The early years of the Irish Free State were full of turmoil, beginning with the conflict between Pro- and Anti-Treaty factions which we know as the Civil War. After the cessation of hostilities in May of 1923, the country was in a ruinous state, with many roads and bridges blown up and in general disrepair. Cumann na nGaedheal was the party in government, with only the Labour Party in opposition due to the abstention of Sinn F\'ein. The financial situation was also dire, and the Government responded with austerity; cutting the old age pension by 10%, introducing a 7 day working week and slashing the wages of farm labourers by 16%. This latter tactic highlighted an objective of the Government which was to support the big farmers, with the aim that agricultural production would be the driving force behind economic recovery. Read more
When we were children in the 1950's, one of the red-letter days was St. John's Day, better known as Bonefire Night. There was much excitement and great competition among we school children as to which group would have the biggest, brightest fire. For several days before the much-awaited night, the whole place would be a hive of activity collecting fuel for the fire. Some people contributed turf, more gave scraps of timber, but the most prized material of all was Bog Deal. Bog deal is the remains of the forests of Ireland that covered the country many years ago. There was an abundance of it in the local bogs close to where we lived, namely Barana, and other townlands around the district. To a child's eye catching a glimpse of these ancient forms bursting through the bog land, would resemble the backdrop of a ghost story. Some had grotesque shapes and were extraordinarily heavy to carry, so the donkey and cart would be brought into service to assist with the collection of the more awkward specimens. Sometimes our group of gatherers would get lemonade and sweets, but always we had a great time heaving and pulling these giant forms from our bog lands. Read more
Our Winter 2018 newsletter was printed in December 2018 and distributed at local shops and Corrandulla Post Office. We welcome articles, items of interest, other material and suggestions for future editions. Articles in this edition: Was there a Famine in the West of Ireland in 1925? by Johnny Burke; Reflections on the Past, by Kathleen O'Shea; Big Deal, by Peter Newell; and Lectern, a poem by Joe McDermott. Read more
By Mary Forde (née Goaley), 1925-2018. We hear so much recently about a recession, meltdown, downturn or other various terms but all meaning the same thing. We are warned that it will give us a much lower standard of living than we enjoyed for the last decade. Of course our age group saw and lived through more recessions than that following the recent prosperity of Irish people called the Celtic Tiger, so for us, the older generation, it's going to bring back many mixed memories. I was going to school when World War Two broke out. We knew little or nothing about war just then beyond what we learned from our history lessons and maybe what we read in the Far East magazine about war in the Phillippines. Indeed history was a school lesson some of us felt we had to endure with its pages of battles, dates and leaders. We in Ireland were just recovering from another kind of war - the Economic War as it was called - a period like the present one breaking in on us. Read more
By Mary Forde (née Goaley), 1925-2018. This article first appeared in Anach Cuain 2006.
When Fr. Pat Garvey was parish priest in Corrandulla in the forties there was an annual Gymkhana on 29th June which was a holyday of obligation at the time. In 1946 St. Peter and Paul's Day fell on a Saturday. So between himself and Fr. John D. O'Malley they decided to make a two day event with a Show and a Sale of Work thrown in. This was to be a fund raiser for the proposed Parochial Hall which would be a start for a Secondary School. At that time, the government were proposing Secondary Schools throughout the country. I think they were to be a form of Technical School. Headford was in its infancy and Athenry was the next base as Coolarne had a Domestic Economy School and Fr. Garvey wanted to have his foot in the door first for Corrandulla. Headford was too near Mayo! Read more
By Mary Forde (née Goaley), 1925-2018. This article describes the destruction of Annaghdown Church by fire in 1936 and subsequent reconstruction work. It first appeared in Anach Cuain 2004.
It was on Tuesday night, 1st December 1936 as we were going to bed about 9 o'clock. My father and mother had gone to put some of their children to bed as some of us had measles at the time. As he looked out the window my father saw flames. He enquired if Micil Fahy had a cock of hay in his field as he usually kept a sheep cock in the field at the foot of the hill between the Church and the school (the old school). Read more
Water has always been the source of life. In turn, wells for drawing water, the sole source before the advent of indoor plumbing, were the heart and hub of every community. When you come across these wells, what is striking is how beautiful they are, how individual and unique, how lovingly cut the stones. Though built for everyday use, they are also overlooked examples of architecture, of the melding of engineering and sculpture, which were created not by specialists from elsewhere, but by people from within each community. Read more
The National Folklore Collection, based at University College Dublin, has recently made their Schools’ Collection for Galway freely available online. This is a collection of stories gathered between September 1937 and January 1939 in primary schools throughout Ireland. It includes material collected in all of the schools in the local area: Anach Cuain (R.S. Ó Conaill), Corr an Droma (Breandán Ó Míodhcháin), Scoil an Mhainistir, Carrowbeg (An Br. Coinleith Ó Mainnín), Caisleán hAicéid (S. Ó Floinn), Scoil Bhríge Naofa, An Cheathrú Bheag (Máire Ní Loideáin) and An Bán Mór (Liam Ó Mainnín). Most of the schoolchildren collected stories from their parents, some from their grandparents, and a few also visited neighbours. Many of them give accounts of events which occurred in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Read more
Our Summer 2018 newsletter was printed in June 2018 and distributed at the Corrandulla Show on 24 June, and thereafter at local shops and Corrandulla Post Office. We welcome articles, items of interest, other material and suggestions for future editions. Articles in this edition: DNA Testing for Family History Research – Science Bringing Genealogy to the Technological Generation, by Irene McGoldrick; Writing a Local History, by Johnny Burke; The Stone-Built Wells of Annaghdown, by Jessica Cooke; A 1927 Visitor to Annaghdown, a diary entry by William Ford; and The Annaghdown Letter of Arthur J. Braginton, from the 1908 book Letters of Arthur J.Braginton. Read more
Last summer it was my happy experience to find the home of one of my grandfathers over in the heart of Merry England. I mentioned the circumstances at the time and by way of apology for further personal and family narrative will only say that justice and equity ought to be shown both sides of the house. In England I had no directions or information whatever, while in Ireland I had a letter brought with me from home, written by Patrick Collins to Mary Collins, my mother's mother, thirty-one years ago. The letter heading read Creggduff, Parish of Annahdown, County Galway, Ireland. The village lying seven miles to the northeast of Galway, was easily located on my map. Having reached the latter city on my way from Dublin, I continued on through the bare granite hills and over boggy stretches to the village of Creggduff. Read more
Mr Thomas Walsh called to Elwood's and accompanied by William Walsh drove through Annaghdown and to Walsh's place where my mother and other Cavanagh's were born and around the fields joining Mr Blake's (Landlords) property of over 300 acres. There is one historic romance on Mr Walsh's farm (formerly Cavanagh's). An oval or round little plot of land-surrounded by a high stone wall about two acres said to have been roofed in the time the Danes occupied Ireland. Leaving the main road to the right, I followed a little boreen about 10 yards and going down an incline and several steps of stone is a well containing pure spring water. This wall is surrounded by rock and the spring is said to come through from a quarry on the hill above. This is the same well that my mother, Mary, in her youth drew water from for the use of the house etc. Read more
Having recently completed a B.A. in History and English, I would like to outline my experiences in researching and writing an academic history essay. The degree course, completed online, consisted of six modules in both disciplines and was ideal for part-time study. The sixth history module was titled 'Researching Local History: People, Place and Time'. I was required to write an extended essay (10,000 words) on a topic of local history of my own choosing. The topics of interest to me were The Great Hunger of 1845-50 in Galway and the Land Wars in Galway during the 1870s and 1880s, but both of these had recently been covered by local historians. It was during a conversation with Br. Conal that he proposed the idea of writing about the Tuam Sugar Factory that I decided this was worth doing, especially since little had been written on it. I chose the title 'Tuam Sugar Factory: Its impact on the town and farming communities of North Galway 1933-1960'. Read more
Family history research has been given a new lease of life thanks to advances in science and technology, meaning that it is easier than ever before to trace your family tree. Up until recent years, researching your 'roots' meant spending hours looking at historical records in musty libraries. Nowadays you can start tracing your family tree from the comfort of your own sitting room, mobile phone or tablet in hand.
One of the most important advances in family history research is the recent addition of DNA testing, which can help you to connect with relations with whom you share DNA, all over the world. There are a number of commercial companies that offer DNA testing. Your DNA is collected using either a cheek swab (a simple 'cotton bud' swab taken from inside your cheek) or through a saliva sample. DNA is then analysed and results are provided within a two month time frame. Read more
The majority of the principal sources for Irish genealogy have been appearing as online databases over the past ten years or so, and it is now possible to conduct much, if not most, genealogical research from the comfort of one's own home. One of the more colourful sets of records to appear has been the Petty Sessions record books, of which the Headford and Galway collections relate to incidents in the Annaghdown area. The Petty Sessions were the lowest rung of the courts system, roughly equivalent to today's district court in some respects, with the Quarter Sessions and Assizes dealing with more serious matters. Most of the Petty Sessions records for Annaghdown relate to incidents of minor significance: road contractors frequently summoned farmers for allowing their stock to wander on the public road, for example. However, there are some more unusual, and some humourous incidents which provide a rich insight into life at the time. The following are a few interesting examples. Read more
From some preliminary meetings held during the winter months of 1995, our Society was formally established in 1996 to compile, correlate and disseminate information pertinent to the many facets of Heritage in our locality. This would be of interest not only to the local community and its diaspora but to all who would wish to avail of it at national or international level. To achieve our objectives, we were kindly given accommodation in the Old Girls' School, Corrandulla, as a focal point for regular meetings and as a store for artefacts and memoribilia, especially those in danger of being lost or discarded. A summary of the undertakings of the Society for the past 21 years is given below. Read more
The first of our Cavanagh family to arrive in New Zealand was William Cavanagh; he landed at Port Chalmers, Otago, on the 'Gill Blas' in 1856 and came from Melbourne, Australia. How he got to Melbourne and with who else I am yet to discover - I suspect he wouldn't have travelled alone. Although important to our family, William Cavanagh (1835-1873) is of greater importance to all of the Galway early settlers, as he was the first Irish Catholic to land in Otago, according to research carried out by Sean Brosnahan of the Otago Early Settlers Museum. Then, shortly after his arrival, he started an 'immigrant chain' that was to nominate many other Galway Catholics for passage to Otago and Southland. Read more
An element of local Annaghdown history which has receded into the dim and distant past is the fact that the area once had a thriving brick industry. The perimeters of various bogs in the area contained a sticky grey 'daub', which when fired or baked-up turned into a yellowy brick. Not entirely suitable for external use, this brick was mainly used for lining chimneys and around window and door openings. There was a surge in demand for Annaghdown Brick when any major project was taking place in the city of Galway. One instance where a lot of brick was required, was in the building of Galway University. A Fahy family from Lisanoran supplied a lot of brick to this project. They were delivered by flat-bottomed boats to Woodquay. The price is reputed to have been eleven shillings per boat load. Read more
Below are births registered in the Annaghdown townlands of Turloughmore Registration District in 1870. Read more
Below are births registered in the Annaghdown townlands of Turloughmore Registration District in 1869 Read more
Below are births registered in the Annaghdown townlands of Turloughmore Registration District in 1868. Read more
Below are births registered in the Annaghdown townlands of Turloughmore Registration District in 1867. Read more
Below are births registered in the Annaghdown townlands of Turloughmore Registration District in 1865. Read more
Below are births registered in the Annaghdown townlands of Turloughmore Registration District in 1865. Read more
Below are births registered in the Annaghdown townlands of Turloughmore Registration District in 1864. Read more
Deaths registered in the Annaghdown townlands of Turloughmore Registration District between 1876 and 1880. Read more