Rowing History in Ringsend

 

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Ringsend and the Famine, An Rinn agus an Gorta Mor

 

I recently visited the National Famine Museum in Strokestown and even though I learned any of the facts in school, when it is presented to you in its rawest form, it is still overwhelming especially with so many of the personal stories and tragedies of Roscommon. While a nation struggled with the onset of famine in 1845, how was Ringsend coping? The 1841 census put the local population as Sandymount 1,142, Irishtown 1,109 and Ringsend 1,755, a total of 4,006

 

In May 1845, crowds lined the Liffey wall to watch a three-boat race on the river with the Dublin Rowing Club hosting the event and in October, The National Glass Company was announcing that it was expanding its business in Ringsend. Business was good in Ringsend and the number of vessels using the Grand Canal basin expanded and even more as thousands made their way to Dublin to escape the famine first from Dublin to Liverpool and onwards to new lives in North America and Australia, if they survived the journey.

 

The following year the 135 foot long The Shamrock was launched from Mr. Barrington’s Foundry in Ringsend. It was the first iron-screw steamer to be built in Dublin for the British and Irish Shipping.

 

 In 1847, the Dublin Reproductive Institution was founded in Ringsend by Falconer Miles. That may sound like a fertility clinic, but it was in fact a very successful organisation to ‘give temporary employment to the industrious poor of the neighbourhood.’ They instructed locals to improve skills including carpentry, building, cooking and even made mats and collected chopped wood and sold it on hand carts travelling until the cart was empty. To alleviate some of the poor lifestyle, the institution would pay the men daily to keep a roof over their heads and food in the family’s stomachs.

 

In April 1847 Devon born William Pullen was a new father, his son William was born. The family were from the Torbay fishermen who settled in Ringsend and created a fishing industry using their skills and technique from England. Pullen was the owner of the Ringsend based fishing smack the Bessy.

On 13th April 1847, the paddle steamer ‘Granna Uile' ( a Gaelic version of Grainne O’Malley) left Liverpool port bound for Drogheda at 8p.m. with 90 aboard and carrying a cargo of grain, urgently required for a starving Ireland and flax. Many of the passengers were returning to Ireland after failing to secure passage to America to avoid the famine. At 6a.m. on April 14^th she went on fire north off Lambay Island. In a rush for the two lifeboats after the ‘Fire’ alert was given, several passengers were drowned.  Captain Thomas Rawdon thought he could make port but at 7a.m. the fishing smack 'Bessy' came alongside and rescued all on deck except, Captain Rowden.  He was killed during a rescue attempt when he used a lifebelt and jumped into the sea but was caught in his ships wash. His body was dragged into the Bessy.  The Bessy made her way to Dublin with 68 survivors uncomfortably packed aboard, reaching the quayside in Ringsend at 6p.m. Twenty-three of the survivors were crew members.

 

According to ‘The Torbay Fishermen in Ringsend’ by Edmond P. Symes,

‘On board the Bessy with Captain Pullen were the mate, John Parker; a young man, George Upham, and a boy apprentice, William Symes. George Upham was related to Elizabeth Upham who had married Prince Symes in Brixham. Indeed, he was now also related by marriage to Captain Pullen, who ten years earlier had married Anna Maria Syms, daughter of Prince and Elizabeth. The boy, William, then aged 12, was their grandson.’

 

The company secretary of the Drogheda Team Packet Company Patrick Ternan organised the sum of fifty shillings as a reward for Captain Pullen and his crew.

In October 1850, the landlord of the Pembroke Estate Sir Sydney Herbert arrived in Ringsend and at a crowded meeting Herbert was praised by local politicians and the clergy alike for keeping the most serious effects of famine out of Ringsend.

‘The practice of other landlords was to send the crowbar brigade to demolish the dwellings of the starving populace, the intention of the Honourable S. Herbert was to erect houses for the poor (cheers of hear hear). Although here were some poor in the neighbourhood, there was not a single death from starvation during the famine in consequence of the help and employment given by Mr Herbert to the poor of the locality’

(Freemans Journal October 19^th 1850)

In April 1851 to great fanfare locally seven vessels of the Austrian Navy under Captain Garguravich arrived in Ringsend. This was a third of the entire navy. At 8am on Sunday morning, with many of the senior personnel attending mass in St Andrews Westland Row, three of the ships fired 21-gun salutes in the harbour. This was repeated at noon but a planned salute at 6pm was cancelled due to heavy rain in the area.

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King James II at the Battle of Ringsend 1690

 

The Battle of the Boyne was described as ‘a family squabble between a Protestant Dutchman fighting a Catholic Scotsman in Ireland for the possession of the English Crown with the influence and finances of the Pope[1] in Rome supporting the Protestant William’. William’s force of 36,000 was made up of Englishmen, Dutch, German, French, Danish, Finns, Prussians, Swiss and Irish, while the opposing Jacobite’s were made up Irish, Scottish and French.

 

However, before the Battle of the Boyne in July 1690, on Good Friday April 4^th that year, King James II, along with a large force of soldiers and supporters departed Dublin Castle and headed to Ringsend. He was in the fight of his life as he battled William of Orange for the British Crown. James II was buoyed by the fact that a number of French ships had entered Dublin Bay and anchored believing that they had brought munitions and goods to support his battle.

 

King James crossed the Dodder over the new bridge at Ringsend that had only been completed in 1650. He made his way down Thorncastle Street, with the crowd following the King getting bigger by the mile. He arrived at the River Liffey edge and spotted a French frigate at the mouth of the river.  The ship moved up the Liffey passed Poolbeg and anchored just offshore.

 

From around the Hill of Howth appeared the Monmouth captained by Sir Cloudsley Shovel. He had commanded the smaller HMS Monck but transferred to the larger Monmouth when he came into the bay. The Monmouth was commanded by Captain William Wright, The Monck was a 52-gun frigate that had been launched in 1659[2], while the Monmouth was a 66-gun vessel[3]. As captain of the Monck, he had just been into Belfast harbour delivering supplies to William of Orange’s 20,000 troops who had landed in Belfast in August 1689 under Marshal Hermon von Schomberg. Shovel was making his way back when he spotted the French frigate in Dublin Bay. The French vessels sixteen guns being outnumbered by Shovel’s vessel.

 Just as King James and his supporters lined the edge of the Liffey, Shovel opened fire and the Battle of Ringsend began in full view on the onlookers. The power of the British navy was on full display and in order to protect life, the French captain, Captain Bennet[4], ran his ship aground and his men took to boats using the ship to hide their escape, landing in Ringsend and joined James’s troops as they made their way back to Dublin Castle. The escape had cost the lives of seven of the forty sailors on board. A British ship got stranded as the tide went out, some of the French naval men ashore grabbed horses and set out in ‘bravado’ firing their pistols at the stranded soldiers. Fire was returned and one ‘Frenchman had the horse shot from under him and was forced to fling off his jack boots and run back in his stockings to save himself. Some of the seamen went ashore and took his saddle and furniture, when the tide came in, they went off with their prize to the ships.’ Shovel’s men boarded the run aground French vessel and seized weapons, silver and other valuables.

 

Once ashore in Ringsend, the French reportedly made full use of the Kings Head Tavern in Ringsend before James’s men moved them out of the village but according to a report written by the Marquess of Ormonde,

‘The barbarous rudeness of the French soldiers was now the whole subject of discourse, about sixty, coming up as guard to the French General's goods, were quartered in Lazy Hill[5] for three nights, in which time they murdered one or two women and ravished one or two, and were so insolent that one who quartered two of them gave twelve shillings to  buy his peace those three nights.’

According to a contemporary report,

‘King James went back much dissatisfied and, it was reported he bellowed, that all Protestants in Ireland were of Cromwell’s breed and deserved to have their throats cut.’

 

 

The French Navy were already smarting after their loss to their British and Dutch counterparts at the Battle of Beachy Head in July 1690.

William of Orange landed in Carrickfergus, Northern Ireland on June 14^th, 1690, taking command of 36,000 men. The vessel he travelled on was captained by Shovel and was promoted to Rear Admiral for his work, getting command of a new ship, the HMS Royal William. William of Orange began to march south and the Williamites to battle the forces of King James on the banks of the River Boyne.

One lasting connection to the Battle of Ringsend was Marguetitte Ferguiaret who was born In Dublin in 1690 when one of the French sailors married a local Ringsend woman only named as Catherine. Margueitte died aged 21 back in her father’s birthplace of France.

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[1] Pope Innocent

[2] Shipwrecked in 1720

[3] Ended its life on the seas undefeated in 1767

[4] The Bennet Bank is a named maritime area of the Dublin Bay

[5] Lazy Hill is Townsend Street today