Born on January 1st, a Troubled Ringsend Child

 

Mary Anne Molloy grew up in Ringsend. Her father, up to 1829, owned the salt works that once operated where Ringsend Park is today. She was once described a ‘smart looking lassie’ but behind this evocative description lay a case of sadness. Born on January 1^st 1821 in what was then known as the Kings County, now County Offaly, her family moved to Ringsend when she was just three years old. The family however seemed to fall on hard times. Living in a tenement building on Thomas Street in Ringsend, Mary was to have a chequered career and would spend much of her life in and out of prison.

 

She was only 13 years old when in December 1834, she found herself in court charged, along with her brother Robert with stealing and umbrella and boots. She was sentenced to three months in Mountjoy Barracks, which housed many female inmates. The jail that we know today was not built until 1850. She was jailed again in November the following year for one month for stealing a handkerchief and in July 1836 she received a six-month sentence for yet again stealing a handkerchief, serving both terms in Mountjoy Prison. Stealing a silk handkerchief was a popular crime as they were easily fenced or sold on. The perpetrator would be charged with ‘felony handkerchief’ which for many the punishment was transportation to Australia. On June 2^nd, 1837, she was sentenced to three weeks in prison for ‘disturbing the peace’, this crime often associated with someone who was drunk on the streets of the city or being a lady of the night. This time, rather than Mountjoy, she served her sentence in Grangegorman’s women’s prison.  According to TU Dublin’s history of Grangegorman,

‘The year 1836 saw the building change uses again – this time pressed into service as a Women’s Prison, the only one of its kind in the British Isles. It even used female guards to maintain an exclusively female presence. The fate for many of its prisoners was transportation to Van Diemen’s Land (Tasmania) where they generally became servants. In fact, the Grangegorman Women’s Prison became a hub for female prisoners from all over Ireland who were first sent there to learn useful skills, such as needlework, before beginning the long journey to the southern hemisphere. In all, over 3,000 female prisoners and more than 500 of their children made the journey from Grangegorman to Van Diemen’s Land. Typically, the journey lasted more than 100 days and many perished on the way.’

 

Over the next seventeen years Mary would serve varying length for sentence seventeen times. In 1841 alone she was sentenced eight times for ‘Disturbing the Peace’ with sentences varying from five days to fourteen days. In 1845 as famine began to grip Ireland, she was sentenced ten times. On February 6^th, 1845, she was sentenced to ten months in Grangegorman for a breach of the peace. But as early as July she was before the courts again sentenced to seven days for a breach of the peace. On May 21^st she was sentenced to another ten months, this time having been convicted of assault. But whatever way the prison was working at the time, Mary was back in Ringsend within weeks only to be found guilty of assault once again in July and this time sentenced to 20 months but would be sentenced five more times that year. Many people at the time committed petty crimes in order to be sent to prison to get a dry roof over their heads and something to eat. Remarkably in 1845 she was sentenced to a total of over 1,300 days in prison, serving only a small percentage of those prison terms.

In 1845, February 19^th, Breach of the Peace (14 Days0 ; March 5^th, Breach of the Peace (14 Days); March 24^th, Breach of the Peace (14 Days); May 21^st Assault (10 Months); July 15^th, Assault (20 Months); October 2^nd, Breach of the Peace (14 Days); October 20^th, Breach of the Peace (14 Days); November 12^th, Assault (10 Months); December 10^th, Breach of the Peace (14 days); December 24^th, Breach of the Peace (1 Month) all served in Grangegorman.

 

In 1850 she briefly entered the North Dublin workhouse but lasted little over a week in there. One of the last recorded sentencings of Mary Molloy was in July 1851 when got a 14-day term for pawning a stolen vest and that despite earlier that year receiving a two-year sentence for being in possession of stolen goods. But in December 1854 she appeared in the newspaper having been charged with two other women of ‘bad character’ with robbing a James Prendergast in Flood Street. When they were convicted in February the following year it emerged that they had robbed him in their brothel, Mary now operating as a prostitute. In December 1860 along with Catherine Keogh they were accused of robbing John Ryan of fifteen schillings once again in the brothel on Flood Street. Mary was discharged while Keogh was sent forward for trial that never took place. Mary died suddenly in Flood Street in 1864 from what the coroner concluded was a burst blood vessel in the brain.

The Original Shamrock Rovers

 

Shamrock Rovers are among the League of Ireland clubs that have competed in European tournaments and are the most successful club in the Republic. According to their website, Shamrock Rovers was founded in the Ringsend/Irishtown area in 1899. The website states,

‘the name of the club was taken from Shamrock Avenue where the committee had a facility for staging their meetings.’

There is the terrace chant ‘there’s only one Shamrock Rovers’ but alas this is not factually correct as we search through the archives.

 

A search through the newspaper archives shows us that there was a Shamrock Rovers club operating in Ireland a decade before the Rovers of Ringsend were formed. In 1887, Joseph Boylan, a future curate at St. Patrick’s catholic church in Lisburn founded Shamrock Rovers FC as a junior soccer club playing their home games in Lisburn, just south of Belfast. As a result, the team was often referred to as the ‘Catholic Rovers’. In 1888 Shamrock Rovers won the local Lisburn District League, taking the step up to junior football the following season. The club seemed to go from success to success and were now fielding a reserve side as well. By the early 1890’s their fixtures included games against Glenavon, a newly founded Linfield and a second Linfield catholic club ‘The Lingfield Swifts’. There move up divisions initially started with success with The Ulster Football News reporting in September 1890,

‘Shamrock Rovers had a visit from the Melrose team at Lisburn on Saturday and licked them 5 goals to nil.’

But in subsequent years the efforts to keep a winning side together proved difficult for Rovers. In their league were teams like Distillery, still operating in the northern league, Washington, a very successful junior club in Belfast and other clubs like Emerald Star, Glenville, Ligoneil, Botanic and Woodland.

By 1894 when they were playing against Roseville, they were favourites to win the junior cup competition known as The Oliver Medals Competition. Alas they were beaten in the quarter finals, but they did attract a large crowd of spectators for a friendly match against a visiting Blackburn Rovers.  

 

In March 1889, the then club Secretary Joseph Rice wrote a letter to the newspapers refuting allegations from Oxford FC that they were ill treated by both Shamrocks Rovers players and spectators and countering that the Oxford team stormed of the pitch at Lisburn following a dispute a possible handball prior to Rover’s goal. No VAR in those days.

 

For many years the club’s secretary was Richard Waring who lived on Sloan Street with his wife and eight children. An engine fitter by trade, his father was a publican at one time in Lisburn. One of Rovers’ great rivalries was against Woodland who played their home games at Ormeau Park. Woodlands FC originated from the Belfast shipyards, with deep connections to former shipyard workers and a traditional East Belfast identity.

 In 1915 the Ringsend based Shamrock Rovers defeated Derry Celtic Swifts to win the Irish Junior Cup. However, their win was tainted when their talented centre half James Sims when he was killed in a boating accident off the Pigeon House. Back in Lisburn their Rovers team had slipped from league status by the early years of the twentieth century, but another Shamrock Rovers emerged in the 1930’s in Armagh with Ireland’s Saturday Night sports newspapers reporting in 1936,

‘A fair-sized crowd saw Lisburn whack Shamrock Rovers by four goals to two at the Wallace Park in their opening fixture in the Minor League competition but they bounced back a week later.

SAVOY UTD. v. SHAMROCK ROVERS. Played at Victoria Park, Teams: Savoy Utd: Cleland: Shaw, Kirkwood, Rainey, Lappin, Millar, Davidson, Johnstone, White. Cranston, & Clarke. Shamrock Rovers: Chambers, Connor, Vennard, Lemon, Curragh, Scott, McAllister, M'Creery, Braden, Clarke, & Campbell. After a brisk opening. Braden scored with a fine shot which beat Cleland well. The same player scored a second. Campbell scored a third. Half-time-Shamrock Rovers 3: Savoy Utd. nil. Clarke scored with a fine shot from the wing. Braden was fouled inside the penalty box and, from the resulting free. McCreary scored. Result—Shamrock Rovers 4; Savoy United 1.’

A Shamrock Rovers appeared in the sports pages during the war years in 1944 playing in the Mid Ulster league with league games against a local RAF team and both Glenavon and Portadown juniors. Yet another Shamrock Rovers appears in the sports pages of the Derry Journal in 1948. The under 18 minor cup final run under the auspices of the North-est of Ireland Football Association was between Shamrock Rovers (Derry) and Iona Swifts (Waterside). Admission was 6d with the notice ‘all must pay’ and there was a 3d supplement for anyone who wanted to be seated in the stand of the Brandywell.

 

In 1983 Newry based Shamrock Rovers played in the Irish Junior Cup Final against Crewe United from Lisburn. Rovers, sponsored by the Bass Brewery the game was played at Mountainview Park in Lurgan. Crewe however beat Rivers one nil to win the trophy. Meanwhile in 2025 the now Tallaght based Shamrock Rovers collected their first league and cup double since 1987 and reached the group stages in Europe competition.

The History of Rowing Clubs in Ringsend

 

THIS SATURDAY DECEMBER 13TH 2025

 

When Ringsend Was Centre of the World 1961

 

In 1961, Ringsend found itself at the heart of Catholic pageantry when the Papal Legate of Pope John 23rd, Cardinal Gregorio Pietro Agagianian arrived in the capital as part of the Patrician Year celebrations.  The Pope despatched the Armenian born cleric to Ireland, arriving at Dublin airport to be greeted by the Taoiseach Sean Lemass and the Archbishop of Dublin John Charles McQuaid. 

The celebrations were to coincide with the 1,500^th anniversary of the death of St. Patricks and as the church in Ringsend was the only Catholic church at the time dedicated to the national saint in the city, it was appropriate that this major event take place here. His itinerary outside Dublin included a visit to the Medical Missionaries of Mary in Drogheda, and to Cork, where he suggested that Irish emigration has been a providential method of spreading the Catholic Faith through the English-speaking world. The Cardinal received an honorary degree from President Eamon de Valera in his capacity as Chancellor of the National University of Ireland, then came a visit to the library of Sir Alfred Chester Beatty and celebrate mass in Croke Park but it was his visit to Ringsend that garnered much of the headlines.

He arrived at a suitably decorated Ringsend Park, in front of thousands of people, where a military guard of honour, drawn from the Irish naval service was inspected by the Cardinal. The was to bless the foundation stone for Our Lady’s Memorial to be built on the South Wall as a beacon for mariners entering and exiting the port. Thousands of pounds had been raised by the dockers and fishermen of the locality to pay for the 60ft memorial which would be illuminated at night as a beacon of hope and safety. 

But despite the best efforts of the local Raytown people and it’s newsworthy start, the planned site was withdrawn as the ESB decided to expand their Poolbeg facility, and a new search began. After numerous proposals and failed to materialise plans eventually ‘Realt na Mara’ designed by Wicklow man Cecil King and standing 60ft tall was erected in 1972 but not on the southside of the River Liffey but at Dollymount where it still stands today. It was unveiled on September 24th, 1972, by Archbishop McQuaid. 

                                    

                                                 

                                  

   

If you want to see some coverage of the visit to Ringsend watch this. 

https://ifiarchiveplayer.ie/hail-glorious-saint-patrick/

The Unveiling of the James Plunkett Kelly Plaque, Bath Street Irishtown

 

(c) RDHS 2025

The Ringsend & Districts Historical Society were delighted to unveil a plaque at 20 Bath Street, Irishtown, the birthplace of author and trade union activist James Plunkett Kelly. The ‘Strumpet City’ author was born here in 1920 and this unique piece of local history was unveiled on Saturday November 1^st 2025.

 

The organising committee of the RDHS and Paul Brannock (facilitator) would like to thank the following people for their support with this project:

Dearbhla McCormick – The current owner of 20 Bath Street, who kindly provided permission to place the plaque on her home.

Valerie and the family of James who attended on the day

Robert Ballagh – Artist

Ruth Hegarty – Actor

Vincent McCabe – Actor

Angela Harding – Actor

Gerry O’Brien – Actor

(All of whom appeared in the 1980 RTE TV adaptation of Strumpet City)

Brian Murray – Actor sent his best wishes but was unable to attend.

The Merry Cobbler Pub and The Stafford Family for their sponsorship and hosting the after event.

The Staff of the Merry Cobbler

Joe Boland – Nephew of James

Gerry Burke – Fixing the Plaque

John J. Cooke & Sons – Woodworkers

Francis Harrison – Special Decorated Cakes

The Irish Labour History Society

News Four & Editor Louise Whelan

And to ALL those who attended on that very special day.

James Plunkett Kelly's granddaughter speaking at the unveiling

Thanks to Paul Brannock, Louise Whelan and Billy Ryan for the photos and video

BRAM STOKER IN RINGSEND