Inverbrens 2007

Strangford2007

Memories from Inverbrena

1Inverbrena Local History Group Magazine 2007

A Note on “Inverbrena”The name first appears in the Annals of the Four Masters as ‘Inver Brena’ –

the mouth of the Bren river and identifies the narrow neck of water through which the tide rushes into Loch Cuan.

“For the olden memories fast are flying from us,Oh! That some kind hand would come

And bind them in a garland e’re the present hardensAnd the past grows cold and dumb.”

Anon.

Chairman’s Note.

Cover: ‘Squeeze Gut’This sunken walk was dug out as a famine relief scheme around 1847.

Its purpose was to allow the peasantry to go to church in Old Court Chapel without disturbing the privacy of the Aristocracy.

It became the village ‘lover’s lane’ where a boy might give his girl a ‘squeeze’ when out of the public eye! (My own explanation).

Mr. Wm James in his book on Strangford, refers to it as “The Squeeze”, inferring, I think, that is was a cattle squeeze to ease the counting of cattle: this I doubt!

© Copyright 2007

I would like to welcome you to the pages of 2007 Inverbrena Magazine. Your local history group has worked hard on the production of this year’s project. We sometimes think we have written about everything there is to write about. But it is amazing how we can inspire each other to come up with some uncovered aspect of local colour, culture or history. All that remains now to make our year a success is for you to read, consume and enjoy this year’s booklet. Perhaps you could even make our Society more successful by joining us and add your own stories, memories and reminiscences to next year’s effort. A warm welcome awaits you.

A special thank you to Colm Rooney, Michael McConville, Bobby Magee, Michael Magee, Albert Colmer and P.R.O.N.I. for snippets of interesting detail included in my talk on Strangford’s history September last.

Eamon McMullan

2 Inverbrena Local History Group Magazine 2007

Contents

AcknowledgmentsThe editor wishes to thank those who submitted articles and trusted us with their photographs. Our thanks to P.R.O.N.I. for permission to publish the 1840 map of Strangford. All the members of our group for their co-operation. Also Community Relations for their help and the staff of Flixx Graphics for their friendly and practical advice as always. Thanks to Kevin Óg for acting as agent.

Cairnashoke Academy ................................................................ Eamon McMullan 3-7

Home Of The Crows ................................................................. Eamon McMullan 7

Kilclief Public Elementary School Booklet 1929 .......................................... 8-11

Vere Henry Lewis Foster .............................................................George McKibbin 12-14

Robert Magee Remembers ..............................................................Joan Magee 15-17

Autumn ..................................................................................... Eamon McMullan 17

Typhoid in Lecale .............................................................................Joan Magee 18

The Truckers of Strangford who fought for a day’s work....................P.J. Lennon 19

The Question ............................................................................ Eamon McMullan 20

Canon Conway’s Golden Jubilee ...................................................Nuala Colhoun 21-22

“The Lad with a ‘Nerve of Steel’” ...............................................George McKibbin 23-24

Gallery ........................................................................................................ 25-40

Saul .............................................................................. Submitted by George McKibbin 41-44

Autumn’s Soft Advance .............................................................. Eamon McMullan 44

Ballyhornan – Telephone Cable .........................................................Joan Magee 45-46

Extracts From Home Words .................................................................I. Magee 47-49

Childhood Memories ...................................... Peggy Hanna & Maureen Murray (nee Kane) 50-51

Strangford Walk - 1930’s ............................................................ Eamon McMullan 52

The Coronary Of An Amateur ......................................................... Willie Crea 53

The Other Side Of The Door ......................................................Catriona Denvir 54

Struck By A Bishop ..........................................................................P.J. Lennon 55

Notes .......................................................................................................... 56


Cairnashoke Academyby Eamon McMullan

I was officially put on the rolls of Kilclief Public Elementary School on 20th April, 1936, a few months after my 4th birthday. Miss O’Hare was our teacher; I later would refer to her as ‘Annie T’, for that was what we discovered in the rolls to be her Christian name. Along with a ‘wheen’ of other boys we were known as the baby infants and we sat at small desks with squares cut into the surface and an ink well at the centre. Of course the ink well was not meant for the use of the baby infants who were only allowed to use pencils. Nibs and pens and the use of ink wells were skills that would come later as we practiced writing ‘headlines’. These headlines were puzzling phrases like ‘evil to him that evil thinketh’, or ‘a rolling stone gathers no moss’, their perfect copperplate was a chore to copy. I was always under the impression that the local priest was the recipient of buckets of evil, for he was the only one who would use the word ‘thinketh’. Isn’t it amazing the mental pictures you carry in your head from childhood. Anyway, as I was saying, these small desks with their square patterns became useful when we were allowed blocks to use as counters as each block fitted each square. In this way we learned to count. We also used bundles of cardboard strips usually made up of matchbox strikers, Swan or Bo-Peep, and would rhyme out the answer to the question ‘what is 21, answer ‘please miss two bundles of ten and one single one’, the stress being on the first ‘one’. I progressed through the year with frequent lapses into babyhood including the time I divested myself of all clothing. My poor father who was the principal, on patrolling through the playground, found me in my birthday suit boasting that I had ‘taken off every stitch myself ’. Obviously this was an accomplishment at bedtime at home but not in the school yard in front of a bunch of schoolboys rolling in mirth. My earliest memory was standing in a basin of water in Mrs McCormick’s kitchen and being sluiced down with a bucket of cold water when I had dirtied my britches in school. However it only happened the once until I learned to use the toilets in the yard. These were a scary bunch of doored cubicles with a long drop and too wide an aperture for small behinds, necessitating a tight hold on either side to prevent disappearing into the void. The school was an up-to-date affair for its day in Kilclief but with no mains water the dry toilets worked on the cesspit principle with a little yeast added to enhance the process.

Each room was bedecked with charts and maps. Miss O’Hare’s room had a chart with all the common birds and the pictures of these have stayed with me ever since. Plover, snipe, blackbird, robin, etc. I suppose you could say ‘learning without pain’ or without even knowing you were learning. The ‘house that Jack built’ was another and although I could never understand how the cow got a crumpled horn, it nevertheless painted a picture. The Master’s room catered for P3 – P7 and in there were the maps of the world, Europe, Asia, etc. I remember Kieran Denvir and I discovering the Zuider Zee. We pronounced Zuider to rhyme with shudder. And we found Timbucktoo one time as well. Anyway, gradually progress was made and with my classmates and friends, Terry Swail, Billy McCartan, Kieran Denvir, Emmet Nevin, Patsy Cultra and the rest we advanced up the scale of excellence provided by Cairnashoke Academy. The school was a four roomed affair, the rooms separated from each other by fold back partitions. These could be pushed back to convert the whole school into a hall for dances, whist drives or plays, switching as the need required. Lights were gas which came from a carbide plant out back.


The main edifi ce had just been completed in 1929 by Father Tom McGowan, a little dynamo of a man, little appreciated by the people because he was trying to raise money during a very impoverished era, the Wall Street crash, the Depression years, etc. He succeeded in building a school and later, a church, at a time when others might have given up. The earliest school on the site was built in the fi rst quarter of the 19th century. It was an elongated low building with a teacher’s residence at its eastern end and a single classroom with three windows on the western side. It was thatched and had a fi replace near the door. In 1867 it was pulled down and a more substantial school built, with two rooms, one for boys and one for girls. Comments from inspectors of the time complained about it not being plastered or whitewashed and of the ‘outhouses’ being too close to the school itself. Master Kerr was the teacher in those days and with at least 46 boys to contend with and teach he must have has his hands full. He lived a few hundred yards from the school at Kerr’s Corner, just across from John Fitzsimons of the Gap. His son Charlie brought up a large family there in my own time at school.

Eventually this 1867 structure failed to fi ll its function and Father McGowan determined to build and between 1927 and 1929 a spanking brand new four roomed edifi ce was erected. The site was small and rocky and had to be blasted to gain a level area big enough for building. Dances, ceilis, whists and draws were held to gather funds and the new school resulted. An inspector, Mr W H Welpley, congratulated Father McGowan on how well he had catered for the education in the area and in a letter, dated 1st November, 1928, he expressed his approval. By this time my father had replaced Master Kerr in 1916 so he was the fi rst principal of the new school. Cairnashoke was on the map of the world!

It was a small clahan of houses, the main road, if you could call it that, passed through west to east from Kerr’s Corner over a little stream at Kerr’s Bridge, through Cairnashoke, over Kilcuddy Brae, to the Row Crossroads. Opposite the school lived Tom McCann and sometimes, his brother Harry.

Tom McCann’s House


McCormick’s and Willie Luke’s Houses

Harry was a simple soul and was Father Campbell’s escort around the Parish when this new Curate fi rst arrived. Harry kept up escort duty long after Father Campbell had learned the geography of the Parish and would inform all the sick calls that ‘we’ll be round on Friday morning’. Tom himself had a wooden leg and was seldom outside. But he kept a bucket of water near the door for thirsty pupils. When Tom died his other brother John, a shoemaker, came from Drumroe and carried on his business in this thriving metropolis.

Down a lane opposite the school were two houses, the McCormick family lived in the fi rst and Willie Luke or Big Willie as he was known, lived next door.

When his mother died his cousin Rosina McGinn came from Kilcoo to take care of him. Both houses were thatched and outside Willie’s

was a covered well, a little corbelled building with a gate fi ve or ten feet above the water level. A bucket with a rope tied to its handle was thrown in and hauled up and it seemed to me to be the best drink of water in the land. How Willie and Rosina put up with the endless stream of thirsty kids, from both the girls’ and the boys’ school, in endless procession to their door for a drink of water, I’ll never know. They were a kindly pair and never was there a refusal or a cross word. Of course you know that the journey was just an excuse away from the school and the desk, for as kids, we were very good at skipping work. As well as drinks of water many a time a pencil lead was broken on purpose so as we could get to the fi re to sharpen a new point and at the same time warm our hands. When the notion took us we would sometimes bother John McCann or


Mrs McCormick for drinks but most often it was Rosina’s we favoured. At lunchtime we could sometimes make it to the Row and back, to Mrs Hinds’ wee sweet shop, although it was wartime and sweets were rationed.

I myself loved to visit John McCann. As a shoemaker, John had a nook in his living room, his workshop, where he practiced his trade, cutting out the shape of a sole or a heel on a side of hide, always a slice of tough centre at the front and the softer tissue towards the back. He straddled a long upholstered stool with his last between his knees and a little selection of nails in sections just beyond but within easy reach. He would spit the nails out into his quick fingers and go down the side of a boot while ‘Johnny wrote the note’, each nail entering at regular intervals and bending over against the last inside the shoe, giving a long lasting repair. The hard wearing centre leather for a sole was hammered flat and compacted by a welting session of five minutes or more. The making of the wax end was an art form of its own. The late Tommy Makem sang a song of the beating of the ‘labstone’. But John was a natural at the job and pulled the hank of flax lint through the bar of Cornuba wax and rolled it on his well waxed knee, with the odd spit to keep it from sticking. He ended up with a wax end that would have held the Queen Mary. With the end product he double stitched through each bradawl hole and pulled tight and knotted every stitch. As a boy of eleven I wanted to be as smart as he was. At that advanced age he deemed me mature enough to go to Stuart & James in Portaferry and get his slab of leather every week or so. He gave me 6d for the boat and 6d for myself and of course, the money for the hide. I must admit the ferryman was lucky to get 3d, after all, a Saturday run to the pictures cost 1/1d, 10d return on the bus and 3d into the cinema, but after all a fellow needed a social event once in a while. John told me to look at the skins and get one with plenty of dark stain near the centre. He liked the dark leather best as it was nearer the centre of the back. Tom and John’s house was thatched and you could see the scraw into which the whisps of thatch were secured with a twist. When the spiders and flies became too well established he blocked the chimney and ‘smoked the buggers out’, as he would say. However, I digress from my main story; my schooldays in Kilclief. Believe me I had no love for learning and had to have it ‘bate into me’. By the time I had reached P3 and gone into the Master’s room, Miss O’Hare had me reasonably straightened out but she was a soft touch and as I was one of the few that would sing, I was her pet in a way. I remember well the songs she taught at the time.

When the spring with magic fingerLightly taps at nature’s portal,

Welcome spring! Lovely spring!Winter’s gale has passed away.

I had no soul and the flowery language just passed right over my head. I thought that a portal was where you bought porter like in Ranaghan’s or Sharvin’s pub and anyway a tough guy like me could not be heard singing such drivel. Give me ‘The Minstrel Boy’ or ‘Off to Dublin in the Green’, anytime, but the gentle Annie T lived on another plain altogether and taught us to push back our cuticles, clean our nails and comb our hair. To prove myself among my classmates I had to skip doing homework once in a while so I could join the line for punishment and be one of the lads. My Dad, in his wisdom, laid on with a will and I was seen to get as much if not more than the others. He was a master of the bamboo, a B.A. (bamboo artist), and the boys used to chant out in the playground ‘reading, writing, arithmetic,


he’s the boy can use the stick’. We had an ink well hidden out in the back of the school and that’s where the sums were copied and the spellings and whatever. I often thought later in life that I worked harder getting out of work than I would have done doing it in the first place. I often wondered too, did my Dad know the game I was playing in order to be accepted by my peer group? My pal, Billy McCartan, was a lovely writer, while I was like a drunken spider on the page and was always in trouble for untidy work, blots etc. So one night I got Billy to do my composition, the difference in presentation was extraordinary, neat, tidy and copperplate. Did ‘oul Paddy’ not notice. Did the ‘oul Dinjer’ not even look? I’ll never know. By the way these were the nicknames we had for my father at school. I had the devil’s own bother not calling him Daddy, but Sir, while in the school environment, but I joined with my peers in the name calling behind his back. Being the master’s son was not all sunshine mind you. When some of the bigger boys had received ‘toko’ from my dad I was given the odd warm ear at lunchtime in revenge and once I was tied to a post in the playground. By the time I got loose I was late in and got a couple of the best. I couldn’t ‘clash’ on the perpetrators in this case, Louis Murphy and Sean Strain, for fear of reprisals on some later occasion. However I survived and am still able to meet my school friends with head held high. Rob Polly, Kieran Denvir, Frank Breen and Terry Swail were among the best hurlers at school. The problem was the lack of hurley sticks. We were mainly reduced to what we called ‘cliques or cleeks’ whatever way you want to spell it. These were curved sticks cut from some tree or pulled from some ditch, something the same shape as a hockey stick. Consequently carrying a ball was an impossible task. As a result too it meant that the mark of Kilclief hurley was a first time pass. The great Brian Denvir always held that first time passing was the sign of a hurler from Cairnashoke. I intend to complete this saga but I don’t want to bore you to death. So next year I’ll tell you of the war years, the evacuees, the army takeover of the school, the coming of the Air Force to Ballywooden, the epidemics, diphtheria etc. and of the Strangford lads who came for a short while to boost the falling numbers in Kilclief.

The Home Of The CrowsE.J.McMullan

As evenings close and you’re ready to doze at the end of an Autumn dayAnd a bit of a fire fills your heart’s desire and your troubles just fade away.Strangford’s at peace and quiet release of all tensions just seem to diminish,All’s well with the world and the sweep and the swirl have finally come to a finish.

In the eastern sky, in dozens they fly from the Ards where the flocks have been feeding,Raucous and raw they cackle and caw as back to their nests they ate speeding.The noise is a sound that just cannot be found in any known keyboard or fretAnd it goes on and on, both thither and yon till your teeth on their edges are set.

For each morning and night our crows are in flight and the village sky rings with their criesIt’s been that way for years and without any fears ‘twill be that way till every one dies.For the trees round the village are filled with their nests and each year some new ones are reared.So batten your hatches they’re laying new batches, next year will be worse than you feared.


Vere Henry Lewis FosterSubmitted by George McKibbin

According to The Dictionary of Ulster Biography, Vere Foster was born in Copenhagen in 1819, where his Irish father was British minister. He was educated at Eton and Oxford. It is said that he was so appalled by conditions during the Famine, he gave many emigrants their passage money to America. Several hundred new parish school houses were built with the grants which he procured. He helped to establish the teachers’ union, which was to become the Irish National Teachers’ Organisation. He also published a series of drawing and copy books for schools, of which this example, supplied by George McKibbin, is an example. Vere Foster died in Belfast in 1900, where he had been working for the relief of the sick and poor.

Vere Foster initially devised this handwriting in 1868 for the benefit of Irish emigrants to America. He wished to design a simpler and more accessible style than the elaborate Copperplate system. It was intended to be a compromise between the needs of elegance and speed. It was also suitable for commercial use, particularly for those lacking the calligraphic skills necessary for Copperplate. Vere Foster’s system is a less elongated, more rounded Copperplate, as can be seen in the illustration. It’s success so was enormous in the UK that it was soon adopted by many schools, becoming the most frequently taught writing in British schools from the 1880s until well into the1950s. The following are examples of writing exercises contained within the covers of this particular copy book, which was used in Ballyculter school.


Better alone than in bad company.

Blessings ever wait on virtuous acts.

Common fame is seldom to blame.

Clever people often miss their mark.

Discretion always goes at gentle pace.

Defer not till to-morrow to be wise.

Enthusiasm is the genius of sincerity.

Experience is the best schoolmaster.

Friendly counsel cuts off many foes.

First catch your hare, then cook it.

Greatest genius often lies concealed.

Great talkers are never great doers.

He tires betimes that spurs too fast.

He is richest who has fewest wants.

It’s a poor heart that never rejoices.

It is safer being meek than fierce.

Knowledge is the antidote to fear.

Kind hearts are more than coronets.

Let your discretion be your tutor.

Language is the dress of thought.

Mildness governs better than anger.

Man creates the evil he endures.

Neither a borrower nor a lender be.

Necessity ne’er made a good bargain.

O, what a tangled web we weave.

When first we practice to deceive.

Procrastination is the thief of time.

Praising all alike is praising none.

Quick wits to madness are allied.

Quick resentments are often fatal.

Riches are parents of eternal care.

Remembrance oft may start a tear.

Simple duty hath no place for fear.

Sweet mercy is nobility’s true badge.

To the pure all things are pure.

The brave only know how to forgive.

The borrower runs in his own debt.

The mind’s the standard of the man.

Unkindness has no remedy at law.

Vanity produces vexation of spirit.

Variety is the very spice of life.

Violent delights have violent ends.

What is done wisely is done well.

We need no grace to bury honesty.

You may know a man by his looks.

Zeal without knowledge is frenzy.


Robert Magee Remembers….As told to Joan Magee

Bob is a son of Willie (William) and Cissie (Mary) Magee, Ballynarry. He is married to Eileen, and they live on the outskirts of Strangford, on the Downpatrick road.

….AuctionsI remember Robert Polley of Ballylenagh with his brown bowler hat. I remember, because there wouldn’t have been too many of them about. You’d see him going to mass at Cargagh on a Sunday morning. Robert Polley was as straight as a rush. He always wore brown boots and brown leggings and a tailored jacket or swallow-tailed coat. I don’t remember Robert Polley farming, but I’ll tell you what I do remember, I remember the day of his auction. I was off school for some reason and my mother was away somewhere, I don’t recall where. My father Willie wanted to go to Robert Polley’s auction and he had no option but to take me with him. Stock, buckets, tools and machinery were all for sale. Senan Sharvin was the auctioneer and there was a crowd attending the sale. There was a well worn graip for sale, I remember it well, and it was bought for 10 shillings. Well the unfortunate individual had it bought and paid for when Senan Sharvin told him that if he had come to Senan’s shop he would have sold him a new one for 7 shillings and sixpence. It just goes to show you that if you want to buy dear then go to an auction.

I remember the time Johnny McMullan came to Ballynarry, and he had a sale of beds. Now there were just the ends of the beds and the steel frames and the wire bases. There were no mattresses around then. They were all ticks, not like nowadays, and you had to fi ll them with chaff. When the threshers came round there was fresh chaff, so all the ticks were emptied of the old stuff and fi lled with the new fresh chaff. Anyway Mick Denvir’s haggard and yard were full of the beds and people came from all over the country to buy them. I think it was about the time I lost my fi nger. I met a woman who gave me half a crown. I didn’t know who she was, but I thought I was a millionaire with this white penny. It was Bea Fitsimmons of Tullyfoyle. Bea’s husband Paddy was a big man and she used to wheel him about in a wheelchair. She used to take Paddy up by Ballyhornan and down the Killard road and back down to the four roads there, and back up to Tullyfoyle. I remember there was a crowd of us one time at the four roads there, at the Row, and Bea wheeled Paddy in beside me at the wall, and she went in to Hynds shop to get a message (where Margaret and Brendan Clendenning live now). I was saying to Paddy that there was a brave few about. “Ach Bob”, says Paddy, “Bob, man, you know nothing about it. I was in this corner many a night and up to 200 people, maybe more, at the four roads. Maybe four fi ddlers and half a dozen accordions and everybody dancing in the dust.” That would have been right enough you know.

….PotatoesI remember Francis and I were heading to Derry one Christmas Eve for potatoes. It was the worst day I think I ever was out. Anyway a couple of days later auld Todd (the potato inspector) arrived down at Ballynarry. He says, “Were you away inside Derry for potatoes the other day and if you

Bob pictured with his grand-nephew, Ruairi McMullan.


were then which way did you come home?” I told him we were and that we came home by the coast. “You didn’t come home by Templepatrick” says Todd? “That’s not by the coast” says I. For you see Templepatrick was a dirty area for potatoes too. If we had said that we came home by Templepatrick we should have had to leave the spuds back. *

Remember that big fellow John, that used to deliver the milk, remember he used to get the orange lilies for The Twelfth from Joe Polley and then Liam Polley of Drumroe. Well Louis (Fitzsimmons from Tullyfoyle) gave John a bag of spuds one day and John put them on his milk lorry. And how Todd knew about it I don’t know, but he got to hear of it. Anyway Todd stopped John at the Quoile bridge and he says “You take them potatoes back to where you got them”, for John wasn’t supposed to be taking spuds from a dirty area to Belfast. It made no difference that he was only going to eat them and wasn’t going to plant them. Well John lifted the bag of spuds down from his lorry and set them on the bonnet of Todd’s car. “Right” says he, “There’s your potatoes, you take them back!” and he drove off leaving Todd standing there.

There was another big fellow, Donnan, who was a potato inspector (the scab man). He used to come round every year, and my father grew the May Queens every year for the house. And Donnan went into the garden and pinched the pink blooms off the May Queens, for that was the only way you could tell the potatoes apart. Then Donnan came into the house and he threw the blooms in the back of the fire, and he said to my mother, “Tell him (Willie) not to be growing them again next year. Now have you any more tea in the pot?”

I think it was William Polley of Drumroe, Joe Polley’s father, that ended up in prison for growing potatoes. He was fined for growing potatoes, but refused to pay the fine as a matter of principle, preferring to go to prison instead. There was a Cockney in prison with him and the Cockney says to Bill “what are you in for?” Bill says, “I’m in for growing potatoes”. “What did you do?” says the Cockney, “did you grow them in another blokes’ garden?” “No,” says Bill, “I’m in prison for growing them in my own field”.

I remember one day we were setting potatoes in Ballylenagh, where Robert Polley used to live. We were in the field in front of Bill Curran’s cottage. My father gave me a knife and says “away there and cut a couple of bags of seed with a knife for we’re scarce of seed.” And Bill Curran came out and nearly ate me, said I was destroying the seed. I says “Right Bill, I’ll plant 2 drills of spuds, and I’ll plant one with whole potatoes and put half potatoes in the other drill. If you’re still here when we’re taking them out then I’ll give you a shout.” And so when we came to taking the spuds out, Bill was there. For Willie said “Bill, you’d better come when we’re taking the spuds out this afternoon.” And when we took out the two drills of potatoes there wasn’t a bit of difference. There were as many potatoes in one drill as there were in the other.

Do you remember the late Jimmy Curran (Sando), from Ballylenagh. Do you remember that he used to call with you and Michael while you were living in Father Coyle’s house, about 1990? Jimmy played a banjo in the ceile band and he used to sing too. He was a good character. He’d sing a few songs when the rest of the boys were taking a break from the music and having their tea. Well I remember this night it was coming up near tea - time and Tommy Reid was MC and he says to Sean Fay “I don’t know where Jimmy is, he hasn’t turned up.” Sean said Jimmy was on his way because “he went up past our place on his bicycle earlier and he had a banjo on his back.” Well he must have gone to Chapeltown or Ballyhornan or some place first, but he did arrive with his banjo alright, but he had no sock or shoe on his left foot. Anyway he got up on


the stage and played and sang. He was really good and you could have listened to him all night. I remember him coming in through the gate at home, freewheeling on his bike. I remember saying to him “what’s wrong with the bike James?” and him saying, “I don’t know Robert, there must be a malfunction somewhere.”

Jimmy used to be in the RAF. I remember he told me that he was home on leave on one occasion and went to a dance in the Canons Hall in Downpatrick. An Afro-American soldier from Ballykinlar was refused entry to the dance by the Canon. Jimmy said to me “isn’t it a strange thing that they took money from us at school for the “black babies” but when one turns up at the door for a dance they won’t let him in?” He came home one time and was able to show us a handful of potato labels with the names of local farmers on them. These labels were taken from Christmas Island now. (In the 1950s and 1960s the UK and the USA tested atom bombs on Christmas Island and it was during this time that Jimmy was based there.) Anyway potatoes from County Down had gone to Christmas Island and Jimmy cut the labels off and brought them home. There were potato labels with the names of Patsy Denvir of Kilclief, William Magee of Ballynarry, Seamus Denvir of Ballynarry, John McKeating of Drumroe and Willie Fay of Boal’s Corner. Jimmy was decorated for making a dinner for the Duke of Edinburgh and the Queen on Christmas Island you know, when they were over visiting the troops. Oh he was some cook, no doubt about it. Sure didn’t he work as a chef in the Lobster Pot in Strangford when he came home from the Airforce.

* Due to the Black Scab in Potatoes Order, restrictions were applied to the growing of potatoes in certain townlands

in County Down. Some areas were designated scab areas, and only varieties of potatoes immune to the disease were

permitted to be grown there. The embargo pressed hard on farmers in the Lecale area, many of whom felt that they

were labouring under a serious grievance and that they should have greater freedom of export.

AutumnE.J. McMullan

The winds moan, a doleful bugle call for the dismal, sorrowful days of autumn to descendand infuse into our lives their chill message of warning.The season of equal day and night, a signpost on our ever repeating journey, is just around the corner. Mournful dusk’s dull cloak shades the day’s end earlier and earlier. Through a filigree of shattered cloud, dappled light creates a pattern, shimmering and unsure, on forest floor, a moving tapestry made so by the disturbed movement of brittle branches now stripped of foliage.The gradual retreat of the sun across the equator pulls down from the polar climes the colder air from off the ice cap and the inevitable onset of the autumnal season commences its reign over us. That reign reaches out in chain links to winter, spring and summer, out into the future, our treasure box. We know, like a slowly ebbing tide laying bare a golden beach. that better days will be ours again. Autumn’s gifts of kernel, fruit and berry, in opulent abundance tumble and fall in wild abandon, they are the wherewithal to strengthen ourselves, the animal and the birdand prepare us for the colder day ahead.The great gamble of survival is played out and we run the gauntlet, as we do each year, through that tunnel into the unknown. The earth, as a single, living entity, will survive,casting off dead cells and growing new, as its Creator intended.And in that great scenario, we can only play the part allotted to us, living when we can and dying if we must.


Typhoid in LecaleSubmitted by Joan Magee Extract transcribed from the Down Recorder Newspaper 29th June 1929, page 3.

The Home Ministry wrote that their medical inspector stated that that there was a possibility that the cases of typhoid which occurred in Strangford were caused by the water, two of the wells having given unsatisfactory results on analysis. Consequently the Council should expedite as much as possible the Tullyratty water scheme now before them. At the same time the inspector called attention to the fact that the sewerage of Strangford was very bad. A complete survey of the system appeared to be necessary with a view to its being overhauled, and disused drains closed up.

Strangford Committee suggested that Messrs. Ferguson and McIlveen, engineers, should meet them at Tullyratty at an early date to determine what stretch of the dam should be taken over and conserved. The clerk called to mind that though Messrs. Ferguson and Mclveen had been appointed on 10th June, 1926, to inspect and report and furnish an estimate, the scheme was knocked on the head because the Council would not then again agree to put a proportion of the cost on the rural district. The firm, whose plans and specifications were forwarded to the ministry in September, 1926, had not yet been nominated to execute the scheme.

Mr Sharvin mentioned that recently a new sewer was laid at Strangford and others repaired. In reply to Colonal Perceval-Maxwell, he said that two years ago Lord Craigavon told them that filtration could make the Tullyratty water fit for potable use. At present there was a lot of vegetable matter in the dam, and cattle also grazed near it.

….On the motion of Mr Sharvin, seconded by Mr Murphy, Messrs Ferguson and McIlveen were formally appointed as the engineers, subject to the reasonableness of their terms: and the question of a survey was deferred till a later date.”


The Truckers of Strangford who fought for a day’s workP.J.Lennon

If I began a conversation with you about truckers you may well jump to the conclusion I was referring to those men who drive their heavy-laden juggernauts along the highways of the world.But actually I would be referring to a group of young men who in the late 20s and early 3os were engaged by the local merchants of Strangford and perhaps similarly at other ports along the lough where potatoes were constantly being loaded onto coastersThe task of the truckers was to wheel a bag of potatoes from the store to the waiting lorry, wasting as little time as possible.The majority of them had left school, but a few of them, always eager to earn a few shillings, would take a day off learning to join in.

If a boat berthed somewhere during the night, the truckers would congregate outside the store before opening time and when the storehouse door opened there would be one mad rush to secure a two or three runged delivery wagon.Now some of the trucks were to be avoided like the plague or your working day would prove to be murderous. But the greenhorn joining that early morning stampede for the fi rst time was liable to grab at the fi rst thing on wheels. More often than not there would be more truckers than equipment and scuffl es were likely to break out.The battles, which were usually of short duration, could hardly be classed as boxing but were more in fact like cats facing up to each other. Fists of course would be raised and

on occasion foul names would be called, but the dispute generally ended when the stronger of the pair refused to let go of the truck.As soon as the cargo was loaded there was quick disposal of the trucks and an equally mad race to the offi ce where those lucky enough to secure the day’s work would crowd into the small offi ce and wait impatiently while the clerk or manager sorted out the reward.


The Questionby Eamon McMullan

I gaze out into hazy blue though cloud and tree obscure my view,Out, out beyond where stars abide and reality is rarified.Out there where nothing can exist and light is said to weave and twist.But a spot of light has dawned on me! Does this explain eternity?I know this is far outside my ken, beyond the mind of normal menwho could never really comprehend, should even Einstein condescendto explain in simple fact and word how E can equal MC².

So I occupy this lumpy mass that circles round a cloud of gas,whose helium burns so fiercely, hot it warms the spot where I am at.That’s over ninety million miles away and yet it warms me day by day.Should I then somehow realize, without it would be my demise.Is it my creator, maker or my first cause? Let me think again and pause.Yes! Someone must have made the Sun! And now I’m back to question one.

Now the solar system is said to lie somewhere out in space and sky.On the outer spiral of a Catherine wheel, but no-one really can revealjust were it is, or if it’s real, or on which spiral of the Catherine wheel.Because deep inside what’s happening, we’re not aware of everything,For when you’re inside looking out, you’re full of puzzlement and doubt.To my simple logic it appears that over millions of light years, long long ago in ions past there was an awesome fearful Blast.

And when the smoke and debris cleared, the planets and the stars appeared.One star, it’s said, became our Sun with planets, of which we are one.But again I’m back where I first begun. And I ask myself just once again, who caused the Bang? It wasn’t men!I scan my brain for information and still I find no explanation.But I’ve just thought of something odd! Could it possibly be ….God??


Canon Conway’s Golden Jubileeby Nuala Colhoun.

“Canon Noel, we thank you for your guidance and support, your compassion and empathy in times of sadness and bereavement and we especially thank you for your humility.”

On 13th June 2007, I was honoured to be asked to deliver a few words of tribute to Canon Noel Conway on the occasion of the Parish celebration of his Golden Jubilee to the priest hood and I am equally privileged to have been asked to pen an account of the celebration and a brief summary of Canon Noel’s life.

Noel Conway was one of a family of nine, having fi ve sisters; Jean, Eileen, Molly, Eithne and Kathleen and three brothers; William (the late Cardinal Conway), Hugh and Joseph (also a Canon). Canon Noel recalls with pride the infl uence his parents had on his vocation and also recognises individuals whom he respected for their commitment to their beliefs and their selfl ess efforts in the fi eld of education; Brother Murphy, a great mathematician in St.Mary’s C.B.S., Mgr.Colm McCaughan and Mairead Gordan who both served on the Belfast Education and Library Board and Fr. Tommy Cunningham, curate in St. Theresa’s. Such was the infl uence of the latter, that from the street where Canon Noel lived, Norfolk Parade, there were 9 men who had vocations to the priesthood!

After his schooling, Noel Conway started Queen’s University, Belfast where he initially pursued an Arts course for one year before diverting to the study of Physics. After graduating in June 1953, Noel entered Maynooth in October to study for the priesthood and was ordained four years later on the 23rd June.

During the following three months, Father Noel had a temporary appointment in the Holy Family Parish, Belfast, acting as chaplain to Fortwilliam. At Christmas of that year he was appointed as teacher of Physics in St.Malachy’s college where he eventually became Head of Physics. Nuffi eld Physics was being introduced during that period and St.Malachy’s joined Bangor Grammer, Methody, B.R.A. and Campbell College on a pilot scheme. Staff training was held during the summer in Oxford University and the ‘A’ Level course proved very rewarding.

During his teaching years, Father Noel visited Potraferry often with Father Hugh Mullan who introduced him to Hughie Tweedie who in turn built him a boat that was similar to the Wychcraft. During a visit to Carlingford, Father Noel received a call from Father Mullan to say that the new boat would be launched the following Tuesday. Sadly, however, Father Hugh never made it as he was fatally shot a few days earlier. (R.I.P.) John Murray from Portaferry was to go on and show Father Noel the intricacies of sailing and there were many enjoyable boating occasions.


In 1983 Father Noel became President of St.Malachy’s College – a position he was to hold until his illness in 1994.After a period of recuperation, Canon Conway was appointed in August 1995 as Parish Priest of Kilcief and Strangford. In his speech during his Golden Jubilee presentation he quoted:

“FUNES CECIDERUNT MIHI IN AMONEIA – THE ROPES FELL FOR ME IN A PLEASANT PLACE”(A biblical reference recalling how the Jews, when they came to the promised land had their allocated places laid out for them with measuring lines and it was the luck of the draw what they got.)

Life as a Parish Priest certainly proved to be challenging and demanding and Canon Conway was indebted to Father Laverty, his curate, for his invaluable support in teaching him “the ropes”. Parish business was to take up much of the Canon’s time and after a couple of years he resigned from the Medical Ethics Committee for Great Britain and Ireland on which he had served for many years.

In April 2007 a committee, representing all ends of the parish, was formed under the leadership of Michael McConville, to plan for the celebration of the Canon’s Jubilee. During the ensuing weeks the members prepared for the Mass, organised a parish collection, arranged a supper, bought gifts and invited guests to share in the occasion.Canon Conway chose to concelebrate the Mass with his brother, Canon Joseph, his fellow priests Canon Murray and Canon Rogan. Dean Henry Hull from the Church of Ireland was also present. A packed church engaged in and enjoyed a moving liturgy.The choirs from St.Joseph’s and St. Malachy’s Primary schools, the senior choir from Star of the Sea and Flautist, Aileen Clarke gave added solemnity to the occasion. It was fitting that the Reading and Prayers of the Faithful were delivered by a group representing the readers of both St.Malachy’s and Star of the Sea.Our community prides itself on its ecumenical ethos and once more we were delighted to be joined by representatives from the Church of Ireland congregation in Ballyculter and Kilclief.

After Mass we moved nearby to The Inverbrena Community Centre to partake of a lovely supper. I, on behalf of the parish, delivered a few words of congratulations to the Canon who responded in his usual humble manner and then received presentations from his parishioners and the congregation of the Church of Ireland. The gifts included a laptop and case, a stunning painting of Swan Island and a cheque.A beautiful cake, decorated to match the theme of the Celebration, was ceremoniously cut by the Canon to the roar of great applause!

Thanks to the members of our committee for their work, ensuring a most memorable evening for all.


The Lad With A Nerve Of SteelBy George McKibbin

A few years ago at one of our Inverbrena Historical Meetings, one of our members, Brian Fitzsimons, told a story as related to him by his father, Patrick Fitzsimons.

The story was of a local lad by the name of Ernest Hill, whom Patrick had watched as he stepped from one parapet to the other around the top of the tower on Ballyculter Church.Earnest had gained access to the top of the tower by entering the Church and ascending the steps which led to and through the door to the bottom fl oor inside the tower, then climbing the two long ladders which takes one to the top fl oor at which level there are louvered windows mounted on the side walls of the tower, allowing the tolling of the large bell to be heard across the countryside. The bell is mounted on two very stout wooden beams that are recessed at either end into the tower walls.One has to crawl under these beams and climb another ladder mounted at a very steep angle against the side wall and then exit off it through a door in the base wall of the spire. Then you are out in the open air and on the very narrow walkway around the base of the spire and on the inside of the parapets of the tower.There is no handrail to hold on to, either on the outside around the parapets or around the base of the spire. As Patrick watched Ernest at his antics it must have been a nerve-wrecking experience for Patrick as well. Perhaps Ernest did not realise it was a drop of fi fty one feet from the top of the parapet to the ground below; most certainly he had a nerve of steel, and fortunate for him that nothing serious happened to him. Ernest had lived for some time with his Aunt, Mrs Patterson, whose home was the little house on the side of the road in Ballyculter Lower between the laneways leading to the old Keaghy Farm and the Corn Mill in those years long ago.In later years the Por ter f a r m was owned by Robert Baillie 1925 – 31 and by my father – James McKibbin –1931.

In an evening in June 1950 Ernest Hill and his son Dick visited us in our home for a few hours. They had been on a tour of the West of Ireland and were fi nishing


up here in County Down.When Ernest had been living with his Aunt in her cottage at the road end of our laneway, he was greatly inspired as he watched the large kettle boiling from the old swinging crook over the open hearth, and so he built himself a ‘Model Railway’ in his garden at his home in Norwich, Norfolk.After his return home to Norwich in July 1950, Ernest wrote a letter to my father in which he said he hoped it wouldn’t be another thirty-three years until he would revisit the Ballyculter area again.

Further to Ernest Hill’s idea of climbing, to what we locals refer to as ‘the square’ i.e. the top of the tower on Ballyculter Church: In December 1992 contractors were working at repointing the stonework on the spire and as they had their many platforms erected from the ground upwards, I thought it would be a great chance if I would be allowed to climb to the top of the spire and take some photographs of the surrounding area – a chance of a lifetime I might never get again! I approached Hugh Fitzpatrick, the foreman on the job, and asked him if he would allow me to climb to the weathervane at the top. He agreed wholeheartedly and led the way and I followed. It was quite a climb as I had my second hip replacement operation the year previous, and as some of the ladders we had to climb were secured in precarious positions, i.e. on the outside corners of the platforms, I kept looking skywards to keep my nerve!! However, once we had climbed to the top platform beside the large metal ball at the bottom of the weathervane it was a bit nerve wrecking for me but when you can hold onto the framework around the side of the platform it takes away some of the nervous strain.

It was a lovely clear day, that 9th of December 1992 and what breathtaking views I had of the Ballyculter village below, the layout of John Orr’s farmyard and all the fields nearby, the beautiful surrounding countryside with all its hues, views of Portaferry, the Ards Peninsula, Strangford Lough, Kilclief Castle and Church, the Conway Farm at Legnegoppack, farms around ‘the Brow’, the old flaxmill chimney on what used to be the old Keaghy Farm. Also our own home farm, my brother Leslie’s and my own present day dwellings, the Lowe farm at Ringcladdy, ‘Hillside’ where the Quayles once lived, houses at Tullaratty and Willie Crea’s farm at Slieveroe’ . What inspiring views!! Lucky I had my camera with me and I have very clear photographs which I cherish very much.Hugh Fitzpatrick took a photo of me standing beside the ball at the bottom of the weathervane and from here, one gets an idea of the height of the framework of the weathervane itself and think what a nerve Hugh’s brother must have had when he sat astride the top of this framework as he removed the ‘fish’ from the top of it, for cleaning and repainting.If the parapets on the Church Tower are fifty-one feet from the ground up, then the weathervane must be one hundred feet or more to where the ‘fish’ is on the top! Fifteen years on the ‘fish’ is still rotating quite freely, giving the local people or anyone who watches it, an idea from which compass point the wind is blowing.It was Adam Porter, a farmer and stone-mason and resident of the old Porter Farmstead in Ballyculter Lower, whose name is recorded in local history as the man who put the ball and weathervane on the spire of Ballyculter Church so it is quite possible it was he who built or helped to build the spire, as the various platforms would have been erected on the outside of the spire as it was being built.

When you turn to my photos in our ‘Gallery’ pages I hope you will enjoy identifying some of the places I have mentioned above.


Gallery

VIEWS FROM THE TOP


Gallery


Gallery

The British Open Golf Champion of 1948 Fred Daly paid a guest visit to Cuan Golf Club Strangford in the 1940's. Captured here playing a shot on the fourth fairway. Local members Gerry Curran and Joe McMullan are helping as caddies.

Kilclief Boys & Girls


Gallery

The photograph was taken in Ballylena in the 1940's L-R Jimmy Magee, Annie Magee, Irene Sharkey(baby) Hetty SharkeyTheresa Curran, Bobby Magee, Mary Magee, Mrs Jackson, Eileen Magee. Mrs Jackson and her

daughter, MIS Sharkey and her granddaughter were refugees from Belfast during the blitz


Gallery

Wed

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f Joh

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and

Mol

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Bac

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, Ann

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cAle

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. Lav

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, Mar

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urra

n, J

ohnn

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(Brid

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Mar

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Gallery

Mas

ter K

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Bac

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Den

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Gallery

Mem

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of S

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Gallery

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Pol

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Gallery

Mem

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Gallery

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Gallery

Senior Citizens of Strangford in the 1940’s. James Farrell, George McDonnell, Senan Sharvin, Jimmy Boden, John Curran (Barman)


Saulsubmitted by George McKibbin

1 Saint Patrick made Saul famous, of that there is no doubt.

But now he has a rival whose job is selling stout.

This man he was ambitious and longed to make his name.

The B.B.C. fulfilled his wish and now he rose to fame.

2 And this is how it happened, quite simple you’ll admit,

Some people called at Leo’s, just to slake their thirst a bit.

And after several chasers they became quite gay and free

And Leo found to his delight they were from the B.B.C.

3 Now here’s my chance, thought Leo, and with a cunning look

Produced for their inspection his famous poetry book.

The Lady was most gracious and in reply seemed impressed

And after reading through it said, “I like the Pub one best.

4 “We are putting on a programme soon, called ‘Country Magazine’

I think we can use a few.” How Leo’s face did gleam!

And gladly he consented, and said he’d do his all

To fall in with their suggestions, and make a name for Saul.

5 And when they departed, back the way they came,

There was no houlden Leo who was soon to rise to fame.

He spread the news in no time and before nightfall

That Pub of his was crowded, by locals one and all.

6 He gave them all the details and said “Take to the town

Your wireless batteries to be charged, in case you’d be let down”

And sure enough they did so, to their P.P.’s delight

Who was under the impression ‘twas to set their watches right.

7 But he was disillusioned for it was, it came to pass,

Next Sunday just as usual, they were all late for Mass.

But early that morning our Leo was astir.

Would he be late to broadcast? Not on your life, No Sir.

8 So out he fetched ‘The Bluebird’, cleaned up to look the part.

Kelly turned the handle but damn the foot she’d start.

“What shall we do” said Leo in tones of great despair.

“T’would be just as well to go on Shank’s Mare” said Kelly


9 But patience is a virtue and after much ado

The old crock ‘Bluebird’ started and like the wind she flew

Down the Mearne Road they rattled at quite a decent rate

“Oh this wont last” said Kelly, “ I know as sure as fate”

10 And rightly he predicted, for sure the car began to shake

And lurch from side to side just like a drunken man .

And Kelly sat up with a jerk, good heavens, what was that?

Poor Leo nearly had a fit, begobs the tyre is flat.

11 “Now don’t despair” sez Kelly, you’ll get there time enough

“She’ll be ready in a minute if you’d only do your stuff ’

So the two of them got started and pumped with might and main

And very soon the ‘the Bluebird’ was on her way again.

12 And soon they came to Saintfield, having left Crossgar behind

And Leo put his foot down in a better frame of mind.

But alas his hopes were daunted for with a mighty roar

A tyre burst and Kelly cursed as he stumbled out the door.

13 So out they jumped and jacked her up, two very harassed men.

They pumped and patched and puffed and blew to mend the wheel again.

It took an hour to do that job, poor Leo was dismayed.

“We’ll have to boot her on” sez he “we’ve been so long delayed”

14 But this time fate was kinder as the ‘Bluebird’ sailed along

And as the City loomed in sight the boys burst into song.

And on to the B.B.C. they came and up the steps they bounced

And landed just in time to hear the programme being announced.

15 And back at home round wireless sets, folks sat with bated breaths,

You could hear a hairpin drop in silence, still as death.

And soon they heard that well known voice in accents clear and true.

T’was Leo speaking now at last, he’d just received his cue.

16 He spoke about St. Patrick and Saul of ancient fame.

And the waters of ‘Struell Wells’ which cured the sick and lame.

Of fishing in the ‘River Quoile’ and Ballyhornan Bay’

And how often he took part in many a local play.

17 Then he mentioned ‘Shorthorns ‘to the great surprise of all,

For devil a ‘Shorthorn’ Leo ever owned at all.

I wonder what his reason was, I’m sure it could be found.

Perhaps it was to get a crack at the auld dood with the hound.


18 You see they cut short Leo’s part so she could have her say,

Which wasn’t fair, thought Leo, and for that I’ll make her pay.

They had warned him to say ‘Ulster’ in reference to an air

But Leo said ‘Irish’ and never turned a hair.

19 And so their Broadcast over, their homeward way did bend.

Kelly spied a little ‘Waaf as they came round the bend.

She put her hand out and timidly ‘The Bluebird’ stopped.

“A lift” sez Leo, “Please” sez she and into it she hopped.

20 “It’s jolly sweet of you” she said “to stop your car for me,

I missed my bus at Belfast and must be there at three”

“O.K.” said both, we’ll have you there, at that there is no doubt

When ‘bang!’ what’s that?. The ‘Bluebird’ stopped and all three got out.

21 It took them twenty minutes to put the car aright.

The ‘Waaf was half demented, she sure looked a sight.

Kelly muttered something naughty to Leo’s shy “H’m, h’m.”

And banged the door like thunder when all three got in.

22 Then once more the ‘Bluebird’ stopped not far from Carryduff.

The ‘Waaf said “Thankyou, I’ve really had enough,

I think it’s best to walk” said she “and if I were you

I’d leave the old crock where she is, and get walking too.

23 Underneath the bonnet they poked their heads once more

And tinkered with the engine till they were sick and sore.

It took a while to get her fired upright

And it was getting quite late when Crossgar came in sight.

24 When they clattered through the town they spied the little ‘Waaf.’

She reached Crossgar before them, and oh! how she did laugh.

They made a move to stop, but she just moved them on.

“I think I’ll just keep walking, I’ll just get there as fast”

25 ‘The Bluebird’ got as far as Inch, then refused to budge.

Sez Kelly then to Leo “Your ‘Waaf was no bad judge,

I’ve had enough of that auld car, I’m taking ‘Shank’s Mare”’

So dumping ‘Bluebird’ in the ditch, off tramped the luckless pair.

26 It is business as usual with Leo up at Saul

And congratulations are spontaneous from every one that call

Who admire Leo’s photo in the Ulster Magazine

With a Radio cheque for £6-10-0, there also to be seen.


27 And now something has happened that we can’t understand.

In local plays and concerts Leo always takes a hand,

But now there is a difference; ‘Brick’ McGreevy had the luck

To be given Leo’s part in ‘The Pope in Killybuck’!.

(Waaf- Women’s Auxiliary Air Force)

Autumn’s Soft AdvanceE.J.McMullan

The keening sound of rising wind, vibrating through the branches of the trees alerts me to autumn’s soft approach.Some little strength of summer still remains, although she fights a loosing battle, a futile rear-guard action, trying to retain what she has gained in her mild and mellow season.But fall is on the rise while summer wanes. Now is the time of harvest, fruit and berry; time for autumn to climb into the driving seat and grasp the driving reins.I watch it all unfold from my eyrie in the eaves. Again I witness the oft repeated paradox of trees divesting themselves while I, in my humanity, contrive to ensheath myself in extra layers to prepare for winter’s onslaught. Cold winds swirl the topmost leaves from off discarded heaps. Desiccated and light, without substance, they offer little resistance to the vagaries of the breeze as they spiral, fly and shatter; or scrape themselves to pieces on briar, bush and branch.“Dust thou art and unto dust thou shalt return”.Some, with a remaining glint of green, hold on with weakened grip, their strength diminished and their beauty too. What was alive and vibrant, worn with pride by stately trees, now cast off, just fallen trash and debris, dead and non-descript. But even this discarded ordure, this used up refuse of yesterday will serve its useful purpose in providing nourishment for the next and coming generations. Life’s never-ending cycle feeds itself by consuming last year’s litter and girds its loins to survive the winter and display anew its beauteous finery when spring arrives again. A minor miracle and a wondrous thing.


Ballyhornan – Telephone CableJoan Magee

In 1929 telephone submarine cables were laid on the Ballyhornan to Port Erin (Isle of Man) route, connecting England and the Isle of Man with Northern Ireland. While GPO was the company/operator, Siemens Bros. was the manufacturer. The cable ship CS Faraday(2) laid the Ballyhornan shore ends of the telephone cables on the route while Sidar laid the Isle of Man shore ends of the four-core balata insulated cables.

The CS Faraday(2) was built in 1923 at Palmers Shipbuilding Company Limited, Newcastle upon Tyne. It had a gross tonnage of 5533 with its length being 394.3’ while its breadth was 48.3’ and its depth was 34.6’. Unfortunately the ship came to a sad end. During WW2, the CS Faraday(2) came under attack on the 25th March 1941 at about 7.45 pm from a Heinkel 111. Machine gun fi re killed eight of the crew and injured twenty-fi ve, and two bombs exploded in the oil bunkers causing a serious fi re so that the remaining crew had to abandon ship. The ship eventually ran aground off St Anne’s Head. The wreck of the Faraday now lies deep in the water under the cliffs at Hoopers Point, Pembrokeshire.

The two postcards below show views of the new telephone cable being brought ashore at Ballyhornan. In the fi rst postcard the larger ship in the background is the CS Faraday(2), while the smaller ships to the foreground were used to work nearer the shore. Accompanying the postcards are two extracts from the local Down Recorder newspaper of the time.

Extract transcribed from:Down Recorder NewspaperSaturday 15th June 1929, page 3.

“Ballyhornan has been the objective this week of quite a number of motor ing parties, to view the repeater station there established and also the 6,700 ton cable ship, Faraday, completing the new deep-sea telephone cable which is to forge a fresh link between Northern Ireland and Britain, with the Isle of Man as a half-way relay station. Land lines have already been laid from Ballyhornan via Downpatrick to Belfast. The new circuit, which will be in operation shortly, is expected to effect an all-round improvement in communication.”


Extract transcribed from:Down Recorder newspaper

Saturday 31st August 1929, page 3.

“The new North of Ireland telephone service to New York through the new cable via Ballyhornan and the Isle of Man and then by wireless telephony from Rugby, opened on Monday. A three-minute call costs £9 6s, and every minute extra £3 2s. The time is charged from the moment the persons begin to speak. During the tests the voices in New York were heard with perfect clearness.”

There are cable samples on display at Castle Ward house – property of The National Trust. These sample cables however do not relate to events at Ballyhornan in 1929. A picture of these cables - which representatives of the National Trust very kindly permitted to be taken - were forwarded to Mr Bill Burns of Long Island USA, site owner of www.atlantic-cable.com. Bill Burns advised that the larger sample cable in the photo is the shore end of the 1865 Atlantic cable, which was laid from Valentia to Newfoundland. The other samples are also of the 1865 cable. For more information and the opportunity to see a set of early atlantic cables at Bill Burn’s website, go to:

http://www.atlantic-cable.com/Cables/1858-66Atlantic/index.htm.

Information on the CS Faraday was retrieved from the following website: www.atlantic-cable.com. This website may be consulted for a more detailed account of the history of the Atlantic Cable & Undersea Communications. A further view of the operations at Ballyhornan may also be seen if you go to the following add. at the same website: http://www.atlanticcable.com/Cables/1929IrelandIOM/index.htm.


Extract from Home Words (continued)Chapter VIII July 1878The Audley roadstead, and that of Ballyhenry bay, on the Portaferry side, are well known asaffording the best and safest anchorage ground possible; men of war yachts, steamers, and large merchant vessels always anchor in either of the above when they come into our Lough for refuge or purpose of trade. During the inclement season and in times of severe gales, from thirty to forty ships are often to be seen here weatherbound; and when they leave in full sail, one after another to continue their course a most picturesque and pleasing sight is offered.

The islands in Strangford Lough are very numerous and of much historical interest; they are dispersed throughout it, fifty four small and large, known by particular names and many others nameless. The following list, with a tolerable correct estimate of the size of each, is given by Harris, but latterly the names of a few have been slightly altered:-

AcresBig Swan Island 20Horse Island 20Hogg Island 8Wooton’s Island 12Inch Island or Inis-Courcey 60Little Swan Island 5Sooter’s Island 4Corn Island 2Castle Island 70Hare Island 6Goose Island 60Swan Island 1Salt Island 20Green Island 12Darangh Island 7Inis-more Island 90Duncey Island 12Green Island 14Pool Island 40Taigart Island 60Doneneel Island (a round island, like a Danish fort) 4Shark Island 2Jackdaw Island 4Chapel Island 6Gibb’s Island 7Con Island 2

AcresInis Shoan 1/2Big Lanchangh Island 5Little Lanchangh Island 4Connely Island 40Transnaagh Island 10Dramon Island 5Minnes South Island 12Ditto 6Ditto 6Ditto 6Aroan Island 6Roe Island 6Little Swan Island 1Castle Isle (off Ringhaddy) 40Long Island 2Bird Island 2Speer Island 15Church Island 10Bourtree Island 7Rugh Island 7Green Island 1/2Reagh Island 90Machee Island 100Inis-beg Island 1Castle Island 18Wren’s Island 6Calfs Island 1Neangh Island 1/2


Some of the islands lie between Audley’s town and Killyleagh, the first of which are Chapel Island and Jackdaw Island; the former can be approached at low water from Tubberdoney, and on it are the ruins of an old place of worship. The grass which grows on them is considered to be very valuable for cattle and sheep. Farther on are the Green and Launches Islands (Lanchangh, according to Harris); these are very fertile, and scattered over their shores are to be found large boulders of limestone and pieces of ironstone. Although both of these minerals are also frequently observed along the Audleystown shore, no quarry containing either, has hitherto been discovered in the neighbourhood. In all the district in and near Castleward, veins of lead-ore abound; several attempts have been at various times, made by companies to establish lead mines but without any material success, as no good lode has as yet been detected.

Chapter IX August 1878Throughout the Lough generally, oysters of a very fair description are to be obtained, but the quantity and size have deteriorated much from overdredging at all seasons. The Lough is also well stocked with scallops, other excellent shell fish, and the usual kinds of salt water fish, and is the resort of a variety of wild fowl, such as widgeon, teal, barnacles, etc. The latter are remarkable for being peculiarly well-flavoured and devoid of any taste of a fishy nature. The burning of seaweed into kelp used to be carried on to a greater extent and with much more profit than it is at present. About a mile from Downpatrick on the Quoile river, there is a convenient quay, which might be called the port of Downpatrick. Vessels of a certain tonnage can lie here, but the trade is now not extensive. The tide once flowed quite up to the town; but about the year 1745 an embankment was made across the Quoile, which reclaimed nearly five hundred acres of land. This embankment having been swept away by a storm, a second with floodgates was raised; but, after heavy rains, a considerable portion of the soil is still inundated, leaving it in the condition of a permanent marsh. The remains of another of the square Norman castles stands on the banks of the Quoile, and may be seen on the right of the road leading from Strangford to Downpatrick, about a mile and a half from the latter town. About two miles and a half from Downpatrick is the parish of Inch (or Inis, the Irish for island). As the waters of the Quoile do not now flow round it, it has ceased to be an island, except in name, and is an example of partial natural reclamation. It was also called Inis-Courcy and Inis-Cumhscraidh (pronounced Cooseray). The latter appellation was seemingly derived from Curnhseraidh, one of the sons of Connor Mac Nessa, king of Ulster, who succeeded his father on the throne of Ulster and was slain A.D. 33. Dr Reeves mentions that “the abbey, the ruins of which yet remain, took the name of Inis-Courcy from its founder, John de Courcy and became an English establishment, being made a cell of Furness in Lancashire (alluded to in our fifth chapter) founded A.D. 1180”. Lewis states as follows: “A Cistercian abbey was founded on a peninsulated portion of this parish, called Inch Island and subsequently Inis-Courcy by Sir John de Courcy in 1180, in atonement for having in his wars demolished the abbey of Erynagh (in theparish of Bright), which had been fortified against him. It was dedicated to the Virgin Mary and amply endowed by its founder, who transferred to it all the possessions of the Benedictine abbey of Erynagh, and placed in it monks from Furness. After the dissolution its site and possessions were granted to Gerald, Earl of Kildare. The parish is bounded on the east by Strangford Lough. Over the river Quoile which here opens into the western branch of Strangford Lough, is a bridge connecting this place with Downpatrick. There are some remains of the Cistercian abbey, situated in a fertile dell near the southern extremity of the parish, and within a quarter of a mile of the cathedral of Down. The choir is nearly perfect, having three lofty windows at east end and two in the north and south walls, with many other interesting details. To the north of the abbey are the ruins of the ancient parish church, a spacious cruciform structure, erected in 1610, partly


with the materials of the old abbey. The cemetery is still used as a burial ground. These ruins are exceedingly picturesque.

In the Ulster Journal of Archaeology we read thus “In that bay of Lake Cuan, which washes Down, is an island of considerable beauty, containing some acres, and joined to the mainland by a bridge, whereon is a monastery, called from its situation Insulense or Insulanum, and in Irish, Mainistir Innsi, the outer and inner walls of which still remain. This house previously to the outbreak of heresy, was occupied by monks of the order of St Bernard. It was the site of an early Irish monastery before the Cistercian abbey was founded here by John de Courcy, in 1180, according to the registry of Furness, its parent, or 1187, according to other historians. Under the new constitution it became thoroughly anti Irish, so much so that it was one of the two monasteries which were noticed in the Querimonia which Donald O’Neill and the Irish chiefs addressed to the Pope in 1318. The Annals, written by Tighernach, abbot of Clonmacnoise, in the eleventh century, record at the year 1002, “Sitric, king of the Danes, arrived with a fleet in Wadh (Down), and plundered Kilclief and Iniseuscraidh”.

The Annals of the Four Masters mention that “in the year 1149 a party, belonging to an army led by Niall O’Loughlin, went upon the islands of Lough Cuan, and plundered Inis-cums - craidh and several other churches”. This intimates that a church existed here before the abbey erected by the Norman conquerors. It is said to have been situated in the middle of the cemetery, and was nearer to the causeway which connected the island with the mainland of the parish of Inch than the later Cistercian abbey church, and that the edifice which Dane and Norman spared has been swept away to make room for a tomb. Finnebrogue, the residence of Mr Maxwell, with its picturesque demesne and extensive plantations, occupies a large portion of the parish of Inch, and forms an attractive feature of this neighbourhood.

* Topographical Dictionary of Ireland, published in 1887.

(To be continued)


Childhood MemoriesBy Twins Peggy Hanna and Maureen Murray (nee Kane)

We have a sister Betty, a brother Jim, another sister Clare and the youngest, Frank.We lived outside Castleward, then known as ‘The Back of the Wall’.We loved the country for there was plenty of space to play. We had what we called ‘wee houses’ furnished with broken delph we had gathered, a jam pot with wild flowers such as daisies, bluebells and primroses. Our wee house was always in the Rabbit-Warren surrounded by gorse with their lovely blossoms and there was a lovely green patch of grass to sit on. We spent ages playing and pretending. We invented a Chapel on a little hill where there were two nice little trees. Because of their colour and the way they were situated we christened them ‘THE GOLDEN GATES’; hopefully our prayers were real though! Once when Daddy was home on leave from the Army he was amused with our ideas for our ‘wee house’ and much to our amusement, he fell asleep as we played.We missed him when he was away, though not as much as our mother did. In his absence she had a big responsibility earning for us children. She would bath us every Saturday night. This indeed was a big job as there was no running water in our home so we had to carry it from a well to our zinc bath. This meant a lot of journeys to get sufficient water, not just to bath us, but to wash our clothes and other duties as well.

We shall always remember Sunday mornings; the lovely smell of bacon, fried bread and egg. Our mother cooked this on an open fire as we did not have a cooker in those days. She had our plates lined up on the fender to keep warm. Then we were dressed for Mass in Carlin Chapel. In the summer she had our dresses washed and starched. The girls also had very pretty little summer-hats while our brothers were dressed in their best. Jim was an altar boy and we were very proud of him.Our School days were memorable: We went to Saul School along with Betty, Jim and Clare. We had over three miles to walk and our sister Betty was responsible for getting us there on time so we walked from one telegraph pole to the next and then she made us run between the next two and so on until we arrived on time for the roll-call. There were no school dinners in those days so we brought sandwiches and a small bottle of goat’s milk and very often we would have some of it eaten before lunch-time. There were no nice biscuits then, just cream crackers, digestive or marie, also no fruit as every thing was so scarce and rationed during wartime. We looked forward to the sweets Daddy saved for us while in the Army. The tin he brought home when on leave brought us great pleasure; we sometimes wondered did we rather see him or the sweets!

We always had animals; a lovely collie-dog named Spot, cats, a goat with kids and some chickens which supplied us with fresh eggs and maybe the odd pot of soup.Maureen, Clare and one of us slept in one room and on wet nights we felt sorry for the cats so we opened the window and slipped them in, hoping we would have them out before Mammy called us for school. Very often we did not wake up on time and she was very cross. We can still hear their happy purrs with us. On one or two occasions we had Spot in bed and put him under our heads, using him as a special warm pillow. He was a very clever dog and lived for a long time. When I worked in Strangford and Clare, now married, also lived in Strangford, Spot left home very often and came to see us. Daddy said he must have had a ticket for the bus! He died at Clare’s and was buried at sea.


Our mother used to do weekly shopping in Downpatrick and always took one of us, time about. We envied the one who was getting dressed to go, leaving the rest to do the work. She had a mile to go to the bus-stop and needed help on the homeward journey for her bags were heavy. She often walked to Strangford to shop via Castleward fields. Sometimes one of us girls would go instead. We remember Willie John Sharvin’s shop. He packed tea and sugar into brown paper bags and tied them up. The tea and sugar were in drawers nice and tidy ( no tea bags in those days.) We called in Laverty’s, the butcher, for meat for Sundays and then to the Post Office, owned by George and Mrs. Wallace; we loved getting the comics ‘The Dandy’ and the ‘Beano’ there. We remember sitting down on the way home to read the comics and my mother was nearly out of her mind as we were so late getting back. Still, it was nice sitting in the sun in the Bear-park at Castleward!

I still recall our schooldays, especially in the winter time. It was so cold and there was more snow back then. How we made it through the drifts I do not know. Our mother used to warn us if rain came on to come back home. On our way a few spits would fall and by the time we got back home the sun would be shining, much to Mammie’s displeasure.One morning we were late for school so the teacher sent us home after walking the miles there. This was too much for our parents to take so we were taken out of Saul and sent to Ballyculter. Betty had left school and Jim went to The Down High. Frank started his schooldays at Ballyculter at four years of age. We all liked our new school. Both Catholics and Protestants were taught there for it belonged to Viscount Bangor.

I would also like to mention that we acquired an oil cooker at home. When we got our mother out we would try to make buns like we were taught at school. Once we nearly set the house on fire as we turned the burners up too high. We were well and truly told off. We tried to make toffee which was sugar boiled in water, then put on a tray to cool. The toffee was so hard it would have broken your teeth. Clare made a funny mixture of cocoa and cornflakes. Maureen ate some of it and was sick. She does not eat cornflakes to this day

One day Maureen came home with a little furry animal. We did not know what it was so she hid it away and later when it was quite tame she had it on her knee stroking it. Poor Mammie nearly had a fit when she discovered it was a ferret a man had been looking for. The owner was delighted to find it and gave Maureen one shilling.

We look back on our childhood days with many memories, much more than we have .recalled here. We had no T.V or computers or mobiles, just a radio. They were happy days but sadly they have gone forever.


You can start at the Square for it’s beautiful there

And walk the same streets as the Lord of Kildare.

Doughetry’s, Wallace’s, then Hedley Quayle’s

Around by the Quay Lane and past Harry Swail’s.

Then at the Quay Corner you’ll find a good view,

Of the Watch House and Cook’s and the Newry Quay too.

And the sweep of the river as fast it flows by,

It’ll change its direction by morning.

Or straight up by Elliot’s you climb Chapel Hill,

Rev Frazer lives there and he’ll do you no ill,

While Father Magowan, builds schools and a hall

Takes the shirt off your back for he’s needing it all.

He runs raffles for turkeys and groceries and coals

And hour long Masses for saving our souls.

He toils like the devil to accomplish his goals,

He’ll not change direction by morning.

Now the Downpatrick Road used to be Quarry Hill,

Where there’s pots of geraniums on each windowsill,

And Miss Brickley’s shop always very well stocked,

And the ‘Telly’ delivered at seven o’clock.

You get haircuts at Lennon’s or old Mrs Curran’s,

People try to be fair and we went there in turns.

The same on the ferry with McDonald and Quail,

Who cross to the Ards night and morning.

Now the Quarry Hill, that was the road into Down,

With a picture house, shops, it’s a sizeable town.

Paddy Corrigan gets wedding photos enlarged,

From there we get papers and batteries are charged.

On the bus the conductor is Thomas McKeown,

If you haven’t 10d he’d give you a loan.

Jimmy Givens, the driver, your safe in his care,

But he’s never on time in the morning .

A Strangford Walk - 1930’sE. J. McMullan

Tune is based on a traditional air ‘The Rambler from Clare’ and set to music by Marcella McMullan


The Coronary Of An Amateurby Willie Crea

The Thursday before Easter I was dozing off to sleep when I felt a tightening in my arms, which quickly became pains; these spread to my chest and I told Tilly; “Phone an ambulance I’m heading for trouble”. My coronary had started.Although it seemed a long time to me the ambulance came quickly and the paramedics put me on oxygen, gave me an injection and an aspirin and wired me up to their heart monitor.I did not respond sufficiently to their efforts and by now I was writhing in agony and sweating heavily. They phoned the doctor in the hospital to come out but she had a problem for there was no transport. She summoned a police car and they were quickly at my bedside but by now I was fading into oblivion and unaware of any more activity.It was an hour, as I’ve been told, before I was in a condition to go in the ambulance to the Downe.Sometime later I partially wakened up in the coronary unit; there were nurses and a doctor round my bed. I was reasonably comfortable but if the nurses and doctor had sprouted wings my illusion would have been complete.

I was under supervision all night with blood pressures and samples taken. I was still wired up to the monitor and it bleeped continuously, night and day. I think I know what the consequences would have been if it had stopped; I didn’t ask and it didn‘t stop and that’s why I am able to write this little article!

After a week I was told I could go home but I would have to learn to walk again. I thought the nurse was making fun of me, but nothing of the sort; I couldn’t walk and needed support and practice. I was able to stagger out to the car with a bagful of pills and a booklet of instructions.After two days I had a visit from Sister McClean from the coronary rehabilitation unit with a wealth of advice on diet and particularly exercise. I took all her advice and took to the road for my exercise but I soon became a nuisance, for cars stopped and people asked me “how I was doing”. Other road users were not interested in “how I was doing” and were annoyed at being slowed up on the Strangford ‘race track’. I now had to abandon the road and resort to the privacy of our fields and the company of the cows.I was not allowed to drive so now I needed a chauffeur, but I didn’t get a chauffeur; better still I got a fully qualified chauffeuse in residence!

Three days after coming home we went down to Strangford for a Sunday paper. Sometimes the shop is very busy on a Sunday morning and this was one of them.There were papers to the right of me and papers to the left of me and papers to the front of me but nevertheless I made my way to the counter; thereupon, and unusually, Kevin leaned across and shook my hand; “Good morning Lazarus, You’re welcome back”.We all had a great laugh at this spontaneous wit but there wasn’t enough room for everyone to laugh at the same time so some had to move out and laugh on the pavement. Two strangers at the back of the shop tittered politely as they edged their way to the door.I went back to the car saying to myself “My goodness, the public must have thought that I was at the ‘final solution’, but they hadn’t taken into account the skills, dedication and the care of the doctors and staff in the coronary unit responsible for my ‘salvation’, and here I am speaking of my physical recovery only, for I would not burden my spiritual short comings on anyone!

I am still under coronary care with frequent visits to the hospital and to my G.P. but I am now allowed to undertake what I feel capable of doing.

October 2007.


The Other Side Of The DoorBallynarry Revisited by Catriona Denvir (Dublin)

On this bright blue October morning, Strangford Lough is spreading out below us, and behind us high up on a hill, Saint Patrick dominates the green fields of Saul. I say ‘Daddy worked on the foundations of that statue, did you know that?’ But my sister doesn’t remember this. We all have our own set of childhood memories. We drive from Saul, through Strangford and Kilclief, to Ballynarry, where Daddy, Francie Denvir, was born. We don’t talk for a while; it is seventeen years since I have been here.

I can smell the griddle bread, and taste the sugary porridge. I can feel the heat from the fire as we make toast on a long fork. I am four years old and they’ve put me standing on the kitchen table. Sing us a song from school, go on now. I only know ‘Yellow Bird’, I feel small and silly, but I am trapped and there is nothing for it but to perform. They laugh and clap.

In the evening, we say the Rosary. Sometimes there are ten or twelve people. Our cousin Brendan pulls faces and we children try not to giggle. We don’t understand a word, but there is comfort in the droning sound of the adult voices. The house smells of dinner. No one thinks of closing the windows and moths fly in. We sleep in our cousins bedrooms that have dressing tables strewn with perfumes and nail varnish, and wardrobes full of fancy clothes.

Now we stop the car and get out. The house I remember is on the left, but in front of me is the older house, which was derelict even when we were children. I have never been inside. On the other side of this door, my father was born. It is incredible to me that he was a child here in this place. His boy’s voice filled the space I stand in now. Here he grew up and became the man who became my father. I open the door and go inside his house.

The floor is still covered in terracotta tiles. The walls are whitewashed. The fire place, all blackened, looks though the fire had just gone out. It’s a very small room with a door on either side; one to the parlour, and the other to the bedroom. There are ghosts here, of people whose names are part of my childhood – Mick and Maggie Denvir, Father Bob and Father Charlie, Uncle James and Aunt Agnes, Aunt Lizzie – I can picture them coming over the threshold, sharing an evening by the fire, talking about births marriages and deaths, about animals and weather and politics, playing cards, saying Rosaries. I close my eyes and I can almost touch the history around me. I am filled with sadness, for the loss of my father and the people who have gone forever from this beautiful place. I close the door and go back outside.

We drive away down these familiar roads, through Ardglass, Killough, Newcastle, Cactlewellan, Newry and on towards home.


Struck By A Bishop!By P.J. Lennon

For weeks we had been in training for the final - a religious terminal known as confirmation.

One evening after school those of us who were up for confirmation played the ‘semi final’ when the religious examiner, Fr. Wall, presented himself at the school in Strangford.Now in life there are many inspectors, ranging from accountants to the easy recognisable type, and they are often looked upon as a kind of ogre.But Fr. Wall proved to be a kindly man, although those of us preparing for the examination and eventual confirmation did not at the time exactly appreciate this.All we seemed to be aware of was for him, we had to know our Catechism and answer all the questions he put to us before he would pass us as fit to confront the Bishop.

Aye there was the rub – a Bishop in our wee minds was indeed an awesome image, all dressed up in his finery, carrying his crosier.All during those weeks of study we were licked into shape by our teacher, Miss Alice O’ Driscoll, who had impressed upon us many times during those days, the importance of the ceremony and step by step went through the drill – the part we would play; the part the sponsors would play and of course, the Bishop’s part.After passing the necessary examination, a load certainly was lifted off my mind. The only thing left now was to face up to the Bishop.

However we had been told by our teacher that the Bishop would, as a symbolic act, slap you on the cheek during the ceremony to ensure that the candidate was expected in his future life to be a good soldier of Christ.Ever since I had received this news I was bothered, for I imagined that the blow struck by such a high Church dignitary would be no light feather touch and I could imagine the majority of the candidates reeling back from this thump and ending halfway down the aisle in a heap.

Now I was halfway down the line drawn up close to the altar rail but out of the corner of my eye I watched the gaudily clothed man of the church nearer and nearer until he was only a yard or so away from me and by then I can assure you I was most unsoldier like. I was in a panic. I often wonder if this was in any way transferred to my sponsor.By the time he was attending the boy next to me, I was ready for the hills but at the last moment as he approached me, I managed to square my shoulders fearing the worst. But all my consternation had been unnecessary suffering for when Bishop McCrory – later to be Cardinal – belted me on the cheek, I barely felt the tap. The whack I had long anticipated just did not happen.Maybe on the other hand if he had delivered a right uppercut, I might have faced up to life’s tribulations with much more fortitude!

These thoughts were rambling through my mind when one day recently I watched a ceremony of confirmation and lo and behold the confirming prelate did not give the candidate a stroke on the cheek but laid his hand on the boy’s shoulder.


Notes

Wishing You Wishing You

A Merry, Happy A Merry, Happy

and Prosperous and Prosperous

ChristmasChristmas

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Inverbrens 2007

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