The Royal Navy Press gangs were licenced kidnappers who operated with official sanction up to the early 19th Century. Their role was to remove sailors from shore or ship and impress them into the service of the Royal Navy. It was a recruitment policy that was...
In a new departure for me, I'm going to be one of the contributors at this years Booze, Blaas & Banter. The venue is Jordan's American Bar on Waterford's Quay. It's part of the Imagine Arts Festival and organised by Johnny Clunno on behalf of the Waterford...
The Waterford Steamship Navigation Company river service commenced in 1837. It ran daily return trips between New Ross-Waterford and Duncannon-Waterford, Monday to Saturday. In the Summer season Sunday trips were also offered. During the week the ships departed the...
Last Saturday I had the good fortune to call over to Waterford Airport to see the materials that were uncovered by Noel McDonagh at Creaden Head, Co Waterford. While there we got into a conversation with Michael Farrell of the Barony of Gaultier Historical Society...
In my recent book on growing up in Cheekpoint I devoted a chapter to my uncle Sonny and his operation of the Cheekpoint pilot boat. His role was to embark and disembark pilots coming to and from New Ross. The role of pilot or river guide is probably as old as people...
Generally, ships in distress receive a welcome in any port, but this was not so with the Liverpool barque Sparkling Wave. For the ship was carrying an explosive cargo, of such a quantity, the city fathers of Waterford could not permit her into their port for fear of...
A stormy January in 1862 saw tremendous seas and howling gales that created havoc in the Irish seas and beyond. As ships do, they sat it out where possible and then when it passed, they raised anchor and got underway. The gales however had not gone, merely abated. ...
In recent weeks we've looked closely at the Waterford Steam Navigation Company and their river based service. The feedback has been very positive, many contacting me to remark on how vibrant and busy the rivers were, and how important they were for transportation and...
Last week we looked at the river services operated by the Waterford Steamship Company. This week I wanted to look at the work of one particular ship the Paddle Steamer Ida. The PS Ida was launched from the Neptune Iron Works on Friday 27th September 1867 and was...
As a child in Cheekpoint I was told that in the past I could have travelled to Waterford by paddle steamer. Christy Doherty RIP, one of the old school fishermen related stories to me of the paddle steamers calling to Cheekpoint quay, picking up passengers and heading...
For generations in the harbour here a small and awkward looking fishing craft was a constant feature. Called locally a Prong, it had a variety of uses which probably sustained its use for so long, but the origins of the craft are a mystery and almost now extinct, it...
This weekend we commemorate the loss of the ships SS Formby and SS Coningbeg in December 1917. It's a topic I covered last week with a view to promoting the commemoration this weekend. In thinking about the sailors who perished this week I came to realise that the...
This months guest blog is courtesy of Fintan Walsh and I think it prepares us for the upcoming month of December, which for us here in Waterford is going to be about commemoration. For it was December of 100 years ago that Waterford's worst maritime tragedy...
When Waterford city was looking to create a river crossing to cater for the increasing trade associated with its dynamic port of the 18th Century the city fathers had a problem. A bridge was needed, but ferrymen operating between its quays on the Waterford and...
Last Sunday there was an understated but very fitting memorial ceremony for the crew of the sailing ship, Alfred D Snow. The ship grounded in Waterford Harbour on January 3rd 1888 and all 29 crew aboard were drowned. The memory of the tragedy lives on however, on both...
The day after my fathers ninth birthday, 26th August 1940, he witnessed something that profoundly marked his life. Up on the hills around the village he caught sight of his first ever German airplane which was followed closely by the dropping of bombs on the small...
Snowhill, Co Kilkenny is now little more than a place-name on the river, but it once graced a fine Georgian mansion with an extensive farm and demesne and boat house on the river. I previously wrote about the house, which prompted a memory in an older neighbour of...
I recently had some American and English visitors on a tour of the village. I found it interesting to hear their thoughts on the area and I always get as much from their perspectives and questions as I ever give. In the same way the perspective of others from years...
Some boats are just not sexy. Sailing ships, paddle steamers, even smokey steam boats returning from foreign shores all have their appeal. But work boats tend to get a poor press, except perhaps amongst the men that plied their trade among them. One that surely fits...
I'm occasionally asked what I miss most about drift-netting for Salmon. When it stopped in 2006 I was fishing on a part time basis, but I refused to participate in the buy out of licences, preferring instead to hope for a return. So when I answer, I'm usually a bit...
If any one thread runs between my weekly blogs, it's the rivers. Being at the meeting place of the three sisters, the Rivers Barrow, Nore and Suir, that's probably not a surprise. But in all those blogs, one I think has been missing, the social element of the...
Let us honour if we can, the vertical man Though we value none, but the horizontal one W.H.Auden These lines from Auden often come to mind when someone dies, particularly when I realise just how much I used to rely on them or value them. I've mentioned this about my...
After 50 years of living with the geographical feature that is the meeting of the Three Sisters, you might think that I would take it for granted at this point. Truth is though, I can't ever remember a time that the rivers fail to interest me. Ever changing and...
One of my earliest childhood memories was playing with my siblings in the old house on the hill in Coolbunnia one chilly summer morning. The scene was unsettling to us I remember, because our usual/familiar view of the harbour, the three rivers flowing our towards...
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