Tag: Co Waterford

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Why is the Russianside, called the Russianside?

One of my earliest memories as a child was my mother bringing us off on a Sunday afternoon to visit our Nanny in the Russianside.  It was a smaller place then.  From the cross roads you passed the homes of Martin Nugent, Joanie Hanlon, Andy Lannen and Nellie McDonalds, all on the right as you walked along.  At Nellie’s there was a laneway to the right that brought you over to Powers fields and down a boreen to Ryan’s quay where at that stage a lady who had returned from Rhodesia named St Ledger lived. The road just continued to the left at Nellies and Mrs Ferguson and her “boys” Charlie and Tom were in the house on the right.  Nanny was on the left with “Uncle Christy” and coming towards the Strand there was a lovely old barn and farmyard on the left and below it on the right lived Pat and Margaret O’Leary and family.

Nothing was made of the name, and I don’t remember ever thinking of it as strange or odd, or to even think of asking where the name came from.  It was a matter of fact affair.  The Russianside just was. Unremarkable, save for Nanny; where we always wanted to go, where we always felt special.

At some point in my teens I remember being in Nanny’s company when a visitor asked where the name had come from.  As I recall, she said that locally people said it had a connection to a Russian ship, but the details she was hazy on.  She always did say though, that even as a child she remembered the fishermen taking a short cut through the yard when the wind was North West.  They had moored off their punts on the “Russian side of the village”  Subsequently I have heard many different theories, and I have passed them on when asked but always with a grain of doubt or uncertainty.

Tall ships passing the Point Light, marking the Russianside

Some have said that a Russian ship sank off the Russianside, and the sailors were buried along the strand.  Interestingly enough Irish Wrecks list dozens of ships that sank in the harbour area, but none seem to have a Russian name.  Others have said that as many as seven sick sailors perished aboard ship and were subsequently buried on the strand.  I’ve never seen any bones unearthed, and I walked the strand almost every day as a child and at least once a week as an adult.

Illness is an age old concern with ships what with plague in particular.  But again this is highly unlikely.  Waterford, like many harbours you see, had their own isolation stations, such was the fears about diseases spreading from sailors.  Ships entering Waterford had to declare any sickness to the “Hospital” above Passage East and sick sailors were rowed ashore and monitored. It appears to have been strictly monitored,  The memory of the black death and other endemics probably ensured a strict enforcement.

Another account was that the Russians were refugees who were fleeing persecution in Russia and were put ashore to look for safe haven.  Stories of the Russian pogroms against Jews do come to mind.  Between  1881-4 there were over 200 incidents, but these dates would correspond with my Grandmothers Grandfathers time Bill Malone. She knew him, and any Jewish refugees would most certainly have been known to him.  As a consequence I would imagine she would have heard some first hand account.  That she didn’t would suggest that this is also unlikely.  I have also read of earlier pogroms, at Odessa for example in 1821.  I contacted the Jewish Museum recently to see if they had any knowledge.  I was delighted to get a very quick and courteous response, but not any information to corroborate such a theory.

The final theory that I have heard comes from a good friend from Carlow, via Dublin, Boston, and heaven knows where else.  Bob the scientist thinks its an Irish name, corrupted and anglicised from the Gaelic “Ros an Sidhe”  For him this comes to Headland of the Fairy Folk.  I think Christy Moran would have approved.

Ryans Shore with the Point light at its tip (on the right)

Now we have talked about the Fairy Folk of the Sidhe only last week in relation to Cheekpoint or Rinn na Sidhe.  Is it possible then the Russianside and Cheekpoint are both one in the same?  Its possible and indeed probably.  But who will ever be able to say for sure.  Canon Power went with the Russian sailor story though!  Which might be well as the blog is just gaining some traction in the federation!

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Cheekpoint placename

Cheekpoint is both a village and a townland, and for many’s the year there has been two explanations to the origins of the name, a practical, geographical placename and what is probably best described as a romantic version.  The name Cheekpoint derives from Pointe na Sige or in other cases Rinn na Sige. Sige, phonetically is pronounced “she-ge”.

According to Canon Power, and his book the Placenames of the Decies, the name derives from the river that flows past the village, and in particular the eddies and currents that are caused as the river flows over the Sheagh (pronounced she-egg) rock, which is an outcrop at the Mount, below the village.  As the tide flows over the rock it causes a distinctive streak in the tide, which the learnered priest considered the origins of the placename, the point of the streaks.  Its hard to discount the theory, as you can see from the photo a streak is very distinctive, and indeed locally we call this, to this day the Stroke.  It’s slightly different to the streaks that are caused as the tide ebbs over the rocks.  However it is easy to see where Canon Power was coming from, that the first settlers to the village would have come by water and would have named the landing point by a distinctive riverine feature.

Sheagh Rock and “the stroke”

Against that however, is the fact that strokes can be seen in the river at various spots and at all different times of tide.  And rocks and outcrops cause eddies and marks in the river at other locations too, such as the point light, Snowhill, etc.  To be honest, to a fisherman there’s nothing too special about the river as it flows there, except for the strength and flow of tide.

Of course the romantics prefer a more elaborate origin.  The gaelic Rinn na Sige may also suggest the headland of the fairies, or the fairy folk.  Interestingly the Loganim site records a reference to “the landing place of the fairies”  Si, Siog or Sidhe (which is very close to the phonetically spelled Sige above – “She-da”) suggests a connection to the other world or fairy folk,  The Sidhe were a mythical people who were thought to have been the first settlers to Ireland and were defeated by the coming of the Gaels to Ireland.  The disappeared into mounds or hills but emerge in times of need.  Their ring forts and fairy paths still exist and to interfere with them is a cause of great harm to an individual.  I was reared on such stories in the Russianside, particularly by our Granduncle Christy Moran who, if he didn’t believe the stories must have been a great actor.

Now the reference to a landing place provokes another speculation on my part.  My cousin Jim Doherty passed on a newspaper article from the mid 19th C which attributed the coming of an ancient tribe to Ireland via the harbour and which landed at Cheekpoint.  Cesaire, Granddaughter of Noah, built an ark to carry her and her lover Fintain and fifty followers.  They left 40 days before Noah and at his direction sailed west.  According to the story, they landed up after much adventures at Cheekpoint, at the confluence of the three rivers and there they settled.  In time Cesaire died and was buried at the foot of the Minaun.  The book of invasions has a similar story, but without Cheekpoint!

Is it possible that the placename Cheekpoint, anglicised but still retaining is older origins may hint at a much more ancient past, a past that includes remnants of the foundation story to the earliest settlers in this area?  We may never know, but what I can say for certain, that the location which was of such strategic importance in the centuries past must have a lot stories yet to be brought to the surface.

I guess the version you prefer depends a bit on your personality.  But as a certified romantic and dreamer, I have to say I tend towards the version that includes the Sidhe!

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Coolbunnia

I was never great at school.  But one specific class I can remember as a highlight was a lesson one day on placenames.  I don’t recall if it was a planned session, or if it was an aside.  But Michael White who was principal at Faithlegg was talking about how important it was to appreciate the Irish language, when it came to an analysis of the origins of placenames.  He gave a brilliant example, Knock Boy or in Irish Cnoc Bui.  The cartographer obviously hearing the name spoken in Irish tongue, completely twisted a beautiful geographic description of Yellow Hill, to a totally irrelevant English language replacement.  I found the translation, of what in my minds eye was a hill festooned with in-flower gorse, and that heady coconut like smell on a hot day, an insult to those who had gone before.

The townland I was born and raised in is called Coolbunnia.  Its a strange enough name, and not one I have come across elsewhere.  For some reason our area doesn’t seem to fall neatly into so many of those obvious Irish placenames such as Rath, or Ard or Dun.  Mind you we do have a Kil.

Canon Power in his Place Names of the Decies decried the fact that during his studies that native Irish speakers were not to be found in our area.  No surprise in a Barony called Gaultier; land of the foreigner.  With so much settlement and trade, the pressure on a native tongue must have been pronounced down the years.

For the learnered priest then, Coolbunnia, despite the fact that he didn’t have a native speaker to pronounce it, suggested to him the “Ridge back of the stream”  The Stream I have always thought is that which flows from below Everetts, now Malachy and Michelle Doherty’s.  It flows down to the left of the road as you drive towards Faithlegg and flows under the road at the “bridge” and then down the Glen and to the Suir.  The stream rises in the fields below Malachy’s and in years gone by a well was oft used to quench your thirst, fed from the source.  The ridge in this context of course is the Whorthill which winds its way towards Passage high above the estuary.

According to Power it didn’t actually exist at the time of the Down Survey.  Then the entire area was known as Faithlegg.  So sometime in the past two hundred years we have had the two local townlands added, Coolbunnia and Cheekpoint.  The following map highlights the extent of it, spreading from Tom Sullivans to the ditch at Vic and Eileen Bibles and from there back to the River.

Of course Canon Power could be wrong. He spelled it Cúl Buinne.  But the Irish placenames site, Loganim considers it Cúil Boinne.  The Cúil in this case is considered a nook or a corner,  They also provide several other spellings including Couboyngne and Coolbunna and interestingly the name Coulboygun is dated to 1313.  Another interesting fact is that it’s the only Townland placename of its kind in the country.

I often wondered if I had picked up more Irish would I have had an advantage in deciphering placenames.  But for the last eight years I have sat beside a native Irish speaker in work and she has reminded me several times that such queries are the gift of specialist people, so many complexities and variations are involved.  So I can let go of that bit of guilt anyway.

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Ballycanvan House and Townland

About forty years ago I went with Michael Duffin and his mother Catherine to have our hair cut by Mandy over in Woodlands Avenue.  We got the hair cut first and then we went off for a stroll while Catherine received the full attention.  Wandering along the avenue we followed a path down towards the river when we came across an old crumbling building,  I had two memories of it, first its ramshackled nature and second that I stood into cow slurry, that stunk to high heaven when we got back to Mandys and meant that Catherine had to lower the windows on the way home.

The house we had stumbled upon was the original seat of power, if you will pardon the pun of the Powers of Ballycanvan, a family directly related to the Powers of Curraghmore and thus direct descendants of the original Le Poer that landed as part of the Norman conquest.  The original tower house, similar no doubt to Ballymaclode castle directly across Ballycanvan Stream (which flows past Jack Meades pub) was later built on and added to.  The following is a brief historical run of the owners or occupiers at one time or another.

Ballymaclode castle on the city side of Ballycanvan stream

In 1537 there is a list of crimes held against one Thomas Power of Ballycanvan including many extortions of travellers, no doubt using to advantage his location.  In 1598 a stone chimenypiece was built with an inscription carved to Richard Power, 4th baron le Poer and Katherine Barry.  In 1697 a Captain William Harrison was leasing the property and this was continued by his son John Harrison.

It came into the Bolton family when Rev Hugh Bolton (1683-1758) acquired the property as Dean of Waterford.  He was succeed by Cornelius Bolton the Elder (1714-1774) who took over in 1758 and extended his ownership to the Mill Farm in 1765. It was here that Arthur Young, the travel writer and chronicler of industrial and agricultural development, visited when he came to East Waterford. We have also met the Mill Farm recently, and the works of Cornelius too.  A Georgian mansion was added to the castle at this point.

the old mill and Ballycanvan overlooking the Suir (Kings Channel)
Photo courtesy of Liam Hartley

Cornelius Bolton the younger, (1751-1829) sold the house to his younger brother Henry around 1792, no doubt to assist in the ongoing investment at Cheekpoint.  Henry however, leased it not long before he died, in 1805, to Samuel Roberts (1758-1834) son of honest John Roberts who did substantial work to the property.  On Henry’s death ownership went to his daughter Elizabeth, a fragile lady who had a nervous breakdown in 1807 and never recovered.

In 1818 Roberts dropped the lease and Thomas Meagher (1764-1837) took on the property.  The Meaghers remained at the property until 1829.  Subsequently the property was leased to Richard Morris and family until 1836.  The next family found on the property is George Kent (bc1786-1866), who made his money in the bacon trade, and was renting from 1848 to his death.

An early map highlighting the house and grounds

Elizabeth Bolton died in Devon in 1852 and Cornelius Bolton the youngers eldest son Cornelius Henry inherited the property.  This he sold in 1857 and it was apparently bought at that time by Patrick Power of Faithlegg House.

The Kent family seem to have continued to live on in the house for some time afterwards, but at some point in the subsequent decades structural problems were found in the building and it fell into disrepair.  What now remains is a sad reminder of a very busy and illustrious past.

The information contained in this piece comes via Mark Thomas in the following article for Abandoned Ireland; http://www.abandonedireland.com/Ballycanvan.html

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Elections, Cheekpoint style

One of the enduring memories of elections in our house was my fathers quip “vote early, vote often”. Whether it was a local, national, EU, presidential or referendum, Bob would be wound up with the run in to the day and was positively buzzing when it came to the count.  A firm left of centre voter, he took a keen, vocal and biased interest in politics in general.

It was the general election of 1977 that I remember most vividly, I guess it must have been the first that I was old enough to understand.  Jack Lynch, then leader of Fianna Fail was fighting the election against Liam Cosgrove, then Taoiseach of Fine Geal and to this day I can remember Lynch’s poster plastered on most of the telegraph poles in the village.

But it was a sticker which we got, possibly at mass one Sunday morning, that really stands out.  It was the novelty value of course, it meant nothing in terms of party allegiance. Bob nearly had a caniption when he saw i, he saw it as an attempt to attract people with a gimmick, politics with no substance, and indeed his view is still debated today.  Fianna Fail won landslide victory, in part, on the basis of what they promised to give away (nothing new there then!).

All the elections in Cheekpoint were, and are, held in the National School, which was a cause of celebration too!  No school!

To get there people would have generally walked.  But there was also a political taxi; local party supporters that would call to your home and offer you a lift.  Of course the drive would be filled with advice, a leaflet and an offer of a lift home, or to the pub!  I remember Beardy Mick (Mick Sullivan) driving around with the car festooned with posters, speakers on top, urging people out to vote, offering a lift, and of course recommending the Labour party.

They say never talk about politics and religion.  It was good advice in an Ireland still racked with civil war politics, and even in some homes adults could barely live with each other in the run up and aftermath of elections.  My Grandfather – Andy Doherty (hops) had no such qualms however. Aunt Ellen lived with him in the village from where she ran the shop.  The shop was a counter inside the door behind which she kept the basics and plenty of sweets and ice cream.  The rest of the room was the living room, and Andy was often perched in his seat with the neighbours sitting around; Jim Doherty, Baby Burns, John Barry, Maryanne Cullen to name a few.

While Andy poured over the Irish Press and exclaimed loudly on what he found, excoriating everything from the local to the international, Ellen would try to act as moderator and the air was often blue with debate.  In fairness, there were strong feelings on all sides whether it was the “civil war politics” still being fought or the campaign waging in Northern Ireland, more often than not I left the shop more confused and unsure of where I should stand, than when I went in.

My father told me one time there was pandemonium in the school one election day.  It was the referendum on whether Ireland should join the EEC held in 1972. An older woman from the village had come in and taken her voting slip behind the booth when those present heard her loud exclamation.  She arrived back out damning and blasting, asking where in the name of God was de valera’s name? Although the returning officers tried to explain patiently that as de valera was president (and almost 90) he could not feature on the ballot, the woman would not be silenced. A crowd had gathered and there was an excited debate some trying to calm her down, others only adding to the woe.

Eventually, a young returning officer (according to my father a teacher in the school at the time) offered a solution, since the woman wanted to vote for de valera and his party was advocating in favour of joining the EEC, surely the woman could be advised that that would be showing allegiance to him.  Satisfied, she went back to the booth and exercised her constitutional prerogative.  I can’t imagine any personality in Irish politics having the same effect today.

Although I can’t say with any certainty that my father voted early, and can almost guarantee that he didn’t “vote often” I can say that he voted every time he was given the option.  It was important to him, and my mother and it rubbed off on me.  I don’t know which way he would have voted today, but I’m guessing he would have had strong opinions on both, and here’s another Bob telling it plainly and in a way my father would have appreciated.

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