Category Archives: Ireland

New Orange Marmalade

The Nobility, Gentry, and the Public generally, are respectfully informed, that they can be supplied with New Orange Marmalade, made up in half and pound pots, at COLMAN’S Confectionery,

3, COLLEGE-STREET.

Country Orders carefully attended to.

NB — There is a vacancy for a Female Apprentice.

Dublin, 16th Feb 1839

Saunders’s News-Letter 16 February 1839. From the British Newspaper Archive run by Findmypast Newspaper Archive Limited, in partnership with the British Library.

Tepid baths

1823

KILRUSH HOTEL, AND TEPID BATHS

This Elegant Establishment is fitted up in a superior style for the accommodation of Visitors, on the reduced terms of last Season.

The House adjoining the Hotel, now occupied by Mrs Colonel Stammers, of Cahernelly, will be Let, from the 12th of June, for the remainder of the Season; it has ample accommodation for a large Family, who can be supplied with any thing they may require from the Hotel; they will also have the use of the Bathing Machines and Bathing Houses — from this House to the Tepid Baths there is a covered passage.

The Lady of the Shannon steam packet sails from Limerick for the Hotel, on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays, and returns on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays, making her passage in five hours.

Kilrush, May 15th, 1823

Dublin Evening Post 20 May 1823. From the British Newspaper Archive run by Findmypast Newspaper Archive Limited, in partnership with the British Library.

1829

[…] The hotel and baths, for which this Town was remarkable, have been suffered to go to decay — at least, are not occupied as such at present.

Limerick Evening Post 8 May 1829. From the British Newspaper Archive run by Findmypast Newspaper Archive Limited, in partnership with the British Library.

The crimefighting Shannon steamer

Limerick, May 26. This morning the Lady of the Shannon steam yacht towed up, in grand style, the Fox cutter, captured by the Vandeleur Revenue cruizer, Capt Hopkins, as stated in our last. She lies at the Custom-house quay, is a very fine vessel, clinker built, pierced for eight guns, which were thrown overboard, in chase, and is remarkably well found. Her cargo is supposed to consist of 1000 gallons of highly rectified Geneva, in 10 gallon casks — 20 hogsheads of tobacco, in bales and half-bales — and a large quantity of teas — amount not yet ascertained.

Public Ledger and Daily Advertiser 5 June 1818 [quoting Irish Papers]. From the British Newspaper Archive run by Findmypast Newspaper Archive Limited, in partnership with the British Library.

Lough Derg rally magazines

Thanks to Michael Geraghty for this link to an online archive of Lough Derg Rally magazines. The link takes you to a Google Drive page, but you do not need to sign in or to have a Google account in order to see the material.

Tralee Ship Canal

The principal export trade of Tralee is in grain, cattle, and pork; they are sent to Cork by land. The harbour is exceedingly bad and dangerous, and, at the time of my visit, a ship-canal was in process of cutting from the bay. By some men of intelligence and experience, a railway was considered preferable.[1]

[1] Jonathan Binns The Miseries and Beauties of Ireland Longman, Orme, Brown and Co, London 1837

Mr Mullins’s steamer

Here is a little information about the steamer Cupid, which was owned or used by the contractor Bernard Mullins on the Shannon in the 1840s.

Launch at Messrs Bewley and Webb’s yard

The first of two new steel canal boats which the above firm are building for the Grand Canal Company was successfully launched on Wednesday.  These boats are 60 ft long by 13 ft 2 in beam, and 5 ft 9 in depth of hold, and are designed to carry forty tons on a light draught of water. They are of improved design and construction, and expected to tow very easily. The Canal Company have expressed themselves well pleased with the time of delivery and workmanship, and it is to be hoped no more orders of this kind will go across the water in future. The firm appear to us to be well able to deal with the work of the port. The ss Magnet, of the Tedcastle Line, which had an extensive overhaul at this yard, we believe, gave every satisfaction, and had a most successful trial trip a few days ago. It is to be hoped that more of our local steamship companies will follow the lead of Messrs Tedcastle, and have their work done in Dublin.

The Freeman’s Journal 1 September 1893. From the British Newspaper Archive run by Findmypast Newspaper Archive Limited, in partnership with the British Library.

Some context here.

A Grand Canal mystery

Passenger boat over lock1

Boat at Lowtown

Alan Lindley has very kindly sent me, and permitted me to publish, this photograph.

It was taken at Lowtown lock, on the Grand Canal, in 1911 or 1912.

Alan says that the man on the left of the group — with cap, waistcoat and watch-chain, and with a dog standing in front of him — is the lock keeper, Murtagh Murphy, the great-grandfather of the present incumbent, James (Jimmy) Conroy. Murtagh was born in Ballycowan, near Tullamore, Co Offaly, in 1849 and, after working on a Grand Canal Company boat, married a Kildare girl and took the job at Lowtown.

The boat had been described as a passenger flyboat but, as the Grand Canal Company had ceased carrying passengers in 1852, that seems unlikely. And the boat looks much more like a pleasure vessel than a working boat.

If the Grand Canal Company had an inspection launch, this might be it, but I have found nothing to indicate that it did. The boat does, though, seem to have been designed for canal travel: it seems (from the twenty feet or so we can see) to have straight sides and to be well equipped with fenders. It might therefore have been designed to travel on the canals (as well as on other waters).

At least one director of the Grand Canal Company, Henry Samuel (aka Harry Samuel) Sankey, of Fort Frederic, Virginia, Cavan and of 64 Wellington Road, Dublin, did have a launch or pleasure craft on the canal, the Aja, which you can read about here. Incidentally Mr Sankey, who died on 5 December 1925, directed “that no Roman Catholic shall take any benefit” under his will.

Further information about the boat and the people shown in the photograph, and about Mr Sankey’s launch, would be very welcome; please leave a Comment below.

A canal caterpillar?

Robertson’s chain propeller system on the Bridgewater and Grand Canals in 1859 and 1860.

Grand Canal Company 1861

Sailing of the company’s trade boats,
commencing Saturday, 1st June, 1861

The Company’s Swift Trade Boats start with the strictest punctuality daily to the following stations, viz: — Athlone, Ballinasloe, Limerick, Tullamore, Kilbeggan, Mountmellick, Philipstown, Monasterevan, Portumna, Dromineer, Williamstown, Killaloe, Shannon Harbour and Banagher, Belmount, Naas, Corbally, Sallins, Portarlington, Rathangan.

Sailing Bills containing all particulars may be had upon application at the Company’s Offices, JAMES’S-STREET HARBOUR or WILLIAM STREET.

The Company’s Boats do not trade to Carrick-on-Shannon or Lanesborough.

By Order, John M’Mullen, Grand Canal House, 29th May, 1861

Freeman’s Journal 1 June 1861. From the British Newspaper Archive run by Findmypast Newspaper Archive Limited, in partnership with the British Library.