Refuse collection in 19th century Athy

Much of life in Athy is carried on in a seamless and carefree manner. We have the amenities of modern society to thank for this, whether it be the water in our taps, the heat from our radiators or the weekly collection of rubbish from our doors. This was brought home to me most acutely while I perused notes I had taken many years ago from back issues of the Nationalist Newspapers dating as far back as the turn of the century. What struck me was the very same facilities that we take for granted were in their absence the source of many problems in the town. In an era before internal plumbing in houses was commonplace, the inhabitants of the town had to concern themselves with the disposal of all forms of domestic waste and refuse. This gave rise to a particular problem which was reported in the paper on the 13th February 1904.

“At the Athy Petty Session on Tuesday a larger number of parties were at the behest of the Urban Council fined for creating obstructions by allowing heaps of manure to accumulate outside the doors on the streets at their residences. At this time the occupants of small houses sell whatever manure is accumulating in their back premises to the local shopkeepers and farmers. The manure has of course to be transferred to the streets where it is sometimes allowed to remain for days constituting a source of danger and presenting a most unsightly appearance. It is a pity however that the real culprits, the purchasers, can apparently escape scot free. In one case disposed of on Tuesday the defendant, a delicate, sickly and indeed hungry looking old woman who was in receipt of 1 shilling and 6 pence a week out door relief was ordered to pay in fines and costs exactly what she received for the manure, 2 shillings. Yet in the case it was shown that the purchaser had bought the manure fully a week before it was transferred to the street. It’s failure to remove it resulted in the unfortunate woman who sold it being punished in a manner almost beyond bearing. Neglect of this description is certainly a crime.”

The principal complaint of the writer was what he perceived as the inequitable treatment of a poor, old woman. Of interest to the social historian is the detail the report provides regarding the living conditions of the period.

Towns varied in their tolerance towards the keeping of dunghills outside private houses. One writer noted - ‘Every house had a heap of refuse outside it, partly because many horses and pigs were kept in the towns, and partly because destruction of refuse by burning was not considered safe.’ In Cambridge in 1402 dung and filth was allowed to accumulate in heaps for up to seven days while in York in the late fourteenth century any accumulation that could be called a heap was prohibited.

Up to the last century Athy Council had a centre at Green Alley and another in the back Square for the accumulation of manure collected from the streets which was then auctioned off every few months to local farmers.

Refuse collection was as you would expect not a service provided in mediaeval towns. Squalor and filth was an integral part of street life of that time. Householders disposed of their rubbish by dumping it outside the town walls or into the river which ran through or around the town. An Act of 1388 prohibited the pollution of rivers and ordered that refuse be carted away. It was around this time that towns such as Athy began to formalise arrangements for disposal of refuse and designated specific areas as dumping sites. The modern system of refuse collection began with the Public Health Ireland Act 1875 which required local Councils to provide for the collection of refuse from private houses on appointed days during the week.

The writer, Theo Richmond, in his book ‘Konin’ dealing with his mothers home town in Poland noted the arrangements the townspeople had for the disposal of waste in the 1920’s -

‘We shared our toilet with two other families. When it came to cleaning, every family had to do it - wipe the wooden seat and so on. The seat was on top of a kind of wooden box. Underneath was a deep hole in the ground. Everything from the seven toilets went into the same hole. Late on Friday night a Polish peasant with a horse and cart came along. There was an opening in the ground outside the shed. They used a long pole with a bucket on the end to get everything out. They poured it into a tank on the back of the cart and took it to the farmers who used it as manure, so they took it away for nothing’.

A memoir of the mid-19th century recalls the individual known as the nightsoil man :-

‘There was the man who came, mysteriously, in the night, every month or so, to empty the earth closet, the little shed screened by bushes, which stood in the corner of the tiny yard by the side of the house. No one ever talked about him, the nightsoil man with his horse and creaking cart. He came when we were all supposed to be asleep and it was proper to behave as though he did not exist’.

Life today is made relatively easy by the public utilities available to us. The nightsoil man, the public lamp lighter and the “scavenger” are no more and in their place are the highly trained technicians who monitor gauges in specially equipped stations such as the modern filtration and pumping system recently installed by Athy UDC at Ardrew.

Athy Gaelic Football Club

On Sunday the 2nd October 1887 a General Meeting of the newly formed Athy Gaelic Football Club was held and Rev. James Carroll C.C. was elected President with David Walsh, Thomas Dignan and Edward O’Reilly as Vice-President, Treasurer and Secretary respectively. The Committee included D. Foley, W. Doriss, N. Hoban, J. George and M. Scully. The meeting noted that Athy Brass Band had donated their musical instruments to the club and that a house had been procured for band practice and the use of Club members.

A report in the Kildare Observer of the 22nd of October 1887 gives a flavour of the almost genteel activities of the Club in these pre-competition days. “A practice came off on the Club grounds on Sunday last at 3.00 o’clock. A large number of people were present and the proceedings were most enjoyable. Mr. J.E. Nolan and Mr. A. Stynes having called sides the ball was set in motion by Mr. E. J. O’Reilly, the Referee, and there was an excellent evenings amusement. Another practice will be held on Sunday next”.

The report of the “second practice match of football” confirmed that “most of the players appeared for the first time in costume”. A meeting of the members was called on the following Sunday to elect a Captain and Vice-Captain for the first and second teams. Mr. P. Lawler of Farmhill was elected Captain with Mr. Scully Vice-Captain of the first team. The members of the Club totalled 150 in 1887 and according to the local newspaper “additional members are enroling every day”.

The first competitive match involving the new Athy Club was played on the 13th November 1887 against Knock, Co. Laois in Mr. Anthony’s field in Rathstewart. The visitors were declared the winners when the Athy team objected to the Knock team wearing heavy nail boots. Patrick Lawler and his team later withdrew their objection and although helped by team mates who included Ms. Bonfield, McConville, Dooley, Anthwell, Scully, Lawler had to concede defeat on the score of 3 goals and some points to nil for the home team. The visitors were later treated in Kavanaghs Hotel in Leinster Street.

Athy played its first Senior Championship match in 1889 when a draw was secured against a Suncroft Team in Monasterevin. Athy won the replay but lost to Sallins in the second round. Athy reached its first semi-final in 1904 when defeated 4-12 to 0-0 by Roseberry. This set back caused Athy to drop out of the Championship for the next two years and to re-enter at Junior level. In 1907 Athy had its first ever success winning the Junior Championship against Caragh following a re-play.

Further success was to elude Athy for many years. On the 4th of May 1924 at Newbridge the Athy team played its first Senior Championship final. The victory in what was the 1923 Championship final went to Naas on the score 2-6 to 0-0. In 1925 Athy beat Caragh in the semi-final but subsequently lost on an objection. Athy lost in two successive finals in 1926 and 1927 and doubts began to emerge as to the Club’s ability on the big day. Success eventually came when Athy won its first Senior Championship beating Rathangan in the 1933 final. In the following year Athy won its second Championship Final beating Raheens after a re-play. Successful again in 1937 when beating Sarsfields, Athy lost the 1941 final to Carbery before exacting revenge on the same team in the 1942 final following a re-play. Athy was not again to win the Championship until 1987 after losses in 1946 and 1978. The 1987 Championship win was at the expense of Johnstown Bridge on the score 2-9 to 0-9.

In 1905 the Club rented a field from the South Kildare Agricultural Society. The successful development of the playing pitch and spectator area resulted in the Athy Club hosting the All Ireland Football Final for 1906 and the Hurling Final for 1908 in what is now called Geraldine Park. Leinster Football Finals were played in Athy, in 1907, 1908, 1942 and 1944 and the Leinster Hurling Final in 1907. Over the years many men have contributed to the success of Geraldine Park as a venue for Gaelic Games. Frank O’Brien Snr., Christy Walsh and Martin Hayden contributed much in the early years and in 1926 Seamus Malone, a teacher in the Local Christain Brothers School spearheaded further improvements at Geraldine Park. Banking for spectators was first provided in 1937 and completed in 1950 using material cleared for an extension to the local Asbestos factory. A further major development in 1950 was the provision of seating, the building of dressing rooms and the levelling and enclosing of the playing pitch. Playing a leading part in this was local District Court Clerk Fintan Brennan who was Chairman of the Leinster Council between 1945 and 1947. John W. Kehoe a Publican in Offaly Street was Chairman of the Geraldine Park Grounds Committee when a boundary wall was built in the early 1960’s to be followed some years later by the provision of modern dressing rooms. The building of the Clubhouse in 1988 was the final act in the development of Geraldine Park which had commenced in 1905.

Athy Gaelic Football Club has given many stars to Gaelic Football over the years. Those who have achieved County or inter-provincial selection include Tommy Mulhall, a player of matchless artistry, Barney Dunne a Cavan man still happily with with us who was the only Athy player to win four Senior Club Championship medals. Johnny McEvoy, a goalkeeper of considerable skill and bravery later played with the great Larry Stanley on the Garda team and won a Dublin Senior Championship medal in 1948 to add to the Kildare Championship medal won with Athy in 1937. Danny Flood first played in Kildare in 1954 and occupied the full back position for many years, winning a Leinster Senior Championship medal in 1956. Mick Carolan started with the County team in 1958 and was still a regular on the team fourteen years later. In more recent years Footballing Stars in Athy and indeed in County Kildare have been somewhat scarce. Gaelic Football in the short grass county has been living for a long time on memories of past glories. Hopefully Clubs like Athy will herald the arrival of a successful County Football Team which will regain for us a pride which has lain dormant for so long.

Fitzgeralds - Dukes of Leinster

I recently attended a seminar in St. Werburgh Church in Dublin, a Church dating in part from the end of the 12th century. It also has many links with Athy and particularly with two members of Anglo-Norman families with connections to the town. In 1715-1719 the Church was rebuilt to the design of Colonel Thomas Burgh who also designed Bert House, Athy for his brother. Burgh also designed Trinity Library and Dr. Steven’s Hospital which can now be seen at its most splendid following its refurbishment as the headquarters of the Eastern Health Board.

In the vaults beneath the Church lie the remains of Lord Edward Fitzgerald, a member of the United Irishmen and for a period a member of Parliament for the Borough of Athy. By a strange coincidence the man who captured him, Major Sirr, lies in the Church Yard of St. Werburghs.

It was during the morning break in the Seminar that I was told of the recent tragic death of what was claimed to be the last direct descendent of the Dukes of Leinster. Thomas Fitzgerald who as Lord Offaly would have succeeded in time to the premier title in Ireland, died at the young age of 23 years in a car accident in the Midlands. He was the only son of the Marquis and Marchioness of Kildare and Grand-son of the present Duke and Duchess of Leinster.

The Fitzgerald family have lived in England for the last 40 years or so, following the sale of their ancient seat of Kilkea Castle. Their connection with the town of Athy lives on in the Street names of our town. William Street, Duke Street, Leinster Street, Offaly Street, Stanhope Street and Emily Square all commemorate members of the Leinster family. Strangely enough Lord Edward Fitzgerald fondly remembered as the Irish Patriot who took a leading part in the planning of the 1798 Rebellion has not given his name to any street in the town which he represented as a Member of Parliament. Maybe in the 1798 bicentenary which will be celebrated next year this omission can be corrected and due honour paid to the man whose family has such long links with Athy.

The family’s association with County Kildare began in 12th century. The Geraldine family of which the Kildare’s were a branch were prominent in the early stages of the Anglo-Norman conquest of Ireland. Their kinsmen, the annalist and cleric, Gerald of Wales writing in the twelfth century eulogised the power and influence the family had in the settlement of Ireland. He noted that they were the most successful in subjugating the native Irish.

By the close of the 13th century the Kildare’s owned large tracts of County Kildare with important castles at Kildare, Maynooth and Woodstock in Athy. In 1316 John Fitzthomas, Lord of Offaly, was made Earl of Kildare as reward for service to the crown during the invasion of Bruce, the Scottish King’s brother. By the early 16th century the Fitzgeralds had consolidated their power to such an extent that they effectively were the most powerful family in Ireland.

The Kildare Rental book of 1518 shows that they held extensive lands in Kildare, Carlow, Cork, Limerick, Tipperary, Kilkenny, Wexford and Dublin. Until the mid-sixteenth century they virtually monopolised the office of Lord Deputy, the Kings representative in Ireland. One Tudor official complained that the deputyship was regarded as the inheritance of the Earls of Kildare. The revolt of Silken Thomas, son of the 12th Earl saw the confiscation of much of their property. Although they never were to attain the same power they had before the revolt of 1534 their influence was still significant. In 1598 Sir Henry Yallop noted that there was “hardly a native of the Kingdom who is not dependent on either the Earl of Ormond or the Earl of Kildare”.

Thereafter the family although extensive landowners did not involve themselves to the same degree in intrigue for power, though within the county of Kildare they effectively controlled the nomination and election of MP’s from the Athy borough up to the early 19th century. As a the primary owners of property in the town their influence on its development in the 18th and 19th centuries was profound. Many of the principal public building are attributable to the interest of the various Duke’s in the town. The construction of the town hall is believed to have been financed by the Leinster family as was the corn exchange, now the courthouse. The layout of Emily square is also a product of their influence.

The market rights granted to Athy by King Henry VIII under the Charter of 1515 was for a Tuesday Market “in a place deputed or ordained therefor by Gerald, Earl of Kildare.” The Market Place chosen was the open ground near the River Barrow on it’s East Bank, now known as Emily Square. In 1669 the King of England was petitioned to grant leave to hold two additional Fairs in Athy. Up to then the town had only one Fair on Michaelmas Day and it was felt that “an ancient and loyal corporation seated in the heart of a plentiful country for both corn and cattle” should also have Fairs of three days duration in May and November. The petition supported by the Fitzgeralds as Landlords of Athy was successful.

The presence of a Presbyterian Community in the town is the result of a migration scheme initiated by the Duke of Leinster following the Great Famine to introduce Scottish cottiers to his estates around Athy. Those who accepted the Duke’s offer of lands and houses in South Kildare mainly came from Perthshire and Eastern Scotland. As Scottish settlers they brought with them the industry and energy of the native Scot, together with their religion, Presbyterianism. Throughout the early months of 1851 the settlers arrived in Athy, a town which in centuries past had witnessed similar arrivals from across the Irish Sea. By June of that year 17 Presbyterian families had settled in the area. In February 1852 a site for a Presbyterian Church had been acquired from the Duke of Leinster on the Dublin Road. A foundation stone for the Church was laid in September 1855 and the Church, known locally as the Scotch Church was opened in 1856. Another member of the Fitzgerald Family who is still remembered today is Lord Walter Fitzgerald, historian and antiquarian who was responsible for the formation of Kildare Archaeological Society in the last decade of the 19th century. He was responsible for collecting an enormous amount of local history material and for encouraging an awareness and an appreciation of the wealth of local historical material and the built heritage of County Kildare.

If the death of Lord Offaly is in fact the end of the direct line of the Fitzgerald Family, it marks a sad end to what was once the most powerful family in this Island. The legacy of the Fitzgerald Family to the town of Athy is a proud one and is best exemplified in that important urban space, an architectural composition occupying a central position in Athy - Emily Square. How strange it is that the Fitzgerald Family should suffer such a tragic loss at a time when plans are afoot to put a new road through the centre of Athy and to deprive us of one of the most important elements which makes Athy such an attractive town.

Castlemitchell Meggars Club

Horse Shoe pitching or “Meggars” as it is locally called has been part of rural life in Ireland for as long as cast off horse shoes have been available. It is claimed to have originated in Roman Times when soldiers spent their leisure hours in camp throwing or pitching horse shoes in friendly competition. Today the sport has evolved as a skillful and well organised one using purpose made pitcher shoes manufactured to a standard size and weight.

In the Irish context, horse shoe pitching is not regarded as a particularly ancient sport. This may well have been because of the large number of small holdings in rural Ireland which did not justify the ownership of even a single horse. It was in the 1940’s that pitching became popular especially during the war years when other forms of sport and entertainment were difficult to organise. The equipment for the game was readily available in all rural areas and before long, weekend matches gained a popularity they have not since lost.

It was in County Wexford that the first Meggar Clubs were organised in Ireland. Counties Laois, Carlow and Kildare were soon to follow and in Ballykilcavan between Athy and Stradbally, meggars were played in the mid 1940’s. In the late 1960’s, meggars was a popular game played by workers in the Sugar Factory in Carlow during their lunch break. In time a club was formed in the factory and soon after the factory workers from Counties Kildare and Laois established Clubs in their own areas. In March 1974, the Midland Horse Shoe League was formed with Clubs affiliated from Cossets of Carlow, Erin Foods of Carlow, Maganey, Tollerton and Ballinabranagh. The first Club from this locality was Castlemitchell founded in 1976. The founder Members included the late Pat Pender and Luke Kinsella and Mick English who later went on to found a Meggars Club in Bray, Athy.

The Castlemitchell Club played on the local green using cast off Horse shoes which were pitched to a spike set in the ground a distance of 33 feet away. The numbers playing increased and as interest developed, a second team was formed in Castlemitchell. This was later to form the nucleus of the highly successful Gouleyduff Team which was founded in 1980. Founder Members included Denis Ryan, Martin Mulhall, Pat Ward, Jim Mulhall and Denis Prendergast. They played in the field next to P.J. Prendergast’s house in Gouleyduff.

Kilberry Meggars Club followed in 1981. Originally based in Mick Drea’s field, the Club Members now play on the green in Kilberry. Mick Drea, Joe McDermott, Mick Clinton and Jimmy Fitzpatrick were some of the original Members of the Kilberry Club. Some short time afterwards, a Club was formed in Churchtown with Billy Harris, Jim Kane, Stephen Lawler and the late Jack “Thatcher”-Carbery as Members. They practised and played on Billy Harris’s field.

When Mick English, one of the Founder Members of the Castlemitchell went to live in Bray, Athy, he was instrumental in forming the Bray Meggars Club with Mick Bolger, Charlie Sourke and Joe Martin.

Today the Gouleyduff, Bray, Churchtown and Kilberry Clubs play under what are described as the Wexford Rules and are Members of the County Kildare Horse Shoe Pitchers. These local clubs are amongst the most successful in the Country. Castlemitchell Club won the inaugural All Ireland Club Championship played in Fairyhouse in County Meath in 1978 with the team of Mick English, Paddy Byrne, John and Charlie Sourke, Pat Prendergast and Luke Kinsella. Since then the Gouleyduff Team has won the All Ireland Championship on three occasions. Victories in 1982, 1989 were followed by last years All Ireland win in Timahoe, Co. Laois. The winning team then comprised Joe Phillips Captain, Pat Ward, John Kelly, Paddy Byrne, Denis Ryan and James Hosy. As a result of that victory, the All Ireland Meggars Club Championship for 1997 will be held in Tegral’s Sport Field in Athy on the Whit Weekend.

Competitions will start on Saturday evening the 31st May and continue on Sunday afternoon. Athy has played host to a variety of All Ireland matches over the years including Hurling and Ploughing Championships. Now meggars is to be added to list given our local sporting activity a unique place in the annals of Irish sport.

Athy's Inner Relief Road - McCarthy Area Report

I have often wondered how the men of ’98 felt as they rose in the year of rebellion to tilt against the might and power of the English Crown. Their rage and perhaps frustration can only be imagined but must be comparable to that which I feel tonight as I find myself teethering on the brink of outrage at the contents of an innocuous brown envelope which has reached me. Outrage is a term normally applied to hideous and dastardly deeds perpetrated under cover of darkness on unsuspecting folk, but it may well describe what prompts my feelings tonight.

I have just received what is described as an executive summary of Athy’s Traffic Management Study which is dated 1997 and which was prepared for Kildare County Council by McCarthy Acer Consultants Ltd. of Dublin. The five page document was prepared by the Consultants following what they described as a “Comprehensive Traffic Management Study for Athy on behalf of Kildare County Council.” The requirements of the study as commissioned by the County Council interalia required the consultants “to validate the 1975 traffic plan for Athy”.

In case you had forgotten, that plan produced in the days before EEC largesse began to transform the road network in Ireland, suggested two new alternative roads for Athy - an Inner Relief Road and an Outer Relief Road. The far sighted Councillors of the day opted for the Inner Relief Road option, but sure wouldn’t they, bearing in mind the quality of Council decision making in those days which for instance failed to secure Whites Castle for the town when offered in exchange for a Council house.

So it was that in 1996 McCarthy and Associates rode into town to start their “Comprehensive Traffic Study”, the outcome of which could never be in doubt. After all, did not their clients Kildare County Council long ago pin their colours to the mast insofar as the Inner Relief Road was concerned. Did we really expect that McCarthy would make a recommendation which would not find favour with it’s clients. I am not of course in any way impugning their professional integrity. Not for one minute would I be so presumptuous, but I am open to persuasion. However, lets return to the traffic study itself. We find that a survey programme was undertaken on a Friday and a Saturday in September 1996 which disclosed that 15% - 20% of traffic on the Main Street was through traffic. The Report also claims that 50% - 60% of traffic entering Athy has either their origin or destination in the town. Into what black hole is the remaining 35% - 20% of the traffic disappearing ? Have I missed something Mr. McCarthy, or is there an explanation which is not apparent on a reading of the executive summary ?

Incidentally, for whom is the five page summary prepared for - hard of reading Councillors or hard pressed Council Officials with limited attention spans ? I have asked for a copy of the full report, but don’t hold your breath while I await a response. Once I got over the shock of reading of Rat Running in Mount Hawkins [I kid you not], I was ready to pass on to the Council’s, sorry Consultants, proposals for managing Athy’s traffic up to the year 2016. A number of proposals were assessed from the “do nothing” to “outer by-pass” to “inner roads with one-way system” to “inner relief two-way system”. McCarthy and Associates do not sit on the fence, especially if it is propped up by Kildare County Council and no doubt to your surprise and mine, they announced their preferred strategy as the Inner Relief Road for two-way traffic ! So there you are, Kildare County Council were right after all and the rest of us were wrong.

“But why an Inner Relief Road”, I hear you say. To the independent consultants who looked at this matter without any prior knowledge of the County Council’s preference I put the same question. The answer is worthy of a consultant. “It will enable existing roads in the town centre to be managed in a way that the environment and vitality of the town centre would be enhanced through the creation of partially pedestrianised areas within Duke Street and Leinster Street”. There you are - I couldn’t put it any better myself. Oh there’s more. “The aim of the Traffic Management Plan is to improve the attractiveness of Athy town centre and the completion of the Inner Relief Road will play a major part in achieving these aims. Facilities for vulnerable road users such as pedestrians and cyclists will be improved, as will environmental conditions. The civic amenity of Athy will be enhanced and the town centre will become a safer and more pleasant place to work, shop and visit”. Well it must be true, after all, these consultants are highly qualified men and if they say that running two roads through the center of the town and keeping all traffic within the town center will create a safer, pleasant place to shop, who are we to disagree ?

It is quite obvious that all the road engineers and consultants in England and Ireland who have favoured outer relief roads and an appropriate measure to make town centers safer and more attractive are wrong. Mr. McCarthy, how can I thank you for letting me see the errors of my ways. You are a genius with words, but incidentally, why did it take so long to produce the finished article ? Was there an awful lot of consultation involved ? You know how it is ! County Council Officials can be difficult when the Messiah approaches with a message which is not in accordance with the tablets of stone.

Where’s me pike ? I smell rebellion in the air ! The Americans had their McCarthy era. We’re about to start on our own. Maybe the 200th Anniversary of the 1798 rebellion can be suitably commemorated on the Square in Athy with more floggings at the triangle. Have we got any likely candidates you can suggest ?

St. John's Cemetery

St. John's Cemetery located just a few yards away from the newly opened Ulster Bank in Edmund Rice Square is unknown to most people in Athy. I passed by it everyday of my school days which I spend in the Christian Brothers and its only within recent times that I have been able to acquaint myself with the history of this most ancient site. The Monastery of St. John's founded by the Order of the Holy Cross in the early Thirteenth Century gave its name to the locality where the Monastery was once located. Over 750 years have passed since the Monks first came to the West of the River Barrow where within sight and easy reach of the stout wall of Woodstock Castle, they founded a Monastery. They were to depart the area before the Reformation in 1540 leaving St. John's as the name of the Main Street on the West Side of Athy and the laneway which ran in a semi-circular route from one end of that street to the other. The Street is now called Duke Street but the laneway or more correctly what remains of it is to this day known as St. John's Lane.

The only possible remains of the Thirteenth Century Monastery is the Cemetery of St. John which from the raised ground which presents itself as you enter through the small gateway is clearly of great antiquity. The explanation is straight forward enough. The accumulation of burials over the Centuries in the confined space which is St. John's Cemetery resulted in an increase in the ground level. The same effect is to be noticed on the South side of the Medieval Church in St. Michael's Cemetery a place much favoured for burials because people associated the darkened North side of the Church with the devil.

The Cemetery of St. John's now in the control and ownership of Athy Urban District Council has been a burial ground for Members of the Protestant Faith since the Reformation. The oldest Memorial Stone was noted in the Kildare Archaeological Society Journal in 1891 as that of William Watson and it bore the date 1635. The last burial in St. John's Cemetery was in 1979 when Sir Anthony Weldon of Donegal, a Member of the Weldon Family of Kilmoroney was buried in the Weldon Family Vault.

Recent work in the Cemetery has seen the removal of years of overgrown grass and bushes and yew trees planted, as was traditional in Cemetery's of old have been trimmed back. The Ancient Cemetery has begun to reveal its secrets which years of neglect had contrived to hide from the General Public. A recent visit by me during the course of Youth Training Project has prompted this article.

Two headstones first noticed in the centre of the Cemetery mark the graves of soldiers, one of whom died in 1791. The second commemorates a sergeant of the 8th Light Dragoons who died in Athy in 1799. The Military Barracks where these soldiers were based was located off Barrack Street (Now Woodstock Street) in the area now occupied by part of the Greenhills Housing Estate. The Cavalry Sergeant who died in 1799 was probably one of Colonel Campbell's troops who were let loose in South Kildare on the 20th April 1798, after the locals had failed to respond to demands to hand up all arms and pikes. He may indeed have had charge of the soldiers who stripped the thatch off a number of cottages adjoining the army barracks in the early months of 1798 in case any difficulty was caused to the Garrison by Rebels setting fire to the straw.

Near to the soldiers headstones is the grave of Captain D.L. Lefroy of the Royal artillery who died in 1820. He must be the man referred to in the Affidavit of Patrick Brady which was forwarded by James Butler, Sovereign of Athy to Dublin Castle concerning the activities of the Ribbon men in Athy in 1820. Brady stated that William Murphy a Publican of Athy had Sworn James Hutchinson, Thomas Ging, Michael Ryder, James Anderson, Daniel Bryan and Terry Niel to murder Captain LeFroy and destroy his property. Lefroy's offence was apparently his refusal to allow pigs on the streets of Athy because they "annoyed the neighbourhood and destroyed the path". The men Sworn to do this dastardly later met in Murphy's Pub for the purposes of agreeing the plan to shoot Lefroy with a gun to be supplied by the Publican. The Records do not disclose if Lefroy was shot but he died in 1820 whether of natural causes or otherwise I have yet to determine.

Another soldiers grave is that of Sir Anthony Weldon of Kilmoroney House whose remains with that of all the Weldon's are buried in the Family Vault. The Commonwealth War Graves Commission have erected a gravestone over the vault honouring the man who as Lieutenant Colonel of the Prince of Wales Regiment served for a brief period in France during World War 1. He returned from there to a Dublin Hospital where he died on the 29th June 1917. The local Sinn Feiners attempted to put a Nationalist Banner across the main Street of Athy on the night before Weldon's Funeral but failed in their attempt. The next morning the Coffin of Sr. Anthony who had commanded the British Troops in Limerick during 1916 was brought by train from Dublin and then on a gun carriage from the railway station to St. Michael's Church. It was preceeded by the Band of the Lancers and 120 men of the Leinster Regiment. Offaly Street was lined by the 4th Leinsters and after the service in St. Michael's the cortege moved to St. John's Cemetery where the coffin was placed in the Family Vault as the Firing party fired three Volleys and the last post was sounded on the bugles.

The Cemetery of St. John's has many interesting reminders of Athys past and those I have mentioned reflect but a few of its Military connections. St. John's is a subject I hope to return to again.

Jimmy Roycroft & Charlie Moore

Two deaths last weekend reawakened memories for a lot of local people. Jimmy Roycroft, doyen of the Roycroft family passed away at the age of 85 years, just 8 years after the death of his wife Teresa. Charlie Moore died at 75 years of age, less than a year after his wife had passed away.

The quiet self effacing man who carried on business as a Chemist in Duke Street gave little hint of the sporting successes in which he shared almost 50 years ago. Charlie was a very good table tennis player and a member of the Social Club team which won the Kildare and District League on four or five occasions in the early 1940's. Others on that team included his brother Eddie, Frank O'Brien, Kevin and Stephen Timmons, Finbar Purcell and Brendan O'Flaherty. The ladies were ably represented by May and Dympna Ward, Betty May, Jo Lawler and Kay O'Brien.

It was Charlie Moore and Frank O'Brien who teamed up to win the Wicklow Open Doubles table tennis tournament around the same time. Badminton was another sport in which the young "blades" of the time participated. They played in the same hall in St. John's Lane where 20 years previously World War I veterans from Athy had socialised. Fifty years ago participation in sport was the norm for every young person, and the crackling sounds of
2 RN coming over the Athlone wavelength did not divert attention as does television today.

It was young men like Charlie Moore, joining the various societies and clubs in native towns who ensured a vibrant social life in rural Ireland in the '40s and '50s. When we look back over 50 years of our local social history we cannot but notice the multiplicity of organisations operating in the town, all geared to providing social outlets for the talents and sporting skills of its members. Who can forget the Tennis Club at Chanterlands with it's eight grass courts all carefully tended by Jack Mitchell of Ardreigh. Everyone will recall the Social Club in St. John's Lane where the billiard tables, the badminton court, the table tennis tables and the card games provided a variety of outlets for young and old, male and female. There was also of course the drama section of the same Club where the members provided a veritable feast of the latest stage offerings for local audiences. This was also the time when a hurling revival was witnessed in Athy following the arrival of Brother Farrell to the local Christian Brothers School. Charlie Moore was a member of the school team which played in College Hurling Championships and with his brother Eddie, shared in the Town's victory in the Junior Hurling Championship of 1945.

The quiet man who set up his chemist business in the former bookies office operated by his father in Duke Street, later moved into the premises which once housed the drapery business of the legendry M.G. Nolan.

Jimmy Roycroft was a link with another and perhaps different element of the towns past. He was from Sligo and while stationed at the Curragh Camp as a member of the Irish Army, met and married Teresa Cummins of Athy. The young married couple went to Sligo where Jimmy worked as a member of the local Fire Brigade before returning to Athy in or around 1954. Living firstly in Shrewleen Lane the Roycroft family next moved to Janeville Lane, then a lane of small two roomed houses which had been built 80 years previously by Mark Cross, builder of Emily Square. I was then living in Offaly Street and recall some of the families who live in the back lane. The Doody family were a large family whose numbers were exceeded only by the Roycrofts whose final family count was an impressive twenty-one. Sadly, only eleven of those children are today alive, nine of whom are living in Athy and two in Carlow. Teresa Roycroft, the mother of the family, was an exceptionally good singer of local balads and I must acknowledge my regret that I never had the opportunity of recording her singing some of those ballads before she passed away.

Jimmy worked for some time with the local Council, and the family moved from Janeville to St. Joseph's Terrace long before I had left Offaly Street. Coincidentally Jimmy's sister Dotty, also from Sligo, married an Athy man and she is now living in the town where last week her brother died.

Jimmy Roycroft and Charlie Moore were part of a local community where history reaches out to us from the very stones of the buildings we pass every day. The men and women who people those buildings do so for a time which in the order of things is extremely short. However short the time, it is those local men and women who give an immediacy and a vitality to local history. Both Charlie Moore and Jimmy Roycroft were part of the rich tapestry of life here in Athy and each in their own way left a mark on the community in which they lived.

K.A.S. visit to Athy and Woodstock Castle

Members of Kildare Archaeological Society recently met in Athy at the start of a Sunday afternoon outing. They gathered in the shadows of Woodstock Castle just as another gathering of enthusiasts had done almost 105 years ago. It was on Thursday, 15th September, 1892 that the then newly formed Kildare Archaeological Society first held an outing to Athy. On that occasion the members travelled by train, arriving at Athy Railway Station from where they walked the short distance to St. Michael's Medieval Church. There the local curate, Fr. J. Carroll gave a talk on the history of the 13th century building, after which the Society members walked or were brought by carriage to White's Castle. Bishop Comerford's paper on the history of this most important building in the centre of the town was then read, after which the Society members inspected the interior of the Castle.

The most recent visit started with Woodstock Castle when the opportunity was taken to detail the significant features of the 13th century ruin. Now surrounded by local authority houses the Castle stands unprotected and somewhat sadly neglected, near to the banks of the River Barrow. As originally built, it was a rectangular keep of two stories, with a large hall on the first floor. The entrance door was on the first floor facing the river and was probably reached by a wooden stairway which could be readily removed in the event of an attack. Such a precaution was necessary at a time when the native Irish were at war with the Anglo Norman settlers. Indeed the Castle was attacked and the developing village of Athy was burnt on at least four occasions during the first one hundred years of their existence.

The stone Castle built with uncoursed limestone rubble has walls 1.3 metres thick. It was lit by round headed window slits, two of which, although blocked up, are still visible on the north facing wall. These are 13th century features and help to date the Castle which has been modified many times since it was first built. An interesting feature of the Castle once recorded in the journal of the Kildare Archaeological Society but no longer to be found there was an ancient chimney piece. It showed the sculptured arms of the Fitzgerald family supported by Lions Couchant and must be dated to before 1300 when the future Dukes of Leinster adopted the monkey as part of their Coat of Arms. This of course is another element in the detective work which goes to show the age of a building which in the case of Woodstock Castle we can reasonably satisfy ourselves is of 13th century origin.

The legend of the Fitzgerald monkey is probably well known to most readers, but for the sake of completeness I repeat the story. Apparently John FitzThomas, child of Thomas FitzMaurice and Rohesia de St. Michael was missing when Woodstock Castle went on fire. He was later found safe in the arms of the family's pet monkey whereupon the FitzGeralds adopted the animal as part of their Coat of Arms. Those of you who have an opportunity to do so should examine the sculptured FitzGerald Coat of Arms set into the South facing wall of Whites Castle. There you will see the monkey incorporated as part of the ancient arms of the Duke of Leinster's family.

Woodstock Castle was the first building in what was the future town of Athy, but because of the hostility of the native Irish the settlers eventually withdrew to the more easily defended East bank of the River Barrow. This may have coincided with the building of Whites Castle in 1417. This Castle was intended to defend the bridge at Athy and it afforded far greater protection for those living on the East bank of the River than Woodstock Castle did for those on the West bank. The subsequent development of the town of Athy was centred in the area now known as Emily Square and Leinster Street.

In the meantime Woodstock Castle continued to be a focal point for warring activities, especially during the Confederate wars of the mid-seventeenth century. Owen Roe O'Neill and the Marquis of Ormond at different times occupied Woodstock Castle while General Preston made an unsuccessful attempt to capture it. His failure to do so owed much to the courage of Catherine Sheil, wife of Dr. Eoin Sheil and a friend of Owen Roe O'Neill. Preston threatened to hang her nephew from an upturned cart in front of Woodstock unless she handed over the Castle. She refused and Preston's threat was not carried out, only because he was prevailed upon by some of his officers not to execute the young man who had been captured while carrying a flag of truce. General Preston and his men marched off to Carlow, passing under the town gate at Offaly Street which was thereafter known as Preston's Gate. This was the medieval town gate located opposite Paddy Garrett's house which was removed in 1860 following an accident in which Rev. F.S. Trench, the local Rector, was killed.

Woodstock Castle underwent extensive refurbishment in the 16th century. This turned what was an Anglo-Norman keep into a fortified house. Large windows were inserted into the walls of the Castle and we can still see on various sides of the Castle remains of those mullioned windows with hood mouldings. A tower was erected at the South side of Woodstock for defensive purposes and this has a number of 16th century gun ports which are of national importance. All of the features referred to have been blocked up for safety reasons, but are still readily identifiable and could be restored with relative ease.

The most recent visitors from the Archaeological Society passed on to Rheban Castle and Ballyadams Castle later that afternoon. They expressed surprise at the rather sad state in which Woodstock Castle has been left to deteriorate and wondered, as we must all do, why this most ancient of buildings has not been restored. It commands an imposing position on the banks of the Barrow and with neighbouring Whites Castle, form an important pair of medieval buildings worth preserving for the future.

Athy Musical Societies

Athy Musical and Dramatic Society now in it's 13th year will put on a performance of "Annie" in the Grove Theatre commencing on Wednesday, 23rd April. The Society's previous shows have been in the Secondary School Hall in Rathstewart and the move to the Grove represents a return to the Theatre in which the South Kildare Choral Society performed in the mid-1960's.

There is a strong musical tradition in Athy. The Shows in the 1940's performed in the Town Hall are remembered by the older generations as highlights in the entertainment calendar of the day. These were followed by the Social Club Players of the 1950's whose forte was the dramatic theatre. They blazed a trail of brilliance during the last pre-television decade which is still talked about to this day. Their performances were, in the early years, put on in the Town Hall and in the latter years in the Hall which was originally the old Comrades Hall in St. John's Lane.

The genesis for the start of the Athy Choral Society in the early 1960's was an unsuccessful Christmas concert arranged for Athy Golf Club. Some of the members came together afterwards and put in motion plans for the following years Christmas concert. They engaged Fr. Pat Crowe, Curate in the local Parish Church to train and conduct a choir comprised of Golf Club members such as Sean O'Connor, Bob Peacock, Joe Carbery, Kevin Timmins, Tommy O'Brien, Leonard Craig and Des McHugh. Their next Christmas concert was a resounding success and prompted another local Curate, Fr. Jim Corbett to consider running a series of concerts to raise funds for the new Parish Church then planned for Athy. Approaches were made to local firms and so was born the Inter Firm Variety Concert Competition which ran so successfully for a number of years. Some of those who competed in the Shows included the Golf Club, the Local Shopkeepers Group, Asbestos Factory, the I.V.I. and the Wallboard Factory. By this stage the Golf Club Society included not only the members mentioned previously, but also Ian Atwell, Paddy Dillon, Charlie Prendergast and Alec Kelly.

A programme from those days which I have is for the Shopkeepers Show on March 11th and 13th, 1964 as part of what is termed "Athy Parish Festival". The performers included Wag O'Keeffe who sang and performed "Phil the Fluters Ball", while Hazel Darling, Deirdre Hughes and Noeleen Murphy comprised the Irish Dancing Troupe. A one act comedy "Love and Acid Drops" was performed by John Hillard, Michael Dempsey, Dolly Hyland, Phyllis Coughlan, Ann Dooley and Brian O'Hara. Michael Noonan, Mary Conlan and Charlie Prendergast sang a selection from "Desert Song". The Merry Widow Soloist was Margot Higginson with Mary Tuohy as principal dancer, while Charlie Prendergast lent his vocal talents yet again to a rendition of "Jeannie with the Light Brown Hair". Others on stage that night included Maureen Ryan, Carmel Hickey, Ernest O'Rourke-Glynn, Ian Atwell while the ladies of the chorus were Helen Walsh, Esther Bannon, Kathleen Kelly, Carmel Hickey and Patricia Mahon. The mens chorus included Joe McNally, Billy Browne, Brendan Ward, John Byrne, P.J. Hyland, Sean Murphy and Ernest O'Rourke Glynn.

The Sunday Night Variety Shows in the Social Club in St. John's Lane proved such a success that minds soon turned to the possibility of harnessing the local talent in one Musical Society for the benefit of the town. A subsequent public meeting led to the formation of the South Kildare Choral Society. Originally it was intended to name the Society after the Town in which it was based, but the participation of Castledermot folk such as Kate Dunne and Frank McDonnell prompted the name "South Kildare".

Captain Dennis Mellerick, then based in the Curragh Camp, was engaged to direct the Society members and for a number of years at Christmas and Easter the Society put on shows in the Grove Cinema. The first show was Gilbert and Sullivans The Mikado followed by the Pirates of Penzance the following year and later by the Arcadians.

The Choral Society members rehearsed in a number of different venues through the town, including Bradburys Restaurant, the Methodist Church Hall and the Parochial Hall in Offaly Street. They also participated for a number of years in the Cork Choral Festival, attaining a very credible second place in its section on one occasion. The Society inevitably went into decline and it was the establishment of Athy's Musical and Dramatic Society 1984 which once again brought the talented singers and thespians of the locality together again. The Society which has performed since it's foundation in a number of different venues in Athy has now returned with its latest offering "Annie" to what was once the home of the South Kildare Choral Society.

There is a strong musical tradition in Athy. The Shows in the 1940's performed in the Town Hall are remembered by the older generations as highlights in the Entertainment Calendar of the Day. These were followed by the Social Club Players of the 1950's whose forte was the dramatic theatre.

The genesis for the start of the Athy Choral Society in the early 1960's was an unsuccessful Christmas concert arranged for Athy Golf Club. Some of the members came together afterwards and put in motion plans for the following years Christmas concert. They engaged Fr. Pat Crowe, Curate in the local Parish Church to train and conduct a choir comprised of Golf Club members such as Sean O'Connor, Bob Peacock, Joe Carbery, Kevin Timmins, Tommy O'Brien, Leonard Craig and Des McHugh. Their next Christmas concert was a resounding success and prompted another local Curate, Fr. Jim Corbett to consider a series of concerts to raise funds for the new Parish Church then planned for Athy. Approaches were made to local firms and so was born the Inter Firm Variety Concert Competition which ran so successfully for a number of years.

The Sunday Night Variety Shows in the Social Club in St. John's Lane proved such a success that mind soon turned to the possibility of harnessing the local talent in one Musical Society for the benefit of the town. A subsequent public meeting led to the formation of the South Kildare Choral Society.

Captain Dennis Mellerick, then based in the Curragh Camp, was engaged to direct the Society members and for a number of years at Christmas and Easter the Society put on shows in the Grove Cinema. The first show was Gilbert and Sullivans, The Mikado followed by the Pirates of Penzance the following year and later by the Arcadians.

The Society inevitably went into decline and it was the establishment of Athy's Musical and Dramatic Society in 1984 which once again brought the talented singers and thespians of the locality together again. The Society which has performed since it's foundation in a number of different venues in Athy has now returned with its latest offering "Annie" to what was once the home of the South Kildare Choral Society.

Jack Murphy of Convent View

Last week Jack Murphy passed away at the age of 94 years. He had been a bicycle mechanic all of his working life. The heyday of the bicycle has long gone and with it the skill of the bicycle mechanic. Indeed, the motor mechanic who succeeded the bicycle mechanic is himself in danger of extinction with the new fangled diagnostic machinery now being built for the cars of today.

Jack first started work in 1919 with Duthie Larges in Leinster Street and about eight years later moved up the street to Jackson Brothers when they started a motor and bicycle business. Both Duthie Larges and Jacksons have since disappeared from the commercial life of Athy.

The first Jackson to come to the town was Francis Robert Jackson who was the local station master employed by the Great Southern Railway Company. A man with apparent entrepreneurial flair, he became involved in the sale of grain waste from Guinesses Brewery in Dublin. He rented the yard at the rear of McEvoy's Public House in Leinster Street from where he carried on business under another persons name while at the same time remaining on as Station Master in Athy. The Railway Company disapproved of his commercial activities and this ultimately led to him resigning his position and purchasing a shop in Leinster Street where he lived with his family for a number of years. He developed a hardware and general merchants business on the premises which was later to grow into the most substantial business outlet of its kind in Athy.

The older generations will remember Jacksons which was always referred to as Jackson Brothers. This was a hark back to the days when the developing business was carried on by the original proprietor Robert Francis, with his two brothers John and William. The prospering business activities of the brothers were brought to a temporary halt in 1907 when their two storied



shop premises was destroyed by fire. The local newspaper reported the disaster as follows :-

"A few minutes before three o clock this morning a fire was discovered on the premises of Jackson Bros. Athy, hardware and general merchants. The residential portion of the premises consists of a two-storey house facing Leinster Street, and a wing at the back or north side...................... The newly formed fire brigade was summoned, and soon arrived as did a large force of police, under Head-Constable Blessing. The efforts of the brigade were principally directed towards keeping the flames from spreading to the adjoining buildings, and in this they were successful. So fierce however, were the flames that within half an hour the roof of the building fell in, and subsequently the walls collapsed. The extensive stores at the back were also burned to the ground."

The shop was re-built and the opportunity was taken to purchase adjoining premises. The hardware and grocery extended over a very large premises which are now occupied by Perrys Supermarket and the adjoining Goggin Hardware Shop. The man who started the business, the former Station Master Francis Robert Jackson died in 1916 and his interests were assumed by his eldest surviving son and namesake, Francis Robert. Before his death Francis Jackson, the elder, had been living in Kilkea House and previously in Shamrock Lodge, Kildare Road where he had moved with his family from the living quarters over the original shop in Leinster Street. It was the second Francis Robert Jackson who in the early 1920'2 opened the garage to cater for the then developing motor business. He obtained permission from Athy Urban District Council to install petrol pumps on Leinster Street and it was to join the newly opened garage that Jack Murphy left Duthie Larges in 1927. Jackson Brothers prospered over the years and it was Francis Robert Jackson, the son of the founder of the firm who purchased Farmhill on the Carlow Road as the family residence. He was also to buy out the interest of his



uncles John Jackson and William Jackson in the family business
which however continued to be known as Jackson Brothers.

Francis Robert Jackson died in October 1949 and was succeeded by his son Francis Kenneth whom locals will recall lived in Farm Hill, the house first purchased by his father. Francis Kenneth, known locally as Ken, worked in the Leinster Street Shop before serving in Italy during World War II where he attained the rank of Major. On his return to Athy he continued the business first set up by his Grandfather improving and expanding it over the years. It was a coincidence that in Leinster Street were to be found two thriving businesses, one managed by Major Jackson while the other was controlled by Colonel Hosie, both of whom served overseas during World War II. Jackson Brothers continued in business until 1963 when a Receiver was appointed and the business was eventually sold. Quinns opened their hardware business in one part of the premises while Byrnes had a supermarket in that portion of the property now occupied by Perrys.

Jack Murphy had left Jacksons long before Francis Robert Jackson had taken over the business. Injured at work he lost a finger and his job in Jacksons Garage, but was fortunately able to rejoin his old employers, Duthie Larges where he was to remain until 1979. As I wrote in a previous Eye on the Past on Jack Murphy when he retired at 78 years of age, Leinster Street no longer had a Duthie or a Large or a Jackson in business.

Herterich's Pork Butchers

Paul Herterich closed the door of his pork butchers shop in Duke Street for the last time on Saturday, 29th March. Another family's long connection with the business life in Athy has now become part of the towns history. The departure of the Herterich name from our main street is a sad reminder of the everchanging face of Irish life as new occupations and skills push out the old and the traditional. Butcher shops, once a familiar site in every town and village in Ireland, are fast disappearing, a victim of the one stop shopping environment established and developed by the supermarket conglomerates.


Paul's father Ernest Herterich opened the doors of his pork butchers shop in Athy in February, 1942 in a premises purchased the previous year from Slaters Bookmakers. He was a member of a large family, the head of which was his father George Herterich who had emigrated from England at the turn of this century. George's father was German born Karl Godfrey Herterich who had opened a pork shop in Preston, England where he died in 1909. George Herterich emigrated to Ireland with two friends, George Haffner and George Mogley and all three were to be involved in pork butchering in one way or the other for the rest of their lives. Haffner was in time to found a sausage manufacturing business of the same name, while Mogley operated a pork butchers shop on the South Circular Road in Dublin. George Herterich opened his first business in Newry, Northern Ireland which did not succeed. He then moved to Dublin where he and his family lived in Percy Place, while he worked with Haffner Sausages.


In or about 1926 George set up a pork butchers business in Main Street, Naas which flourished and from where the later Herterich pork butchering empire was to spring. George and his wife Maud had eleven children, all of whom with he exception of their daughter Alice are now deceased. As the head of the Herterich family, George was noted for his strongly held views on the "perfidious" nature of Roman Catholicism which found expression in a tale often told of George and the annual Corpus Christi procession in Naas. Apparently the procession wound its way around the back of his property and passed a spot on George's wall where someone mischievously or otherwise had placed a statue. George stood nonchalantly at the side of the wall while the procession approached and as the standard bearers drew close, he tumbled the statue to the ground with a flick of his hand where it smashed in smithereens.


What is extraordinary to relate is that all eleven of his children became Catholics, and even his wife Maud was receiving instruction in the Catholic faith when she died. His two eldest sons, Charlie and Fred apparently made their decision to convert without recourse to their parents and on the pretext of travelling to football matches, cycled to Mass in Newbridge each Sunday morning. Ernest, who was to set up business in Athy, wanted to marry local Naas girl, Margaret Mahon but in the days of Ne Temere could not do so without himself being received into the Catholic Church. On approaching the local Parish Priest, Ernest was advised to his astonishment to discuss the matter with his two older brothers who unknown to him had already become Catholics.


The Herterich story is not limited to extraordinary happenings on the religious front, but follows the trail of the eight sons of George and Maud who opened up pork butchering businesses throughout the country. Charlie took over his father's business on the latter's death in 1932, while Fred opened up a shop in Galway which is still going strong. Ernest came to Athy and his brother Reggie went west to Tuam, both shops having since closed. Louis Herterich opened his pork shop in Longford, George in Newbridge and after his early death Harry opened up there. Desmond Herterich had his own shop in Westport which is still in business. Of the nine pork shops opened over the years, only three are still in operation. Ernest Herterich died in Athy in 1967 aged fifty three years and now the business he started fifty five years ago has closed for the last time.

As a young lad I can recall the enormously appetizing cooked hams which were once the hallmark of Herterich Pork Butchers. Unlike today, ham was then something acquired for the special guests, especially someone who arrived unannounced at teatime. Their presence generally necessitated a quick rethink on the evenings eating arrangements and a high tea was quickly assembled after a dash to Herterichs Pork Shop. There the whole cooked hams looked splendid in their dressed state, awaiting your choice before being plucked from the cabinet and sat comfortably into the slicer where the thin slices of meat were carefully assembled for weighing. A slice more or less could make all the difference as regards an equal distribution between young family members, the guest of course always having more than the rest of us and generally far too much for one person. At least that is what one could only presume from the protestations which always seemed to greet the proffered plate of ham. "Ah, sure that's too much for me" was the oft repeated claim which however never seemed to result in a more even distribution of Herterich's ham amongst the rest of us around the kitchen table.


The delights of Herterich's homecooked hams are today replaced by the bland uniformity of the Supermarket product which lacks the taste, texture and aroma of that which we enjoyed so many years ago. The closure of Herterich's Pork Shop would seem to suggest that we value convenience shopping more than we do the wholesome distinctive qualities which are the hallmark of the local shopkeeper.

Cobh - Emigration - Heritage Centre

I sat at my desk this evening to write of a recent trip to Cobh, gateway to the Americas. It was for me a journey of discovery revealing as it did the evocative nature of Irish history. But as I sat poised to commence the article my eye fastened on a small, somewhat battered green card lying on my desk. Eighty seven years ago that card was sold for the sum of two shillings guaranteeing its purchaser a reserved seat for the Grand Popular Concert in the Town Hall, Athy, on St. Patrick's Night 1910. The Concert was given by the members of the "Athy Pierot Troupe" including Miss Stanford Campbell and Mr. Sealy Jeffares. Songs, choruses, instrumental selections and national dances were on offer for those attending. I have no knowledge of Miss Campbell or Mr. Jeffares or indeed any other member of the "Athy Pierrot Troupe", all of whom have undoubtedly passed away, almost certainly forgotten and unremembered. As they performed on the Town Hall stage that night they were possibly the most talked about group of individuals in the town. Their time is now long passed and their lives have disappeared unmarked and without leaving a trace in our own time.

I had a similar sense of loss as I travelled last week on the road between Cork and Cobh. At times the road narrowed between old stone walls which could have been there for over 100 years and it was then that thoughts crowded in on my mind of emigrants who once made the same journey. I could imagine them travelling with heavy hearts but as the harbour of Cobh came into view their tired faltering steps quickened in anticipation of the adventures that lay ahead. I thought also of the 37 young orphan girls sent from Athy Workhouse to Australia between 1849 and 1850. They were part of the 4,000 or so exported from Ireland under the Orphan Emigration Scheme introduced by the English Government following the Great Famine in order to reduce the number of children in Irish Workhouses. Those young girls probably travelled the same road as I did but they were destined never again to return to their homeland.

I paid a visit to the Heritage Centre located in the old Railway building of the harbour town which told of the origins, history and legacy of Cobh under the general title of the Queenstown Story. I have previously written of Ellis Island, New York, where the Irish emigrants of a later generation were to disembark for health and other checks before being allowed on to the mainland. In the post Famine years most emigrants from Ireland travelled to Canada ending up in Gosse Island which served as a receiving station for those crossing the Atlantic. The Irish travelled to America and Canada from many Irish ports but Cobh is fixed in most of our minds as the departure point for the greater number emigrating from this island. We will never know how many Athy men and women looked upon the towering spires of St. Colman's Cathedral in Cobh as their ships sailed over seas. The personal stories of the thousands who have left this area over the last 150 years cannot now ever hope to be told. All that may now remain, perhaps laid aside and forgotten, are mementos of a time and of a place which can never be reclaimed. Letters, cards and personal effects of the emigrants are like the ticket for the St. Patrick's Night Concert in 1910, a nostalgic reminder of another forgotten age.

The Queenstown Story as related in the Heritage Centre failed to catch my imagination despite the enormous advantages which the wealth of Cobh's historical links should have gained for it. I did not come away with a sense of the awfulness which must have attended the coffin ships and the convict ships which sailed from Cobh. The story of Irish emigration is a sad but inspiring one which gives enormous opportunity in its telling for the rich tapestry of history to be unfolded in its most lucid colours. That opportunity was not seized in the Cobh Heritage Centre and while I came away satisfied enough with what I had read, heard and seen I still long for a more dramatic retelling of a story in which people from my area of Co. Kildare played a part.

The importance of a Heritage Centre in a designated Heritage Town can perhaps be over emphasised. For instance in Cobh there was obvious neglect visible in the grass infested roads and pathways and in the poor state of many shop fronts. Athy could well take to heart the lessons to be learned from this and ensure that its shop fronts, street furniture and road signage complement and support its heritage status. Our Heritage Centre will be ready towards to end of the Summer and it is perhaps now we should be reviewing the need to replace the ugly road signs around the town. Time also to get rid of the E.S.B. sub-stations erected in Barrow Quay and Woodstock Street in the 1930's and time indeed to take away the unsightly poles on our streets and put the overhead wires under ground.

The site of our new Heritage Centre, the ground floor of the Town Hall, this week began to take on an appearance it last had over 100 years ago. It was once an open area which provided shelter for the Town Market and as the walls later built to provide meeting rooms are pulled down we can more easily visualise the market as it was at the beginning of the last century. Here was the centre of commercial life in 18th and 19th century Athy and as we head into the second millennium we are reshaping the building yet again confirming its status as the cultural centre of our town.

Athy's Town Hall

There is a feeling of nostalgia in the air this week. As a child of Offaly Street, l look upon the development of Butler's Row and the refurbishment of the ground floor of the Town Hall as further proof, if such is required, that the Town of my childhood is changing every so rapidly. The row of little houses in Butler's Row have been demolished and replaced by modern semi-detached models of the Architect's Training and Skill. It's the demolition work on the ground floor of the Town Hall which commenced on the Tuesday after St. Patrick's Day which brings back memories of times not so long ago.

When the builders have finished reshaping what was once the butter market, in its place we will have a Heritage Centre. I never imagined that such a thing existed when as a young fellow I played in the back square under the watchful eye of Jim Dempsey the Weighmaster. He sat in his little office alongside the Weighbridge which was positioned at the entrance of what up to last week was the Fire Station. Then of course the Fire Station was located in Meeting Lane and the Town Hall housed nothing more than the Wright family, the Ballroom on the First Floor and the Freemasons Lodge at the top of the building. What an extraordinary combination that was in the grand building which was provided for the people of Athy by the Duke of Leinster in the early years of the Eighteenth Century.

The initial construction date for the Town Hall is unclear although it was an existence by the time Bishop Pocoke passed through the town in 1745 . He noted "a new market house at Athy". It was for this purpose that the building was first constructed where its arcaded structure provided easy access for traders while protecting them and their wares from the vagaries of the Irish Weather. The building of the new corn exchange in 1862, a building later converted to use as the Courthouse, reinforced the Market Square as the Commercial Centre of Athy in the Nineteenth Century.


The ground floor of the Townhall served as the Market Place while the upper stories functioned as the centre of local Government during the days of the Borough Council of Athy. A number of borough officers would have used the Townhall. These included the Recorder, the Sergeants at Mace, the Town Clerk and Billet Master, the Bellman, the Weighmaster and the Inspector of Coal and Culm. Also on the first floor of the Townhall was the Courtroom where many a local man and woman faced the fearsome rigours of eighteenth and nineteenth Century Irish Law. Lengthy prison sentences were then common place even for what we would now regard as the simplest form of offence. The theft of a chicken merited the harsh penalty of seven years imprisonment which was served in the primitive conditions of the White Castle Prison up to 1830. Thereafter the new jail on the Carlow Road was the centre of detention where the prisoners at least could expect a more reasonable standard of care during their confinement. The Courtroom was a scene of many notable trials including those of persons implicated in the 1798 Rebellion and Robert Emmets Rebellion of five years later. The infamous hanging Judge Lord Norbury sat in Judgement on offenders in the Town Hall and on one memorable occasion he had a Jury which displeased him transported in turf baskets on the back of jennets to the borders of Co. Laois.


In the more recent years the Ballroom was a welcome addition to the facilities provided in the Town Hall. Again it was the Duke of Leinster who had the Ballroom incorporated into the building which was owned by the Duke's Family before it was acquired by Kildare County Council. For natives of Athy, the Ballroom holds many memories. A Theatre at times, it was home to successive amateur dramatic clubs and to Musical Societies long before the Social Club in St. John's Lane came on stream. Indeed, I can recall the very first play I attended in the Town Hall when I was a young lad, I was brought to the Town Hall by my older brother Jack to see "The Barrets of Wimpole Street". The Social Club players were involved and I have never forgotten what for me was a most memorable experience. Later on the Ballroom was a scene of Sunday afternoon dancing classes organised by Cara an Irish Language Organisation started in Athy forty years ago. There my pals and I made our first faltering attempts to follow in the dancing footsteps of our elders all of whom seemed to us to possess uncanny and seemingly unlearnable Ballroom Dancing skills. But the intricacies of the quick step were in time to be conquered even by us clumsily corduroyed lads of the late 1950's and before long we were able to strut our skill with the best of them. Indeed, the Town Hall Ballroom provided a great training ground for us before we transferred our allegience to Dreamland Ballroom when it opened its doors in 1961. By then the Town Hall was no longer the local dancing mecca having lost out to the Ritz in Carlow and Lawler's of Naas. Everything however was put to right with the coming of the Reynolds Brothers to Athy and the opening of Dreamland. The Town Hall was forgotten as we made the weekly Sunday night trip up past Blackparks to the Glitzy Lights of Athy's newest attraction.

As in life the wheel turns full circle and here we are over thirty five years later returning to the Town Hall. The lights have long gone out in Dreamland and its the ancient Buttermarket Building that is now about to come to life again.

Archbishop Empey

Walton Empey Archbishop of Dublin and Primate of Ireland returned to Athy on Sunday, 2nd March to confirm a number of young people in St. Michael's Church, Athy. It was an important day for the youngsters involved and no less important for Athy, the onetime town on the borders of the English Pale. The occasion was marked by the Town Council with a civic reception for Archbishop Empey the first such so far as I am aware for any Church of Ireland Archbishop of this Diocese.

In a very pleasant speech after the formal presentation in the Council Chamber, Archbishop Empey regaled the audience with memories of both his parents family links with Athy. The Empey's of Leinster Street and the Cox's of Duke Street are still remembered in the Town. Newcome Empey Painting and Decorating Contractor carried on business in what is now O'Sullivan's Video Shop while the Cox's lived in Number 27 Duke Street.


For the Archbishop, the visit was a welcome return to the town where he spent many happy holidays with his grandmother. Indeed, as he told the congregation in St. Michael's Church on Sunday morning as a young boy, he had pumped the Church organ on many an occasion during Sunday service in the 1940's. The Organist was his Granny, Mrs. Cox whose devotion to her duties as Church Organist extended over three decades.

The Members of the Town Council attended the Confirmation Service in St. Michael's again possibly another first for the elected representatives of Athy. I was reminded of a recently published book of memoirs by Tim Leahy, a retired Garda Superintendent who recalled Confirmation Day in Buncranna, Co. Donegal in the 1970's where the local F.C.A. provided a Guard of Honour for the Bishop while the Urban Councillors attended at the Church with the Chairman wearing his chain of office. The writer noted "Bishop Farren it would appear was partial to this ostentatious pomposity".

No such ostentatious display for Archbishop Empey, however as he reciprocated the Councillors Civic Reception with an invitation to the Confirmation Ceremony. He spoke during the Confirmation Ceremony addressing his words to the youngsters who were to receive Confirmation. As I sat there listening to him, I was conscious that St. Michael's was the oldest Church in Athy still in use. The doors of St. Michael's were first opened in 1840, five years before the advent of the Great Famine. The Rector at the time was Frederick Trench then living in Kilmoroney House who was to tragically die following an accident at Preston's Gate in Offaly Street in November 1860. His Parishioners erected a beautiful marble pulpit in St. Michael's in his memory which is still standing and in use.

But to return to Archbishop Empey, he was generous of his time that Sunday and welcomed the opportunity to meet the public representatives from his parents home town. Indeed there was a delightful moment in the Council Chamber when Tom "Tanner" Bracken met Archbishop Empey and the two reminisced of the days when the Brackens and Newcombe Empey worked together. Born in 1934 in Dublin, Archbishop Empey was ordained 25 years later and spent the next 22 years in various Parishes in Ireland and Canada. He was the Bishop's curate in Grand Falls New Brunswick Canada for three years from 1960 and Incumbent of Madawaska in Canada for another three years. Returning to Ireland he spent five years in Stradbally the nearest Parish to Ballintubbert where another prominent churchman but from a different century was born. That was Thomas Kelly, the man who often preached in St. Michael's, Athy and who established the Kellyites in Athy and in Blackrock, Co. Dublin at the beginning of the last Century.

Walton Empey was first elected Bishop for Limerick, Ardfert, Aghadoe, Killaloe, Kilfenora, Clonfert, Kilmadugh and Emly in 1981. The amalgamation of the ancient Dioceses enumerated in this title is a clear indication of the falling numbers then and now being experienced by the Church of Ireland. Today there are approximately 100,000 members of what I always refer to as the reformed Catholic Church in the Republic of Ireland. Bishop Empey was elected Bishop of Meath and Kildare in 1985 before becoming Archbishop of Dublin and Primate of Ireland last year. Although he was not born in Athy, we can justifiably claim him as our own, and take pride in his appointment as Primate of Ireland.

A number of people have written to me recently with various queries and from that correspondence, I take one letter which questioned whether I was right in claiming that Pairc Bhride was named after St. Brigid, the Patron Saint of Kildare. The writer thought that Miss. Brigid Darby former member of Athy Urban District Council and Headmistress of Churchtown National School was the person honoured in the name of the early 1950 housing estate. I wonder can any of my readers throw light on the subject.

Medieval Athy

Two weeks ago in the Town Hall the local branch of An Taisce hosted a lecture given by Mr. John Bradley, a lecturer in medieval history at Maynooth College. The title of the lecture was the ‘Medieval town in Ireland’ with particular reference to the towns of County Kildare. Those who braved the elements on that wintry night enjoyed a comprehensive treatment of the origins, nature and form of the urban settlement in Ireland. It prompted me to reflect on Athy in the medieval period, as to the type of communal facilities or arrangements which existed in the town. Squalor and filth was an integral part of the street life of that period. Towns varied in their tolerance towards the keeping of dunghills outside houses. One writer noted -
‘Every house had a heap of refuse outside it, partly because many horses and pigs were kept in the towns, and partly because destruction of refuse by burning was not considered safe’.

Athy’s charter of 1515 is silent on such matters but it may be assumed that there existed some system for disposal of waste. One author writes of the period -
‘Street cleaning defeated the authorities of every medieval town. Despite regulations often repeated, householders persisted in dumping refuse and sewage in the streets, and allowing their animals and poultry to foul public thoroughfares at will. Few people concerned themselves if dead animals lay about unburied for days, and butchers who commonly did their slaughtering in the streets, allowed the blood and offal to drain away as best they could. The channel which ran down the middle of most streets became an open sewer, and on hot and humid days, it must have stunk abominably’.

In English towns for this period there survive some references to the disposal of refuse. In Cambridge in 1402 dung and filth was allowed to accumulate in heaps for up to seven days while in York in the late fourteenth century any accumulation that could be called a heap was prohibited. It is likely that in these English towns as in Athy there would have existed ‘carters’ or scavengers’ who would have removed such materials for a small sum. In the 12th of July, 1890 issue of the Kildare Observer it was reported that at the meeting of the Town Commissioners, the ‘scavenger’ who was normally required to be in attendance to preserve order in the town fair was not noticed. The reason apparently was the latest suit of clothes, paid for him by the Commissioners, was of a brown colour rather than the traditional red which had made it easy to distinguish him from other people at the fair. It was suggested and agreed, that the colour be altered and that a green suit would be used instead. The job of the scavenger was to keep the marketplace and the fair clean and free of all dirt or obstructions. His appointment might have been a consequence of the Town Commissioners meeting in September 1886 ‘when the dirty conditions of the streets of the town were once more discussed. It is really time that something should be done to remedy this crying evil.’

It would appear that the ‘scavenger’ was unable to perform his role adequately as the sheer volume of his work overwhelmed him. One anonymous writer, more cynical than most, was inspired to pen a piece entitled ‘Sweet Athy’ which he stated was inspired by the ‘present superfluity of mud and gas in Athy’.
“Sweet Athy! Loveliest village in Kildare,
Where muddy streets appear with mud so fair,
How often I wandered down thy street,
While lovely clinging slush adorned my feet.
Here nature holds her own with regal sway,
No wandering scavenger e’er mars the day,
And if per chance he comes to ply his art,
With shovel, brush and corporation cart.
Poetic soul he takes not all the dirt,
Fearing dame nature he per chance might hurt,
The better part he leaves upon the ground,
To be by passing footsteps spread around.”

But the Towns administration was not always dilatory in its treatment of such matters and where required reverted to law. From time to time the courts had to intervene in such matters. The Leinster Leader for the 13th February, 1904 reported that -
“At the Athy Petty Session on Tuesday a large number of parties were at the incidence of the Urban Council fined for creating obstructions by allowing heaps of manure to accumulate outside the doors on the streets at their residences. At this time the occupants of small houses sell whatever manure is accumulating in their back premises to the local shopkeepers and farmers. The manure has of course to be transferred to the streets where it is sometimes allowed to remain for days, constituting a source of danger and presenting a most unsightly appearance. It is a pity however that the real culprits, the purchasers, can apparently escape scot free. In one case disposed of on Tuesday the defendant, a delicate, sickly and indeed hungry-looking old woman who was in receipt of 1 shilling and 6 pence a week outdoor relief was ordered to pay in fines and costs exactly what she received for the manure, 2 shillings. Yet in the case it was shown that the purchaser had bought the manure fully a week before it was transferred to the street. Its failure to remove it resulting in the unfortunate woman who sold it being punished in a manner almost beyond bearing. Neglect of this description is certainly a crime.”

Today happily such problems are a thing of the past.

Athy UDC and the War of Independence

New Year's Day 1921 saw no respite in the continuing conflict between the Black and Tans and the newly recruited auxiliaries on the one hand and the Irish Republican Army on the other. The year started as the old year had ended with killings on both sides, but losses were heaviest amongst the ranks of the largely untrained volunteers on the Republican side. Even before the first 24 hours elapsed John Lawler of Ardfert, Thomas Murphy of Ballylanders and Daniel Tobin of County Limerick would be killed.

In Athy the Urban District Council met in the Town Hall on 4th April under the chairmanship of Thomas Corcoran of Woodstock St. His vice-chairman was Michael "Crutch" Malone, also of Woodstock St. whose later claim to fame was as author of the "Annals of Athy". The other Council members included Rex Hannon of Athy Mills, Thomas J. Whelan, Thomas O'Rourke and Joseph O'Rourke, all of William St., Patrick Keogh and Peter Paul Doyle of Woodstock St. The Bleach was represented by Patrick Dooley who was not to be confused with another Council member of the same name but who lived in Leinster St., which was also the address of Francis Jackson. William Mahon of Clonmullin, John Joseph Bailey of Stanhope St., Daniel Toomey of Meeting Lane and James Dargan of Butler's Row were the remaining Council members.

The Town Clerk, Joseph A. Lawler, had little to do that night as the fifteen man Council quickly went through the meetings Agenda. Apparently the Council's only decision concerned the taking down of the public lamps and gas fittings for the summer of 1921. The Town Surveyor, Michael Bradley of Offaly St. informed the members that surfacing with broken limestone and steam rolling of the main roads would continue, while five heaps of manure had been sold by P.J. Corcoran, Auctioneer for £5.7.6.

On 11th April the Council members met yet again to strike a rate of £7.6s in the pound to meet it's financial needs for the coming year. One week later it again convened to establish a Committee to further the appeal issued by the Irish White Cross. This organisation had been established late the previous year to help cope with the distress and hardship resulting from the War then being raged throughout Ireland. The Athy Committee consisted of Canon Mackey, the Parish Priest; Archdeacon Johnson, Church of Ireland Rector; Thomas Corcoran, Urban Council Chairman; M.E. Doyle; P.P. Doyle; William Malone; R.A. Hannon; Michael Dooley and C.J. Supple, a local Trade Union organiser. The White Cross Organisation was later to report that £125.15 was paid in personal relief to Athy people to 31st August, 1922. During the same period a total of £1,302.00 was paid to residents in Carlow.

Athy Young Emmets, the local Gaelic Football Club were granted permission by the Urban Council to erect a barrier at the entrance gate of the show grounds on the occasion of the Kildare v. Laois football match on Sunday, 8th May 1921. No doubt the young men from Barrowhouse area travelled to Athy that day to cheer on their County team. They were to be disappointed as the Kildare men ran out victors on the score of 2:3 to 1:3. As they travelled home that evening little did they realise that on the following Sunday two of their neighbours would become part of the deadly statistics in the bitter armed struggle which would end even if only temporarily with the calling of the truce on 11th July.

James Lacey and William Connor would die on the side of the roadway at Barrowhouse on 15th May, 1921. They had been members of a party which attempted to ambush a group of Black and Tans which were travelling through the Irish countryside around Barrowhouse on their way from Ballylinan to Maganey.

The next night the members of Athy Urban District Council met again in the Town Hall. Reference was made to the house Dr. John Kilbride was building in what the minute writer termed "Crib Road". Even now we know that the reference was to Church Road, although the name "Crib Road" has long gone out of use. A vote of sympathy was passed on the death of Mrs. Murphy, wife of Michael Murphy of Commercial House, Athy who had been a member
of the Council for many years. The minutes of that meeting do not record any reference to the killing of Connor or Lacey, nor was there any reference at their next meeting held on 6th June. At that latter meeting votes of sympathy were passed on the death of Matthew Minch, "a member of this Council and it's Chairman for many years and it's largest rate payer". A similar vote of sympathy was also passed on the death of John Holland, veterinary surgeon of Model Farm, Athy.

During the month of May 1921 70 Irishmen were killed by the Crown forces in Ireland, while 39 men were killed the following month. Nowhere is there recorded in the minutes of the local Urban District Council any reference to this. No outrage followed the shocking events which were unfolding daily throughout the country. Even where the drama unfolded within shooting distance of the town, it did not apparently merit any mention at meetings of the local Council.

Life in the Market Town went on as before, with the town fathers' only concern being with that of the public lamps, the sale of manure heaps and road surfacing. History appears to have passed by the Town Council without leaving it's mark.

Athy in the last decade of the 18th century

Next year will mark the 200th anniversary of the 1798 rebellion. This was a period of great turmoil in Ireland and particularly in the county of Kildare and the town of Athy. How we commemorate what has been called the year of liberty will be indicative of our views concerning the murderous events that unfolded two centuries ago. A previous commemoration in 1898 was marked by an upsurge in nationalism with a particular idolisation of those men and women involved in the rebellion. It was however a different age. Parnell was not long dead and the nationalist movement that would soon sweep the country was only then in the early stages of a development which would see it replace the Irish Home Rule party in Westminster.

However, this was all in the future when the assizes opened in the Town Hall, Athy on the 3rd August 1790. Among the barristers robing in the bar room that day was a young newly qualified member of the legal profession. Theobald Wolfe Tone was then struggling to support his young family while at the same time developing his political outlook. What would Tone have made of the town of Athy as it was in 1790. He could hardly have foreseen that he would be one of those responsible for the events that would divide the townspeople eight years later. Our knowledge of the town in this period comes from contemporary writings of the time. The French traveller De Latocnaye who journeyed from Carlow to Athy in 1796 in order to catch the ‘service of public boats to Dublin’ described Athy as a ‘village’. On entering it he was ‘stopped by four or five persons who asked for charity - they explained that it was to be used to give decent burial to a poor wretch who had died of hunger’. Dear Latocnayes response was quite cynical - ‘I replied that since he was dead he wanted nothing. This answer did not appear to satisfy them, and so I contributed to the funereal pomp, the occasion being, perhaps, the only one in which the poor fellow’s friends were interested in his concerns’.

Chevalier De Latocnaye was an exiled French royalist whose lifestyle in his homeland would have been a world apart from the rather bleak small midland towns he found himself while travelling through Ireland. For example, his single observation regarding Carlow was that a seminary for catholic priests had recently been established there. Although in the case of Athy one must conclude that the Frenchman’s view was a fair refection of the town as it then was.

Not many years earlier the antiquarian Austin Cooper visited the town and his description of the town in 1782 suggests a quiet, sleepy backwater, the town being ‘a small town situated on the river Barrow over which is a plain bridge of arches with a low square castle adjoining on the east side. Here is a market house, church and county courthouse, nothing remarkable in elegance of building. On the north west side of the town is a plain horse barracks and near it another old castle’.

The year before Wolfe Tone attended the court at Athy, Deborah Chandlee, a member of the local Quaker community (whose husband Thomas was a linen draper in Duke Street), wrote to her sister Sarah Shackleton in Ballitore that ‘Athy affords nothing worth sending (newswise) it being dead in every sense of the word’.

Thomas Rawson, one time Sovereign of the town, and the man who would play a prominent part in the events of 1798 on the government side wrote in 1807 that ‘in the midst of a populous charming country with water carriage to all the world Athy is neglected, is in poverty and has not any one manufacture carried on’. He felt that the position of the town on the river Barrow and with its junction with the grand canal held out ‘much invitation to English capital and English Industry’. He further noted that ‘its vicinity abounds with mill sites yet it is full of unemployed inhabitants’. A colourful account survives of one individuals impressions of the towns market in 1837 which would not have been vastly different from the market scene at the end of the 18th century - ‘just take a walk to Cobb’s Corner and proceed from thence around the market square. On your left is a row of decent looking housewives, clean aprons, clean faces, with “I assure you it is as sweet and clean butter as any in Ireland, and those eggs were laid this blessed good morning.” Don’t be surprised if the butter and eggs get together. Go on a little further through the corn sacks, and it is a chance if you don’t stumble over the new crocks and dishes prepared to pack the butter or hold the milk in, with now and then a sort of jingling knell, sounding in the midst of those self same crocks”.

So we might picture Athy on the eve of the rebellion as typical market town somewhat stagnant and yet to experience the growth which would come in the first half of the nineteenth century. The rebellion would have many participants, some willing, many others unavoidably and reluctantly dragged into the horror and grief which marked those times. Some locals would play a more prominent part than others. Thomas Rawson of Glassealy House who later wrote of the town in his book ‘Survey of Kildare’, would be blamed for the repressive government action in the locality in the months leading to and after the rebellion itself. Mary Leadbetter, a resident of Ballitore, would write eloquently and with great compassion in the Annals of Ballitore of the excesses on both sides. A member of the Fitzgerald family would enter the pantheon of nationalist heroes before the rebellion had ended. Lord Edward Fitzgerald, who had once been a member of parliament for the Borough of Athy was to be captured due in no small measure to the treachery of another local, Thomas Reynolds, who lived in Kilkea Castle. But more important than all those individuals were the people of Athy who suffered and endured the most terrible hardships during and after the rebellion.

Next year we will have an opportunity to both remember and commemorate this significant period in our town’s history. Whether we view these events with misty eyed romanticism as did those who celebrated the centenary in 1898 remains to be seen. Perhaps these events and their participants deserve a more realistic appraisal and assessment in the context of the national and local history of the day.

Woodstock Castle and its stone carvings

A recent article in the Irish Times dealt with the history of the bagpipes and their usage and popularity in Ireland from the early medieval period to the present time. In the course of this reference was made to a carving of a man garbed in medieval dress playing the bagpipes. The columnist mistakenly described it as being in wood and from “Woodstock Castle, Co. Kilkenny”. The sculpture is however in stone and once formed part of the elaborate chimney piece which adorned the fireplace of the great hall on the first floor of Woodstock Castle, in this town, in the sixteenth century. Today all that remains of the fireplace in the castle is one or two simple, undecorated fragmentary remains high up in the internal wall face of the now roofless castle. Although the fireplace has long since disappeared, we can get some idea of its splendour as it originally appeared. Lord Walter Fitzgerald the renowned antiquarian and founder member of the Kildare Archaeological Society recorded these stones. One fragment would have formed the centre of the mantel consisting of a pair of opposed lions figures holding the Fitzgerald coat of arms while a similar piece has a pair of opposing angel-like figures either side of the Fitzgerald arms. It is likely that the carvings date to the late fifteenth/early sixteenth century. Of particular interest is the absence of the monkey traditionally found on the crest of the Fitzgerald family which is evident on another carved stone from Woodstock Castle which now rests in the south wall of Whites Castle. These various carvings were first recorded by an anonymous writer at the turn of the nineteenth century who noted that angel-like figures and the lions formed compartments of the cornice of the chimney piece. After this authors visit the carvings were removed to the Earl of Kildare’s residence at Carton.

The castle, like many in the Irish countryside, is remarkably absent from the historical record for large parts of its history, but considerable information may be garnered from the architecture of the castle and most particularly from its carved and decorated fragments. The Fitzgeralds occupied many castles in Kildare with their principal seat at Maynooth but the delicacy of the carved ornamentation from Woodstock Castle with its bold display of the family coat of arms is sufficient proof of the importance of the castle in Athy.

Castles by their very nature were dark and gloomy places which afforded title light or warmth to their residents and while the thick walls might provide a cool refuge from the heat of the summer sun, they were in the depths of winter often oppressively cold and damp dwellings.

The inhabitants might seek to alleviate such cold and discomfort by a variety of methods, principally thick and voluminous layers of clothing which found suitable accompaniment in large open fires. The fireplace, particularly in the throws of winter, formed a natural focal point in the principal rooms for the castle dwellers. It was thus not unnatural that considerable care and effort would be expended in the design and execution of such a feature. Naturally the visitor to the castle on entering the ‘great hall’ would immediately be drawn to the fire by his host and thus the visitors eye might fall upon the intricacies and subtleties of a large and well-decorated chimney piece. The style and nature of the carvings would indicate that they were executed in the period of the castles history when it was undergoing substantial alterations to its structure and form. In a sense the insertion of the large well-decorated chimney pieces might well be said to mark the evolution of the castle from a simple castle structure to the prototype of the later country house of the gentry. The small and narrow windows which since the 13th century had served to ventilate and light the castle were replaced by large gracious mullioned windows with sleek hood mouldings lighting the great hall on the first floor to an extent never possible before. Within these windows would have been set large window seats adding to the comfort of this the principal room of the castle. Woodstock of the many Fitzgerald castles was not alone in experiencing such additions. Maynooth Castle underwent substantial alterations in the sixteenth century, similar to those at Woodstock. These served to increase the comfort afforded by these buildings while at the same time reducing their defensive abilities by creating much large openings in the external walls. At Woodstock one concession to security was made by the addition of a defensive tower on the south face with narrow windows and gunports.

The only reference to building or repairs at the castle dates to 1536 when remedial work to the structure was necessitated by damage caused to doors, windows and battlements. A lease of the castle in 1560 stipulated that new lofts be constructed which may not have been done as another lease of the castle was granted to William Sheregolde in 1569. It is likely that all the finely carved stones from Woodstock Castle relate to the earlier residence of the Fitzgerald family and it is appropriate that these very same carvings were rescued from the ruins of Woodstock Castle by a member of the family that originally commissioned some unknown mason to create them many centuries ago. The stones to this day remain at Kilkea Castle, another ancestral home of the Fitzgerald family although the carving of the piper is now lost.