Galway in Days Gone By
Galway In Days Gone By
1918
Shooting outrage
From further particulars regarding the firing at Mr. J.G. Alcorn, J.P., Kilroe House, Headford, while on his way to Mass at Currandulla, it appears that his assailant had fired the shot when Mr. Alcorn had gone on some yards past the point where he was concealed behind the hedge.
It seems that a woman on her way from early Mass met Mr. Alcorn and the man, Burke, who were on a car on the road just opposite the place where the person was concealed, and this evidently prevented his firing when he had Mr. Alcorn in a direct range, as he was probably afraid of shooting the woman.
Five bullets lodged in Mr. Alcorn’s jaw and neck. The remainder of the charge lodged in the two heavy coats which he was wearing, thereby saving him from being seriously wounded in the side and shoulders.
With blood flowing freely from the wounds in his jaw and neck, Mr. Alcorn attended at Mass, and after it was over, addressed the congregation outside the chapel.
He told the people of what had occurred to him, and said he was sorry he had not been shot dead, instead of being left alive in a place where there were such savages as those who perpetrated such an outrage. He never thought that there were such people in Annaghdown.
Mr. Alcorn was afterwards treated at the Monastery, and had his wounds dressed. The report concludes with the usual formula, “No arrests have been made”.
The local Catholic Curate also denounced the outrage strongly at Mass.
1943
Seaside licensing laws
In addition to providing both open-air and indoor amusements for Salthill during the past twelve months, and securing a good deal of first-class publicity for the place, the Salthill Citizens’ Organisation has asked other Irish seaside resorts to cooperate in obtaining an amendment of the licensing laws.
This was revealed at the annual meeting of the organisation, which drew a large attendance to the Salthill Pavilion on Friday night. It was also stated that a sub-committee had acquired a lease of the Pavilion for twelve months.
To secure some relief from the provision of the Licensing Laws, the Committee sponsored an application for an exemption order, on behalf of the licensing trade generally.
A resolution was to be sent to the organising bodies in other seaside reports asking for their cooperation in obtaining the amendment of the Licensing Laws “which, as at present constituted, are most unfair to seaside resorts and visitors”.
Salthill school
The need for a school at Salthill was stressed at the meeting of the Salthill Citizens’ Organisation. It was pointed out that at present, little children in the district had to travel a long way to school and, because of the restricted ’bus service, were not always able to get a seat on a ’bus on wet days.
Oat crop rumour
Mr. Fitzgerald-Kenney stated in the Dáil on Thursday that a new disease had appeared in the oat crop in the West. He asked for official views on the matter. Mr. B. O’Sullivan, Secretary of the County Galway Committee of Agriculture, interviews by a Connacht Tribune representative on the following day, stated that he had heard nothing about a new disease in the oat crop in the West, and added that there were already plenty of old ones.
For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.
Get the Connacht Tribune Live app
The Connacht Tribune Live app is the home of everything that is happening in Galway City and county. It’s completely FREE and features all the latest news, sport and information on what’s on in your area. Click HERE to download it for iPhone and iPad from Apple’s App Store, or HERE to get the Android Version from Google Play.
1921
Treatment of women
At the meeting of the Galway Board of Guardians on Wednesday, Mr. Pk. Thornton in the chair, a discussion took place regarding the admission of women with illegitimate children.
Mr. Cooke said that it was one of those questions which the Dáil Éireann was trying to solve. The assistant clerk said that Galway was only a small place in comparison to other places.
A member said that these people were coming in month after month, and it was perfectly scandalous.
Mrs. Young said that the practice should be stopped as in England. The assistant clerk said that they had laws of their own in England in regard to this matter. Mrs. Young said that it was a matter that the guardians should go into.
Clerk: So these women assist in washing and scrubbing, Mr. O’Toole?
Master: Yes, they do.
Mrs. Young: Until you tackle the thing, you can never make much headway. The nuns were terrified by some of them who absolutely refused to work.
Mr. Cooke: They should be cleared out.
Chairman: It is not fair for any able-bodied woman to be in the workhouse at the ratepayers’ expense.
The clerk said that this question was one of the most difficult which had confronted Dáil Éireann, and they were looking the matter up.
Profiteering black spot
Galway is the blackest spot in Ireland for profiteering. It is maintaining its inglorious record in extortion – a record that all but killed the race meeting some years ago and diverted the stream of visitors from the town for nearly a decade.
If this flagrant profiteering continues, it will have the result of reducing the city ultimately to poverty, whilst the few grow rich. The economic balance must be maintained. Elsewhere desperate efforts are being made to maintain it.
Prices must come back. Labour in Galway has done absolutely nothing to bring them back, because Labour in Galway appears to be less intelligently led than elsewhere. Yet unemployment is rife amongst us, poverty is already knocking consistently at the door of not a few, wages are falling and must fall.
For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.
Connacht Tribune Digital Edition App
Download the Connacht Tribune Digital Edition App to access to Galway’s best-selling newspaper.
Click HERE to download it for iPhone and iPad from Apple’s App Store, or HERE to get the Android Version from Google Play.
Or purchase the Digital Edition for PC, Mac or Laptop from Pagesuite HERE.
Get the Connacht Tribune Live app
The Connacht Tribune Live app is the home of everything that is happening in Galway City and county. It’s completely FREE and features all the latest news, sport and information on what’s on in your area. Click HERE to download it for iPhone and iPad from Apple’s App Store, or HERE to get the Android Version from Google Play.
1921
Life in internment
A Gort man at Ballykinlar sends to the West and interesting account of the conditions in the internment camp, where so many men from our country are at present held prisoner without charge every having been preferred against them, without trial or conviction.
There are some disturbing features in his report, the cause of which might well be removed at this period when the Truce is being so well observed, when peace is in the air. For instance, he begins by the complaint that whilst the English papers are freely delivered, there is difficulty in getting their own papers.
“The camp,” he goes on, “is an improvement on the Earl’s Island death trap or the Town Hall poison den. There is a greater sense of security here than in either of those places. The food is inadequate, and doubtful of quality, as you may have seen by the Press. The men here have to put up a great fight against the ennui, which anyone acquainted with internment has experienced. Physical development classes and outdoor sports, football, handball and hurling, have kept their devotees fit and energetic, but the vitality is slowly and surely ebbing away.
“Exercises are being less violently participated in, brisk walks are being less frequently indulged in, and a general apathy and listlessness, hardly observable as yet, is, nevertheless, gradually setting in.
“The education board, which owes a lot to Mr. O’Connell, Duniry, to whom all students are deeply indebted, has been instrumental in endowing many of the boys with a liberal increase to their attainments (a description of the work would require a great deal of space), and has provided a much-needed antidote to the deterioration of the mind, which is so invariably associated with internment. The study of Gaelic has pride of place in the curriculum, and many students have made great headway. It is not unusual to find half-a-dozen in a hut almost at any hour carrying on a laboured conversation in Irish or debating some of the finer points in grammar. I believe one f the boys (none of them had a word of Irish coming in) passed for a fáinne at the recent examination.
“Hobbies in arts and crafts have an enormous sway, and a surprising amount of latent talent has been discovered and developed. Silver rings, chased, engraved and inset, have been made from silver coins, that, placed beside the finished works at Faller’s or Dillon’s, would not cause the designs to blush! Bones, more plentiful than meat at the cookhouse, have been manufactured into brooches of beautiful and distinctive design, which, I am sure, will be seen gracing the fair necks of favoured colleens later on.”
For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.
Connacht Tribune Digital Edition App
Download the Connacht Tribune Digital Edition App to access to Galway’s best-selling newspaper.
Click HERE to download it for iPhone and iPad from Apple’s App Store, or HERE to get the Android Version from Google Play.
Or purchase the Digital Edition for PC, Mac or Laptop from Pagesuite HERE.
Get the Connacht Tribune Live app
The Connacht Tribune Live app is the home of everything that is happening in Galway City and county. It’s completely FREE and features all the latest news, sport and information on what’s on in your area. Click HERE to download it for iPhone and iPad from Apple’s App Store, or HERE to get the Android Version from Google Play.
1921
Outdated laws
Ireland obtained her workhouses from the famine. They were erected to ameliorate a condition of things brought about by an alien government – a condition which historians unite in declaring could have been avoided.
On the 25th March, 1846, Tuam, Castlerea, Cahirciveen, and Clifden workhouses were opened, and a rate was struck on the Clifden union. The Tuam workhouse was contracted for July, 1840, at a cost of £7,600 for building and completion and £1,400 for fittings and contingencies.
It was made to accommodate 800 persons but in 1851 it housed no fewer than 2,881 paupers. Sheds had to be extemporised to afford a roof to those who had been stricken by the famine, and scenes of horror were enacted there during the period of the Black Death.
The workhouses also are a landmark of the fact that in these famine years Ireland’s population was reduced practically by half, and that so impoverished had the country become that it was unable any longer to maintain even the 4½ millions left without workhouses.
At present, on the eve of happier times, an effort is being made to reduce public expenditure and divert public monies into more profitable channels by amalgamating existing unions, and thus reducing their number.
Some have claimed that this is a question upon which the ratepayers ought to have been consulted and that in any drastic scheme of reform they should have a voice. None will dispute however that reform is absolutely necessary, and the sooner it comes the better.
The poor, no doubt, we shall always have with us, but when employment is revived throughout Ireland, and wages and the cost of living are reduced, we feel convinced that pauperism in this country will largely disappear and that public monies can thenceforth be utilised much more profitably than in maintaining an army of officials.
The neighbouring county of Mayo has drawn up an elaborate scheme of union amalgamation which the secretary of the county council has courteously forwarded to us. We hope to deal with this scheme fuller in our next issue.
For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.
Connacht Tribune Digital Edition App
Download the Connacht Tribune Digital Edition App to access to Galway’s best-selling newspaper.
Click HERE to download it for iPhone and iPad from Apple’s App Store, or HERE to get the Android Version from Google Play.
Or purchase the Digital Edition for PC, Mac or Laptop from Pagesuite HERE.
Get the Connacht Tribune Live app
The Connacht Tribune Live app is the home of everything that is happening in Galway City and county. It’s completely FREE and features all the latest news, sport and information on what’s on in your area. Click HERE to download it for iPhone and iPad from Apple’s App Store, or HERE to get the Android Version from Google Play.
Boil water notice issued for Barna area
Man missing from Athenry found safe and well
County planners back Renville sports facility after second bid to bring amenity to Oranmore
1,163 new cases of COVID-19 nationally
Coming up on FYI Galway@5
Landmark Oasis nightclub in Salthill demolished
Up to 500 construction jobs to be created in new ‘City North’
Plan for ‘world-class’ campus with potential for 10,000 jobs at Galway Airport
Win a fantastic seven-night Mediterranean cruise in this week’s Connacht Tribune
Galway City Council knocks new wall – so they can build it again!
