The Beacon Towers Rev Gayer had nearly finished are, as it were, his own tombstones[1] Long before Fungi the dolphin put Dingle Harbour on the map in the 1980s, this particular stretch of water was more renowned for its treacherous conditions and shipwrecks. Newspapers of the time carried reports of disasters and…… Continue Reading
Tears and Smiles: Killarney Memoir has Castleisland links
Big Boys Don’t Cry, a book by Ted O’Shea of Muckross, Co Kerry, has just been added to the archive of Castleisland District Heritage.[1] The work provides information on O’Shea genealogy with interesting links to the Ahern family of Castleisland. It traces how the author’s great grandfather, James O’Shea, went as a teenager to…… Continue Reading
Castleisland: Mapped and Measured 180 Years Ago
About the year 1836, a young man named John O’Donovan was despatched by the office of the Ordnance Survey to visit in succession every county in Ireland with the object of noting and recording all existing remains of antiquity: By the direction of the Ordnance, O’Donovan visited, we may say, every townland in Ireland,…… Continue Reading
The Republican Monument, Kilbannivane, Castleisland
We publish below brief references to the thirteen men commemorated on the Kilbannivane Republican Monument, Castleisland. Michael O Brosnacain / Michael Brosnan (1900-1920) Son of Cornelius Brosnan and Margaret (née Collins) Brosnan of Close, Castleisland. Michael Brosnan was shot by Black and Tans on 8 November 1920. Account of incident in Dying for…… Continue Reading
Poff & Barrett: The P D Kenny Affair
On Fair Day, 8 September 1884, Earl Spencer, the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, and his suite passed through Castleisland during a week-long vice-regal visit to the South of Ireland. It was a Monday, and the weather was notably fine. The visiting party included the Lord Lieutenant’s aides-de-camp, Captains Ross and Little, his private secretary,…… Continue Reading
Stinking Soup and Sausages: Life in a Kerry Seminary in the 1960s
Urinating in the priests’ milk jug in the early hours of the morning shows a certain level of bravado among the male boarders of St Andrew’s seminary, the subject of the short, succinct Sausages for Tuesday. It also displays, however, an inordinate level of resentment. Sausages for Tuesday, a book by Patrick Kennelly, schoolteacher…… Continue Reading
The Family of James Barrett of Dromultan, Scartaglen, Co Kerry[1]
In the wake of the executions of Sylvester Poff and James Barrett in Tralee prison on 23 January 1883 following their conviction for the murder of Thomas Browne, the families of all involved were left to deal with their grief. I never saw before such a saddening spectacle and trust I never shall again…… Continue Reading
Cover-Ups and Confusion: John Twiss Brought up for Trial
I say this, the jurymen should not bring me in through the evidence of a child – John Twiss, Speech from the Dock James Donovan, an emergency-man living in Glenlara, near Newmarket, Co Cork, was bludgeoned to death in the early hours of 21st April 1894. John Twiss of Castleisland and Eugene Keeffe of Glenlara…… Continue Reading
‘Three Cheers for Castleisland’ – The Innocence of John Twiss
When John Twiss was arrested on 25 April 1894, within days of the brutal murder, at Glenlara, of caretaker James Donovan, he explained to officers that he and his sister Jane were financially dependent on the tolls of a local Kerry fair.[1] The fair, he informed them, was imminent, and he asked if he could…… Continue Reading
‘Where is Glenlara?’: John Twiss of Castleisland, from a Cork Perspective
‘The dogs in the street knew John Twiss was innocent’ As the descendants of John Twiss, and the Michael O’Donohoe Memorial Heritage Project, await the outcome of the application for the Presidential Pardon of Twiss, hanged in 1895 for a crime he maintained he did not commit, a space is given here to reflect on…… Continue Reading