Offaly and the Great War essays published in 2018 now on Open Access to all. Thanks to the Decade of Centenaries

The bumper volume of essays (list below) in Offaly and the Great War (Offaly History, 2018) can now be accessed free online at www.offalyhistory.com thanks to the Decade of Centenaries. The book of 28 essays is also available in hardcopy from Offaly History for just €20. In all over 50 articles free to download. Go to the Decade of Centenaries on the offalyhistory.com website.

When the great historian and first ‘telly don’ A.J.P. Taylor published his short history of the First World War just in time for the remembrance days of over fifty years ago he wrote that the war reshaped the political order in Europe. That its memorials stood in every town and village and that the real hero of the war was the Unknown Soldier.

46-47, Grand Canal Townlands East to West: Ballindrinan to Cornalaur No 46-47 in the Grand Canal Offaly Series. By Philomena Bracken, Offaly History

Rahan, Civil Parish is situated in the ancient O’Molloy territory of Fear Ceall meaning Men of the Woods or Men of the Churches. It is bounded on its north west side by the Brosna River. Its bedrock is Limestone and it has deposits of brick and clay along the Grand Canal.

The townlands from Ballydrohid, Tullamore to Cornalaur

Ballindrinan Townland/ Image Source Townlands.ie

Its best know archaeological site is the Rahan Monastic Centre which was an area of great importance in the early Christian Period.

Townland: Ballindrinan is in the Electoral Division of Rahan, in Civil Parish of Rahan, in the Barony of Ballycowan, in the County of Offaly.

The Irish name for Ballindrinan is Baile an Draighneáin meaning land of the blackthorns.

Launch of new book ‘The River Brosna – An Environmental History’ by John Feehan, Friday 22 March 8 p.m.

There is an open invitation to all those interested in the River Brosna to come to the book launch on Friday 22 March at 7.30pm in The Star (GAA hall) River Street,  Clara hosted by Clara Heritage Society. 

John Feehan has dedicated much of his life to studying and communicating the evolution of the landscape and how we have lived in and changed it – his previous Offaly publications have included books on the Slieve Blooms, Croghan Hill, the Landscape of Clonmacnoise, An Atlas of Birr and more recently Killaun Bog and the Camcor River.  This new publication focuses on the River Brosna and its catchment.

The River Brosna is one of Ireland’s hidden rivers, glimpsed over bridges and for short stretches as it travels through Mullingar, Ballinagore, Kilbeggan, Clara, Ballycumber and Ferbane on its journey from Lough Owel to ShannonHarbour.  Until now very little has been written about it yet few rivers have a more fascinating and varied story to tell.  In this beautifully illustrated book John Feehan brings his long experience as an environmental scientist and historian to bear on all aspects of the natural, cultural and industrial heritage of the river and its catchment.  Successive chapters review geological origins, the biodiversity of the river and its tributaries as well as the great area of bogland it drains.  The history of the mills along the course of the river, and of the two great arterial schemes that so altered the river are reviewed and particular attention is devoted to the extraordinary stories of Mesolithic Lough Boora and the Bronze Age Dowris hoard.

26-27 Vallancey’s account of the north Offaly towns in 1771 and the improvements that were expected to follow canal navigation. No 26-27 in the Grand Canal Offaly series featuring Edenderry, Daingean, Tullamore, Clara and Ferbane, County Offaly

This article looks at the north Offaly towns featured in Major (later general) Vallancey’s report carried out in 1771 and designed to support the construction of the new Grand Canal line to Tullamore and the Shannon.  Vallancey was then a young engineer, employed to report to the Commissioners of Inland Navigation and his findings were published in,  A Report on the Grand Canal or Southern Line (Dublin 1771).[1] This report is useful as a window on some of the north King’s County (hereafter generally referred to as Offaly) towns and villages.[2] 

17 The Finest Building in Offaly: The Grand Canal: A Modest Declaration. By James Scully, No. 17 in the Grand Canal Offaly series

A case can be made for declaring that the Grand Canal in Offaly is the county’s greatest building. No other structure has contributed so much to the economic development of so many of its towns and villages over the last 230 years. In addition, it has supported the recreational wellbeing of local citizens for a hundred years or more and seems set to do so exponentially in the decades ahead. It also preserves a relatively undisturbed wildlife corridor for many of our threatened flora and fauna species. The canal has its own rich cultural identity, much celebrated in literature and music. Its components, listed below, still combine to create an architectural entity that is almost fully operational although in a fashion undreamt of when it was first conceived in 1715, well over 300 years ago.

Combining the Shannon or Main Line (1793–1804) and the Kilbeggan Branch (1830–35), the stretches of the canal in Offaly and Westmeath took just over fifteen years to build. As it flows forty-four miles from Cloncannon, south-east of Edenderry, to Bunbrosna and Minus, downstream of Shannon Harbour, and eight miles along the Kilbeggan Line, its architectural components present a staggering list: it tumbles through sixteen locks; crosses five large aqueducts; supports and reflects forty or so ancient and modern bridges; funnels into its own channel an array of supplies or feeders, kept in control by a strategically placed system of overflows or overspills; conducts scores of unwanted streams, syphoned and otherwise, through scores of tunnels or culverts, under its non-porous bed to nearby rivers and gently glides along between a hundred miles of well-staunched towpaths and embankments to a seamless confluence with the brimming Brosna and the Lordly Shannon.

Down the Decades – The journey with George Griffith of Clonshanny, Clara, Ireland. By Tom Minnock

Down the Decades was launched in Rahan Hall in November 2023 with a large audience and since then the new book by Tom Minnock has proved to be extremely popular with more copies printed to meet the demand. We asked Tom Minnock to tell us in this blog article about how the book came about. Born in 1922, the life of George Griffith tracked the life of the new Irish State, down through the decades. George never left his native Clonshanny giving him a local perspective on community life in the area during a fascinating period in the history of Ireland and the world. George Griffith died in March 2022.

Tom’s book is a collection of George’s reflections on that century up to 2022. Tom has set the context both locally and globally for each decade.

Tom Minnock writes:

The book is out there now and it is a peculiar feeling that is hard to put into words as something that you have spent countless hours living with takes wings.  A few random words sketched out on a large note book and transferred on to a computer screen had grown and grown over time.  How did this come about and why do I think it was important to publish it and expose myself to my community to be judged? I would like to share the journey and in doing so challenge you all reading this to consider writing or sharing your stories with somebody who will set them down for a future generation to ponder and continue the process.

2 The background to the development of the towns on the Grand Canal in County Offaly. ‘The man-made features of the Irish landscape, urban and rural, were created within little more than a century before the 1840s and remained largely unchanged till the 1950s.’[1] Prepared by Offaly History

This week we look at the background to the Vallancey report on the Offaly towns carried out in 1771  to  facilitate the construction of the new Grand Canal line from Dublin to the Shannon.  Vallancey was then a young engineer, employed to report to the Commissioners of Inland Navigation and his findings were published in a little known and very scarce pamphlet, A Report on the Grand Canal or Southern Line (Dublin 1771).[2] This report is useful as a window on some of the north King’s County (hereafter generally referred to as Offaly) towns and villages and all the more so because of the scarcity of published accounts of the midland towns prior to 1800.[3]   The report was published in the same year as that of John Trail who was at the time employed by Dublin Corporation.[4]  Vallancey was writing with a mission.  He was being paid to spin the story of the benefits that would come from inland navigation and to highlight the difficulties with road transport and its adverse impact on competition and pricing of commodities so as to bolster the arguments in favour of canal construction and satisfy those who were paying his consultancy fees.

Why not contribute to our series of blog articles on the Grand Canal in Offaly – info@offalyhistory.com.

1 The Grand Canal in County Offaly, Ireland: one of the county’s greatest amenities for walking, cycling and taking time out in tranquil countryside. Buen Camino this Christmas and in 2024. Prepared by Offaly History

This month we begin a series of articles on the history and heritage of the Grand Canal in County Offaly that will run to upwards of 50 blog articles in 2024 and have its own platform on our website, http://www.offalyhistory.com. Our aim is to document the story of the course of the canal from the county boundary east of Edenderry to Shannon Harbour in the west. Today the Grand Canal is one of the greatest amenities that County Offaly possesses and we want to tell the story, and for readers to contribute by way of information and pictures. All the material will be open to be used on our website and the format will allow for editing to improve and to receive additional information from you the reader, which will be acknowledged. So Buen Camino as we make our journey through a quiet and well-watered land. The year 2024 marks the 120^th anniversary of the completion of the Shannon Line at Shannon Harbour and may also see the completion of the canal greenway in this county.

When turkeys could fly: Irish Christmases in England. By Sylvia Turner

During the twentieth century a tradition arose of a Christmas bird, usually a turkey, being sent from Ireland to extended members of the family who had emigrated to the Britain.  They arrived in a canvas bag packed in straw. The Second World War disrupted the tradition. It did not resume immediately after the War as the British Government thought that birds would be traded on the black market in contravention of food rationing as explained by the New Ross Standard 22^nd October 22^nd 1948.

He just walked…. Ireland’s lost people 1850-1950: reflections on the Protestant experience. By Sylvia Turner

Ireland has been associated with the loss of its people through migration for centuries.  The analyses by the Central Statistics Office identifies that the famine of 1845 – 52 led to a peak in migration and changed the country’s demographic, political, and cultural landscape. Related themes of endemic poverty and religious intolerance were reasons why others left Ireland’s shores trying to find a better life. Literacy rates in 1841 were 47% but by 1911 had risen to 88%. Limited literacy hindered emigrants maintaining contact. Migration could mean that when someone left, they were gone for good and it was unlikely they would ever again speak to or see friends or family back home. Apart from emigration,  Irish demographic anomalies, such as late marriage and large families led to people being dislocated from their families. The age gap between parents, particularly fathers, and children was frequently such that being orphaned in childhood was common. Often, there was also a large age gap between older and younger siblings, with the latter hardly knowing brothers or sisters who had left home or emigrated while they were still in infancy. [i]

This context helps me to understand a phrase my mother used when she reminisced about her family life with three sisters and parents, growing up in the Midlands as workers at the ‘big houses’. They would join friends and listen to fiddle playing  in the evening occasionally. When I asked her about someone she had described and what happened to them, she would sometimes say ‘Oh,  he just walked’ often adding ‘it was very common then’.