Archive News
June 23, 2011
Date Published: {J}
1911
Prisoner’s pathetic plea
At a special court held on Monday, Mr Kilbride, R.M., presiding, a man named Andrew Hopper, who has been employed as night porter in the Railway Hotel, was charged with the larceny of £55 18s 6d from a safe in the hotel.
In a statement, he wrote: “One night, I found out just by curiosity that the key of my pantry opened the bar door, a skeleton key it was, so I went in and helped myself to whiskey and brandy but never touched a penny; only took drink. Well I kept thinking about the money in the till and determined to steal it and clear out. I went in again on Friday morning, took two glasses of whiskey full, then opened the till and saw the key of the safe.
I opened it and when I saw the gold and notes, I could not resist them. I had no intention of touching the safe just the few pounds in the till, only took notes and gold out of the safe.
I had a suit of military uniform in my possession, so I put them on under my own clothes, took a box of cigars and cigarettes, put the money in my bag and took a return ticket to Athlone. In the train I counted the money and found I had £59 1s 6d after paying for my ticket. I never dreamt there was so much.
I met a girl who was going to Glasgow, so I went with her. I drank all day as I had no peace, but thinking of what I had done.
Now, when I am done for, it sounds hypocritical to say I am sorry; I only ask for mercy for my Kitty’s sake. I have lost my character, friends and everything over this false step of mine. This is the first time to have connection with the police. Of course I must be punished; I hope that they will deal easy with me, so that I won’t lose my army pension.
I am willing to hand it over and pay back all I have spent. Don’t make a jail bird of me; it is hard enough that I am in detention. After this no more drink, no more nights and days of torment.
Constable Costigan said the police in Newcastle-on-tyne handed him over £17 19s 4d with the prisoner and his military papers. The prisoner, who sat silent, was returned for trial to the ensuing Assizes.
1936
Hit with a hen
Derreen District Court was held on Friday before Mr. Sean MacGiollarnath, D.J. Mary Farragher, Ballinastack, summoned Mary Burns, same place, for assault and for using abusive language towards her. Mr P.M. Hosty, solicitor, for complainant, and Mr. F.B. McDonogh, solr., for defendant.
Evidence was given that a dispute took place over the trespass of hens on May 7. Mrs. Farragher said that Mrs. Burns hit her with a stone and Mrs. Burns said Mrs. Farragher hit her with a hen.
Sergt. McDonogh, Cummer, said he saw Mrs. Farragher with a cut on the shin bone, caused, she alleged, by a stone thrown by defendant.
The Justice bound Mrs. Burns to the peace for twelve months in £5 bail for the assault and fined her 5s. and costs for using abusive language.
New factory
At a special meeting of the Galway Chamber of Commerce, held in the Chamber Institute on Tuesday evening, the President, Mr. T.J. W. Kenny, announced that there was a possibility of having a brush factory established in Galway shortly.
The factory, the President said, would be started on a big scale, and the capital required would be very little. The factory would be started without any assistance from outside or from the Industrial Credit Corporation.
It would given employment to about one hundred persons in the manufacture of all kinds of brushes. The company would be altogether a Galway-Mayo company. He felt sure that when the prospectus was issued, the factory would have the full support of Galway.
For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.
People’s living conditions less than 100 years ago were frightening. We have come a long way. We talk about water charges today, but back then the local District Councils were erecting pumps for local communities and the lovely town of Mountbellew, according to Council minutes, had open sewers,” says Galway County Council archivist Patria McWalter.
Patria believes we “need to take pride in our history, and we should take the same pride in our historical records as we do in our built heritage”. When you see the wealth of material in her care, this belief makes sense.
She is in charge of caring for the rich collection of administrative records owned by Galway County Council and says “these records are as much part of our history as the Rock of Cashel is. They document our lives and our ancestors’ lives. And nobody can plan for the future unless you learn from the past, what worked and what didn’t”.
Archivists and librarians are often unfairly regarded as being dry, academic types, but that’s certainly not true of Patria. Her enthusiasm is infectious as she turns the pages of several minute books from Galway’s Rural District Councils, all of them at least 100 years old.
Part of her role involved cataloguing all the records of the Councils – Ballinasloe, Clifden, Galway, Gort, Loughrea, Mountbellew, Portumna and Tuam. These records mostly consisted of minutes of various meetings.
When she was cataloguing them she realised their worth to local historians and researchers, so she decided to compile a guide to their content. The result is For the Record: The Archives of Galway’s Rural District Councils, which will be a valuable asset to anybody with an interest in history.
Many representatives on these Councils were local personalities and several were arrested during the political upheaval of the era, she explains.
And, ushering in a new era in history, women were allowed to sit on these Rural District Councils – at the time they were not allowed to sit on County Councils.
All of this information is included in Patria’s introductory essay to the attractively produced A4 size guide, which gives a glimpse into how these Rural Councils operated and the way political thinking changed in Ireland during a short 26-year period. In the early 1900s, these Councils supported Home Rule, but by 1920, they were calling for full independence and refusing to recognise the British administration.
“I love the tone,” says Patria of the minutes from meetings. “The language was very emotive.”
That was certainly true of the Gort Rural District Council. At a meeting in 1907, following riots in Dublin at the premiere of JM Synge’s play, The Playboy of the Western World the councillors’ response was vehement. They recorded their decision to “protest most emphatically against the libellous comedy, The Playboy of the Western World, that was belched forth during the past week in the Abbey Theatre, Dublin, under the fostering care of Lady Gregory and Mr Yeats. We congratulate the good people of Dublin in howling down the gross buffoonery and immoral suggestions that are scattered throughout this scandalous performance.
For more from the archives see this week’s Tribunes here
Date Published: 23-Jan-2013
SLIGO 0-9
GALWAY 1-4
FRANK FARRAGHER IN ENNISCRONE
GALWAY’S first serious examination of the 2013 season rather disturbingly ended with a rating well below the 40% pass mark at the idyllic, if rather Siberian, seaside setting of Enniscrone on Sunday last.
The defeat cost Galway a place in the FBD League Final against Leitrim and also put a fair dent on their confidence shield for the bigger tests that lie ahead in February.
There was no fluke element in this success by an understrength Sligo side and by the time Leitrim referee, Frank Flynn, sounded the final whistle, there wasn’t a perished soul in the crowd of about 500 who could question the justice of the outcome.
It is only pre-season and last Sunday’s blast of dry polar winds did remind everyone that this is far from summer football, but make no mistake about it, the match did lay down some very worrying markers for Galway following a couple of victories over below par third level college teams.
Galway did start the game quite positively, leading by four points at the end of a first quarter when they missed as much more, but when Sligo stepped up the tempo of the game in the 10 minutes before half-time, the maroon resistance crumbled with frightening rapidity.
Some of the statistics of the match make for grim perusal. Over the course of the hour, Galway only scored two points from play and they went through a 52 minute period of the match, without raising a white flag – admittedly a late rally did bring them close to a draw but that would have been very rough justice on Sligo.
Sligo were backable at 9/4 coming into this match, the odds being stretched with the ‘missing list’ on Kevin Walsh’s team sheet – Adrian Marren, Stephen Coen, Tony Taylor, Ross Donovan, David Kelly, David Maye, Johnny Davey and Eamon O’Hara, were all marked absent for a variety of reasons.
Walsh has his Sligo side well schooled in the high intensity, close quarters type of football, and the harder Galway tried to go through the short game channels, the more the home side bottled them up.
Galway badly needed to find some variety in their attacking strategy and maybe there is a lot to be said for the traditional Meath style of giving long, quick ball to a full forward line with a big target man on the edge of the square – given Paul Conroy’s prowess close to goal last season, maybe it is time to ‘settle’ on a few basics.
Defensively, Galway were reasonably solid with Gary Sice at centre back probably their best player – he was one of the few men in maroon to deliver decent long ball deep into the attacking zone – while Finian Hanley, Conor Costello and Gary O’Donnell also kept things tight.
For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.
Date Published: 23-Jan-2013
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