Uncle Arthur is resting at Ardclough, near the Grand Canal. His brewery is 250 years old this year, but he himself is sadly neglected — and suffering badly from thirst.
In recognition of his major contribution to the development and use of Irish waterways, a small ceremony was held recently at Ardclough, at which he was presented with a bottle of his finest product. This page records the event.
Posted in Irish waterways general
Tagged canal, Grand Canal, Guinness, Ireland, Limerick, Operations, porter, stout, waterways
I’ve added some photos of Moscow to my page South of Moscow, north of Geneva about the Grand Canal Company’s collieries.
Posted in Forgotten navigations, Irish waterways general, Operations
Tagged canal, coal, Grand Canal, Ireland, lost, Monasterevan, Monastereven, Monasterevin, Mountmellick, Operations, waterways
I’m sure you know what I mean: long hours, often at night, spent in the garret, poring over dusty tomes, searching for tiny fragments of information that, placed in the right context and interpreted with the skill of the trained scholar, provide a clue that leads to yet more tomes …. The search, extending over many months, that finally results in a small nugget of information, something that nobody else has noticed ….
I was trying to work out a route from one side of the island to the other. One possibility was a route through Johnstown, Co Kilkenny. I looked at a map. The R502, the road from Johnstown to Templemore, is called, at the Johnstown end, Canal Road.
Could this be a CLUE?
Johnstown historian Susan Garrett very kindly confirmed that there was indeed a canal there, and I’ve since found it on the 1839 OS map. She has kindly promised to send me some more information; in the meantime, I have put a holding page under Lost Irish waterways.
Posted in Forgotten navigations, Uncategorized
Here’s a new page about some canals that were never built: several proposals for canals to the Grand Canal Company’s collieries in Co Laois.
Posted in Forgotten navigations, Irish waterways general, Operations
Tagged Barrow, canal, coal, Grand Canal, Ireland, Monasterevan, Mountmellick, Operations, waterways
New page up, linked off the Lost Irish Waterways page.
Posted in Forgotten navigations, Irish waterways general
Tagged canal, coal, Ireland, Lombardstown, Longueville, lost, Mallow, Ockenden, Pallas, waterways
This is a considerably expanded and updated version of an article I wrote years ago, with lots of photos. There are traces of three lost waterways to be seen in Monasterevan (my favoured spelling) and lots of other interesting waterways artefacts as well. There is even an operational puzzle: in the days when boats locked down from the canal to the Barrow, and locked back up on the far side, how were they propelled (and controlled) when crossing the river?
Dukart’s inclined planes, on the canal from Coalisland to the Drumglass colliery, are known as dry hurries. It may be that the term derives from coal-mining; I’ve published some extracts from Richard Griffin’s 1814 report on the Leinster coalfield.
Posted in Forgotten navigations, Operations
Tagged canal, coal, coalisland, dukart, Ireland, lost, tyrone, waterways
I have uploaded a report by Sir John MacNeill on experiments with steam boats on the Irish Grand Canal in 1851. The Grand Canal Company evidently asked him to compare two vessels; interestingly, one of them was a twin-screw boat. His recommendations include a change to the use of canal-boats with a beam of 6′ 6″ and the use of turf (peat) as a fuel.
Posted in Irish waterways general, Operations
Tagged Grand Canal, Ireland, Ireland canals Grand Royal, Operations, turf
Another neglected navigation: the River Finnery in Co Kildare.
I’ve added an account of one of Ireland’s shortest canals, the Canal at the World’s End, to the Lost Irish Waterways page. There are several photos.
Posted in Extant waterways, Forgotten navigations, Irish waterways general
Tagged canal, Castleconnell, Ireland, lost, Shannon, turf, waterways
Irish waterways history