From Ballywolverhampton in the County Monaghan

Seamus Treanor

This is a storytelling app based on the drive up to Monaghan from Dublin Airport.
We assume you are driving via the M1 Motorway North to Belfast, 
Then turning off at Junction 14 and the A33 to Ardee. 
And from there following the N2 North to Derry.  
Typically, the Journey takes an hour and twenty minutes. 
This is not a sat-nav so check a map.  Keep your eyes on your driving and your hands on the wheel. 
No Laughing!
We’ll let you get onto the Motorway and get used to the car before we start telling stories.
If you've any sugestions contact me seamustreanor@yahoo.co.uk

This is a storytelling app based on the drive up to Monaghan Town from Dublin Airport.
We assume you are driving via the M1 Motorway North to Belfast, 
Then turning off at Junction 14 and the A33 to Ardee. 
And from there following the N2 North to Derry.  
Typically, the Journey takes an hour and twenty minutes. 
 This is not a sat-nav so check a map.  Keep your eyes on your driving and your hands on the wheel. 
No Laughing!
We’ll let you get onto the Motorway and get used to the car before we start telling stories.

The sculpture in the middle of the roundabout, at the entrance to the Airport, is called The Spirit of the Air.Designed by Richard Enda King in 1989.

Swords is the next turnoff – but keep straight on for Monaghan
Swords is ancient, at least 1200 years old and has a history to boot. From Colum Kill, one of the earliest Irish saints, to the Vikings, Brian Boru, the Normans, Edward the Bruce (no not Robert, his brother).  And that’s only the first 500 years.
It is a very ancient village, the full name of which Sórd Cholaim Chille  (Sword of Colum Cill) shows its origin, having been an important foundation of St. Columba, who placed St. Finian as abbot over the brethren.
To the Abbey, on that fateful Good Friday in 1014, were borne the bodies of Brian Boru and his son Murrough, after the Battle of Clontarf, to rest for one night on the long journey to Armagh. 
Swords returned two members to the Irish Parliament. At the Union in 1800, £15,000 was paid for the loss of this privilege (a bribe to vote for the United Kingdom), and some of this compensation money was spent in the building and endowment of the Old Boro Schools.
Does Sord mean swords in English? It’s not clear – the Gaelic is more like the Scottish Claymore? But the name has been used for the area since 800AD well before the Vikings or Normans came over.
Now you know more about Swords than most of the people who live there

starling

goldfinch

King James was on his way from losing the Battle of the Boyne to Dublin, and [decided] to stay a night with Mrs. Fagan who was living on Feltrim Hill. Feltrim Hill is about half a mile over to the east from here. When she saw the figure coming, she at first thought it was her uncle. Then he recognised that it might be King James. 
 So she asked who won the battle, and he answered. "My cowardly Irish troops have run away" 
Mrs Fagan said "But your Majesty, you appear to have won the race?". 
James returned to France, where he spent the rest of his life in exile at Saint-Germain, protected by Louis XIV.
Oh, and Feltrim means,  Ridge of the Wolves, possibly.

Broad Meadow or Malahide Estuary, which you are about to cross over, is the place to come to see Shelduck, Pintails, Goldeneye, Red-breasted Merganser among a dozen or more birdspecies. The estuary is slightly tidal and brackish fed from the Broad Meadow River.
Malahide, the town, out by the sea, is a pleasant seaside town with some decent restaurants and a great fish and chip shop.

About 60 years ago [around 1880] there lived a curate in Donabate named Reverend Father O'Neill. This priest was a thrifty, mean, odd, old man, and was known as a miserly priest. 
One day this priest ordered a sack of potatoes from a man in the Burrow. When the man was bringing the potatoes up to the priest, he brought an extra bag for him as a present. When the man arrived at the priest's house, he told the priest he had an extra bag for him as a present. 
When the priest heard this, he said to the man, give me the bag of potatoes you are giving me for nothing, and bring home the other sack. 
So the man brought home the other sack, and gave the other to the priest for nothing.
Collected by Noel Kinsella from Andrew Howard aged 80 of Beaverstown, County Dublin

St. Macculinn is the patron saint of Lusk. He lived towards the end of the fifth century. The present Catholic Church in Lusk is called St Macculinn's.
It is said that he jumped from the round tower, and he landed about a hundred yards away, where there stands an old Barrack now. There is a well at the back of the Barrack's and it is said St Macculinn's footprints are there yet. 
He tried to jump back to the top of the tower, but he struck his face off the wall and he was killed.
Why did they make him a saint? I don’t know!

There are many different kinds of travelling folk but the most common are tinkers, ragmen and gipsies. 
The tinkers deal mostly in buying, selling, and swapping asses. They travel the roads from morning to night selling mats and tin cans. They mend leaking kettles, teapots, saucepans, and every kind of tinware. Some tinkers go around begging and staying here and there.
Most ragmen are not too poor. They make baskets and other furniture. They gather rags, jampots, bottles, horse hair and other scrap.
The gipsies go around in a caravan drawn by two ponies. They make fancy lace, baskets, tables and other wicker work. Some gipsies go around telling fortunes, and in this way get a lot of money off foolish people.
The tribes that come round this locality are - Donavan's, Cash's, Purcell's and Haligans. All these tribes are intermarried. One remarkable thing about the Cash's, was that every one of them grew to about six feet in height.

There are many different wild birds namely, the blackbird, the thrush, the robin, the wren, the lark, the gold finch, the swallow, the starling, the cuckoo, the corncrake, the plover, the woodquest, the pheasant, the yellow hammer, the crow, the titlark known as the "swingeen", the hawk, the seagull and many others.
Some of these birds leave us the cuckoo, the swallow, the corncrake leave when summer is over and go away to other countries. Before the swallows fly away, they all come together in great flocks and they perch on the telegraph wires.
The robin builds its nest on the side of a bank, with moss and feathers. She lays white eggs with red spots. there are old stories told that if you scale a robin's nest you will get a stye in your eye.
The thrush builds her nest in a bush with mud and hay. She lays green eggs with brown spots.
The blackbird builds her nest in a bush also, with clay and hay. She lays blue eggs.
The wren builds her nest in a little stumpy bush, with moss and rotten ferns. She lays pale eggs with brown spots.
The cuckoo does not build a nest. She lays her eggs on the ground and puts them in a small birds nest. When the eggs are hatched the young cuckoos push the other birds out and they get all the food.
Collected by C. Maypother from John Maypother of Tyrrelstown, County Dublin
Image: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/ https://www.flickr.com/photos/vermazeren/

What is Balbriggan famous for?  It was international news in the War of Independence 100 years ago but instead here we have some Balbriggan… riddles
What is the hardest thing to do in the world?
To put the tide out with a fork.

I went and I did not know where. I got and I did not know what, and I when I came back all knew!
I was Baptized.

Why is butter so much like a soldier?
Because it runs before fire.

If a man had fifty holes in his trousers, what time would it be?
Time to get a new one.

As red as blood and blood it is not, as green as grass but grass it is not, as black as ink but ink it is not?
A blackberry.

What turns and we cannot see it?
Milk.
As round as an apple, as flat as a pan, one side woman, and the other side a man?
A penny.

As black as ink and ink it is not, as white as milk and milk it is not. It hops o the road like a marble stone and a marble stone, and yet a marble stone it is not?
A magpie.

What goes through the wood and never tops the wood?
A knife in a man's pocket.

What is the difference between a dead horse and a dead police man?
The dead police man gives up swearing oaths and the dead horse gives up eating oats.

How far can a dog run into a wood?
Half ways in, and half ways out.

Breda McGillivray, Told to me by my father, mr. Mc Gillivray, 4 High St., Balbriggan.

Up ahead along the verge are a set of beehives of St Mologo.  He came back from Wales in the 6th century, cured the sick, built a church and taught the people around here about beekeeping. He was a Corkman, but we can forgive him for that, he did good deeds.
There’s an Irish folklore custom of ‘Telling the Bees’, which ensures that the bees not feel any offence due to exclusion from family affairs, and so will remain with the hive. It was believed that if one didn’t tell the bees of a wedding, a birth, or a death, they would take umbrage and leave. 
So, when you’re passing these hives on the way up to the Gathering, tell them where you’re going. And on the way back tell them when you’re coming back.

The Turnpike at Julianstwon
In olden days there was a turnpike at Mr Byrne's White Cross Julianstown. There was a thatched house where the present house now stands and a big loft over the door where they used to keep the money. There was an iron railings around the house and also a big iron gate across the road where the cars had to stop and pay tolls a penny or two pence, according to the width of the tyre on the wheel. The narrower the tyre the higher the payment. Funerals were allowed to pass free of charge. There was a footpath for pedestrians on their way to Mass and also on their way to the mill and the Forge. A bay window which ran to the road edge acted as office. The north bound traffic paid at the South window of the bay and the South bound traffic paid at the North window. The tolls went to the Peppers, owners of the Ballygarth estate. The estate paid the toll collectors in furniture for the house instead of money. When the toll was paid the traveller received a ticket as receipt for his money which bore the words.
"This ticket clears Dunleer, Kilineer, and Drogheda gates."
Collected by Una Murtagh of Julianstown, Co. Meath from Mrs Mc Donald
From the Schools Collection https://www.duchas.ie/en/cbes/5008904/4965496/5238814

Horseracing on Laytown Beach
Each autumn, the Laytown races are held on the beach just south of Drogheda.  It’s an official race part of the Jockey Club season.  It’s a run in a straight line now, as the u-turn at the end was considered too dangerous.  There’s the full panoply of bookmakers, bars, owner’s restaurants, best dressed racegoers, starting gates, and the spectacle of riders in full colours racing down the beach.  
It’s a movable feast as they must fit in with the tides, so look it up next time you’re over. Laytown Races

The Rivers Nanny and Brad-an
Would you believe that the Toll is on an island? 
The River Brad-an, just south of the Toll, is unusual in that it splits in two.  
One part joins the Nanny, which flows through Julianstown, and into the sea at Lay-town, and the other part enters the sea at Moss-knee 
In between the island, including the Toll, is referred to as ‘Inish na Ree; “hidden island of the King.

The river “Brad-an” simply means the  ‘Salmon’ river. 
However, the name Nanny which comes from the word Aingidhe, meaning ‘furious or irrational one’, reveals the true character of the river, as it has often unexpectedly flooded in the past.

Sonairte: The National Ecology Centre	The National Ecology Centre
Sonairte is set a beautifu,l 18th century group of farm buildings, on the lush, grassy, banks overlooking the Nanny River, over toward Laytown. The farm buildings were restored, and redeveloped into an ecoshop, cafe, lecture hall, and meeting rooms. 
The walled garden, provides the perfect space for a demonstration organic garden, set in an orchard which dates back at least 200 years. In the orchard there is also a dovecote. In the past, this five sided red brick structure housed up to 350 pigeon nesting boxes.  Just that, would make it worth a visit, wouldn’t it?
The ten acre site, also includes meadows, salt marshes, woodland, and a beautiful scenic nature trail, which takes you along the Nanny river, and circles around a rath, which legend suggests was the home of Laogh mac Riangabra, Cuchulain’s charioteer.

The Boyne
We could take the whole journey from Dublin to Monahan, and further, and just talk about this river.  But we’ll just put up five bits, in reverse order:
1.	In 2013, the bridge was named the Mary McAleese Boyne Valley Bridge, after the first (and to date) only female President of Ireland.  Why after a living person?  Because no other bridges in the South, the Republic, the 26 Counties are named after a woman. Was it controversial, yes, because locals wanted a local name, hence the Boyne Valley bit.

2.	Down the river in Drogheda is the head of St Oliver Plunkett, in St Peters Church. He was the Catholic Archbishop of Armagh, in the time of Charles II, and  had by all accounts spent his time tending his flock. In 1681, he was framed in Ireland for treason, insurrection and rebellion, he was tried in Ireland.  The case collapsed. He was then tried in London, in a trial no-one believed, not the prosecution, not the English Lord Chief Justice, not even King Charles himself.  He was hung, drawn and quartered at Tyburn in London, just down from Marble Arch, if you know it.

3.	As you cross the bridge – to the west you can see the site of the 1693 Battle of the Boyne. Where the English King James II lost to the Dutch William of Orange, and Ireland lost either way.  Luckily there’s a café and an interpretation centre there so it’s worth a visit if a) your hungry, and b) you don’t know anything about it

4.	The river has been a highway for since people came to live in Ireland after the Ice Age.  In the last ten years or so, when the river was low, twelve hollowed tree-trunk boats were found along the banks. They dated from the megalithic to the medieval.

5.	Newgrange, the iconic megalithic tomb, is only six miles up the river, it is over 5000 years old. It has a chamber aligned with dawn on the winter solstice on 21st December. At that time the light of the sunshines directly into the middle of the tomb.  You can enter a raffle to be there. There are others up and down the valley, from the same period, but they don’t have cafés, and interpretation centres. 
And I haven’t even told you how lovely it is to walk along it. 
There is too much to say about this river

The Lone Bush 
There is a legend told of a lone bush, which was growing in Coolrath, about four miles from Drogheda. A man cut it down, and left a hole in the ground, where he took up the root which he brought to the yard.
That night, three knocks came to the back of the house. The next night the same thing happened. The following morning, when the fire was being lighted, a terrible noise came to the door. It was like as though someone was hitting it with a mallet.
That day the man put the root back into the hole where it was formerly growing, and it grew again. The noise never came anymore.”
Lone bushes in the middle of a field, typically hawthorn, are supposed to be haunted by the fairies, leprechauns or little people. Whether they live there, or party there, or just sleep there isn’t known. One isn’t even to break twigs off them on pain of death. So, in digging up the whole root, and living, the man from Coolrath can consider himself lucky!

Monasterboice 
OK, don’t look if you’re the driver, but off to the west, you can see the round tower of Monasterboice.  The ruins of a monastery raided and destroyed by Vikings is still used as a cemetery by local people.  But there are also three large Celtic Crosses, dating from the 10th Century.  
The largest, known as the West Cross, is almost seven metres high, and engraved from top to toe with scenes from the Bible; David, Moses, Abraham and Issac as well as the passion, death and resurrection of Christ. 
Tradition has it that after the Famine, emigrants would chip pieces off it as keep-sakes of the old country.  
The second cross, is much more elaborate and much less damaged.  This cross known as Muireadach’s Cross is the most complete. Five and a half metres high, covered in 63 panels. It has an inscription on the west side base; “A prayer for Muireadach, under whose auspices the cross was built”
It’s free to visit, there’s a car-park, but shockingly, no shop, café or interpretive visitors centre!

The Tinure donkey and the ghosts
About twenty years ago [about 1910), there lived in this parish of Tenure, an old man named Dan McCullough, who used to see a ghost nearly every night.
One night he was coming from Drogheda with a donkey, the donkey stopped seven times from the dispensary to the Red Gap hill, that is the place where Cromwell fought his battle. The poor old man would take off his hat, and put it on the donkey's eyes, and he would move along. 
Every time the donkey would see a ghost he would stop, and start sweating, and try to turn on the road. That would happen any time he would be late coming from Drogheda on that part of the road.
Around about that locality, a great many people see a ghost. There is a gate on the top of the Red-Gap hill, which keeps shaking the calmest night of the year at twelve o clock.
A little north of the Red-Gap is another ghost place. One night a man was coming with a bundle of hay on his back, when crossing a stile, he felt no weight on his back. 
He looked behind him, and saw about twenty little men. He went on farther, and just when he was going past a place called the "middle gap", all the little men disappeared. 
They were called the good men. Plenty of people hear footsteps late at night at that place.
https://www.duchas.ie/en/cbes/5008866/4962225/5078770
The Schools’ Collection, Volume 0674, Page 284
Photographer Maurice Curtin https://www.duchas.ie/en/cbeg/6136 The Photographic Collection, A015.15.00018

The Tinure Donkey and the Ghosts of Red-Gap Hill

Slieve Gullion and the Cursed Lake 
The mountain straight ahead north is Slieve Gullion. In the tale known as The Hunt of Slieve Gullion, two sisters Áine, the goddess of summer, and Milucra, the goddess of winter, both seek after the legendary hero Fionn mac Cumhaill. 
Áine had vowed never to marry a man with grey hair. So Milucra secretly puts a spell on the lake atop Slieve Gullion, so that anyone who swam in it would immediately grow old. She tricked Fionn asking him to fetch her golden ring which she lost in the lake.
He does and emerges as an old man with white hair. His men, the Fianna, force her to give him a restorative potion from her cornucopia. 
Fionn's youth returns, but his hair stays white.  And this is why he is called, Fionn, meaning 'white'.  The lake is still up there and is called the Cursed Lake. Are you brave enough to swim in it?
Lower down, on a hillock called Spellick, is a rock feature called the Calliagh Birra's Chair.  Calliagh Birra's being Milucra alter ego. Locals would visit it at Lughnasadh and take turns sitting on the chair.

One of them, Lawrence Taffe, tells this ghost story:
There is a certain field in the district of Roodstown, where there are fairies. This old man, who lived about a century ago in 1840, was always going home late, and was usually drunk. Then someone warned him not to be going across this field after midnight, but in return, he told them that he would fight all the fairies in Ireland. 
This night he was going home after midnight, and he was drunk. As he was crossing the field, he got a slap on the face, which knocked him. He rose, but got the same again. He lay there groaning, and while thus, a little red man came up to him, and said "Now my good man, you must come for a ride to the Slieve Gullion mountains". 
The old man refused, but the next place he found himself, was on top of an enormous horse. The little man told him, that when he would want the horse to jump anything, he should say "High over all". But anyway, when he was near Armagh, a big river, with a ditch on the side opposite appeared. "Beggora, she will never jump this". So instead of saying "High over all", he said "Right through all", so excited was he, but the horse jumped through the ditch, leaving the man behind, and him stuck fast in the ditch. It took the man three hours to get out, and three weeks to get back home.  So, he never said that he was not afraid of the fairies after that.
Told by Laurence Taaffe of Roodstown,  to Nancy Conlon of Drumcashel, County Louth duchas.ie
Photograph: https://www.duchas.ie/en/cbeg/4625; The Photographic Collection, A001.29.00038 Photographer Åke Campbell 1935

Roodstown Castle can be seen on the hill to the north (to the right if heading to Monaghan). If you have time on the way back, it is worth a small detour just to see an intact £10 castle.
£10 castles were built by local lords, paid for by Henry VI
Locally associated with the Taffe family, yes Taff, as in the nickname for the Welsh from the river through Cardiff.  The Taffe’s built it and number of others around Ardee, and Carlingford, in the 1400s.  They weren’t blow-in’s they had been around for over three hundred years even in 1400.
But, the Taffe’s went onto to be on the losing side in The War of the Three Kingdoms in 1690, and they lost all their Irish Land, and the First World War in 1918 where they lost all their Irish titles, the English being sore winners. They are still known as the Graf von Taffes in Europe. Oh and there are still Taffes around here, only not Counts and Grafs.  

One of them, Lawrence Taffe, tells this ghost story:
There is a certain field in the district of Roodstown where there are fairies. This old man, who lived about a century ago in 1840, was always going home late and was usually drunk. Then someone warned him not to be going across this field after midnight, but in return, he told them that he would fight all the fairies in Ireland. 
This night he was going home after midnight, and he was drunk. As he was crossing the field, he got a slap on the face, which knocked him. He rose, but got the same again. He lay there groaning, and while thus, a little red man came up to him and said "now my good man, you must come for a ride to the Slieve Gullion mountains". 
The old man refused, but the next place he found himself, was on top of an enormous horse. The little man told him, that when he would want the horse to jump anything, he should say "High over all". But anyway, when he was near Armagh, a big river, with a ditch on the side opposite appeared. "Beggora she will never jump this". So instead of saying "High over all", he said "Right through all", so excited was he, but the horse jumped through the ditch, leaving the man behind and him stuck fast in the ditch. It took the man three hours to get out, and three weeks to get back home.  So, he never said that he was not afraid of the fairies after that.
Told by Laurence Taaffe of Roodstown,  to Nancy Conlon of Drumcashel, County Louth
422 words

https://www.duchas.ie/en/cbes/5008852/4961104/5074900
The Schools’ Collection, Volume 0670, Page 005
Image and data © National Folklore Collection, UCD. See copyright details »

Just south of Ardee we have the jumping Church of Millextown, having been one of the many religious houses which fell a victim to plunder and destruction, it was reduced to ruins and subsequently became a place of burial only. 
Immediately inside the end wall of the church was a grave containing the ashes of one whose religious opinions were not considered orthodox to warrant his being interred within the sanctuary. 
However this may be, the end wall was discovered one morning by some mysterious and, as yet, unexplained means, to have changed its position, moving so far inward as to leave the mouldering remains of the "unbeliever" outside. 
This might be considered fabulous and written in the language of fiction, but, it is, nevertheless, true. By whatever agency it has been accomplished the wall is not now, where it was originally built. It is about four feet from the foundation wall, the grave occupying the space between. 
Whatever difficulty visitors may find in explaining this phenomenon, they will experience none whatever in consulting the facts, as both the wall and its foundation are still perfect, with the obnoxious grave between them. Hence it has been called the "Jumping Church" of Millextown.
https://www.duchas.ie/en/cbes/5008848/4960933
The Schools’ Collection, Volume 0668, Page 360
Image and data © National Folklore Collection, UCD. See copyright details »
You can still go and see it – and if you have a better explanation, tell someone.

Farney is the name of the first Monaghan barony we come to from the south.  
If you are of a certain age or if you watched black and white films on TV growing up you may remember Erroll Flynn playing the Earl of Essex against Betty Davis’s Queen Elizabeth.  Well that Earl of Essex was given Farney (over the local Macmahon) by Hugh O’Neill, The O’Neill, way back in 1599, to make him go away. Essex did only to get into trouble with Elizabeth and was executed two years later.  
Because it was ‘officially’ in English eyes owned by the Essex’s, his family, his daughter,  legally held onto Farney.  Farney and Monaghan for similar reasons were never ‘planted’ as such. Planted being in modern terms meaning ‘complusory purchased’ or ‘eminent domain’ without the compensation involved.
So the Barony was divided between Essex’s descendants. the Baths and the Shirley’s.  The Shirleys took the land west of Carrickmacross Main Street and the Baths east of it.  Both families remained Landlords for the next three hundred plus years 

The following is told by Mrs Mary Burns, 100 years of age in 1938 to her granddaughter Kate Anne Finegan. Both of Lisnagunnion, Co. Monaghan

Our local landlord was Lord Bath, Bath and Shirley got the big estate around Carrick and our farm is on Bath's estate. They came into possession of this land in the 17th century. Queen Elizabeth gave the whole estate to Lord Essex. He had two daughters and when he was dying he left the estate to them. One of the daughters married a Shirley and the other married the Lord of Bath and this is how they came to own the land. The estate was divided by a running through Carrick which divided the Main St. and gave one side to each. 

All of Baths were supposed to be good and were liked well by the people. When they got these lands they divided them into farms. Farms were never subdivided among members of the family in marriage. The landlord had never any special powers over his tenants and they were never punished for trivial acts. 
Long ago the tithe money would be gathered around here. It was not gathered in money but in value. The best remembered tithe proctor was Cupid Kiarnan and anyone who did not pay the tithe money ten stooks of corn would be taken from his field. Not many people in this district were evicted. 
Although Lord Bath was liked well by the people he was a bit selfish. One day as he was riding on his horse over a race course he hit an Orangeman with his whip and said "A man of money can do what he likes" and the man took out his revolver and struck Lord Bath off his horse with it and said "and a man without money can do something too".

One of the unintended consequences of the takeover of Farney by Essex’s descendants was that Irish was spoken here longer than anywhere else in Monaghan. Because the land was owned by the Baths and the Shirley’s it wasn’t planted like most of the rest of Ulster. The native Irish remained in the majority and kept their own tradition.  However then the Famine struck here worse and Farney lost over 40% of its’ population in less than ten years.

Drumlins, Drumlins, Drumlins
The landscape changes from the little hills of Monaghan, to the flat, or gentler inclines of Louth, around Ardee.  These drumlins spread up through Monaghan, out through Cavan, and up through Lough Erne in Fermanagh. The islands in Lough Erne are half submerged drumlins. The net effect of this mass of drumlins, meant from ancient to medieval times, that Ulster as a whole, was easily defended from the South, and from the English Pale.  
Each hill would typically have been a townland, though some have merged or been split over time.  There would have been one extended family, living in a fort or a homestead, a bally if you like.  Families, typically but not exclusively native families, were living that way here, up till the Napoleonic Wars and some even later than that.
But the hills weren’t divided into fields like now.  Those hedges are an 19th Century innovation encouraged by the landlords.
Each drumlin was surrounded by undrained lowland, wet, boggy, overgrown and (hopefully) impassable to livestock escaping, and to trouble coming in.  The outlines of the townlands still follow the streams today.
Livestock would be let out in the morning and brought back in at night.  More like the Masai in Kenya, than Little Boy Blue’s The sheep’s in the meadow, the cow’s in the corn.

Come Dance with Kitty Stobling

No, no, no, I know I was not important as I moved
Through the colourful country, I was but a single
Item in the picture, the name, not the beloved.
O tedious man with whom no gods commingle.
Beauty, who has described beauty?  Once upon a time
I had a myth that was a lie but it served:
Trees walking across the crest of hills and my rhyme
Cavorting on mile-high stilts and the unnerved
Crowds looking up with terror in their rational faces. 
O dance with Kitty Stobling I outrageously
Cried out-of-sense to them, while their timorous paces
Stumbled behind Jove's page boy paging me.
I had a very pleasant journey, thank you sincerely
For giving me my madness back, or nearly.
-Patrick Kavanagh 
Copyright © Estate of Katherine Kavanagh

As we come the next major junction you’ll see on the right three figures dancing on stilts, a sculpture by ????.
Carrickmacross
In olden times the crossroads was a gathering place for the young people. There were dances, singing, pitching marbles and jumping and throwing weights at the crossroads. A fire was always lit long ago at the crossroads on bonfire night.
Collected by Marcella Loughran aged 12 from Patrick Loughran aged 81 [born 1859]. Both of Cavanaguillagh, Co. Monaghan.
Come Dance with Kitty Stobling

No, no, no, I know I was not important as I moved
Through the colourful country, I was but a single
Item in the picture, the name, not the beloved.
O tedious man with whom no gods commingle.
Beauty, who has described beauty?  Once upon a time
I had a myth that was a lie but it served:
Trees walking across the crest of hills and my rhyme
Cavorting on mile-high stilts and the unnerved
Crowds looking up with terror in their rational faces. 
O dance with Kitty Stobling I outrageously
Cried out-of-sense to them, while their timorous paces
Stumbled behind Jove's page boy paging me.
I had a very pleasant journey, thank you sincerely
For giving me my madness back, or nearly.
-Patrick Kavanagh

The Queen of Sweden, yes, the Queen of Sweden, gets married with a Carrick-mecross Lace shawl.
From the Schools Archive:
“This town is noted for lace this great many years and I am sure that there are few people who have not heard of Carrick-mecross lace.
This lace has a very peculiar design which makes it very tedious and difficult to do. Very few people make lace in this town except the nuns, and Miss Simmons who lives in Mulinarry. Some time ago more people worked at it but there is not much sale for it as it is very expensive.
The lace is made into collars, vests, wedding robes and many other such articles, and these are carefully preserved in families from generation to generation.
Our little town is known in places that it would not be known in, by its lace.
“Lace - making was a very famous industry round here about forty years ago. All the women & girls were kept very busy. They first cut a piece of wood from a tree, bought a linen spool at 5 shilling & needles at 3 shillings. Then starting with 9 shillings a family named Smith were known to make £20.”

You will have passed though about 120 townlands by the time you get to Monaghan.
This is just the ones going up the hill here…

Monanny. Monanny means Little Bird's Bog in Irish. Eanna being an Irish boys name (for last actually). Monanny.
Creevy (Swinburn). Creevy meaning Bushy. Swinburn being a local landlord. Creevy (Swinburn).
Killabrick - only the left half of the road here- the other half being ???. Killabrick means Badger wood in Irish. Killabrick.
Aghavilla. Aghavilla translates as Field of the Bill - as in someone owed someone a bill. Aghavilla.
Lissgall. Lissgall meaning Cathals or Charles' Hill Fort. Lissgall
Donaghmoyne.	the Church of the Precincts, referring to the territories of the Mugdorna, a tribe that in the first millennium inhabited this area.  Donaghmoyne.
Annahaia	Field of the Kiln
Donaghmoyne again
Toneyellida	The geldings bottom land
Tullyvaragh (Upper)	Hillock of the Strangers 
Tullyvaragh (Lower)  Hillock of the Strangers

The Tin Church at Laragh. The tin church at Laragh
About three or four miles west of here, is the tin Church of St. Peter's Church in Laragh, County Monaghan. It is a tin tabernacle, constructed in 1890 from corrugated iron and timber. 
The Swiss-Gothic design of the church was inspired by travels on the continent in the 1880’s by Laragh Tweed Mill operator James McKean and his wife, while on their honeymoon. 
As you approach from either side and round a bend in the road, this highly unusual Tin Church stands dramatically on a high rock overlooking a small, fast flowing river. It is a rare example of a 19th century corrugated iron clad church.
Local stories suggests McKean had the mill river realigned to create the spectacular site in Aughnamullen parish, the intention being to build a Catholic church to serve the mill workers of the town. However, following a breakdown in industrial relations, a falling out with the local clergy and the eventual permanent closure of the Irish Laragh Tweed factory in 1885, 
St. Peter's was eventually built in 1890 and consecrated as Church of Ireland on 13 August 1891. It was de-consecrated in 1962. 
Fifty years later, Laragh Heritage group was formed to raise funds, to restore St. Peter's back to its former glory. 
The Tin Church is now open to the public, and free to visit 7 days a week from 10am to 6pm including Bank Holidays.
Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St._Peter%27s_Church,_Laragh

The Witches path through Monygorbet
Long ago my great-grandfather was coming home from a fair late at night. He was drunk. He slept on the bewitched path. In the morning he came home. He found a small box in his pocket. When he opened the box in his house he saw a very small hammer, a tiny awl and a last and other tint cobbler's tools. The fairies put them in his pocket. Ever after that he could sole any boot or shoe although he never made it a trade.

Collected by Róis Níc A' Bháird of Monygorbet

Back to the Queen of Sweden, and Carrick-mecross Lace
In 1904 her father Prince Arthur, Duke of Connaught and Strathearn, Victoria’s third son, was Commander in Chief of the British Army in Ireland.  
His headquarters were in Dublin, but he fancied Leonie, Lady Leslie of Glas-lough, and moved his HQ up to Castleblaney to be closer to her.  With his wife and children in tow!  
Oh, The Headquarters were owned by Henry Thomas Hope of Hope Diamond fame. So the royals weren’t slumming it here.  The building, known as Hope Castle, was badly damaged by fire in 2010.
His daughters, aged about 18, one of them the Wife of the Crown Price of Sweden, would go out walking on a Sunday afternoon visiting the poorest houses.  And these houses typically produced Carrick-mecross Lace.
So when Princess Margaret Victoria Charlotte Augusta Norah of Connaught married the Crown Prince of Sweden, she was married in a Carrick-mecross Lace.  She died young aged 38, while pregnant, and was buried in her wedding dress.  Her wedding shawl is still used in Swedish Royal weddings.

The Queen of Sweden and Carrickmacross Lace

You see the lake down to the right, that was known as Corrinchago lake in the townland of the same name.  This is probably the best fairy story I’ve heard in English as opposed to the Irish.  I look forward to be corrected.

On the top of Corrinchago hill there is a fort called Corrinchago fort. The people who owned this farm often say that they still hear the fairies sing-and-dance to fairy music. Here is a story told by a woman who lives in the farm presently and who says she remembers the day of this happening.
She is 80 years old on 1st Jan '38. Her father had about 3 acres of flax beside Corrinchago Lake. This day they had a boon of lovely boys-and-girls, pulling the flax. She was only a girl of 5 years of age at the time. Her mother and two neighbour women were cooking the dinner for the flax pullers which consisted at that time of a large pot of champ (mashed potatoes) oat cake made on the grid-iron and baked or roasted in front of a turf fire, along with a bowl of sweet milk. This meal was served at a large table in the middle of the floor like this. A large dish with champ piled up on it was placed in the middle of the table, in the centre of the champ a hole was made and about 1/2lb of butter was put into this hole. The workers each got a spoon and dipped each spoonful of champ in the butter, ate a piece of oat cake, and drank the sweet milk with it. No tea or second course was served. 
In those days a boon might consist of from 30 to 40 according to the popularity of the farmer who had his flax to pull, in the chance of a nice flax-pulling-dance taking place that night. On this special occasion there was to be a dance so this fact was partly responsible for 40 pullers. Needless to say the cooks were very busy and anxious about the dinner which was always due at 12 noon. 
About 11.30 am the cooks espied a very small woman coming up the boreen. She was dressed in a black skirt check apron with patch pockets and a red kerchief on her head. She carried a stick and a small white bag (size of a 1/4 stone paper bag) under her shawl. She knocked at the door and asked for some oat meal. The bean-a-tighe who was a Mrs Connolly (bhrian ardghail) went to her and told her they were very busy and to call back after the dinner. She would help her, as the meal by the way was out in a barn loft and it would take away too much of the woman's time to go up in the loft in it at the time. This little beggar woman "turned-on-her-heel" as is said around here and never spoke, but went her way. 
At the same moment the story goes that very strong gust of wind blew from the fort in the field where the flax pullers were and blew the flax, the beads, the bands in all directions through the country and also lifted in the air the prettiest girl in the boon, and flung her into the middle of Corrinchago Lake, and then formed circle within circle while she was going to the bottom of the lake. 
This girl was 17 years of age- the eldest girl of the lady of the house who refused the oaten meal to the wee beggar woman till after dinner. 
Needless to say, there was consternation among all and after a few minutes all realised what had happened and they got drags, chains, currachs & even tubs were used as boats to take the men to the middle of the lake to see if they could rescue her, but no trace of her was to be found. 

Some old man in the district suggested that the woman (mother of the girl) who sent the "wee" woman off till after dinner should leave a bag of oaten meal at the fort, to see would the any result. 
And she did overnight.
Next day a great gust of wind came, and a lovely man dressed as a king, in clothes of most brilliant colours, came riding on a grey steed down from the Corrinchago fort. He came into the field where the flax pulling boon was some days before, leaped straight into the air and down into the middle of the lake and at the same spot where the girl was blown into the lake. 

All those present looked on in amazement, and as the horse and rider were going down, circle after circle was appearing on the surface of the water. 
After the lapse of a few seconds, the rider and horseman appeared again, and the lady who was taken away a few days before this, was seated on the grey steed behind the man who appeared as a King, and was afterwards described as King of the Fairies in Corrinchago Fort. 
The horse galloped in the flax field, the lady jumped off, and the horseman and horse galloped off up the hill in the direction of the fort, and disappeared underneath the ground.
The girl returned to her parents unharmed, but refused to tell what had happened except to say she was in a lively home.
* This story has been told to me [the Schoolmaster] in presence of the school children by Mrs Anne Connolly - Corrinchago - 81 years of age [in 1938]. She is the cousin to the lady who was carried away. She can tell the genealogical table of almost every family in the district. She crossed to America 13 times, has all her passports and is now in receipt of the old age pension. 
https://www.duchas.ie/en/cbes/4723822/4716453/4937039
The Schools’ Collection, Volume 0936, Page 190
c/o National Folklore Collection
The Connolly’s and their people still live in the area now.

Image https://www.duchas.ie/en/cbeg/15703; The Photographic Collection, J012.06.00001Image and data © National Folklore Collection, UCD

There is a vault in the grave-yard at Clontibret church, St Colman’s, belonging to a family called Fitzgerald. In a public house nearby, a few men were talking about the vault. There was a wager laid that one of the party, named Bob Brown, who never knew what fear was, would not enter the vault, and bring back a skull. Brown accepted the wager. While he was getting the key from the sexton, another of the party, named George Grimes, got into the vault, and hid in a dark corner, behind some coffins. When Brown arrived, he lifted the first skull he came to. At that, Grimes called out, in a hoarse voice, "That's mine". Brown lifted another, but Grimes repeated, "That's mine". When he had lifted the fourth skull, and Grimes had called "That's mine".  Says Brown, "It makes no difference who owns it, I'm going to win my ten bob", and off he went with the skull, to win the wager.
Recounted by Michael Cunningham of Cashel, County Monaghan
https://www.duchas.ie/en/cbes/4723825/4716655
The Schools’ Collection, Volume 0936, Page 392
Image; By Pieter Claesz, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=4892401

Just at the end of the War of Independence, Castleshane, a very imposing mansion burned down. By accident or deliberately is not known for certain.  However for the young Leslie children of Glass-lough fame there was an upside, as Anita Leslie tells us;
Occasionally we were driven to play with seven-year-old Oriel Scudamore at Castle-Shane, a Victorian-Gothic house lying deep in its forest, five miles away. 
One morning at nursery breakfast the news reached us that Castle-Shane was burning down.  The grown-ups hurried around looking grim and in the afternoon we went to see the smoking ruin.
Oriel's teer-streaked mother was directing firemen-and-police to search for her jewellery in the ashes.
Charles II's prayer book had been burned with other precious volumes in the library, and a pet Pekinese had succumbed. We watched the activities unmoved.
The burning happened to suit our book, for Oriel and her governess came to stay with us at Castle Leslie and she was dressed in my clothes until her mother could purchase more
Children’s perspective on rebellion and civil war is not what you might imagine is it?

For more on Castleshane see Master Liam O'Connor's site https://www.castleshanehistory.ie/

A story is told about a hole in a barn wall still to be seen at my home in Aughnaseda. Up to 1920 this place belonged to a family called Clarke. Mr. David Clarke now residing near Glass-lough, who is 75 years of age [born 1863?], remembers when he was a boy that this particular barn had a front and back door directly opposite each other. This had been used by his father for cleaning corn.
His father, who was a mason, decided to build up the back door for some reason. He did so with mortar and stone and next morning it had fallen down. He built it again and the same thing occurred next night. 

An old woman called Katie McKenna, who lived in the same lane, told them that they might not try to close that door for it was the fairies path right up the street, through the barn to Roddie's Hill.

She advised them that if they must build it up to leave a "wee windy" for the fairies. They took her advice and built it the third time leaving a small square hole which is to be seen there to this day.
Told to Rita Mc Clelland of Aghnasedagh  by Mr David Clarke of Hillhall
https://www.duchas.ie/en/cbes/4742057/4731466/4816899
The Schools’ Collection, Volume 0957, Page 234
Do people still believe in the fairies? Maybe not to the same extent, but sensible people don’t go out of their way to disabuse them. Why would you tempt fate?

Now you are coming up to Corlat Roundabout where we leave you.  
Straight on for Monaghan Town, the Westenra Hotel and the Hillgrove. 
Turn right for the Four Seasons.

The Road to Monaghan

39 ECHOES

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Spirit of the Air roundabout

Swords

King James and the Race to Feltrim Hill

Broad Meadow Estuary

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