destined for this country, I concluded that the town, would as before, be left to the yeomanry. In a hurry I had temporary walls ran up, merely doubling the former barrier, and recollecting that for four months last summer we had lain on the flag way on the bridge, in the open air with stones for our pillows - I covered the walls with a temporary skid of boards which are not even nailed on .
His detailed explanation gives us, for the first time, a sense of the danger and anxiety experienced by the townspeople during the 1798 Rebellion and the measures which were taken to protect the town.
I started off this article by referring to the 1798 memorial which remains to be erected in Athy, even though it has been ready for some years. Perhaps the Town Council will ensure that the Memorial is in place before the national commemoration for Emmet’s Rising of 1803 comes around.
Thursday, October 17, 2002
Thursday, October 10, 2002
Nicholas Grey 1798 Rebel / War of Independencde and Civil War Incidents in South Kildare
I attended a number of lectures organised by the County Kildare Federation of Local History Societies last weekend. One of the lectures dealt with the Emmet Rebellion of 1803 and the part played by men from our county in that debacle. Athy’s contribution to Emmet’s attempt to overthrow English rule in Ireland was minuscule, even if the man appointed by Emmet to be overall leader of the county’s rebels was based in the south of the county. He was Nicholas Gray, an attorney originally from county Wexford who in 1803 was living in Rockfield House on the outskirts of Athy. Gray played little or no part in the events of July 1803 and in that regard mirrored what may have been his contribution during the 1798 Rebellion. Richard Madden in his history of the United Irishmen writing of the Battle of Ross described how General Bagenal Harvey “and his aide de camp Mr. Gray, Protestant Attorney, remained upon a neighbouring hill, inactive spectators during ten hours incessant fighting”.
Gray, appointed as General in command of County Kildare by Robert Emmet was expected to march at the head of the Kildare rebels into Dublin when the rebellion broke out. He set out from Athy with his man servant and proceeded as far as Johnstown from where he turned around and came back to Athy. The failure of the Kildare men to respond in sufficient numbers to the call to arms might perhaps be excused on account of Emmet’s inadequate planning and the insufficiency of arms for those expected to participate. For whatever reason Gray felt it appropriate to abandon his responsibilities and the so called `Emmet Rebellion` petered out.
While listening to Seamus Cullen’s lecture I was prompted to think of the men and women from the county who played a part in the War of Independence and the subsequent Civil War. Some weeks ago I wrote briefly of some of the activities of the Carlow/Kildare Brigade in the south Kildare region. It is a topic I hope to return to again if for no better reason than to reduce to print whatever information on the events of those days is known to the generation which followed.
I have before me a sheet of headed notepaper printed “Oglaigh na h’Eireann” with the partly printed address “5th Battalion Head Quarters, Carlow Brigade, Military Barracks, Athy.” The sheet contains a manuscript letter signed by Thomas Finn Commandant and the date 8th July 1922 indicates that the letter was written three months after the anti-treaty forces under Rory O’Connor established their headquarters in the Four Courts, Dublin. Thomas Finn who was from Ballinabarna, Kilmead had been a captain in the Irish Republican Army during the War of Independence.
Another sheet of paper before me, this time a photocopy of a newspaper extract is headed “Court-martial results” and was taken from the Leinster Leader of 21st May 1921. It reads, “Michael Duffy, Poplar Hall, Inchaquire, Co. Kildare. On 25th October 1920 his premises were searched and in a stable a packet of seditious papers were found. These were :- copy of An Toglagh dated 15th August 1920; instructions from Brigade Adjutant IRA and letter from O.C. Carlow Brigade containing appointment of Mr. Duffy as O.C.E. company. In a trough 19 rounds of revolver ammunition and five 12 bore cartridges were found. Accused’s defence was that the trough in which the ammunition was found was outside Poplar Hall and was accessible from the outside. He was found not guilty of having ammunition but was sentenced to two years with hard labour.”
Michael Duffy was one of the small number of men chosen by Eamon de Valera to be officers in the National Army when Fianna Fail went into government for the first time in 1932. De Valera feared that the Army might not look too favorably on the defeat of the outgoing government and immediately sought to draft into the army a number of handpicked followers to bolster support for his government. Michael Duffy entered with the rank of Captain and so far as I can find out his army career was spent as a recruiting officer.
During the Civil War the area around Baltinglass was the centre of much activity and that activity spilled over into the Castledermot area with harrowing results. On 16th June 1922 Thomas Dunne of Carlow Gate, Castledermot, a member of the irregulars or anti-treaty side was killed. Less than three weeks later another two members of the irregulars were killed in action in Castledermot. They were Laurence Sweeney of Stillorgan, Co. Dublin and Sylvester Shepperd of Monasterevin, both of whom died on 5th July 1922. I have an extract from a newspaper which is undated but of some age with a photograph of volunteer Sylvester Shepperd over a report that “on Sunday at 3.00 o’clock a stone will be unveiled at Monasterevin to the memory of Sylvester Shepperd, IRA who was killed in action at Castledermot, Co. Kildare on July 4th 1922.” The best information available to me however indicates that Shepperd and his companion were killed on 5th July.
Another ambush which I have heard of, but as yet cannot get any information on, is reputed to have taken place on the Levitstown/Kilkea road. I am told that on the roadside there was a memorial erected to the memory of those involved but a recent inspection of the site shows no such memorial. There were clues that a memorial of some sort was there at one time, but to what or whom I cannot say. My informant told me that a number of IRA men raided a local big house for arms and afterwards walked along the railway track towards Levitstown. They were accosted on the Levitstown/Kilkea road, with what result I cannot say. I would welcome any information in relation to this incident.
Some years ago an interviewee referred to an ambush at Maganey but had no information as to when it occurred or who was involved. Was it by any chance the same event as believed to have occurred on the Levitstown to Kilkea road? Maganey did figure in a tragic accident involving an IRA officer but that was after peace had been restored to Ireland. Tommy O’Connell was Commandant of the IRA Brigade located in Carlow town and was responsible for organising the Carlow Brigade Flying Column. O’Connell died tragically in a road traffic accident at Maganey after his car had a tyre blowout causing his vehicle to overturn.
The O’Rahilly who died during the 1916 Insurrection visited Athy and delivered a splendid speech in the Town Hall on 9th May 1914 following which the Irish Volunteers were formed in the town. Thomas McDonagh, poet and author, another man to die following the 1916 Insurrection also addressed the Irish Volunteers in Athy. The Volunteers were formed in Ballitore on 7th August 1914, just days after the start of World War I and at a time when many men from that area and other parts of South Kildare were enlisting to fight in France and Flanders.
It would be wrong to presume that men who enlisted in the British Army and those who stayed behind and subsequently joined the National struggle for independence constituted two separate and distinct strands of Irish society. Despite the formation of the Volunteers in Athy and Ballitore in 1914 there was not then a clear consensus as to Ireland’s future whether as an independent state or as a member of the British empire. Those who fought for independence chose the path which differed initially at least from that of the majority of the population but in time the majority view changed. The Sinn Fein election successes of 1917 marked a watershed in the changing attitudes of Irish people. The likes of John Finn of Ballinabarna, Paddy Fleming of The Swan and Michael Duffy of Inchaquire made a major contribution to the course of Irish history but so did those unfortunate local men who died in foreign battles during World War I.
Our history is full of such contradictions but all of us who have benefited from the sacrifices made by men and women of an earlier generation have an obligation to acquaint ourselves with the lessons of the past. For that reason I would like to hear from anyone who can help me fill in the missing pieces regarding the Volunteer movement in South Kildare during the years 1914 - 1923.
Gray, appointed as General in command of County Kildare by Robert Emmet was expected to march at the head of the Kildare rebels into Dublin when the rebellion broke out. He set out from Athy with his man servant and proceeded as far as Johnstown from where he turned around and came back to Athy. The failure of the Kildare men to respond in sufficient numbers to the call to arms might perhaps be excused on account of Emmet’s inadequate planning and the insufficiency of arms for those expected to participate. For whatever reason Gray felt it appropriate to abandon his responsibilities and the so called `Emmet Rebellion` petered out.
While listening to Seamus Cullen’s lecture I was prompted to think of the men and women from the county who played a part in the War of Independence and the subsequent Civil War. Some weeks ago I wrote briefly of some of the activities of the Carlow/Kildare Brigade in the south Kildare region. It is a topic I hope to return to again if for no better reason than to reduce to print whatever information on the events of those days is known to the generation which followed.
I have before me a sheet of headed notepaper printed “Oglaigh na h’Eireann” with the partly printed address “5th Battalion Head Quarters, Carlow Brigade, Military Barracks, Athy.” The sheet contains a manuscript letter signed by Thomas Finn Commandant and the date 8th July 1922 indicates that the letter was written three months after the anti-treaty forces under Rory O’Connor established their headquarters in the Four Courts, Dublin. Thomas Finn who was from Ballinabarna, Kilmead had been a captain in the Irish Republican Army during the War of Independence.
Another sheet of paper before me, this time a photocopy of a newspaper extract is headed “Court-martial results” and was taken from the Leinster Leader of 21st May 1921. It reads, “Michael Duffy, Poplar Hall, Inchaquire, Co. Kildare. On 25th October 1920 his premises were searched and in a stable a packet of seditious papers were found. These were :- copy of An Toglagh dated 15th August 1920; instructions from Brigade Adjutant IRA and letter from O.C. Carlow Brigade containing appointment of Mr. Duffy as O.C.E. company. In a trough 19 rounds of revolver ammunition and five 12 bore cartridges were found. Accused’s defence was that the trough in which the ammunition was found was outside Poplar Hall and was accessible from the outside. He was found not guilty of having ammunition but was sentenced to two years with hard labour.”
Michael Duffy was one of the small number of men chosen by Eamon de Valera to be officers in the National Army when Fianna Fail went into government for the first time in 1932. De Valera feared that the Army might not look too favorably on the defeat of the outgoing government and immediately sought to draft into the army a number of handpicked followers to bolster support for his government. Michael Duffy entered with the rank of Captain and so far as I can find out his army career was spent as a recruiting officer.
During the Civil War the area around Baltinglass was the centre of much activity and that activity spilled over into the Castledermot area with harrowing results. On 16th June 1922 Thomas Dunne of Carlow Gate, Castledermot, a member of the irregulars or anti-treaty side was killed. Less than three weeks later another two members of the irregulars were killed in action in Castledermot. They were Laurence Sweeney of Stillorgan, Co. Dublin and Sylvester Shepperd of Monasterevin, both of whom died on 5th July 1922. I have an extract from a newspaper which is undated but of some age with a photograph of volunteer Sylvester Shepperd over a report that “on Sunday at 3.00 o’clock a stone will be unveiled at Monasterevin to the memory of Sylvester Shepperd, IRA who was killed in action at Castledermot, Co. Kildare on July 4th 1922.” The best information available to me however indicates that Shepperd and his companion were killed on 5th July.
Another ambush which I have heard of, but as yet cannot get any information on, is reputed to have taken place on the Levitstown/Kilkea road. I am told that on the roadside there was a memorial erected to the memory of those involved but a recent inspection of the site shows no such memorial. There were clues that a memorial of some sort was there at one time, but to what or whom I cannot say. My informant told me that a number of IRA men raided a local big house for arms and afterwards walked along the railway track towards Levitstown. They were accosted on the Levitstown/Kilkea road, with what result I cannot say. I would welcome any information in relation to this incident.
Some years ago an interviewee referred to an ambush at Maganey but had no information as to when it occurred or who was involved. Was it by any chance the same event as believed to have occurred on the Levitstown to Kilkea road? Maganey did figure in a tragic accident involving an IRA officer but that was after peace had been restored to Ireland. Tommy O’Connell was Commandant of the IRA Brigade located in Carlow town and was responsible for organising the Carlow Brigade Flying Column. O’Connell died tragically in a road traffic accident at Maganey after his car had a tyre blowout causing his vehicle to overturn.
The O’Rahilly who died during the 1916 Insurrection visited Athy and delivered a splendid speech in the Town Hall on 9th May 1914 following which the Irish Volunteers were formed in the town. Thomas McDonagh, poet and author, another man to die following the 1916 Insurrection also addressed the Irish Volunteers in Athy. The Volunteers were formed in Ballitore on 7th August 1914, just days after the start of World War I and at a time when many men from that area and other parts of South Kildare were enlisting to fight in France and Flanders.
It would be wrong to presume that men who enlisted in the British Army and those who stayed behind and subsequently joined the National struggle for independence constituted two separate and distinct strands of Irish society. Despite the formation of the Volunteers in Athy and Ballitore in 1914 there was not then a clear consensus as to Ireland’s future whether as an independent state or as a member of the British empire. Those who fought for independence chose the path which differed initially at least from that of the majority of the population but in time the majority view changed. The Sinn Fein election successes of 1917 marked a watershed in the changing attitudes of Irish people. The likes of John Finn of Ballinabarna, Paddy Fleming of The Swan and Michael Duffy of Inchaquire made a major contribution to the course of Irish history but so did those unfortunate local men who died in foreign battles during World War I.
Our history is full of such contradictions but all of us who have benefited from the sacrifices made by men and women of an earlier generation have an obligation to acquaint ourselves with the lessons of the past. For that reason I would like to hear from anyone who can help me fill in the missing pieces regarding the Volunteer movement in South Kildare during the years 1914 - 1923.
Thursday, October 3, 2002
Andy Smith, 42 Leinster St. and his daughter Peggy
Human memory can play tricks with the past. I had always believed that No. 42 Leinster Street was a grocery shop and public house at the time it belonged to Andy Smith. I was wrong, for the premises which was next door to the Co-op Stores did not hold a liquor licence. It was a grocery shop with a store given over to dry feed stuffs for supply to local farmers.
Andy Smith was from Drumboe near Cootehill and came to Athy to work as a barman with Louis O’Mara’s mother in her pub in Leinster Street. He had previously served time in Belfast and in Ferbane, county Offaly in which latter village he featured on the local football team. His arrival in Athy was in the 1920’s and pre-dated his marriage in 1930 to Kathleen McKenna, daughter of Tom McKenna, a railway worker who lived at the Railway company house on the Carlow road before he moved to 28 St. Patrick’s Avenue.
After marrying Andy and Kathleen Smith lived with Tom McKenna in St. Patrick’s Avenue before renting a house in Offaly Street in 1937 from Myles Whelan. That was the same house that my parents moved to in the early 1950’s when it was vacated by Tom White and his family. The youngest member of the Smith family, Dolores, was born in 5 Offaly Street just shortly before Andy Smith purchased No. 42 Leinster Street. In 1940 the Smith family, now including six children, Peggy, Peter, Kitty, Andrew, Mary and Dolores moved to Leinster Street which was to be the Smith home for the next 28 years.
Last week I had the great pleasure of talking to Peggy Smith who was in Athy for a short holiday from her home in New Jersey. Peggy emigrated to America in 1954 but she still recalls with fondness the town where she spent her youth as a student in the local convent school. Her memories are of the wealth of characters of the time and of the carefree days when as a young girl she was involved in the local Gaelic League. Kevin Meany of St. Patrick’s Avenue and Tom McDonnell of the Technical School were two of the local organisers of the League which met each Monday night in the ballroom of the Town Hall. The Tennis Club on the Carlow Road and dances in the Town Hall and in the Social Club in St. John’s Lane were other favourite social outlets of the time.
Peggy attended St. Mary’s Convent School where her classmates included Tessie Flanagan, Finola Smyth, Noreen Tierney, Frances Fenlon, Sheila Doogue, Maureen Rigney, Betty Myles, Patsy Butterfield, Kathleen Coogan, Breda Delahunt and Irene McNamara. She later went to work for her father before transferring to McClellans grocery shop at Duke Street. McClellans was noted for its exceptionally large china department located to the rear of the shop. Jim Fennin who at that time worked in Myles Whelan’s grocery shop later bought McClellans and Peggy continued to work there with Kathleen Curtis. When Kathleen married John Cusack her position was taken by Helen Walsh. The McClellans shop, later Jim Fennin’s, is now Perry’s Supermarket.
Peggy left for America on 1st October 1954 and still recalls with some misgivings the American wake held in 42 Leinster Street the night before her departure. The happiness and joy of seeing so many friends and relations was tinged with an overwhelming sense of sadness as the night progressed and the time for leaving home for the last time drew near. Strange to relate that of a family of four girls and two boys, the girls, of which Peggy was the eldest, each in turn emigrated to America. The boys, Peter and Andrew, stayed in Athy. Peggy returned to Ireland towards the end of 1955 with the intention of travelling back to the States with her younger sister Kitty. However, Kitty’s visa was delayed and so Peggy worked for a few months with Paddy Dillon in his newly opened grocery shop in what is now the J-1 restaurant at Emily Square. The two sisters left for America in May 1956 to be followed by their sisters Mary in 1958 and Dolores in 1961.
Peggy married in May 1960, Thomas J. O’Sullivan from the Bronx, whose father had emigrated from the Dingle peninsula. They had five children, Thomas, Andrew, Kathleen, Susan and Margaret. Her father Andrew Smith sold 42 Leinster Street in 1968, approximately five years after his wife, the former Kathleen McKenna passed away. He moved for the second time to No. 28 St. Patrick’s Avenue where he lived until his death in December 1970.
Looking back on her time in 42 Leinster Street, Peggy remembers the Smith home as an open house for many people, some of whom dropped in for the Rosary which was said every May and October just after the tea. Every Sunday night a card game took place at No. 42 with the likes of Jim Dooley, Johnny Mahon, Tom McKenna and “Verser” Prendergast taking part. Greatly treasured are the memories of the tea room which was in fact the dry goods store at the back of the shop. Gaelic games played an important part in the life of Andy Smith who was a long standing member of the local football club and of the Geraldine grounds committee. It was customary for county teams playing in Geraldine Park to have a meal after every match and the unofficial tea rooms in Smiths was always the venue. The dry food stuffs were removed from the storeroom, the floorboards were meticulously scrubbed down and trestle tables were brought in in preparation for the players who descended on 42 Leinster Street to partake of Mrs. Smith’s homecooking. Mrs. Alcock of Dooley’s Terrace lent her assistance, while the Smith girls served the players at the tables.
As a young girl Peggy often accompanied her grand-father Tom McKenna on his usual Sunday morning walk “down the line” as far as “Bummeries” and from there up to the Carlow road where the customary stop was made at Barrington’s public house. There Tom could, and did avail of the bone fide traveler’s rule which allowed anyone who travelled three miles from home to take a drink on Sunday afternoons.
I was intrigued to hear Peggy speak of old “Nanny” Whelan, a blind woman who lived in the vicinity of Shrewleen Lane and who each day walked unassisted to Leinster Street to get her dinner. Initially “Nanny” went to Mrs. O’Mara’s but when Andy Smith opened his grocery shop in 1940, “Nanny” shortened her daily journey and called to Smiths where she sat down in front of the fire in the shop to eat what may have been her only meal of the day. On occasions when “Nanny” was unable to make the trip down town, Peggy was dispatched to Shrewleen Lane with a covered basket containing the old ladies dinner. “Nanny” Walsh, who always dressed in black and wore a shawl lived alone in her small two roomed house which is long gone. She apparently lost her sight when she was 10 or 11 years old but little else is known of her. I would like to hear from anyone who recalls “Nanny” Whelan.
Peggy O’Sullivan, eldest daughter of Andy and Kathleen Smith returned to America last week. She brought with her refreshed memories of her youth spent in Athy during the war years and the frugal times which followed. Athy has changed in the 48 years she has been away. New houses have been built in the green fields where once she played. The drab streetscape of the 1940’s has given way to the colour strewn shop fronts of today, while the once derelict Town Hall and its near neighbour, the Courthouse once again give cause to have pride in Athy’s town centre. The only feature of provincial Irish town life which puzzles the New Jersey based native of Athy is the all pervasive steel shuttering in local shop windows.
The days of the open door and evening recitations of the rosary in the kitchen are no more. The memories however, are still as vivid as the day they were first formed all those years ago.
Andy Smith was from Drumboe near Cootehill and came to Athy to work as a barman with Louis O’Mara’s mother in her pub in Leinster Street. He had previously served time in Belfast and in Ferbane, county Offaly in which latter village he featured on the local football team. His arrival in Athy was in the 1920’s and pre-dated his marriage in 1930 to Kathleen McKenna, daughter of Tom McKenna, a railway worker who lived at the Railway company house on the Carlow road before he moved to 28 St. Patrick’s Avenue.
After marrying Andy and Kathleen Smith lived with Tom McKenna in St. Patrick’s Avenue before renting a house in Offaly Street in 1937 from Myles Whelan. That was the same house that my parents moved to in the early 1950’s when it was vacated by Tom White and his family. The youngest member of the Smith family, Dolores, was born in 5 Offaly Street just shortly before Andy Smith purchased No. 42 Leinster Street. In 1940 the Smith family, now including six children, Peggy, Peter, Kitty, Andrew, Mary and Dolores moved to Leinster Street which was to be the Smith home for the next 28 years.
Last week I had the great pleasure of talking to Peggy Smith who was in Athy for a short holiday from her home in New Jersey. Peggy emigrated to America in 1954 but she still recalls with fondness the town where she spent her youth as a student in the local convent school. Her memories are of the wealth of characters of the time and of the carefree days when as a young girl she was involved in the local Gaelic League. Kevin Meany of St. Patrick’s Avenue and Tom McDonnell of the Technical School were two of the local organisers of the League which met each Monday night in the ballroom of the Town Hall. The Tennis Club on the Carlow Road and dances in the Town Hall and in the Social Club in St. John’s Lane were other favourite social outlets of the time.
Peggy attended St. Mary’s Convent School where her classmates included Tessie Flanagan, Finola Smyth, Noreen Tierney, Frances Fenlon, Sheila Doogue, Maureen Rigney, Betty Myles, Patsy Butterfield, Kathleen Coogan, Breda Delahunt and Irene McNamara. She later went to work for her father before transferring to McClellans grocery shop at Duke Street. McClellans was noted for its exceptionally large china department located to the rear of the shop. Jim Fennin who at that time worked in Myles Whelan’s grocery shop later bought McClellans and Peggy continued to work there with Kathleen Curtis. When Kathleen married John Cusack her position was taken by Helen Walsh. The McClellans shop, later Jim Fennin’s, is now Perry’s Supermarket.
Peggy left for America on 1st October 1954 and still recalls with some misgivings the American wake held in 42 Leinster Street the night before her departure. The happiness and joy of seeing so many friends and relations was tinged with an overwhelming sense of sadness as the night progressed and the time for leaving home for the last time drew near. Strange to relate that of a family of four girls and two boys, the girls, of which Peggy was the eldest, each in turn emigrated to America. The boys, Peter and Andrew, stayed in Athy. Peggy returned to Ireland towards the end of 1955 with the intention of travelling back to the States with her younger sister Kitty. However, Kitty’s visa was delayed and so Peggy worked for a few months with Paddy Dillon in his newly opened grocery shop in what is now the J-1 restaurant at Emily Square. The two sisters left for America in May 1956 to be followed by their sisters Mary in 1958 and Dolores in 1961.
Peggy married in May 1960, Thomas J. O’Sullivan from the Bronx, whose father had emigrated from the Dingle peninsula. They had five children, Thomas, Andrew, Kathleen, Susan and Margaret. Her father Andrew Smith sold 42 Leinster Street in 1968, approximately five years after his wife, the former Kathleen McKenna passed away. He moved for the second time to No. 28 St. Patrick’s Avenue where he lived until his death in December 1970.
Looking back on her time in 42 Leinster Street, Peggy remembers the Smith home as an open house for many people, some of whom dropped in for the Rosary which was said every May and October just after the tea. Every Sunday night a card game took place at No. 42 with the likes of Jim Dooley, Johnny Mahon, Tom McKenna and “Verser” Prendergast taking part. Greatly treasured are the memories of the tea room which was in fact the dry goods store at the back of the shop. Gaelic games played an important part in the life of Andy Smith who was a long standing member of the local football club and of the Geraldine grounds committee. It was customary for county teams playing in Geraldine Park to have a meal after every match and the unofficial tea rooms in Smiths was always the venue. The dry food stuffs were removed from the storeroom, the floorboards were meticulously scrubbed down and trestle tables were brought in in preparation for the players who descended on 42 Leinster Street to partake of Mrs. Smith’s homecooking. Mrs. Alcock of Dooley’s Terrace lent her assistance, while the Smith girls served the players at the tables.
As a young girl Peggy often accompanied her grand-father Tom McKenna on his usual Sunday morning walk “down the line” as far as “Bummeries” and from there up to the Carlow road where the customary stop was made at Barrington’s public house. There Tom could, and did avail of the bone fide traveler’s rule which allowed anyone who travelled three miles from home to take a drink on Sunday afternoons.
I was intrigued to hear Peggy speak of old “Nanny” Whelan, a blind woman who lived in the vicinity of Shrewleen Lane and who each day walked unassisted to Leinster Street to get her dinner. Initially “Nanny” went to Mrs. O’Mara’s but when Andy Smith opened his grocery shop in 1940, “Nanny” shortened her daily journey and called to Smiths where she sat down in front of the fire in the shop to eat what may have been her only meal of the day. On occasions when “Nanny” was unable to make the trip down town, Peggy was dispatched to Shrewleen Lane with a covered basket containing the old ladies dinner. “Nanny” Walsh, who always dressed in black and wore a shawl lived alone in her small two roomed house which is long gone. She apparently lost her sight when she was 10 or 11 years old but little else is known of her. I would like to hear from anyone who recalls “Nanny” Whelan.
Peggy O’Sullivan, eldest daughter of Andy and Kathleen Smith returned to America last week. She brought with her refreshed memories of her youth spent in Athy during the war years and the frugal times which followed. Athy has changed in the 48 years she has been away. New houses have been built in the green fields where once she played. The drab streetscape of the 1940’s has given way to the colour strewn shop fronts of today, while the once derelict Town Hall and its near neighbour, the Courthouse once again give cause to have pride in Athy’s town centre. The only feature of provincial Irish town life which puzzles the New Jersey based native of Athy is the all pervasive steel shuttering in local shop windows.
The days of the open door and evening recitations of the rosary in the kitchen are no more. The memories however, are still as vivid as the day they were first formed all those years ago.
Thursday, September 26, 2002
Athy 150 Years Ago and the Coming of the Sisters of Mercy
One hundred and fifty years ago Athy was noted as having made a decided improvement in its appearance compared to ten years previously. New houses had been built and several old ones renovated while the streets were well paved and kept in good order. However, the townspeople were still relying on public water pumps for water which was untreated and quite often unfit for consumption. An outbreak of cholera had occurred in 1832 and 17 years later just as the worst excesses of the Famine were abating, cholera hit again. The first cholera case was diagnosed in Athy on 25th June 1849 and between then and 29th September of the same year 27 cholera sufferers were reported resulting in the death of 11 locals.
Prostitution flourished on the streets of Athy of 150 years ago, prompting the Town Commissioners to post a notice warning that “persons keeping places of public resort for the sale of refreshment of any kind who knowingly supply any common prostitute or allow them to assemble on his premises will be prosecuted according to the Law”. Thomas Roberts was appointed by the Council to apprehend and prosecute prostitutes and beggars for which he was paid 4/= per week with an additional 2/6 for each conviction of a prostitute. The cases summarily disposed of by the local magistrates confirmed that Mr. Roberts was quite successful in apprehending the “ladies of the night” who were generally fined £1 for each offence, or one month in default of payment.
One hundred and fifty years ago the first Presbyterian settlers who had arrived from Pershire in Scotland in response to the Duke of Leinster’s offer of land in South Kildare were settling into their new homes. On 17th August 1851 a meeting of the Scottish families presided over by Rev. Patterson of Bray and Rev. Powell of Carlow agreed to establish a Presbyterian ministry in Athy. Within five years the “Scot’s” Church was built on a site on the Dublin Road. Nearby and just across the main Athy / Dublin road was the newly opened Model School where boys and girls of all denominations attended school.
In January 1852 Samuel Talbot published from Athy the first edition of what was intended to be a monthly magazine devoted “to the advancement of Science, Literature and the Industrial Arts”. It was the only edition ever published. Consisting of 36 pages it included a report of the lecture given the previous November at a meeting of Athy Mechanics Institute by its secretary Thomas Cross. The Mechanics Institute was part of a countrywide movement which had originated in England intended for the instructions of artisans or mechanics as they were then known, in scientific principals underlying their trade. The local institute was formed from the nucleus of the Athy Literary and Scientific Institute which had been founded in Athy in 1849. Athy’s Mechanic Institute, although intended for skilled workers, was largely dependent for its membership on the middle class elements of the town who made use of its reading room where newspapers and magazines were available.
Just two years previously and despite the ending of the four year long Famine the local Workhouse, then but ten years old, and built to accommodate 600 persons was still experiencing overcrowding. An Orphan Emigration Scheme initiated in March 1848 and intended to rid the Irish workhouses of teenage girls by sending them to Australia met with the approval of the local Board of Guardians. When the last boat sailed in April 1850 as part of the Orphan Emigration Scheme, 42 teenage girls who had been inmates in Athy’s Workhouse had emigrated to start new lives on the other side of the world.
Prior to the opening of the Model School in 1852 the children of the town, or rather those whose parents wished them to be educated, attended the local Poor School. The school building had been provided by Colonel Fitzgerald of Geraldine House on ground which at one time formed part of the commonage of Clonmullion. The teachers Patrick O’Rourke and Ann Doogan catered for 150 or so boys and approximately 40 girls who attended classes regularly. In the spring of 1843 the local Catholic clergy called a meeting of their parishioners to promote the idea of establishing in the town a school to be run by nuns. Arrangements were made to take up a weekly collection and in August 1844 the Parish Priest of Castledermot laid the first stone of the new convent building. The weekly collection continued for a few years but stopped in 1847 because of the difficulties experienced during the Famine. Fr. Thomas Greene and his colleague Fr. John Harold, both of whom were curates of St. Michael’s Parish, resumed the weekly collection in 1849 but despite their best efforts the funds necessary to complete work on the convent and school were not forthcoming. Eventually the sum of £300 was advanced by the Superioress of the Convent of Mercy, Baggot Street, Dublin to enable the building work to be completed.
Nine years after the first public meeting held to discuss the school project the Sisters of Mercy were ready to take over the newly built convent and school. On 10th October 1852 Sr. Mary Gabrielle Sherlock and Sr. Mary Angela Rowland left the Baggot Street Convent of the Sisters of Mercy and travelled by horsedrawn carriage to Kingsbridge Railway Station. On arrival they bought tickets to convey themselves and their luggage to Athy on the Great Southern Western Railway line which had been extended only six years previously to Athy and Carlow. On arrival in Athy the nuns were met by the local clergy and brought to the newly built convent building.
In August 1854 the Athy Convent was adopted as a branch house of the earlier established Carlow Convent of Mercy and two sisters were sent from Carlow to replace the Dublin nuns. Sr. Mary Teresa Maher and Sr. Mary Xavier Downey arrived in Athy on 2nd February 1855 and were jointed by two novices from Dublin, Sr. Mary Joseph Leader and Sr. Mary Magdaline. A description of the convent at that time reads :-
“A three storey house of hammered lime stone 95ft. by 20. The Hall, Parlours, Community Room, Corridors and Cells well lighted and ventilated. The hall door is very fine, having outer casings and massive pillars supporting an ornamental canopy all of cut stone. The community rooms a beautiful spacious room has its cornice elegantly designed in stonework and the door ornamented in woodwork. The hall and reception room with ceilings suitably designed in stonework and doors correspond with those of the community room. The oratory is small. It is specially ornamented with stonework on the ceiling and cornice. The vine leaf and grape are most artistically carried through the design.”
One hundred and fifty years later what was once the Convent of Mercy no longer echoes to the sound of prayer or the patter of feet hurrying to or from Chapel or classroom. The last Sister of Mercy to teach in the local Convent National School was Sr. Teresa Ann Nagle who retired on 11th June 2001. The Sisters of Mercy who took vows of poverty, chastity and obedience as well as a vow to serve the poor, sick and those lacking education are now facing new and different challenges posed by an Irish society which is everchanging. Whatever the future may hold for the Sisters of Mercy the rich heritage of Mercy education which they developed in Athy and district over the past 150 years will continue to live on. On Thursday, October 10th a special service will take place in St. Michael’s Parish Church at 12noon to celebrate the sequicentenary of the arrival of the Sisters of Mercy in Athy. Its an occasion which deserves to be supported in great numbers by the people of Athy and district.
Prostitution flourished on the streets of Athy of 150 years ago, prompting the Town Commissioners to post a notice warning that “persons keeping places of public resort for the sale of refreshment of any kind who knowingly supply any common prostitute or allow them to assemble on his premises will be prosecuted according to the Law”. Thomas Roberts was appointed by the Council to apprehend and prosecute prostitutes and beggars for which he was paid 4/= per week with an additional 2/6 for each conviction of a prostitute. The cases summarily disposed of by the local magistrates confirmed that Mr. Roberts was quite successful in apprehending the “ladies of the night” who were generally fined £1 for each offence, or one month in default of payment.
One hundred and fifty years ago the first Presbyterian settlers who had arrived from Pershire in Scotland in response to the Duke of Leinster’s offer of land in South Kildare were settling into their new homes. On 17th August 1851 a meeting of the Scottish families presided over by Rev. Patterson of Bray and Rev. Powell of Carlow agreed to establish a Presbyterian ministry in Athy. Within five years the “Scot’s” Church was built on a site on the Dublin Road. Nearby and just across the main Athy / Dublin road was the newly opened Model School where boys and girls of all denominations attended school.
In January 1852 Samuel Talbot published from Athy the first edition of what was intended to be a monthly magazine devoted “to the advancement of Science, Literature and the Industrial Arts”. It was the only edition ever published. Consisting of 36 pages it included a report of the lecture given the previous November at a meeting of Athy Mechanics Institute by its secretary Thomas Cross. The Mechanics Institute was part of a countrywide movement which had originated in England intended for the instructions of artisans or mechanics as they were then known, in scientific principals underlying their trade. The local institute was formed from the nucleus of the Athy Literary and Scientific Institute which had been founded in Athy in 1849. Athy’s Mechanic Institute, although intended for skilled workers, was largely dependent for its membership on the middle class elements of the town who made use of its reading room where newspapers and magazines were available.
Just two years previously and despite the ending of the four year long Famine the local Workhouse, then but ten years old, and built to accommodate 600 persons was still experiencing overcrowding. An Orphan Emigration Scheme initiated in March 1848 and intended to rid the Irish workhouses of teenage girls by sending them to Australia met with the approval of the local Board of Guardians. When the last boat sailed in April 1850 as part of the Orphan Emigration Scheme, 42 teenage girls who had been inmates in Athy’s Workhouse had emigrated to start new lives on the other side of the world.
Prior to the opening of the Model School in 1852 the children of the town, or rather those whose parents wished them to be educated, attended the local Poor School. The school building had been provided by Colonel Fitzgerald of Geraldine House on ground which at one time formed part of the commonage of Clonmullion. The teachers Patrick O’Rourke and Ann Doogan catered for 150 or so boys and approximately 40 girls who attended classes regularly. In the spring of 1843 the local Catholic clergy called a meeting of their parishioners to promote the idea of establishing in the town a school to be run by nuns. Arrangements were made to take up a weekly collection and in August 1844 the Parish Priest of Castledermot laid the first stone of the new convent building. The weekly collection continued for a few years but stopped in 1847 because of the difficulties experienced during the Famine. Fr. Thomas Greene and his colleague Fr. John Harold, both of whom were curates of St. Michael’s Parish, resumed the weekly collection in 1849 but despite their best efforts the funds necessary to complete work on the convent and school were not forthcoming. Eventually the sum of £300 was advanced by the Superioress of the Convent of Mercy, Baggot Street, Dublin to enable the building work to be completed.
Nine years after the first public meeting held to discuss the school project the Sisters of Mercy were ready to take over the newly built convent and school. On 10th October 1852 Sr. Mary Gabrielle Sherlock and Sr. Mary Angela Rowland left the Baggot Street Convent of the Sisters of Mercy and travelled by horsedrawn carriage to Kingsbridge Railway Station. On arrival they bought tickets to convey themselves and their luggage to Athy on the Great Southern Western Railway line which had been extended only six years previously to Athy and Carlow. On arrival in Athy the nuns were met by the local clergy and brought to the newly built convent building.
In August 1854 the Athy Convent was adopted as a branch house of the earlier established Carlow Convent of Mercy and two sisters were sent from Carlow to replace the Dublin nuns. Sr. Mary Teresa Maher and Sr. Mary Xavier Downey arrived in Athy on 2nd February 1855 and were jointed by two novices from Dublin, Sr. Mary Joseph Leader and Sr. Mary Magdaline. A description of the convent at that time reads :-
“A three storey house of hammered lime stone 95ft. by 20. The Hall, Parlours, Community Room, Corridors and Cells well lighted and ventilated. The hall door is very fine, having outer casings and massive pillars supporting an ornamental canopy all of cut stone. The community rooms a beautiful spacious room has its cornice elegantly designed in stonework and the door ornamented in woodwork. The hall and reception room with ceilings suitably designed in stonework and doors correspond with those of the community room. The oratory is small. It is specially ornamented with stonework on the ceiling and cornice. The vine leaf and grape are most artistically carried through the design.”
One hundred and fifty years later what was once the Convent of Mercy no longer echoes to the sound of prayer or the patter of feet hurrying to or from Chapel or classroom. The last Sister of Mercy to teach in the local Convent National School was Sr. Teresa Ann Nagle who retired on 11th June 2001. The Sisters of Mercy who took vows of poverty, chastity and obedience as well as a vow to serve the poor, sick and those lacking education are now facing new and different challenges posed by an Irish society which is everchanging. Whatever the future may hold for the Sisters of Mercy the rich heritage of Mercy education which they developed in Athy and district over the past 150 years will continue to live on. On Thursday, October 10th a special service will take place in St. Michael’s Parish Church at 12noon to celebrate the sequicentenary of the arrival of the Sisters of Mercy in Athy. Its an occasion which deserves to be supported in great numbers by the people of Athy and district.
Thursday, September 19, 2002
Athy C.B.S. Reunion
The Class Reunion has come and gone. It has taken more than 40 years to bring together the lads who shared their young days as schoolboys in Athy. Many persons contacted me over the past week about the reunion which seems to have caught the public attention and ignited its imagination in a very positive way. The general public seems to have looked upon the weekend reunion as an event which highlighted something good about the town in sharp contrast to the seemingly never-ending bad press which grabs the headlines almost every week.
The Class Reunion was just that. It was the coming together of fellows who were companions and colleagues in a particular class which began in St. Joseph’s School in 1946 and finally ended with the Leaving Certificate Examination of 1960. In between those years some fellows left school while others joined the class, either as new arrivals in Athy or alternatively as pupils coming in from outlying rural areas.
As you can well imagine the opening event scheduled for the evening of Friday 20th September in the Leinster Arms Hotel was intended to allow everyone to renew old acquaintances. For men who may not have seen each other for more than 40 years name tags were an essential aid. But truth to tell, while faces and bodies may have become extended and distorted, yet somehow or other the faces from the past were easily superimposed on the aging creatures who trooped into the Leinster Arms. We knew each other, even if a surreptitious glance at a name tag was required on occasions to confirm and in some cases to put a name on a particular face.
That first meeting after the passage of so many years was a great occasion. Imagine my surprise and delight at meeting Paddy Bracken whose family left Athy in 1956. The Bracken’s lived at the corner house, now undergoing reconstruction, opposite the Courthouse and Paddy was not only a classmate, but also one of the Offaly Street youngsters who played together each day of the week. Paddy was immediately recognisable and had a wonderful fund of stories and memories of his days as a youngster in Athy. I was particularly amused by his recall of the famous hurling matches between the Offaly Street lads and the St. Patrick’s Avenue fellas and how those occasional encounters finally came to an end. Paddy contends that the St. Patrick’s Avenue lads deliberately set out to put one of the Offaly Street lads out of commission, courtesy of a skelp of a hurley. Both the perpetrator and the victim enjoyed Paddy’s telling of the story and marveled at his unshaken belief that the head injury inflicted on the awkward Offaly Street player was premeditated and deliberate. As the victim on the occasion in question, all I can say is that the perpetrator who was even more awkward than myself was highly unlikely to have been able to execute a plan of attack with such deadly precision.
Writing of the St. Patrick’s Avenue lads, they were ably represented by Jimmy Malone who travelled from California, and locally based Mick Rowan. The Offaly Street crew were there in the person of Teddy Kelly, Willie Moore and myself. I hadn’t seen or met Willie for many many years and he too had great memories and stories of times in Offaly Street and in the cauldron of learning we called the Christian Brothers School. While Willie travelled from Wexford, a lot of the lads living in and around Athy gave their support.
John Mealy and Jack Murphy who spent a substantial part of their working lives in Bradbury’s Bakeries were there swopping stories of their school days and both astonished me with the clarity of youthful memories culled from so many years back. Two of the great surprises of the reunion was tracing Christy Southwell and Eddie Wall, both of whom left Athy and their classmates long before the class began to break up as it did when our 14th birthday was reached. As it turned out Christy was located in the Curragh where he has lived ever since his time in the Army, while Eddie now lives in Luton, England. Another to travel from England for the occasion was Joe Gordan who was with us in primary school until his father left the Athy area. Joe’s father was a farm steward on Taylor’s farm on the Dublin Road and Joe who entered the Christian Brothers is now the Provincial of the English Province. Another to make the trip from England was Brendan Ward and he enlivened the weekends proceedings with his banter and lively personality.
I can still remember the morning Brother Brett walked into our classroom, leaned over my desk and shook the hand of Enda Dooley who was sitting behind me. “Congratulations on your father’s election to the Dail” he said to Enda. I think that was the first realisation I had that Enda’s father Paddy Dooley, Principal of Kilberry National School, was standing for the Dail, for in common with my classmates I had no interest in the affairs of State. Our lives centered in those far off days around football and the fairer sex. Enda travelled from County Longford for the reunion, as did George Robinson whom I have been privileged to meet on many occasions in the intervening years. Two men I hadn’t seen for years were Pat Timpson, formerly of St. Patrick’s Avenue and Kerry O’Sullivan, originally from Aughaboura. Kerry was another of our visitors from England, while Pat made the cross country trip from Sligo.
The longest journeys were made by Mick Robinson and Seamus Ryan who travelled from Australia and China respectively. Clearly they were delighted to meet old school pals such as Eddie Hearns, now living in Dublin, and the local lads including Eddie Ryan, Jack Carr, Peter Whelan and P.J. Hyland. Like myself they had not met Frankie Bradbury since we all left school. Frankie travelled from Kilkenny winning hands down the laurels for the fellow possessing the exilir of youth in greatest abundance. He looked more like a 25 year old than somebody who is entering his 7th decade.
Joe Brophy came from Dublin and entertained Paddy Lannigan and Brian Finn with stories of his days on the buses. Another visitor from England was John Prendergast whose father Charlie sadly died just a few weeks ago. Paddy Mulhall travelled from Kildare town, while P.J. Wall from Arles met up with Noel Scully, now one of Town Fathers and Michael O’Meara, now a publican in Dublin. John Roche, after spending his Army years in the bomb disposal unit, is well used to the pressures associated with his role in the local Credit Union, even if Frank English, another of our Town Fathers and Fintan Kinsella might claim, that after years in the Christian Brothers School we were all experienced in bomb disposal work.
The weekend reunion was a great experience for everyone involved, and no-one enjoyed it more than another of our weekend visitors, Brendan McKenna who swapped yarns with locals Jim Malone and Ted Wynne, Reggie Lalor and Jerry Carbery.
On Sunday afternoon a service of remembrance and commemoration was held in the local schoolyards where the names of 16 former classmates who had died were read aloud. Little did we know that another name would be added to those who had passed away before the reunion finished later that evening. Michael Cardiff was to attend the reunion but he was not able to do so as he was struck down by illness in some recent weeks. He died on Sunday afternoon, even as his former classmates gathered together for possibly the last time.
With his passing another thread in the tapestry of our youth had unravelled.
The Class Reunion was just that. It was the coming together of fellows who were companions and colleagues in a particular class which began in St. Joseph’s School in 1946 and finally ended with the Leaving Certificate Examination of 1960. In between those years some fellows left school while others joined the class, either as new arrivals in Athy or alternatively as pupils coming in from outlying rural areas.
As you can well imagine the opening event scheduled for the evening of Friday 20th September in the Leinster Arms Hotel was intended to allow everyone to renew old acquaintances. For men who may not have seen each other for more than 40 years name tags were an essential aid. But truth to tell, while faces and bodies may have become extended and distorted, yet somehow or other the faces from the past were easily superimposed on the aging creatures who trooped into the Leinster Arms. We knew each other, even if a surreptitious glance at a name tag was required on occasions to confirm and in some cases to put a name on a particular face.
That first meeting after the passage of so many years was a great occasion. Imagine my surprise and delight at meeting Paddy Bracken whose family left Athy in 1956. The Bracken’s lived at the corner house, now undergoing reconstruction, opposite the Courthouse and Paddy was not only a classmate, but also one of the Offaly Street youngsters who played together each day of the week. Paddy was immediately recognisable and had a wonderful fund of stories and memories of his days as a youngster in Athy. I was particularly amused by his recall of the famous hurling matches between the Offaly Street lads and the St. Patrick’s Avenue fellas and how those occasional encounters finally came to an end. Paddy contends that the St. Patrick’s Avenue lads deliberately set out to put one of the Offaly Street lads out of commission, courtesy of a skelp of a hurley. Both the perpetrator and the victim enjoyed Paddy’s telling of the story and marveled at his unshaken belief that the head injury inflicted on the awkward Offaly Street player was premeditated and deliberate. As the victim on the occasion in question, all I can say is that the perpetrator who was even more awkward than myself was highly unlikely to have been able to execute a plan of attack with such deadly precision.
Writing of the St. Patrick’s Avenue lads, they were ably represented by Jimmy Malone who travelled from California, and locally based Mick Rowan. The Offaly Street crew were there in the person of Teddy Kelly, Willie Moore and myself. I hadn’t seen or met Willie for many many years and he too had great memories and stories of times in Offaly Street and in the cauldron of learning we called the Christian Brothers School. While Willie travelled from Wexford, a lot of the lads living in and around Athy gave their support.
John Mealy and Jack Murphy who spent a substantial part of their working lives in Bradbury’s Bakeries were there swopping stories of their school days and both astonished me with the clarity of youthful memories culled from so many years back. Two of the great surprises of the reunion was tracing Christy Southwell and Eddie Wall, both of whom left Athy and their classmates long before the class began to break up as it did when our 14th birthday was reached. As it turned out Christy was located in the Curragh where he has lived ever since his time in the Army, while Eddie now lives in Luton, England. Another to travel from England for the occasion was Joe Gordan who was with us in primary school until his father left the Athy area. Joe’s father was a farm steward on Taylor’s farm on the Dublin Road and Joe who entered the Christian Brothers is now the Provincial of the English Province. Another to make the trip from England was Brendan Ward and he enlivened the weekends proceedings with his banter and lively personality.
I can still remember the morning Brother Brett walked into our classroom, leaned over my desk and shook the hand of Enda Dooley who was sitting behind me. “Congratulations on your father’s election to the Dail” he said to Enda. I think that was the first realisation I had that Enda’s father Paddy Dooley, Principal of Kilberry National School, was standing for the Dail, for in common with my classmates I had no interest in the affairs of State. Our lives centered in those far off days around football and the fairer sex. Enda travelled from County Longford for the reunion, as did George Robinson whom I have been privileged to meet on many occasions in the intervening years. Two men I hadn’t seen for years were Pat Timpson, formerly of St. Patrick’s Avenue and Kerry O’Sullivan, originally from Aughaboura. Kerry was another of our visitors from England, while Pat made the cross country trip from Sligo.
The longest journeys were made by Mick Robinson and Seamus Ryan who travelled from Australia and China respectively. Clearly they were delighted to meet old school pals such as Eddie Hearns, now living in Dublin, and the local lads including Eddie Ryan, Jack Carr, Peter Whelan and P.J. Hyland. Like myself they had not met Frankie Bradbury since we all left school. Frankie travelled from Kilkenny winning hands down the laurels for the fellow possessing the exilir of youth in greatest abundance. He looked more like a 25 year old than somebody who is entering his 7th decade.
Joe Brophy came from Dublin and entertained Paddy Lannigan and Brian Finn with stories of his days on the buses. Another visitor from England was John Prendergast whose father Charlie sadly died just a few weeks ago. Paddy Mulhall travelled from Kildare town, while P.J. Wall from Arles met up with Noel Scully, now one of Town Fathers and Michael O’Meara, now a publican in Dublin. John Roche, after spending his Army years in the bomb disposal unit, is well used to the pressures associated with his role in the local Credit Union, even if Frank English, another of our Town Fathers and Fintan Kinsella might claim, that after years in the Christian Brothers School we were all experienced in bomb disposal work.
The weekend reunion was a great experience for everyone involved, and no-one enjoyed it more than another of our weekend visitors, Brendan McKenna who swapped yarns with locals Jim Malone and Ted Wynne, Reggie Lalor and Jerry Carbery.
On Sunday afternoon a service of remembrance and commemoration was held in the local schoolyards where the names of 16 former classmates who had died were read aloud. Little did we know that another name would be added to those who had passed away before the reunion finished later that evening. Michael Cardiff was to attend the reunion but he was not able to do so as he was struck down by illness in some recent weeks. He died on Sunday afternoon, even as his former classmates gathered together for possibly the last time.
With his passing another thread in the tapestry of our youth had unravelled.
Thursday, September 12, 2002
Extract from Christian Brother Annals
I was reading through some notes from the Annals of the Christian Brothers in advance of the class reunion last weekend and what I found may be of interest to some readers. It was a short history compiled of the early years of the Christian Brothers in Athy which opened as follows :-
“On the ground now occupied by the Brothers’ house and schools, stood formerly a monastery of Crossed Friars, built about the year 1253, by Richard de St. Michael Lord of Rheban. It was granted in the 17th of Charles II to Dame Mary Meredith.
The present dwellinghouse was built upwards of 100 years previous to its being handed over to the Brothers. During the above time it passed into several hands, mostly Protestant, until at last it and the adjoining fields were purchased by His Grace, The Most Rev. Dr. Cullen Lord Archbishop of Dublin and Glendalough.
The whole concern containing about 12 acres, was handed over by His Lordship, the aforesaid Paul Cullen to the Very Rev. Andrew Quinn, P.P. Athy, and Canon of the Archdiocese of Dublin, who subsequently built two school-rooms by the aid of the parishioners and a few friends, but chiefly by the assistance of the generous and truly charitable Mr. Pat Maher of Kilrush in this county (Kildare), who principally at the suggestion of his eldest daughter, Mrs. Mary Teresa Maher, Superioress of the Convent of Mercy, St. Michael’s, Athy, gave £400.
When the Schools were finished in the August of 1861, three Brothers, viz - John Stanislaus Flanagan, director - Francis Luke Holland, sub-director - and John Patrick Sheehy, lay-brother, were sent by our Very Rev. Brother, Michael Paul O’Riordan, Superior General, to conduct the establishment, which was put into the possession of the Brothers on the 8th August 1861.”
The Annals, after making some references to the local Model School, continued :-
“The Brothers commenced the Schools on the 19th of August 1861 having some months previously obtained the consent and signature of the above Dr. A. Quinn to the following conditions :-
1. The Premises to be occupied by the Brothers to be put into proper repair, and furnished.
2. Two Schools to be built (each 36 feet by 26, with a lecture-room 10ft. wide between) on a site convenient to the House.
3. The Brothers to have the management of the Schools and to be allowed the observance of their Rules in the same manner as enjoyed by them in other places.
4. The School-pence paid by the children, to be at the disposal of the Brothers for the benefit of the Schools.
5. £30 a-year to be allowed each Brothers, this sum to be realised by subscriptions, collections, or sermon, as the Very Rev. Dr. Quinn may appoint.
6. The Brothers to be prepared to take charge of the Schools in the month of December, if necessary.
The part of the land not occupied by the Brothers is held by the Parish Priest who received the rent of it. The Brothers have nothing to do with the payment of taxes, etc. This being done by the Parish Priest.
Soon after the coming of the Brothers the above-mentioned Dr. Cullen, Archbishop said Mass in the Domestic Chapel, after which he blessed all the rooms and house. From that morning the Brothers have enjoyed the privilege of having the Blessed Sacrament in the house.
Shortly after the opening of the School it was found necessary to secure the services of a third School Brother. He was accordingly applied for by Dr. Cullen, who succeeded in obtaining him on the same condition as the three Brothers already mentioned. The salary of the fourth Brother (Hugh Francis Sweeney, novice) was procured for 2 years by the before-mentioned Mrs. M. T. Maher, from her father. Both Mrs. and Mr. Maher deserve the grateful remembrance of the Brothers.
The grounds about the dwellinghouse and schools continued in a very neglected state for about 3 months after the coming of the Brothers - then a few of the influential men of the town undertook to defray the expenses necessary to be incurred, and the place was rendered somewhat comfortable before the Brothers entered their Annual retreat before Christmas 1861.
The very necessary appendage of gas was introduced into the house in the beginning of January 1862 at an expense of £20, which sum was supplied by the benevolent Mr. P. Maher.
On the second Sunday of January this year, a Lending Library was opened for the benefit of the children and others who might wish to join it. Mr. Maher gave £5 for the purchase of books. For some months after it could only number 8 or 9 members.
According to the present arrangements the salary of the Brothers is procured by means of two collections every year, made at the doors of the Parish Church - one in February, the other in August. These collections are totally in the hands of the Parish Priest who, if they did not realise the required sum is bound to make up the residue as best he can.
On 31st July 1862 the Brothers held the first public examination of their pupils at which His Grace, The Most Rev. Paul Cullen presided. The examination was held in the room occupied by the junior pupils, the desks were removed, and a platform was erected at the lower end of the room on which the children stood while undergoing the examination. The visitors, who amounted to very near 300 persons, sat on chairs, or stood facing the children. The chairs, for the occasions were abundantly supplied by well-wishers in the town, who, moreover, sent as much carpeting as covered the whole floor and platform. The walls and window recesses were tastefully decorated with evergreen and flowers. There were present besides the Archbishop - the Very Rev. Canon Quinn P.P. of Athy; Rev. H. M. Manus, D.D., Rev. Thomas Doyle; Rev. Eugene Clarke, P.P., Narraghmore and many more. The examination commenced at 11 o’clock and continued until 3 o’clock during which time the audience displayed the greatest interest. At the conclusion the pupils presented the Archbishop with an address which was read by Master John Lawler.”
If ever you walk up St. John’s Lane past the entrance to what was the Christian Brothers Monastery you may notice that the crest about the doorway gives the year 1862. It was in 1911 that the high wall around the monastery similar to that which still encloses St. John’s Cemetery was lowered and a new entrance provided to the Monastery on which was surmounted the Christian Brothers’ crest with the date of the foundation of the Athy house. Clearly a mistake was made when 1862 was given as that date.
“On the ground now occupied by the Brothers’ house and schools, stood formerly a monastery of Crossed Friars, built about the year 1253, by Richard de St. Michael Lord of Rheban. It was granted in the 17th of Charles II to Dame Mary Meredith.
The present dwellinghouse was built upwards of 100 years previous to its being handed over to the Brothers. During the above time it passed into several hands, mostly Protestant, until at last it and the adjoining fields were purchased by His Grace, The Most Rev. Dr. Cullen Lord Archbishop of Dublin and Glendalough.
The whole concern containing about 12 acres, was handed over by His Lordship, the aforesaid Paul Cullen to the Very Rev. Andrew Quinn, P.P. Athy, and Canon of the Archdiocese of Dublin, who subsequently built two school-rooms by the aid of the parishioners and a few friends, but chiefly by the assistance of the generous and truly charitable Mr. Pat Maher of Kilrush in this county (Kildare), who principally at the suggestion of his eldest daughter, Mrs. Mary Teresa Maher, Superioress of the Convent of Mercy, St. Michael’s, Athy, gave £400.
When the Schools were finished in the August of 1861, three Brothers, viz - John Stanislaus Flanagan, director - Francis Luke Holland, sub-director - and John Patrick Sheehy, lay-brother, were sent by our Very Rev. Brother, Michael Paul O’Riordan, Superior General, to conduct the establishment, which was put into the possession of the Brothers on the 8th August 1861.”
The Annals, after making some references to the local Model School, continued :-
“The Brothers commenced the Schools on the 19th of August 1861 having some months previously obtained the consent and signature of the above Dr. A. Quinn to the following conditions :-
1. The Premises to be occupied by the Brothers to be put into proper repair, and furnished.
2. Two Schools to be built (each 36 feet by 26, with a lecture-room 10ft. wide between) on a site convenient to the House.
3. The Brothers to have the management of the Schools and to be allowed the observance of their Rules in the same manner as enjoyed by them in other places.
4. The School-pence paid by the children, to be at the disposal of the Brothers for the benefit of the Schools.
5. £30 a-year to be allowed each Brothers, this sum to be realised by subscriptions, collections, or sermon, as the Very Rev. Dr. Quinn may appoint.
6. The Brothers to be prepared to take charge of the Schools in the month of December, if necessary.
The part of the land not occupied by the Brothers is held by the Parish Priest who received the rent of it. The Brothers have nothing to do with the payment of taxes, etc. This being done by the Parish Priest.
Soon after the coming of the Brothers the above-mentioned Dr. Cullen, Archbishop said Mass in the Domestic Chapel, after which he blessed all the rooms and house. From that morning the Brothers have enjoyed the privilege of having the Blessed Sacrament in the house.
Shortly after the opening of the School it was found necessary to secure the services of a third School Brother. He was accordingly applied for by Dr. Cullen, who succeeded in obtaining him on the same condition as the three Brothers already mentioned. The salary of the fourth Brother (Hugh Francis Sweeney, novice) was procured for 2 years by the before-mentioned Mrs. M. T. Maher, from her father. Both Mrs. and Mr. Maher deserve the grateful remembrance of the Brothers.
The grounds about the dwellinghouse and schools continued in a very neglected state for about 3 months after the coming of the Brothers - then a few of the influential men of the town undertook to defray the expenses necessary to be incurred, and the place was rendered somewhat comfortable before the Brothers entered their Annual retreat before Christmas 1861.
The very necessary appendage of gas was introduced into the house in the beginning of January 1862 at an expense of £20, which sum was supplied by the benevolent Mr. P. Maher.
On the second Sunday of January this year, a Lending Library was opened for the benefit of the children and others who might wish to join it. Mr. Maher gave £5 for the purchase of books. For some months after it could only number 8 or 9 members.
According to the present arrangements the salary of the Brothers is procured by means of two collections every year, made at the doors of the Parish Church - one in February, the other in August. These collections are totally in the hands of the Parish Priest who, if they did not realise the required sum is bound to make up the residue as best he can.
On 31st July 1862 the Brothers held the first public examination of their pupils at which His Grace, The Most Rev. Paul Cullen presided. The examination was held in the room occupied by the junior pupils, the desks were removed, and a platform was erected at the lower end of the room on which the children stood while undergoing the examination. The visitors, who amounted to very near 300 persons, sat on chairs, or stood facing the children. The chairs, for the occasions were abundantly supplied by well-wishers in the town, who, moreover, sent as much carpeting as covered the whole floor and platform. The walls and window recesses were tastefully decorated with evergreen and flowers. There were present besides the Archbishop - the Very Rev. Canon Quinn P.P. of Athy; Rev. H. M. Manus, D.D., Rev. Thomas Doyle; Rev. Eugene Clarke, P.P., Narraghmore and many more. The examination commenced at 11 o’clock and continued until 3 o’clock during which time the audience displayed the greatest interest. At the conclusion the pupils presented the Archbishop with an address which was read by Master John Lawler.”
If ever you walk up St. John’s Lane past the entrance to what was the Christian Brothers Monastery you may notice that the crest about the doorway gives the year 1862. It was in 1911 that the high wall around the monastery similar to that which still encloses St. John’s Cemetery was lowered and a new entrance provided to the Monastery on which was surmounted the Christian Brothers’ crest with the date of the foundation of the Athy house. Clearly a mistake was made when 1862 was given as that date.
Thursday, September 5, 2002
C.B.S. Class Re-union
Michael Robinson will set out from Brisbane Australia this Wednesday morning to travel to Athy. Seamus Ryan will commence his journey in Beijing, China. His destination, like Michael’s, will be Athy. Jimmy Malone will travel from California, while Joe Gordon makes the comparatively short trip from Manchester. All are travelling back to the town where some or all of their schooldays were spent during the 1950’s and earlier. The occasion is a class re-union for men, many of whom started school as four year olds in St. Joseph’s Boy’s School where they were taught by Sisters of Mercy, Bernadette, Brendan and Alberta in the years immediately following the Second World War. Transferring to the Christian Brothers Primary School in St. John’s Lane in or about 1949 they were taught over the following five years by a succession of Christian Brothers and one lay teacher. From that period Christian Brothers O’Loughran, Flaherty and Smith are recalled as well as Bob Martin, a lay teacher who later took up the principalship of Ballyroe National School.
Classes and colleagues changed over the years. Some youngsters skipped classes, others stayed back for an extra year, but eventually most of them passed the hurdle which was the Primary Certificate Examination taken in the Sixth Class. Class numbers were by today’s standards quite large. The Second Class rollbook for 1950 shows 57 youngsters, while the Third Year Class had 62 young, if not so eager, students. In the early 1950’s sickness exacted its toll amongst the frail youngsters and the untimely deaths of Paddy Dowling, George Ryan and Myles Cash were a sad blow to their classmates.
Many of those who sat the Primary Certificate Examination passed on into secondary school. Others however went out into the world of work on reaching 14 years of age. Family circumstances often dictated that a young fellow’s academic career had to be curtailed to ensure a family’s survival during the harsh economic climate of the 1950’s. Not that many of those who left school at 14 and sometimes even younger objected to being taken from school. Given the opportunity, most of us would have followed the same route. After all, the prospect of earning a few shillings as a messenger boy or working with a local farmer sounded far more exciting than spending the daylight hours stuck in the classroom. The 1950’s were difficult times for most local families. Jobs were scarce in the town and such employment as was available required a young man to work in unhealthy conditions which over time would damage health and shorten life expectancy. For many, even such grim employment prospects were limited and the mail boat journey to Holyhead was as familiar to many Athy men and women as the train journey to Dublin is to present day locals.
As those with whom we started school in 1946/1947 left the educational system others remained on in secondary school. We had no choice in the matter, for if we had, the school yard would soon have been but a memory. In any event we stayed on in secondary school, each morning making the trip up St. John’s Lane and climbing the metal stairs to the school rooms on the first floor. The upper story of the school building consisted of three rooms, one of which in time was divided by a curtain to make an extra room. The teachers were Brother Brett, who was the headmaster, and Brother Keogh, with lay teachers Bill Ryan and Paddy Riordan. All but Riordan were there for the entire period my classmates spent in secondary school up to 1960.
In the third year of secondary school you sat your Intermediate Certificate Examination and it was the common practice in the 1950’s to repeat your Inter Cert. I know I did, as did some of my classmates. During the first three years of secondary school there was a steady stream of students leaving to take up employment. This exodus became an avalanche after the Inter Certificate and following years classes had but a sixth of the number which had started school 12 years previously in St. Joseph’s at Rathstewart. In the meantime of course many young lads joined the class from outlying country areas but while they swelled the class numbers in first and second year, they seldom stayed for the full six years of secondary school.
The final hurdle was the Leaving Certificate Examination of 1960 and the class size that year was the largest ever known in the Christian Brothers School. It was all of eleven students and compares with this years Leaving Certificate class of 64 students. Coming after previous Leaving Certificate classes where there had been three or four students and a single student on at least one previous occasion, a class of eleven was a significant improvement.
I was talking yesterday to a pupil from this years Leaving Certificate class, and marveled to hear that most of the students will attend university or some form of third level education. From the class of 1960 only one student had the opportunity to go to university on a full time basis and that was at a time when the only restriction on entry to university was your parents ability to pay the university fees. Times certainly have changed and nowhere is that better demonstrated than in the opportunities for further education now available for present day students.
All of the above is by way of background explanation to the travails of those one time youngsters now in their 60th year or thereabouts who will come together this weekend for the first time since they left school. For some it will be the first time to meet for over 40 years or more. On Friday evening the Leinster Arms Hotel will host the gathering of past pupils where the years will be wound back, memories dusted down and friendships renewed. On Saturday afternoon a civic reception in the Town Council offices will be followed by a further reception in Scoil Eoin. Later that evening the former pupils and their partners will sit down to dinner with a number of invited guests at Kilkea Golf Club Restaurant. On the last day of the weekend reunion a service of remembrance and commemoration will take place in the yard of the old school in St. John’s Lane and will be followed by a tree planting ceremony in Edmund Rice Square and a going away reception.
In conjunction with the class reunion a photographic exhibition will be held in the Heritage Centre which will be of particular interest to anyone who remembers the people or the events of Athy of the 1950’s.
Classes and colleagues changed over the years. Some youngsters skipped classes, others stayed back for an extra year, but eventually most of them passed the hurdle which was the Primary Certificate Examination taken in the Sixth Class. Class numbers were by today’s standards quite large. The Second Class rollbook for 1950 shows 57 youngsters, while the Third Year Class had 62 young, if not so eager, students. In the early 1950’s sickness exacted its toll amongst the frail youngsters and the untimely deaths of Paddy Dowling, George Ryan and Myles Cash were a sad blow to their classmates.
Many of those who sat the Primary Certificate Examination passed on into secondary school. Others however went out into the world of work on reaching 14 years of age. Family circumstances often dictated that a young fellow’s academic career had to be curtailed to ensure a family’s survival during the harsh economic climate of the 1950’s. Not that many of those who left school at 14 and sometimes even younger objected to being taken from school. Given the opportunity, most of us would have followed the same route. After all, the prospect of earning a few shillings as a messenger boy or working with a local farmer sounded far more exciting than spending the daylight hours stuck in the classroom. The 1950’s were difficult times for most local families. Jobs were scarce in the town and such employment as was available required a young man to work in unhealthy conditions which over time would damage health and shorten life expectancy. For many, even such grim employment prospects were limited and the mail boat journey to Holyhead was as familiar to many Athy men and women as the train journey to Dublin is to present day locals.
As those with whom we started school in 1946/1947 left the educational system others remained on in secondary school. We had no choice in the matter, for if we had, the school yard would soon have been but a memory. In any event we stayed on in secondary school, each morning making the trip up St. John’s Lane and climbing the metal stairs to the school rooms on the first floor. The upper story of the school building consisted of three rooms, one of which in time was divided by a curtain to make an extra room. The teachers were Brother Brett, who was the headmaster, and Brother Keogh, with lay teachers Bill Ryan and Paddy Riordan. All but Riordan were there for the entire period my classmates spent in secondary school up to 1960.
In the third year of secondary school you sat your Intermediate Certificate Examination and it was the common practice in the 1950’s to repeat your Inter Cert. I know I did, as did some of my classmates. During the first three years of secondary school there was a steady stream of students leaving to take up employment. This exodus became an avalanche after the Inter Certificate and following years classes had but a sixth of the number which had started school 12 years previously in St. Joseph’s at Rathstewart. In the meantime of course many young lads joined the class from outlying country areas but while they swelled the class numbers in first and second year, they seldom stayed for the full six years of secondary school.
The final hurdle was the Leaving Certificate Examination of 1960 and the class size that year was the largest ever known in the Christian Brothers School. It was all of eleven students and compares with this years Leaving Certificate class of 64 students. Coming after previous Leaving Certificate classes where there had been three or four students and a single student on at least one previous occasion, a class of eleven was a significant improvement.
I was talking yesterday to a pupil from this years Leaving Certificate class, and marveled to hear that most of the students will attend university or some form of third level education. From the class of 1960 only one student had the opportunity to go to university on a full time basis and that was at a time when the only restriction on entry to university was your parents ability to pay the university fees. Times certainly have changed and nowhere is that better demonstrated than in the opportunities for further education now available for present day students.
All of the above is by way of background explanation to the travails of those one time youngsters now in their 60th year or thereabouts who will come together this weekend for the first time since they left school. For some it will be the first time to meet for over 40 years or more. On Friday evening the Leinster Arms Hotel will host the gathering of past pupils where the years will be wound back, memories dusted down and friendships renewed. On Saturday afternoon a civic reception in the Town Council offices will be followed by a further reception in Scoil Eoin. Later that evening the former pupils and their partners will sit down to dinner with a number of invited guests at Kilkea Golf Club Restaurant. On the last day of the weekend reunion a service of remembrance and commemoration will take place in the yard of the old school in St. John’s Lane and will be followed by a tree planting ceremony in Edmund Rice Square and a going away reception.
In conjunction with the class reunion a photographic exhibition will be held in the Heritage Centre which will be of particular interest to anyone who remembers the people or the events of Athy of the 1950’s.
Thursday, August 29, 2002
Athy U.D.C. Now Athy Town Council
The change was made imperceptibly and without fuss or fanfare. It wasn’t just a change of name but it was the name change highlighted on headed notepaper received in correspondence some days later which alerted me to what had happened. It was the first time that illustrious body had changed its name since it was set up in 1898, but even then it had been superimposed on an institution with a history stretching back to the 16th century.
I am referring to Athy Town Council which up to December 31st last was known as Athy Urban District Council but which at midnight that night changed its name. The links with the 16th century are very real as it was Henry VIII, who so far as we can ascertain, granted the first charter to the village of Athy, thereby constituting it a borough. There is the possibility that a previous charter had been in place but research to date has not unearthed any evidence of it.
The charter of 1515 was granted by the English King to the village founded by Anglo Norman’s in the 12th century and peopled by settlers from the English mainland. It established the office of Town Provost, who had overall charge of the town’s affairs and who was elected each year by the Burgesses of the town on the Feast of St. Michael. His modern equivalent would be town Mayor. However, Mayors today share power and authority with administrators and consequently wield less power than their medieval predecessors.
In addition to the Office of Town Provost, Henry VIII’s charter established a borough council comprised of 12 burgesses who were to be elected by the freemen of the village of Athy. In time the appointment of the burgesses of the town was exercised by the head of the House of Leinster, by what authority, if any, we cannot say. The Earl of Kildare whose successor was later to be elevated to the Dukedom of Leinster thereafter nominated his own friends as burgesses of the market town. This situation continued even when the new Charter granted to Athy in 1613 under which a town Sovereign was elected each year to take charge of the town’s affairs. The Borough Council continued in place with powers similar to those provided under the earlier charter.
Athy Borough Council, an unelected body, consisting of members who were by and large non-residents of the town with no apparent proprietary interest in south Kildare continued in existence until the passing of the Municipal Corporations Act, 1840. Up to 1800 Athy Borough Council returned two Members of Parliament to the House of Commons. It was not however active in improving the infrastructure of a town whose population had increased to almost 5,000 by the early decades of the 19th century. The undemocratic nature of the Borough Councils such as Athy and their failure to make proper provision for the development of urban areas signaled the need for the reform of Local Government in Ireland. This culminated in the Municipal Corporations Act, 1840 when a large number of Borough Councils, including Athy, were abolished.
For a short time Athy was without any form of municipal government but in the mid 1840’s the people of the town petitioned the Dublin authorities for Athy to be granted Town Commission status. When granted it lead to the first municipal elections for public representatives on the new body which was named Athy Town Commission. The previous office of Town Sovereign which had replaced the earlier Town Provost was itself replaced by the Office of Chairman of the Town Commissioners. The Commissioners who were elected at regular intervals thereafter set about their task of improving the paving, lighting and cleaning of the streets of the town. With the limited powers available to them the Commissioners continued to develop the towns facilities over the following 60 years. The passing of the Local Government Act, 1898 put County Local Government on a representative basis and at the same time gave Town Commissioners the right to be reconstituted as Urban District Councils.
On 14th November of that year Athy Town Commissioners agreed to submit a petition to the Local Government Board to separate the town of Athy from the rural district and to constitute it an urban district. For some unexplained reason the petition was not submitted and a further petition agreed by the Town Commissioners in February 1899 was sent forward following which a public enquiry was held in the town hall. As a result of this enquiry Athy was constituted an Urban District Council with effect from 1st April, 1900. This was the third time in the form of local government for the town was changed since Henry VIII’s charter of 1515. It would not be the last.
The next 100 years witnessed the most active period in the development of public services in the town under the mandate of the Urban District Council. The Slum Clearance Programme of the 1930’s initiated under the housing programmes of the first De Valera led government together with the provision of a piped water supply system in the second decade of the 20th century were the highlights of the Council’s successes over the years. During the periods when the town was governed by a Borough Council, Town Commissioner or Urban District Council, the chief administrator of the town was the Town Clerk. Initially a part-time job it later required the services of a full-time official who was based in the municipal offices in the Town Hall. The Clerk of the Urban District Council was appointed by the members of the Council on the recommendation of the Local Appointments Commission and as such was an officer of the Council. However, under recent changes in the Local Government structure the recruitment of personnel for the town of Athy is now centralised to Kildare County Council and the Town Clerk of Athy is employed directly by that Council. Athy Urban District Council has also had its title changed to Athy Town Council.
As successors to the Borough Council, the Town Commissioners and the Urban District Council, Athy Town Council continues to serve the local people, even if the changes heralded with the change of name confirm that the roles of town councils are to be reduced in the drive to centralise Local Government in this country.
The photo exhibition presently in the Heritage Centre is to be augmented for the Christian Brothers Class Re-union scheduled for the weekend of 20th September. Photographs relating to Athy and school groups during the 1940’s and later will be on display. The Heritage Centre would like to hear from anyone who has any photographs which could be lent for the period of the exhibition. All photographs will be returned to the owners at the end of September when the exhibition closes. If you have any suitable material for display please contact Margaret O’Riordan at (0507) 33075.
I am referring to Athy Town Council which up to December 31st last was known as Athy Urban District Council but which at midnight that night changed its name. The links with the 16th century are very real as it was Henry VIII, who so far as we can ascertain, granted the first charter to the village of Athy, thereby constituting it a borough. There is the possibility that a previous charter had been in place but research to date has not unearthed any evidence of it.
The charter of 1515 was granted by the English King to the village founded by Anglo Norman’s in the 12th century and peopled by settlers from the English mainland. It established the office of Town Provost, who had overall charge of the town’s affairs and who was elected each year by the Burgesses of the town on the Feast of St. Michael. His modern equivalent would be town Mayor. However, Mayors today share power and authority with administrators and consequently wield less power than their medieval predecessors.
In addition to the Office of Town Provost, Henry VIII’s charter established a borough council comprised of 12 burgesses who were to be elected by the freemen of the village of Athy. In time the appointment of the burgesses of the town was exercised by the head of the House of Leinster, by what authority, if any, we cannot say. The Earl of Kildare whose successor was later to be elevated to the Dukedom of Leinster thereafter nominated his own friends as burgesses of the market town. This situation continued even when the new Charter granted to Athy in 1613 under which a town Sovereign was elected each year to take charge of the town’s affairs. The Borough Council continued in place with powers similar to those provided under the earlier charter.
Athy Borough Council, an unelected body, consisting of members who were by and large non-residents of the town with no apparent proprietary interest in south Kildare continued in existence until the passing of the Municipal Corporations Act, 1840. Up to 1800 Athy Borough Council returned two Members of Parliament to the House of Commons. It was not however active in improving the infrastructure of a town whose population had increased to almost 5,000 by the early decades of the 19th century. The undemocratic nature of the Borough Councils such as Athy and their failure to make proper provision for the development of urban areas signaled the need for the reform of Local Government in Ireland. This culminated in the Municipal Corporations Act, 1840 when a large number of Borough Councils, including Athy, were abolished.
For a short time Athy was without any form of municipal government but in the mid 1840’s the people of the town petitioned the Dublin authorities for Athy to be granted Town Commission status. When granted it lead to the first municipal elections for public representatives on the new body which was named Athy Town Commission. The previous office of Town Sovereign which had replaced the earlier Town Provost was itself replaced by the Office of Chairman of the Town Commissioners. The Commissioners who were elected at regular intervals thereafter set about their task of improving the paving, lighting and cleaning of the streets of the town. With the limited powers available to them the Commissioners continued to develop the towns facilities over the following 60 years. The passing of the Local Government Act, 1898 put County Local Government on a representative basis and at the same time gave Town Commissioners the right to be reconstituted as Urban District Councils.
On 14th November of that year Athy Town Commissioners agreed to submit a petition to the Local Government Board to separate the town of Athy from the rural district and to constitute it an urban district. For some unexplained reason the petition was not submitted and a further petition agreed by the Town Commissioners in February 1899 was sent forward following which a public enquiry was held in the town hall. As a result of this enquiry Athy was constituted an Urban District Council with effect from 1st April, 1900. This was the third time in the form of local government for the town was changed since Henry VIII’s charter of 1515. It would not be the last.
The next 100 years witnessed the most active period in the development of public services in the town under the mandate of the Urban District Council. The Slum Clearance Programme of the 1930’s initiated under the housing programmes of the first De Valera led government together with the provision of a piped water supply system in the second decade of the 20th century were the highlights of the Council’s successes over the years. During the periods when the town was governed by a Borough Council, Town Commissioner or Urban District Council, the chief administrator of the town was the Town Clerk. Initially a part-time job it later required the services of a full-time official who was based in the municipal offices in the Town Hall. The Clerk of the Urban District Council was appointed by the members of the Council on the recommendation of the Local Appointments Commission and as such was an officer of the Council. However, under recent changes in the Local Government structure the recruitment of personnel for the town of Athy is now centralised to Kildare County Council and the Town Clerk of Athy is employed directly by that Council. Athy Urban District Council has also had its title changed to Athy Town Council.
As successors to the Borough Council, the Town Commissioners and the Urban District Council, Athy Town Council continues to serve the local people, even if the changes heralded with the change of name confirm that the roles of town councils are to be reduced in the drive to centralise Local Government in this country.
The photo exhibition presently in the Heritage Centre is to be augmented for the Christian Brothers Class Re-union scheduled for the weekend of 20th September. Photographs relating to Athy and school groups during the 1940’s and later will be on display. The Heritage Centre would like to hear from anyone who has any photographs which could be lent for the period of the exhibition. All photographs will be returned to the owners at the end of September when the exhibition closes. If you have any suitable material for display please contact Margaret O’Riordan at (0507) 33075.
Thursday, August 22, 2002
Pamela - Lady Fitzgerald
Thames Ditton. A strange name isn’t it? It was my latest port of call in the continuing quest for links with the history of Athy. I arrived in Thames Ditton after a long and somewhat bewildering drive through the spaghetti-like streets which criss-crossed London’s suburbia before exiting into the countryside around Hampton Court Palace. This one time home to Wolsey and King Henry VIII is but a few miles from Thames Ditton to where I travelled to locate the grave of Pamela, wife of Lord Edward Fitzgerald.
Every Irish schoolboy has heard of Lord Edward Fitzgerald. There is almost a Che Cuevara quality to the aristocrat who turned his back on privilege and status to align himself with the revolutionaries of 1798. Lord Edward represented the borough of Athy as a Member of Parliament on the nomination of his brother William the 2nd Duke of Leinster in 1783. Incidentally William Duke of Leinster is the man whose name is recalled in the principal street names of our town which are named William Street, Duke Street and Leinster Street in his honour. Lord Edward who was a younger brother of the Duke was himself well known in the town of Athy having succeeded to a family estate at Kilrush. He also stayed on a few occasions at Leinster Lodge on the outskirts of the town. Lord Edward Fitzgerald was and remains to this day not only an important name in Irish history but also important and relevant in the history of Athy.
In 1792 he married the 19 year old Pamela who is believed to have been the illegitimate daughter of the Duke of Orleans by Madam de Genlies, a French Countess. Lord Edward and Pamela had three children, a son called Edward and two daughters, Pamela and Lucy. They lived for a time in France and in the years immediately prior to the 1798 Rebellion at Kildare Lodge, Kildare town and also for different periods at Leinster House, Dublin, Castletown and Carton. In April 1798 Lord Edward was appointed Lieutenant General and Commander and Chief of the United Irishmen. This followed the arrest of most of the Leinster Directory of the United Irishmen in Oliver Bond’s house in Dublin the previous month. Lord Edward went into hiding using a number of different houses including that of James Moore, a merchant of 119 Thomas Street, Dublin. Moore’s wife was a native of Athy and their house was used for at least one meeting between Lord Edward and a number of United Irishmen from the town of Athy shortly before the planned uprising. Lord Edward escaped arrest while passing from Thomas Street to Usher’s Quay with his body guards on the night of 17th May but within two days his fate was decided. He had earlier moved from Moore’s house to 153 Thomas Street and was in bed after dinner when Major Sirr accompanied by a number of soldiers entered his bedroom. In the ensuing struggle Fitzgerald was wounded and he was to die of his wounds while in prison on 4th June.
Lady Pamela Fitzgerald and her three children were forced to flee the country and following the attainder of the Fitzgerald estates by the Crown his family was effectively pauperised. Now commenced an unsettling and unhappy period for Lady Pamela which would last for most of her remaining life. She arrived at Thames Ditton where Lord Edward’s brother, Lord Henry Fitzgerald and his sister Lady Sophia Fitzgerald were living. Lady Pamela’s third child Lucy was but one month old at the time. Suspected of involvement with the United Irishmen Pamela was not allowed to stay in England and she left for Hamburg leaving her youngest child with Lady Sophie Fitzgerald and her only son with the Duchess of Leinster. With her on the journey to Hamburg she took her second child and namesake Pamela. Within two years Lady Pamela married John Pitcairn, the American Counsel in Hamburg. The marriage was an unhappy one and while she had another son and daughter her husband refused to pay for the education of Lord Edward’s eldest daughter Pamela, claiming that it was the responsibility of the Fitzgerald family. Disillusioned Lady Pamela and her young daughter left for France where she hoped to petition Napoleon for a pension but her husband on hearing of this refused to allow her to return to Hamburg.
After spending some time in Vienna Lady Pamela Fitzgerald returned to France where she would spend the rest of her life. Following the banishment of Napoleon to Elba in 1814 Louis XIV, brother of the guillotined King of France was crowned King and the Duke of Orleans arranged for a pension to be paid to Lord Edward’s widow. Her last years were more comfortable than those which had gone before but she suffered the loss of her youngest daughter Lucy who died in 1826. Lady Pamela herself died in 1834 aged 58 years while staying at the Hotel de Danube in Paris.
In November 1857 Richard Madden, author of “United Irishmen Their Lives and Times” visited Montmatre Cemetery in Paris to trace the last resting place of Lady Pamela Fitzgerald. After a long search her headstone was found. It consisted of a slab of white marble with an inscription, inserted into a headstone which had sunk below the level of the adjoining graves. Madden arranged for it to be raised to its original height, the inscription re-cut and the headstone otherwise repaired. In 1880 J.P. Leonard, an Irishman living in Paris contacted Pamela Fitzgerald’s grandson who was living in Thames Ditton to alert him to a proposal to build a road through the Montmatre Cemetery. The remains of Lord Edward Fitzgerald’s widow were exhumed and transferred to England where they were re-interred in the Churchyard of Thames Ditton Parish Church. A marble slab inset into the headstone at Thames Ditton reads “Lady Edward Fitzgerald’s remains were removed from Paris by J.P. Leonard Esq. and interred here the 21st of August, 1880 by her grandchildren. The above stone was on her tomb at Montmatre Cemetery and was broken by the bursting of a shell during the siege of 1870.”
Before visiting Lady Pamela’s grave I was lead to believe that a local lady tended the grave with red, white and blue flowers, the colour of the French tricolour. On the warm sunny day I stood at her graveside there was no evidence of any flowers. The grave, like its neighbours, was devoid of any floral decoration but was otherwise neat and tidy.
Lady Fitzgerald’s daughter Pamela who was married to Sir Guy Campbell and lived in Thames Ditton until her death in 1869 is buried beside her mother. Her other daughter Lucy who married Captain George Lyon and who also lived in Thames Ditton where she died in 1826 is buried in the same cemetery. Lucy was remembered for her charitable works among the poor in Thames Ditton and for founding a local school in which she taught for a time.
The tombstone over Lady Pamela Fitzgerald’s grave at Thames Ditton incorporating part of the damaged tombstone which stood over her first resting place in Montmatre Cemetery Parish is the only visible reminder of the woman who shared her life with the aristocratic and revolutionary Member of Parliament for Athy, Lord Edward Fitzgerald.
In last weeks article I gave details of the web page for the CBS Class Reunion in September. Unfortunately the information given was incorrect. The correct web page is www.rawlinsons.com.au/reunion.
Every Irish schoolboy has heard of Lord Edward Fitzgerald. There is almost a Che Cuevara quality to the aristocrat who turned his back on privilege and status to align himself with the revolutionaries of 1798. Lord Edward represented the borough of Athy as a Member of Parliament on the nomination of his brother William the 2nd Duke of Leinster in 1783. Incidentally William Duke of Leinster is the man whose name is recalled in the principal street names of our town which are named William Street, Duke Street and Leinster Street in his honour. Lord Edward who was a younger brother of the Duke was himself well known in the town of Athy having succeeded to a family estate at Kilrush. He also stayed on a few occasions at Leinster Lodge on the outskirts of the town. Lord Edward Fitzgerald was and remains to this day not only an important name in Irish history but also important and relevant in the history of Athy.
In 1792 he married the 19 year old Pamela who is believed to have been the illegitimate daughter of the Duke of Orleans by Madam de Genlies, a French Countess. Lord Edward and Pamela had three children, a son called Edward and two daughters, Pamela and Lucy. They lived for a time in France and in the years immediately prior to the 1798 Rebellion at Kildare Lodge, Kildare town and also for different periods at Leinster House, Dublin, Castletown and Carton. In April 1798 Lord Edward was appointed Lieutenant General and Commander and Chief of the United Irishmen. This followed the arrest of most of the Leinster Directory of the United Irishmen in Oliver Bond’s house in Dublin the previous month. Lord Edward went into hiding using a number of different houses including that of James Moore, a merchant of 119 Thomas Street, Dublin. Moore’s wife was a native of Athy and their house was used for at least one meeting between Lord Edward and a number of United Irishmen from the town of Athy shortly before the planned uprising. Lord Edward escaped arrest while passing from Thomas Street to Usher’s Quay with his body guards on the night of 17th May but within two days his fate was decided. He had earlier moved from Moore’s house to 153 Thomas Street and was in bed after dinner when Major Sirr accompanied by a number of soldiers entered his bedroom. In the ensuing struggle Fitzgerald was wounded and he was to die of his wounds while in prison on 4th June.
Lady Pamela Fitzgerald and her three children were forced to flee the country and following the attainder of the Fitzgerald estates by the Crown his family was effectively pauperised. Now commenced an unsettling and unhappy period for Lady Pamela which would last for most of her remaining life. She arrived at Thames Ditton where Lord Edward’s brother, Lord Henry Fitzgerald and his sister Lady Sophia Fitzgerald were living. Lady Pamela’s third child Lucy was but one month old at the time. Suspected of involvement with the United Irishmen Pamela was not allowed to stay in England and she left for Hamburg leaving her youngest child with Lady Sophie Fitzgerald and her only son with the Duchess of Leinster. With her on the journey to Hamburg she took her second child and namesake Pamela. Within two years Lady Pamela married John Pitcairn, the American Counsel in Hamburg. The marriage was an unhappy one and while she had another son and daughter her husband refused to pay for the education of Lord Edward’s eldest daughter Pamela, claiming that it was the responsibility of the Fitzgerald family. Disillusioned Lady Pamela and her young daughter left for France where she hoped to petition Napoleon for a pension but her husband on hearing of this refused to allow her to return to Hamburg.
After spending some time in Vienna Lady Pamela Fitzgerald returned to France where she would spend the rest of her life. Following the banishment of Napoleon to Elba in 1814 Louis XIV, brother of the guillotined King of France was crowned King and the Duke of Orleans arranged for a pension to be paid to Lord Edward’s widow. Her last years were more comfortable than those which had gone before but she suffered the loss of her youngest daughter Lucy who died in 1826. Lady Pamela herself died in 1834 aged 58 years while staying at the Hotel de Danube in Paris.
In November 1857 Richard Madden, author of “United Irishmen Their Lives and Times” visited Montmatre Cemetery in Paris to trace the last resting place of Lady Pamela Fitzgerald. After a long search her headstone was found. It consisted of a slab of white marble with an inscription, inserted into a headstone which had sunk below the level of the adjoining graves. Madden arranged for it to be raised to its original height, the inscription re-cut and the headstone otherwise repaired. In 1880 J.P. Leonard, an Irishman living in Paris contacted Pamela Fitzgerald’s grandson who was living in Thames Ditton to alert him to a proposal to build a road through the Montmatre Cemetery. The remains of Lord Edward Fitzgerald’s widow were exhumed and transferred to England where they were re-interred in the Churchyard of Thames Ditton Parish Church. A marble slab inset into the headstone at Thames Ditton reads “Lady Edward Fitzgerald’s remains were removed from Paris by J.P. Leonard Esq. and interred here the 21st of August, 1880 by her grandchildren. The above stone was on her tomb at Montmatre Cemetery and was broken by the bursting of a shell during the siege of 1870.”
Before visiting Lady Pamela’s grave I was lead to believe that a local lady tended the grave with red, white and blue flowers, the colour of the French tricolour. On the warm sunny day I stood at her graveside there was no evidence of any flowers. The grave, like its neighbours, was devoid of any floral decoration but was otherwise neat and tidy.
Lady Fitzgerald’s daughter Pamela who was married to Sir Guy Campbell and lived in Thames Ditton until her death in 1869 is buried beside her mother. Her other daughter Lucy who married Captain George Lyon and who also lived in Thames Ditton where she died in 1826 is buried in the same cemetery. Lucy was remembered for her charitable works among the poor in Thames Ditton and for founding a local school in which she taught for a time.
The tombstone over Lady Pamela Fitzgerald’s grave at Thames Ditton incorporating part of the damaged tombstone which stood over her first resting place in Montmatre Cemetery Parish is the only visible reminder of the woman who shared her life with the aristocratic and revolutionary Member of Parliament for Athy, Lord Edward Fitzgerald.
In last weeks article I gave details of the web page for the CBS Class Reunion in September. Unfortunately the information given was incorrect. The correct web page is www.rawlinsons.com.au/reunion.
Thursday, August 15, 2002
School Photograph - Independent House 1959
This week I am on holidays so Eye on the Past is largely comprised of what one man’s eyes saw through the lens of his camera in 1959. The occasion was a visit to Independent House in Middle Abbey Street in Dublin, home of the Independent group of newspapers by senior classes of the Christian Brothers School Athy. The one teacher I can recognise in the photograph was the then principal of the school, Brother Brett. The lay teacher standing at the back of the group I do not know, nor can I recognise him from the caption to the photograph when it appeared in the Irish Independent of 43 years ago. There he is identified as Mr. C. Buckley.
I believe the photograph is of pupils from the 5th year class as well as possibly the 2nd and 3rd year classes in the old Christian Brothers School in St. John’s Lane. The original photograph which was kindly lent to me by Ted Wynne has a note appended which gave the date of the visit as 1960. I think however since that was the year we sat our Leaving Certificate examination that it is more likely to have taken place the previous year when we were free of exam pressures. I am open to correction on this however and look forward to hearing from anyone who can identify some or all of the youngsters pictured in the photograph.
Many of those young fellows now approaching pension age will be coming to the class reunion scheduled for the weekend of 20th to 22nd September 2002. The latest bookings confirm that former classmates will be travelling from Australia, America, Canada, China and England to renew acquaintances with many they have not seen for over 40 years.
Details of the programme for the class reunion weekend are on the net at www.rawlinsons.com.au. If you know of anyone who was at school at anytime with the likes of Billy Browne, Teddy Kelly or Enda Dooley contact them and let them know of the upcoming reunion.
In the meantime let me have the names of those captured in this weeks photograph. Again, as with the previous class photograph, a book prize will be offered to the first person coming up with the names of the youngsters photographed on the roof of the Independent House in 1959 or was it 1960?
I believe the photograph is of pupils from the 5th year class as well as possibly the 2nd and 3rd year classes in the old Christian Brothers School in St. John’s Lane. The original photograph which was kindly lent to me by Ted Wynne has a note appended which gave the date of the visit as 1960. I think however since that was the year we sat our Leaving Certificate examination that it is more likely to have taken place the previous year when we were free of exam pressures. I am open to correction on this however and look forward to hearing from anyone who can identify some or all of the youngsters pictured in the photograph.
Many of those young fellows now approaching pension age will be coming to the class reunion scheduled for the weekend of 20th to 22nd September 2002. The latest bookings confirm that former classmates will be travelling from Australia, America, Canada, China and England to renew acquaintances with many they have not seen for over 40 years.
Details of the programme for the class reunion weekend are on the net at www.rawlinsons.com.au. If you know of anyone who was at school at anytime with the likes of Billy Browne, Teddy Kelly or Enda Dooley contact them and let them know of the upcoming reunion.
In the meantime let me have the names of those captured in this weeks photograph. Again, as with the previous class photograph, a book prize will be offered to the first person coming up with the names of the youngsters photographed on the roof of the Independent House in 1959 or was it 1960?
Thursday, August 8, 2002
Visit to Dun Chaoin / Blasket Islands / Annascaul, Co. Kerry
I was in County Kerry last week on a weekend trip organised by the local Heritage Centre, the main purpose of which was to meet members of the Tom Crean Society in Annascaul. Tom Crean you will recall was a colleague of Ernest Shackleton, the Antarctic explorer whose exploits are featured in an exhibition in Athy’s Heritage Centre. Annascaul was the birth place of Tom Crean and the place to where he returned when he retired from the Royal Navy in 1920. It was in the South Pole Inn in Annascaul, Co. Kerry that the Athy visitors met the Tom Crean Society members. It was an appropriate meeting place, given its association with Crean who was landlord of the Inn following his retirement until his death in 1938.
On Friday night Brendan Grunewald, originally from South Africa but now living in Belgium, gave a lecture on “living and working at the South Pole”. Brendan who is a physicist spent 14 months living in the Antarctic in conditions which would tax the bravest and the sanest amongst us. His was a wonderful and well received lecture accompanied by slides which I gather may well be included in the Shackleton Autumn School scheduled for Athy during the October bank holiday weekend.
Saturday morning saw the intrepid would be explorers from Athy and South Kildare venturing on foot across the Kerry landscape to visit sites and places associated with Tom Crean. Our guide was Maeve Kelly of Donegal who is now living in Annascaul from where she operates “Walking Boots Tours”. The montbretia and the fuchsia laden hedges provided a colorful backdrop as the walkers followed the Tom Crean Trail which brought us on his favourite walk as well as to his place of birth and his final resting place. It was a lovely sunny day and would remain as such for most of the day as the men and women from the short-grass county made their way past houses still adorned with the Kerry flag following the recent football match played in Thurles. The Crean family home and where Tom Crean was born was down a narrow country lane and there it stood deserted and somewhat dilapidated. A kindly neighbouring farmer did his best to clear the laneway of cow dung so that visitors could walk with greater ease while the football banter flew between the followers of the vanquished and the spade wielding follower of the victors. The men of the kingdom so long used to success bear their football superiority with a generous display of good humour.
The graveyard where Tom Crean is buried is a small one, perhaps a mile or more away from the village of Annascaul. Bound on one side by a stream it occupies ground which was clearly of even poorer quality than the surrounding fields. Those fields for their part did not, to Kildare eyes at least, seem capable of maintaining more than a handful of sheep and even they were conspicuous by their absence. The boggy ground in which the dead of Annascaul had been laid for generations past had caused a village of pedestal tombs to be erected there. These chest-like tombs whose height are greater than their length encased in concrete or stones the remains of local families. There, in the furthest corner beside the murmuring stream was the tomb which the Antarctic explorer Tom Crean built with his own hands to hold the remains of his family. Resting there with Tom Crean is one of his daughters and his beloved wife.
Later that afternoon we journeyed to Dún Chaoin at the uppermost tip of the Dingle Peninsula to meet up with Kilkea born Michael Delaney who was bringing us on a guided tour of the Great Blasket Island. Michael who has spent 30 years or so teaching in the National School in Dún Chaoin had arranged what for most of us was our first opportunity to set foot on the island which was last occupied in 1953. The Great Blasket is thought to have been first occupied in the 17th century and at one time had a population of about 160 people. The chief livelihood of the islanders was fishing, but emigration, particularly to America, provided an escape route for the younger generation. With only 22 or so remaining on the island in 1950 the island was officially evacuated three years later.
Interest in the Blasket Islands has been nurtured over the years by the writings of islanders such as Muiris O’Suilleabhain, Peig Sayers and Thomas O’Criomhthain. O’Suilleabháin’s “Twenty Years of Growing” and O’Criomhthain “The Island Man” are particularly good examples of Blasket Island literature. As for Peig Sayers work anyone who has had to study her for the Leaving Certificate course generally claims that hers is the literature of depression!
The Great Blasket Island is about three miles by one mile of mountainous land, with that part facing Dún Chaoin Parish holding the remains of the houses which in earlier times made up the village. The ruins of about twenty houses dot the landscape and included amongst them is the Protestant school built in the 1830’s as part of the mission work of the Church of England. There is no Church on the island and there never was one. At one time the Church of Dún Chaoin was visible on a good day from the island and the practice evolved of hanging out a white sheet at the Church door when Mass was being said as a signal to the islanders congregated in the island school. There they said their prayers, participating from afar in the mainland Mass across the sea from them in Dún Chaoin. When the white sheet was taken in they new Mass was over and all then departed to their homes.
The Great Blasket trip was the highlight of the weekend trip to County Kerry and to Michael Delaney goes my thanks for generously sharing his time and his knowledge with his former County Kildare neighbours. On the way home on Sunday we stopped off to visit the County Museum in Tralee, and particularly to see the Antarctic exhibition which is on there and will be for a further few months. It’s a first class exhibition and well worth the visit by anyone interested in the South Pole and especially the exploits of such great men as Scott and Kerry’s own Tom Crean.
Tralee itself is like Athy, a 12th century town founded by the Anglo Normans. There the similarities do not end for we find that it was the Fitzgeralds of Desmond who established the town of Tralee and who founded its Dominican Friary ten years before the Dominicans arrived in Athy. Of course it was the Fitzgeralds of the House of Kildare who were the lords and masters of Athy and South Kildare for centuries past and they with the Fitzgeralds of Desmond were the two main branches of the Geraldine family.
The towns of Tralee and Athy founded 800 years ago by different branches of the same family bear many similarities over the years which I hope to go into at another time. Suffice to say that the names Crean and Shackleton are inextricably linked by their Antarctic journeys with Crean honoured in his native County Kerry and the town of Tralee, while Shackleton is remembered in the town of Athy near to where he was born 126 years ago.
The second Shackleton Autumn School will be held in Athy over the weekend of 24th to 27th October, 2002 and further information in relation to the Shackleton School will be announced by Margaret O’Riordan, Manager of the local Heritage Centre over the next few weeks.
On Friday night Brendan Grunewald, originally from South Africa but now living in Belgium, gave a lecture on “living and working at the South Pole”. Brendan who is a physicist spent 14 months living in the Antarctic in conditions which would tax the bravest and the sanest amongst us. His was a wonderful and well received lecture accompanied by slides which I gather may well be included in the Shackleton Autumn School scheduled for Athy during the October bank holiday weekend.
Saturday morning saw the intrepid would be explorers from Athy and South Kildare venturing on foot across the Kerry landscape to visit sites and places associated with Tom Crean. Our guide was Maeve Kelly of Donegal who is now living in Annascaul from where she operates “Walking Boots Tours”. The montbretia and the fuchsia laden hedges provided a colorful backdrop as the walkers followed the Tom Crean Trail which brought us on his favourite walk as well as to his place of birth and his final resting place. It was a lovely sunny day and would remain as such for most of the day as the men and women from the short-grass county made their way past houses still adorned with the Kerry flag following the recent football match played in Thurles. The Crean family home and where Tom Crean was born was down a narrow country lane and there it stood deserted and somewhat dilapidated. A kindly neighbouring farmer did his best to clear the laneway of cow dung so that visitors could walk with greater ease while the football banter flew between the followers of the vanquished and the spade wielding follower of the victors. The men of the kingdom so long used to success bear their football superiority with a generous display of good humour.
The graveyard where Tom Crean is buried is a small one, perhaps a mile or more away from the village of Annascaul. Bound on one side by a stream it occupies ground which was clearly of even poorer quality than the surrounding fields. Those fields for their part did not, to Kildare eyes at least, seem capable of maintaining more than a handful of sheep and even they were conspicuous by their absence. The boggy ground in which the dead of Annascaul had been laid for generations past had caused a village of pedestal tombs to be erected there. These chest-like tombs whose height are greater than their length encased in concrete or stones the remains of local families. There, in the furthest corner beside the murmuring stream was the tomb which the Antarctic explorer Tom Crean built with his own hands to hold the remains of his family. Resting there with Tom Crean is one of his daughters and his beloved wife.
Later that afternoon we journeyed to Dún Chaoin at the uppermost tip of the Dingle Peninsula to meet up with Kilkea born Michael Delaney who was bringing us on a guided tour of the Great Blasket Island. Michael who has spent 30 years or so teaching in the National School in Dún Chaoin had arranged what for most of us was our first opportunity to set foot on the island which was last occupied in 1953. The Great Blasket is thought to have been first occupied in the 17th century and at one time had a population of about 160 people. The chief livelihood of the islanders was fishing, but emigration, particularly to America, provided an escape route for the younger generation. With only 22 or so remaining on the island in 1950 the island was officially evacuated three years later.
Interest in the Blasket Islands has been nurtured over the years by the writings of islanders such as Muiris O’Suilleabhain, Peig Sayers and Thomas O’Criomhthain. O’Suilleabháin’s “Twenty Years of Growing” and O’Criomhthain “The Island Man” are particularly good examples of Blasket Island literature. As for Peig Sayers work anyone who has had to study her for the Leaving Certificate course generally claims that hers is the literature of depression!
The Great Blasket Island is about three miles by one mile of mountainous land, with that part facing Dún Chaoin Parish holding the remains of the houses which in earlier times made up the village. The ruins of about twenty houses dot the landscape and included amongst them is the Protestant school built in the 1830’s as part of the mission work of the Church of England. There is no Church on the island and there never was one. At one time the Church of Dún Chaoin was visible on a good day from the island and the practice evolved of hanging out a white sheet at the Church door when Mass was being said as a signal to the islanders congregated in the island school. There they said their prayers, participating from afar in the mainland Mass across the sea from them in Dún Chaoin. When the white sheet was taken in they new Mass was over and all then departed to their homes.
The Great Blasket trip was the highlight of the weekend trip to County Kerry and to Michael Delaney goes my thanks for generously sharing his time and his knowledge with his former County Kildare neighbours. On the way home on Sunday we stopped off to visit the County Museum in Tralee, and particularly to see the Antarctic exhibition which is on there and will be for a further few months. It’s a first class exhibition and well worth the visit by anyone interested in the South Pole and especially the exploits of such great men as Scott and Kerry’s own Tom Crean.
Tralee itself is like Athy, a 12th century town founded by the Anglo Normans. There the similarities do not end for we find that it was the Fitzgeralds of Desmond who established the town of Tralee and who founded its Dominican Friary ten years before the Dominicans arrived in Athy. Of course it was the Fitzgeralds of the House of Kildare who were the lords and masters of Athy and South Kildare for centuries past and they with the Fitzgeralds of Desmond were the two main branches of the Geraldine family.
The towns of Tralee and Athy founded 800 years ago by different branches of the same family bear many similarities over the years which I hope to go into at another time. Suffice to say that the names Crean and Shackleton are inextricably linked by their Antarctic journeys with Crean honoured in his native County Kerry and the town of Tralee, while Shackleton is remembered in the town of Athy near to where he was born 126 years ago.
The second Shackleton Autumn School will be held in Athy over the weekend of 24th to 27th October, 2002 and further information in relation to the Shackleton School will be announced by Margaret O’Riordan, Manager of the local Heritage Centre over the next few weeks.
Thursday, August 1, 2002
St. Joseph's Boy School Photograph 1946
This week’s Eye on the Past features a photograph of school boys from St. Joseph’s School in Rathstewart. It was taken in or around 1947 or thereabouts. I should be in that photograph as I had started school on 13th May 1946, the same day as Frank English and he figures prominently in that picture from the past. Can you pick him out? And what about the other young lads staring out at the camera lens? A prize awaits the first person who gives me the names of all the young scholars from 55 years ago.
Many of those captured in the photograph all those years ago will be coming together for the first time ever during a class reunion scheduled for the weekend of 20th September. Fifty past pupils of St. Joseph’s School and the Christian Brother’s School have been identified but unfortunately attempts are still being made to locate the present whereabouts of a small number who left Athy many years ago. These include Peter Allen, last heard of in Manchester. Paddy Bracken whom I believe is in Naas but where exactly I have yet to find out. Does anyone know where Leo Dempsey, formerly of the Hibernian Bank, Leinster Street can be contacted? What about Theo Kavanagh, formerly of the Bleeding Horse in Castlemitchell and Paddy Maher, now somewhere in England and originally from Dooley’s Terrace?
Others still to be traced are Colin Seabrook and Christy Southwell, although I am told that Christy might be somewhere in the Curragh/Newbridge area. More difficult to trace will be John Whelan whose family lived in St. Patrick’s Avenue before they emigrated to England in the 1950’s. If you can help trace any of the above I would be delighted if you would contact me.
In the meantime arrangements are going ahead for the class reunion and some of the unfortunate teachers who had to deal with us over the years have now been traced. Paddy O’Riordan, now living in retirement in Cork is the only secondary teacher still with us. Of the primary school teachers Brother Flaherty and Brother Loughran have been traced while the redoubtable Sr. Bernadette who was with us in St. Joseph’s School in the 1940’s will be, hopefully, with us for the September celebrations.
While we have identified 50 past pupils with whom our young years were shared, undoubtedly there will be a few names overlooked. If you are one of those who has not been contacted in connection with the class reunion would you please make contact with me over the next few weeks. The reunion is for everyone and anyone who shared classes with the likes of Frank English, Ted Wynne, Teddy Kelly or myself in either St. Joseph’s School or the Primary School or the Secondary School at St. John’s Lane.
Let me hear from you please. Don’t forget a book prize for the first person to give me the names of all the youngsters snapped in the Convent of Mercy driveway on what was obviously a sunny day over 50 years ago.
Many of those captured in the photograph all those years ago will be coming together for the first time ever during a class reunion scheduled for the weekend of 20th September. Fifty past pupils of St. Joseph’s School and the Christian Brother’s School have been identified but unfortunately attempts are still being made to locate the present whereabouts of a small number who left Athy many years ago. These include Peter Allen, last heard of in Manchester. Paddy Bracken whom I believe is in Naas but where exactly I have yet to find out. Does anyone know where Leo Dempsey, formerly of the Hibernian Bank, Leinster Street can be contacted? What about Theo Kavanagh, formerly of the Bleeding Horse in Castlemitchell and Paddy Maher, now somewhere in England and originally from Dooley’s Terrace?
Others still to be traced are Colin Seabrook and Christy Southwell, although I am told that Christy might be somewhere in the Curragh/Newbridge area. More difficult to trace will be John Whelan whose family lived in St. Patrick’s Avenue before they emigrated to England in the 1950’s. If you can help trace any of the above I would be delighted if you would contact me.
In the meantime arrangements are going ahead for the class reunion and some of the unfortunate teachers who had to deal with us over the years have now been traced. Paddy O’Riordan, now living in retirement in Cork is the only secondary teacher still with us. Of the primary school teachers Brother Flaherty and Brother Loughran have been traced while the redoubtable Sr. Bernadette who was with us in St. Joseph’s School in the 1940’s will be, hopefully, with us for the September celebrations.
While we have identified 50 past pupils with whom our young years were shared, undoubtedly there will be a few names overlooked. If you are one of those who has not been contacted in connection with the class reunion would you please make contact with me over the next few weeks. The reunion is for everyone and anyone who shared classes with the likes of Frank English, Ted Wynne, Teddy Kelly or myself in either St. Joseph’s School or the Primary School or the Secondary School at St. John’s Lane.
Let me hear from you please. Don’t forget a book prize for the first person to give me the names of all the youngsters snapped in the Convent of Mercy driveway on what was obviously a sunny day over 50 years ago.
Thursday, July 18, 2002
Death of Charlie Prendergast / Baby Dooley - Local
It’s not unusual for me to attend two funerals in the one week. It’s a common enough occurrence in a town where births and deaths have been recorded for almost 800 years. What was unusual last week was the age span which separated a 91 year old whose remains were brought in procession for burial in St. Michael’s Cemetery and the tiny one month old baby who followed a few days later.
Those who turned out for the funeral Mass for the nonagenarian Charlie Prendergast did so as a mark of respect for the man who was, for as long as many of us can remember, a well known and widely popular member of Athy’s community. My earliest memories of Charlie Prendergast was in Offaly Street where he called on a few occasions to do some electrical repairs for my parents. He was an extremely likeable man with a quiet air of authority, skilled at his job, who could always be relied upon to come whenever required to sort out any electrical emergencies that arose. He passed away just a few weeks after his younger brother Ger and is survived by his sons Michael and John and daughter Philomena.
Looking around me at the funeral I was struck by the realisation that almost all those in attendance represented what I could recognise as families with ties extending back at least two generations in the town. As the older people such as Charlie pass on, they do so largely unnoticed by the new arrivals in the town. The newcomers are destined not to know the Charlie Prendergast’s of our town and those of his generation who in their younger days created and sustained the social, sporting and cultural life of Athy.
If you are regular readers you may remember that I wrote an Eye on the Past on Charlie Prendergast some time ago. There I extolled his qualities as a singer whose wonderful tenor voice for many years was heard to great effect in the local Church. In later years, Charlie who had spent a lifetime in the electrical business, took to golf as a recreational sport and was a much valued and beloved member of the Geraldine Golf Club. His contribution to the local community made over many decades in his middle years and later is known and acknowledged by those of us whose memories of Athy extend back a few decades.
Even as the population figures released today confirm a substantial increase in the population of county Kildare there is a realisation that Athy is changing. The old order passes on and those who replaced them, sometimes with no previous links with the town, have little or no appreciation of those whose lives were spent in the vale of the Barrow near to the Ford of Ae. Charlie Prendergast was one whose adult life was spent in Athy and his passing severs another link with the story of the town stretching back to the 1940’s and beyond.
The tiny baby whose remains were conveyed to St. Michael’s Cemetery just days after those of Charlie Prendergast has now joined the nonagenarian in the anonymity of death. The short service in St. Michael’s Church immediately before the burial was a poignant reminder of the sadness which flows from the loss of a human life which had not the opportunity to stretch to childhood and beyond. Its a particularly sad time for parents and grand-parents alike and the sight of the tiny white coffin carried in the arms of the father and mother is surely one of the saddest funeral images imaginable. The first funeral, that of 91 year old Charlie Prendergast was attended by friends and community members who wanted to pay their respects to a man who richly deserved their tributes. The infant’s funeral was more a family gathering with neighbours and friends who came to sympathise and show their support for the grieving parents.
How many times have you walked behind a hearse making the short journey to St. Michael’s Cemetery? It’s a journey that is made every week, sometimes as last week more than once. The same journey has been repeated thousands of times, ever since St. Michael’s Cemetery was first used as a burial place for the people of the town. The now familiar funeral procession first started when the Church of St. Michael’s was built on the outskirts of the medieval town sometime in the 14th century. The Church, the remains of which still stand in the cemetery and known today as the “Crickeen” was the first Parish Church for the Parish of St. Michael’s. It followed on the siting of two monasteries in the then village of Athy. The first monastery was that of the Trinitarians near to the Castle of Woodstock on the West bank of the River Barrow. The second monastery founded by the Dominican’s in 1253 was in the area recently in the news following the burning of the Abbey House at the rear of Emily Square. It’s strange that in a town with a history stretching back 800 years that there are but two town cemetery’s - St. John’s and St. Michael’s. They do not seem capable of holding the remains of all those who died and were buried in Athy since the 12th century so the question arises in what other locations were the local people buried?
Perhaps many locals were buried in and around the grounds of the original Dominican Monastery located at the rear of Emily Square. It is almost certain that members of the local Dominican Order found a final resting place in a community cemetery which would have been attached to the Monastery founded in the 13th century. If and when work commences on the development planned for the Abbey site it will inevitably be preceded by an archaeological excavation of the site which should reveal for us heretofore unknown details of the Dominicans and their medieval monastery in Athy.
Burial grounds are sacred places and in our small provincial town we have old St. Michael’s Cemetery on the Dublin Road and it’s more recent replacement new St. Michael’s across from it in what was once part of the town’s Fair green. In addition there is St. John’s Cemetery, a direct link with the Monastery of St. John’s which existed in the area between Duke Street and Woodstock Castle in the 13th and 14th century. Within the town’s boundaries there is also the small cemetery within the grounds of the former Convent of Mercy and the earlier mentioned but as yet unconfirmed Dominican Monastery Cemetery at the rear of Emily Square. Just outside the town are to be found Ardreigh Cemetery on the Carlow Road, Geraldine Cemetery on the Kildare Road and Tubberara Cemetery between the Monasterevin Road and the Milltown Road. Just opposite St. Vincent’s Hospital which started out as the town Workhouse is St. Mary’s Cemetery where the famine dead were laid to rest. They were to be joined by those poor unfortunate people who impoverished and diseased died in the Workhouse in the 19th century or in the County Home as it was designated in the following century.
In the mid-1980’s AnCO - The Industrial Training Authority, since re-named FAS, funded a youth training project during which the gravestones in Old St. Michael’s Cemetery were recorded and mapped. A similar project was undertaken in relation to St. John’s Cemetery a few years ago as a Probation Services Project. In both instances much useful information was collected and collated to give those involved in family research another means of verifying family details.
History is recorded on the gravestones in our local cemeteries and last week two additional names were added to the long list of those who have already passed through life to become part of our communities history.
Those who turned out for the funeral Mass for the nonagenarian Charlie Prendergast did so as a mark of respect for the man who was, for as long as many of us can remember, a well known and widely popular member of Athy’s community. My earliest memories of Charlie Prendergast was in Offaly Street where he called on a few occasions to do some electrical repairs for my parents. He was an extremely likeable man with a quiet air of authority, skilled at his job, who could always be relied upon to come whenever required to sort out any electrical emergencies that arose. He passed away just a few weeks after his younger brother Ger and is survived by his sons Michael and John and daughter Philomena.
Looking around me at the funeral I was struck by the realisation that almost all those in attendance represented what I could recognise as families with ties extending back at least two generations in the town. As the older people such as Charlie pass on, they do so largely unnoticed by the new arrivals in the town. The newcomers are destined not to know the Charlie Prendergast’s of our town and those of his generation who in their younger days created and sustained the social, sporting and cultural life of Athy.
If you are regular readers you may remember that I wrote an Eye on the Past on Charlie Prendergast some time ago. There I extolled his qualities as a singer whose wonderful tenor voice for many years was heard to great effect in the local Church. In later years, Charlie who had spent a lifetime in the electrical business, took to golf as a recreational sport and was a much valued and beloved member of the Geraldine Golf Club. His contribution to the local community made over many decades in his middle years and later is known and acknowledged by those of us whose memories of Athy extend back a few decades.
Even as the population figures released today confirm a substantial increase in the population of county Kildare there is a realisation that Athy is changing. The old order passes on and those who replaced them, sometimes with no previous links with the town, have little or no appreciation of those whose lives were spent in the vale of the Barrow near to the Ford of Ae. Charlie Prendergast was one whose adult life was spent in Athy and his passing severs another link with the story of the town stretching back to the 1940’s and beyond.
The tiny baby whose remains were conveyed to St. Michael’s Cemetery just days after those of Charlie Prendergast has now joined the nonagenarian in the anonymity of death. The short service in St. Michael’s Church immediately before the burial was a poignant reminder of the sadness which flows from the loss of a human life which had not the opportunity to stretch to childhood and beyond. Its a particularly sad time for parents and grand-parents alike and the sight of the tiny white coffin carried in the arms of the father and mother is surely one of the saddest funeral images imaginable. The first funeral, that of 91 year old Charlie Prendergast was attended by friends and community members who wanted to pay their respects to a man who richly deserved their tributes. The infant’s funeral was more a family gathering with neighbours and friends who came to sympathise and show their support for the grieving parents.
How many times have you walked behind a hearse making the short journey to St. Michael’s Cemetery? It’s a journey that is made every week, sometimes as last week more than once. The same journey has been repeated thousands of times, ever since St. Michael’s Cemetery was first used as a burial place for the people of the town. The now familiar funeral procession first started when the Church of St. Michael’s was built on the outskirts of the medieval town sometime in the 14th century. The Church, the remains of which still stand in the cemetery and known today as the “Crickeen” was the first Parish Church for the Parish of St. Michael’s. It followed on the siting of two monasteries in the then village of Athy. The first monastery was that of the Trinitarians near to the Castle of Woodstock on the West bank of the River Barrow. The second monastery founded by the Dominican’s in 1253 was in the area recently in the news following the burning of the Abbey House at the rear of Emily Square. It’s strange that in a town with a history stretching back 800 years that there are but two town cemetery’s - St. John’s and St. Michael’s. They do not seem capable of holding the remains of all those who died and were buried in Athy since the 12th century so the question arises in what other locations were the local people buried?
Perhaps many locals were buried in and around the grounds of the original Dominican Monastery located at the rear of Emily Square. It is almost certain that members of the local Dominican Order found a final resting place in a community cemetery which would have been attached to the Monastery founded in the 13th century. If and when work commences on the development planned for the Abbey site it will inevitably be preceded by an archaeological excavation of the site which should reveal for us heretofore unknown details of the Dominicans and their medieval monastery in Athy.
Burial grounds are sacred places and in our small provincial town we have old St. Michael’s Cemetery on the Dublin Road and it’s more recent replacement new St. Michael’s across from it in what was once part of the town’s Fair green. In addition there is St. John’s Cemetery, a direct link with the Monastery of St. John’s which existed in the area between Duke Street and Woodstock Castle in the 13th and 14th century. Within the town’s boundaries there is also the small cemetery within the grounds of the former Convent of Mercy and the earlier mentioned but as yet unconfirmed Dominican Monastery Cemetery at the rear of Emily Square. Just outside the town are to be found Ardreigh Cemetery on the Carlow Road, Geraldine Cemetery on the Kildare Road and Tubberara Cemetery between the Monasterevin Road and the Milltown Road. Just opposite St. Vincent’s Hospital which started out as the town Workhouse is St. Mary’s Cemetery where the famine dead were laid to rest. They were to be joined by those poor unfortunate people who impoverished and diseased died in the Workhouse in the 19th century or in the County Home as it was designated in the following century.
In the mid-1980’s AnCO - The Industrial Training Authority, since re-named FAS, funded a youth training project during which the gravestones in Old St. Michael’s Cemetery were recorded and mapped. A similar project was undertaken in relation to St. John’s Cemetery a few years ago as a Probation Services Project. In both instances much useful information was collected and collated to give those involved in family research another means of verifying family details.
History is recorded on the gravestones in our local cemeteries and last week two additional names were added to the long list of those who have already passed through life to become part of our communities history.
Thursday, July 11, 2002
Carlow / Kildare Brigade I.R.A.
I have been attempting for some time past to put together a detailed account of the activities of the Irish Volunteers in south Kildare during the War of Independence. It is proving a very difficult task, largely because everyone involved in that period of Irish history has passed away, leaving little or no record of their involvement in the armed struggle which started with the Easter Rising of 1916.
Athy and South Kildare with parts of counties Wicklow and Laois formed part of the Carlow/Kildare Brigade area and as such was separated from the North Kildare 1st and 2nd Battalions IRA which were based in Maynooth and Naas. The A Company of the 5th Battalion Carlow/Kildare Brigade was centred in Athy, while the B Company was in Kilrush and Castledermot formed the C Company of the same battalion. The Volunteers in Athy were under the command of Captain John Hayden of Offaly Street and his two lieutenants were his brother Paddy Hayden and Michael Dunne of Barrow Quay. John Hayden was a teacher in the local Christian Brothers school who emigrated to America in the early 1920’s. His son Fergus was subsequently reared by John’s brother Paddy who later lived in St. Patrick’s Avenue and worked as a baker in Bradburys. Paddy Dunne was a barman in Dillon’s of Barrow Quay and he subsequently lived in Duke Street and worked in Batchelor’s Pea Factory in Rathstewart. The company quartermaster was Mick Carroll of Shrewleen Lane.
The volunteers forming the A Company of the 5th Battalion Carlow Brigade included Bill Nolan, St. Michael’s Terrace; Jim Bradley, Barrack Street; Peter Lambe, Blackparks; Billy Browne, Ardreigh; Jack Delahunt, Chapel Hill; Mick Curtis, Castlemitchell; Joe Walsh, Barrack Street; Paddy Keeffe, Ardreigh; Joe May and Jack Bradley, both of Woodstock Street. Another Volunteer was an employee of McHugh’s Chemist of Duke Street whose surname was either Hogan or Teehan. The list of Volunteers in the A Company is incomplete and I would welcome hearing from anyone who can add to that list.
The Athy based volunteers were principally engaged in frustrating the movement of British troops and the Royal Irish Constabulary and destroying Constabulary Barracks which had been vacated as constabulary withdrew from outlying areas. The mail trains on the Waterford/Dublin line were raided on a few occasions and letters intended for Dublin Castle were taken. During the course of the boycott of goods from Belfast members of the A Company torched the abattoir at the Fairgreen in Athy. The abattoir was leased by a London-based company and that company subsequently lodged a compensation claim for malicious damage with Athy Urban District Council. Around the same time the Courthouse in Emily Square was completely destroyed by fire but while the arsonist was an IRA Member his action did not meet with the approval of his superiors. He was subsequently court marshalled and “drummed out” of the local company of the IRA for a short period. The Courthouse was to remain a derelict ruin for several years before it was rebuilt by Kildare County Council.
During most of this period the Carlow Brigade had as its officer in charge Commdt. Eamon Malone of Barrowhouse, Athy. I have previously written of Eamon Malone who was imprisoned for a period in Mountjoy following his arrest in 1919. While in jail he was one of the leaders of the hunger strike in which many of the IRA Prisoners then in Mountjoy were involved. He is remembered today in the name Malone Place which is a small local authority housing scheme at the end of Woodstock Street opened a few years ago.
The B Company based in Kilrush was under the immediate control of Captain Sean Flanagan who was later promoted to Battalion Commandant. I have not been able to identify the members of his company, many of whom were involved in destroying a number of bridges in their area. They succeeded in blowing up Kilboggan Bridge, as well as two other bridges in the Tippeenan area which is in the parish of Fontstown. The most serious incident involving the Kilrush area was the arrest, court martialling and subsequent execution of a local man suspected of passing information to the British authorities.
The C Company of the Carlow Brigade was centred in Castledermot. Paddy Cosgrove was the company captain and it is generally believed that the Castledermot Company was one of the more active units in South Kildare during the War of Independence. They burned down the local RIC Barracks during the course of which Captain Cosgrave suffered serious burns as he re-entered the burning building to rescue a young volunteer who had been injured in a premature explosion. Cosgrave was later brought in secret to the hospital in Athy where he was detained and treated by the hospital staff without word of his whereabouts ever being leaked to the Constabulary in the nearby RIC Barracks. Some members of the Castledermot Company may have also been involved in the burning down of the RIC Barracks in Ballitore although I understand this was an action for which the Dunlavin Volunteers were largely responsible.
The Athy Company made an unsuccessful attack on the RIC Barracks in Athy during the War of Independence. This Barracks had been relocated from White’s Castle to the former Army Barracks in Barrack Lane some years previously. Shots were exchanged between the IRA attackers and the RIC men but so far as I am aware no-one was injured.
Not so fortunate were William Connor and Jim Lacey members of the Ballylinan Company which with Killeshin and Bilboa were also part of the Carlow/Kildare Brigade area. Connor and Lacey were part of an IRA ambush which lay in wait near Barrowhouse for RIC men travelling on bikes between Ballylinan and Maganey. The date was 16th May 1921 and on the previous day guns and ammunition had been brought from Castledermot and delivered to Joe Maher of Cullinagh, leader of the Barrowhouse unit. The ambush proved a disaster for the local IRA men. The two young volunteers, William Connor and Jim Lacey, were shot dead by the RIC men and their bodies were left at the scene of the ambush when their companions withdrew. They were the only IRA volunteers to die in this area during the War of Independence and today the place where they fell in is marked by a simple metal cross. Their bodies lie side by side in the graveyard attached to St. Mary’s Church in Barrowhouse.
Eamon Malone, Commandant of the Carlow/Kildare Brigade married an Athy girl Kathleen Dooley following the treaty and he later lived and worked in England. He died a relatively young man and was subsequently buried in Barrow House graveyard, not far from where his colleagues William Connor and Jim Lacey are buried.
The story of the War of Independence in the South Kildare area needs to be fleshed out more than I have been able to do so in this article. I would like to hear from anyone who can give me any information on the topic and particularly anyone who can help me identify those men who were involved in any of the IRA Companies in Athy, Kilrush, Castledermot or Ballylinan.
Margaret O’Riordan of the Heritage Centre tells me that the trip to Annascaul in County Kerry, the birth place of the Antarctic explorer Tom Crean was postponed due to Kildare’s participation in the Leinster Football Final. The trip will now take place over the weekend of 10th August and anyone interested in travelling should contact Margaret at (0507) 33075.
Athy and South Kildare with parts of counties Wicklow and Laois formed part of the Carlow/Kildare Brigade area and as such was separated from the North Kildare 1st and 2nd Battalions IRA which were based in Maynooth and Naas. The A Company of the 5th Battalion Carlow/Kildare Brigade was centred in Athy, while the B Company was in Kilrush and Castledermot formed the C Company of the same battalion. The Volunteers in Athy were under the command of Captain John Hayden of Offaly Street and his two lieutenants were his brother Paddy Hayden and Michael Dunne of Barrow Quay. John Hayden was a teacher in the local Christian Brothers school who emigrated to America in the early 1920’s. His son Fergus was subsequently reared by John’s brother Paddy who later lived in St. Patrick’s Avenue and worked as a baker in Bradburys. Paddy Dunne was a barman in Dillon’s of Barrow Quay and he subsequently lived in Duke Street and worked in Batchelor’s Pea Factory in Rathstewart. The company quartermaster was Mick Carroll of Shrewleen Lane.
The volunteers forming the A Company of the 5th Battalion Carlow Brigade included Bill Nolan, St. Michael’s Terrace; Jim Bradley, Barrack Street; Peter Lambe, Blackparks; Billy Browne, Ardreigh; Jack Delahunt, Chapel Hill; Mick Curtis, Castlemitchell; Joe Walsh, Barrack Street; Paddy Keeffe, Ardreigh; Joe May and Jack Bradley, both of Woodstock Street. Another Volunteer was an employee of McHugh’s Chemist of Duke Street whose surname was either Hogan or Teehan. The list of Volunteers in the A Company is incomplete and I would welcome hearing from anyone who can add to that list.
The Athy based volunteers were principally engaged in frustrating the movement of British troops and the Royal Irish Constabulary and destroying Constabulary Barracks which had been vacated as constabulary withdrew from outlying areas. The mail trains on the Waterford/Dublin line were raided on a few occasions and letters intended for Dublin Castle were taken. During the course of the boycott of goods from Belfast members of the A Company torched the abattoir at the Fairgreen in Athy. The abattoir was leased by a London-based company and that company subsequently lodged a compensation claim for malicious damage with Athy Urban District Council. Around the same time the Courthouse in Emily Square was completely destroyed by fire but while the arsonist was an IRA Member his action did not meet with the approval of his superiors. He was subsequently court marshalled and “drummed out” of the local company of the IRA for a short period. The Courthouse was to remain a derelict ruin for several years before it was rebuilt by Kildare County Council.
During most of this period the Carlow Brigade had as its officer in charge Commdt. Eamon Malone of Barrowhouse, Athy. I have previously written of Eamon Malone who was imprisoned for a period in Mountjoy following his arrest in 1919. While in jail he was one of the leaders of the hunger strike in which many of the IRA Prisoners then in Mountjoy were involved. He is remembered today in the name Malone Place which is a small local authority housing scheme at the end of Woodstock Street opened a few years ago.
The B Company based in Kilrush was under the immediate control of Captain Sean Flanagan who was later promoted to Battalion Commandant. I have not been able to identify the members of his company, many of whom were involved in destroying a number of bridges in their area. They succeeded in blowing up Kilboggan Bridge, as well as two other bridges in the Tippeenan area which is in the parish of Fontstown. The most serious incident involving the Kilrush area was the arrest, court martialling and subsequent execution of a local man suspected of passing information to the British authorities.
The C Company of the Carlow Brigade was centred in Castledermot. Paddy Cosgrove was the company captain and it is generally believed that the Castledermot Company was one of the more active units in South Kildare during the War of Independence. They burned down the local RIC Barracks during the course of which Captain Cosgrave suffered serious burns as he re-entered the burning building to rescue a young volunteer who had been injured in a premature explosion. Cosgrave was later brought in secret to the hospital in Athy where he was detained and treated by the hospital staff without word of his whereabouts ever being leaked to the Constabulary in the nearby RIC Barracks. Some members of the Castledermot Company may have also been involved in the burning down of the RIC Barracks in Ballitore although I understand this was an action for which the Dunlavin Volunteers were largely responsible.
The Athy Company made an unsuccessful attack on the RIC Barracks in Athy during the War of Independence. This Barracks had been relocated from White’s Castle to the former Army Barracks in Barrack Lane some years previously. Shots were exchanged between the IRA attackers and the RIC men but so far as I am aware no-one was injured.
Not so fortunate were William Connor and Jim Lacey members of the Ballylinan Company which with Killeshin and Bilboa were also part of the Carlow/Kildare Brigade area. Connor and Lacey were part of an IRA ambush which lay in wait near Barrowhouse for RIC men travelling on bikes between Ballylinan and Maganey. The date was 16th May 1921 and on the previous day guns and ammunition had been brought from Castledermot and delivered to Joe Maher of Cullinagh, leader of the Barrowhouse unit. The ambush proved a disaster for the local IRA men. The two young volunteers, William Connor and Jim Lacey, were shot dead by the RIC men and their bodies were left at the scene of the ambush when their companions withdrew. They were the only IRA volunteers to die in this area during the War of Independence and today the place where they fell in is marked by a simple metal cross. Their bodies lie side by side in the graveyard attached to St. Mary’s Church in Barrowhouse.
Eamon Malone, Commandant of the Carlow/Kildare Brigade married an Athy girl Kathleen Dooley following the treaty and he later lived and worked in England. He died a relatively young man and was subsequently buried in Barrow House graveyard, not far from where his colleagues William Connor and Jim Lacey are buried.
The story of the War of Independence in the South Kildare area needs to be fleshed out more than I have been able to do so in this article. I would like to hear from anyone who can give me any information on the topic and particularly anyone who can help me identify those men who were involved in any of the IRA Companies in Athy, Kilrush, Castledermot or Ballylinan.
Margaret O’Riordan of the Heritage Centre tells me that the trip to Annascaul in County Kerry, the birth place of the Antarctic explorer Tom Crean was postponed due to Kildare’s participation in the Leinster Football Final. The trip will now take place over the weekend of 10th August and anyone interested in travelling should contact Margaret at (0507) 33075.
Thursday, July 4, 2002
World War I Cemeteries
The experience of visiting places associated with our history is probably one of the most interesting aspects of historical study. There are few areas in Europe more closely linked with Athy than the town of Ypres in Southern Belgium and the villages and rural areas lying in the vicinity of the river Somme in France between Gommecourt and Maricourt. Ypres a former garrison town was famous for the production of flax, lace and cotton and for its Cloth Hall, the largest non-religious gothic building in Europe.
When Belgium became embroiled in the first World War on the 4th of August 1914 there was a little reason then to believe that the thriving country town of Ypres would soon become a symbol of the destructive power of warfare. When the war ended on the 11th of November 1918 the entire town had been levelled to the ground and in the surrounding countryside many thousands of Irish men had died. The Western Front across which the German army faced the combined Allied Forces became a burial ground as men fell in battle. Further south the river Somme was to be forever associated with battles between the opposing forces and the most horrific losses of human life imaginable.
I had occasion recently to visit Flanders and the Somme areas associated with World War I. The experience was an extraordinary one. I have often written of Athy men’s involvement in the war but have to admit that I never appreciated or quite grasped the enormity of the loss of human life which occurred on the Western Front during World War I. Everywhere I went in southern Belgium I came to realise that the entire Flanders countryside was a memorial to the dead. Here, there and everywhere, were cemeteries each with headstones of uniform size and shape reminding one of ranks of soldiers on parade. Those cemeteries, sometimes containing thousands of graves, sometimes hundreds or even smaller numbers, are found at the side of roads or located inland and accessed through fields. Each headstone carries the name of a soldier, his rank, regiment, the date he died and often his age and an inscription chosen by his family. Very often a headstone did not bear a name but instead the inscription “A soldier of the Great War” and the words “Known unto God”. This latter phrase was chosen by the English writer Rudyard Kipling who himself lost his son in the war.
The cemeteries, especially the smaller ones, located nearer to farmyards or in farmers fields, are generally battlefield cemeteries containing the remains of soldiers buried where they fell. The larger cemeteries are for the most part where the dead were brought for burial or where, after the war bodies exhumed from outlining areas were brought together. For many thousands who died during World War I there is no identifiable resting place. For that reason a number of memorials were erected in France and Flanders to record the names of those unfortunate men. In the town of Ypres in Flanders is to be found the famous Menin Gate Memorial regarded by many as the most important British War memorial in the world. It records on wall panels the names of approximately 54,000 men who died in various battles in and around Ypres and whose remains were never identified or found. The names of several Athy men are recorded on the Menin Gate Memorial and I was very conscious of that fact when I stood there last week as the Last Post was played by four buglers at preciously 8 o’clock in the evening. Every day of the year the traffic passing through the Menin Gate on one of the main routes into the town of Ypres is stopped while the Last Post is sounded. It is a moving ceremony which has taken place every evening since it was inaugurated on the 2nd of July 1928. The only exception was during World War II when Germans again occupied Ypres. On the memorial gate itself I noted the names of Patrick Flynn, Andrew Reilly, Michael Devoy, Patrick Leonard, Joseph Byrne, James Dillon, Christopher Power, Patrick Tierney, Moses Doyle, Edward Lawler and Henry Hannon all from the town of Athy. These were some of the unfortunate young men from our town who died fighting in Flanders during the first World War and whose bodies were never identified or found.
Just a few short miles outside the town of Ypres I came across the grave of another Athy man killed in that war. It was at Sanctuary Wood Cemetery that I found the last resting place of Patrick Curtis who was 28 years old when he died on Thursday, 5th of November 1914. He was a son of John and Margaret Curtis of Kilcrow and one of three brothers who died in World War I. His was the first World War I grave of an Athy man I came across in Flanders and when I journeyed later into Northern France I had the opportunity of paying my respects at the graveside of John Coulson Hannon who died on the 18th of August 1916 aged 23 years. He is buried in Caterpillar Valley Cemetery near the village of Longueval and his gravestone carries the inscription “Of such is the Kingdom of Heaven” put there at the request of his parents, Mr and Mrs John Hannon of Ardreigh House. John Coulson Hannon was a brother of Norman Hannon who was only 20 years old when he was killed in France on the 16th of May 1915.
Not very far away from Longueval is the small village of Guillemont where another Athy man John Vincent Holland won his Victoria cross. Outside the small village church in Guillemont stands a Celtic cross and as I stood there in the centre of the village my thoughts were of those Athy men who fought and died and those who survived what we still call the Great War. There was surely nothing great about a conflict which sent so many young men to premature deaths and to graves which are scattered throughout the countryside of France and Flanders.
While I was away Ger Prendergast and Dan Meany passed away. Full of years and part and parcel of life in Athy for decades past, both men contributed, each in his own unique way, to the social life of the town. Ger’s entire life was spent with racehorses and during his colourful life he contributed an extraordinary amount to the lore of the town where he had lived for so long. Dan Meany was a man whose interest in Athy and whose knowledge of the people and fabric of the town was combined with a an expertise which resulted in a photographic collection unequalled anywhere else in Athy. For decades he captured on film the events and happenings in the town and the results are an extremely important visual account of the social life of Athy and its people. Both Gerard and Dan will be sadly missed.
The Last Post which represents in military funerals, a last farewell to the dead is an integral part of the daily Menin Gate Memorial ceremonies in Flanders. This week St. Michael’s cemetery echoed to the sound of the Last Post played by two buglers of the Irish Army as a parting salute to their dead colleague, Sean Day. His sudden and untimely death and the manner of his death shocked his neighbours and friends and brought great grief to his family. His funeral in St. Michael’s cemetery was that accorded to a serving soldier and was marked with the military precision and orderliness which one comes to expect on such occasions.
As the Last Post echoed across the graves of St. Michael’s Cemetery I was reminded of the Athy soldiers from a previous generation who died fighting on the Continent over 85 years ago and who are remembered each evening at the Menin Gate in Ypres.
May they all rest in peace.
When Belgium became embroiled in the first World War on the 4th of August 1914 there was a little reason then to believe that the thriving country town of Ypres would soon become a symbol of the destructive power of warfare. When the war ended on the 11th of November 1918 the entire town had been levelled to the ground and in the surrounding countryside many thousands of Irish men had died. The Western Front across which the German army faced the combined Allied Forces became a burial ground as men fell in battle. Further south the river Somme was to be forever associated with battles between the opposing forces and the most horrific losses of human life imaginable.
I had occasion recently to visit Flanders and the Somme areas associated with World War I. The experience was an extraordinary one. I have often written of Athy men’s involvement in the war but have to admit that I never appreciated or quite grasped the enormity of the loss of human life which occurred on the Western Front during World War I. Everywhere I went in southern Belgium I came to realise that the entire Flanders countryside was a memorial to the dead. Here, there and everywhere, were cemeteries each with headstones of uniform size and shape reminding one of ranks of soldiers on parade. Those cemeteries, sometimes containing thousands of graves, sometimes hundreds or even smaller numbers, are found at the side of roads or located inland and accessed through fields. Each headstone carries the name of a soldier, his rank, regiment, the date he died and often his age and an inscription chosen by his family. Very often a headstone did not bear a name but instead the inscription “A soldier of the Great War” and the words “Known unto God”. This latter phrase was chosen by the English writer Rudyard Kipling who himself lost his son in the war.
The cemeteries, especially the smaller ones, located nearer to farmyards or in farmers fields, are generally battlefield cemeteries containing the remains of soldiers buried where they fell. The larger cemeteries are for the most part where the dead were brought for burial or where, after the war bodies exhumed from outlining areas were brought together. For many thousands who died during World War I there is no identifiable resting place. For that reason a number of memorials were erected in France and Flanders to record the names of those unfortunate men. In the town of Ypres in Flanders is to be found the famous Menin Gate Memorial regarded by many as the most important British War memorial in the world. It records on wall panels the names of approximately 54,000 men who died in various battles in and around Ypres and whose remains were never identified or found. The names of several Athy men are recorded on the Menin Gate Memorial and I was very conscious of that fact when I stood there last week as the Last Post was played by four buglers at preciously 8 o’clock in the evening. Every day of the year the traffic passing through the Menin Gate on one of the main routes into the town of Ypres is stopped while the Last Post is sounded. It is a moving ceremony which has taken place every evening since it was inaugurated on the 2nd of July 1928. The only exception was during World War II when Germans again occupied Ypres. On the memorial gate itself I noted the names of Patrick Flynn, Andrew Reilly, Michael Devoy, Patrick Leonard, Joseph Byrne, James Dillon, Christopher Power, Patrick Tierney, Moses Doyle, Edward Lawler and Henry Hannon all from the town of Athy. These were some of the unfortunate young men from our town who died fighting in Flanders during the first World War and whose bodies were never identified or found.
Just a few short miles outside the town of Ypres I came across the grave of another Athy man killed in that war. It was at Sanctuary Wood Cemetery that I found the last resting place of Patrick Curtis who was 28 years old when he died on Thursday, 5th of November 1914. He was a son of John and Margaret Curtis of Kilcrow and one of three brothers who died in World War I. His was the first World War I grave of an Athy man I came across in Flanders and when I journeyed later into Northern France I had the opportunity of paying my respects at the graveside of John Coulson Hannon who died on the 18th of August 1916 aged 23 years. He is buried in Caterpillar Valley Cemetery near the village of Longueval and his gravestone carries the inscription “Of such is the Kingdom of Heaven” put there at the request of his parents, Mr and Mrs John Hannon of Ardreigh House. John Coulson Hannon was a brother of Norman Hannon who was only 20 years old when he was killed in France on the 16th of May 1915.
Not very far away from Longueval is the small village of Guillemont where another Athy man John Vincent Holland won his Victoria cross. Outside the small village church in Guillemont stands a Celtic cross and as I stood there in the centre of the village my thoughts were of those Athy men who fought and died and those who survived what we still call the Great War. There was surely nothing great about a conflict which sent so many young men to premature deaths and to graves which are scattered throughout the countryside of France and Flanders.
While I was away Ger Prendergast and Dan Meany passed away. Full of years and part and parcel of life in Athy for decades past, both men contributed, each in his own unique way, to the social life of the town. Ger’s entire life was spent with racehorses and during his colourful life he contributed an extraordinary amount to the lore of the town where he had lived for so long. Dan Meany was a man whose interest in Athy and whose knowledge of the people and fabric of the town was combined with a an expertise which resulted in a photographic collection unequalled anywhere else in Athy. For decades he captured on film the events and happenings in the town and the results are an extremely important visual account of the social life of Athy and its people. Both Gerard and Dan will be sadly missed.
The Last Post which represents in military funerals, a last farewell to the dead is an integral part of the daily Menin Gate Memorial ceremonies in Flanders. This week St. Michael’s cemetery echoed to the sound of the Last Post played by two buglers of the Irish Army as a parting salute to their dead colleague, Sean Day. His sudden and untimely death and the manner of his death shocked his neighbours and friends and brought great grief to his family. His funeral in St. Michael’s cemetery was that accorded to a serving soldier and was marked with the military precision and orderliness which one comes to expect on such occasions.
As the Last Post echoed across the graves of St. Michael’s Cemetery I was reminded of the Athy soldiers from a previous generation who died fighting on the Continent over 85 years ago and who are remembered each evening at the Menin Gate in Ypres.
May they all rest in peace.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
