Patrick Gormley St Johnston webmaster
My name is Patrick Gormley and I am a St Johnston man and have lived here most of my life. In my earlier days, I heard much about the oral history of the St Johnston and Carrigans area but unfortunately I was rather late in attaining a perception of how important this history was and is. I even turned down history as a Leaving Certificate subject when I was a student in the former Raphoe Vocational School. Not even participation in a FÁS Letterkenny Heritage Project ignited concern for the preservation of the precious memories of days gone by that lived in the people of St Johnston and Carrigans and their environs that were evaporating into oblivion.
In due
course, however, I realised that much of the St Johnston and Carrigans heritage
and tradition was vanishing. The decline of the senior populace, the
growing impact of modernity and the apathy of my own generation were the chief
determinants. This gave me a desire to do my part to help preserve as much
of the rich past as I could. My educational background is in IT, Accountancy
and have recently completed a Life Coaching Programme. So I had to educate
myself in the essentials of being an amateur historian and learn how to
investigate the past investigating and cross-check the information given.
In 2003, my concern for the rapid erosion of local oral history deepened and I set in motion some initial plans to help stem this. I soon decided that the best way to achieve this was through the help of St Johnston and Carrigans Family Resource Centre. It provided a locus where information could be gathered and contacts could be established. In that year, I was responsible for the St Johnston and Carrigans Newsletter and for providing informal and formal computer training. These roles created a context in which people could approach me and provide essential information. Gradually the thought that some medium through which this knowledge was communicated to the wider community needed to be established took hold of me. Was it going to be a book or a website? I settled on the latter as I knew that a website by nature would be fluid and malleable and could be continually improved on.
I attended the AGM of St Johnston and Carrigans Family Resource Centre in 2004 and became a member of the Management Committee with a view to volunteering my time to accomplish my goals pertaining to St Johnston and Carrigans history. Shortly after that, I formed the informal St Johnston and Carrigans Heritage Group. I left the committee to commence employment as IT Worker a role which enabled me to carry on my work of collecting information about the past. I spent a considerable amount of time scanning and copying photographs from times gone by both in my job and outside my job in a voluntary capacity. My work was exhibited during the Beltaine Festival in the Centre in 2005 and the first practical though slightly faltering steps towards creating a website for the area were taken. Through the years when I compiled and edited the newsletter and the St Johnston and Carrigans community notes, I frequently invited further information and drew attention to the website. The website www.stjohnstonandcarrigans.com went online in September 2005 and has been revised slowly but surely since then and enhanced. The replacement website went live in February 2011.
I wish to thank the Centre, staff and users and visitors. The Resource Centre funds the presence of the website on the internet and my research role is voluntary. The website has a special page to thank every one of the contributors and people who assisted me with information and photographs. Without the outstanding help I have received, none of this would have been possible. Thanks again everyone.
Here are some of excerpts from the website.
Roman Catholic baptismal records go back
as far as 1843.
James Crawford of Craighadoes
worked in the Forge as it was called. He was the last blacksmith
ever to have worked in the St Johnston and Carrigans area. He died in
1975. He was listed in the 1911 census as 13 years of age meaning he was
born in 1898 and he could read and write. The family was listed as living
in Craighadoes. His blacksmith father John was 45 and his mother Martha -
nee Galbraith - was 39. James' son John who died in 2007 chose not to
follow in his father's footsteps. The Crawford family is buried in the
churchyard at Ballylennon Presbyterian Church.
Bridie Lynch participated in Track and Field events at the 1996 Para Olympic Games in Atlanta where she gained a gold and a bronze medal.
The year 1938 saw great tragedy at Dunmore House, Carrigans. William George McClintock was shot by his mother Jennie, who suffered mental illness. She then shot herself. His distraught bride-to-be Miss Macworth committed suicide shortly after. The bodies of Jennie Margaret McClintock and William George McClintock and Miss Macworth were interred in the Churchyard of Killea Parish Church, Carrigans. They were buried on the day chosen by the tragic couple for their wedding. September 26th 1938 brought sadness to Carrigans village not the joy of a marriage. Macworth's dog Blarney was put to sleep and buried with her.
The oldest Presbyterian Congregation in the Laggan Valley was started at Monreagh in 1644 which was the year the first minister was installed. Monreagh also boasts the second oldest Presbyterian Church congregation in Ireland.
During the Siege of Derry 1689, King James II passed through the St Johnston and Carrigans area on his way to Derry which at that time was encapsulated within the city walls. At the start of the siege, St Johnston was used as the headquarters for King James II army. It is rumoured that the King spent a night or two in Steravage on the outskirts of the town but it is more plausible that if he stopped here then he in fact stayed at Mongavlin Castle.
A bloodcurdling murder took place
at the castle on the orders of the vengeful Inghean Dubh. This evil
was rooted in 1586 when her brother Alasdrann MacDonnell was murdered by Aodh
Mac an Deccanaigh O Gallagher. She got her revenge by having Aodh murdered
in turn at the Castle in 1588.
Here is a tale from World War II. One day during wartime, two men were ferreting
near St Johnston and Carrigans. Suddenly they heard an engine running and looked
up at the sky. It was a small German one man plane. It crashed. The occupant was
trapped inside. The men rushed to his assistance knowing there was a danger of
fire or even an explosion. They had bars to use for ferreting. They wielded
these bars to break the cockpit and helped the occupant out. The guards were
sent for and duly arrived. And the Irish Army came as well. They were satisfied
that the plane carried no bombs. The plane and the occupant were taken to
Baldoyle in Dublin.
FOLKLORE AND MY BINNION CHILDHOOD
My name is Patrick Gormley. In my earlier days, I heard much about the oral
history of the St Johnston and Carrigans area but unfortunately I was rather
late in attaining a perception of how important this history was and is. But
better late than never!
I was raised in Craighadoes, on the side of Binnion Hill, and was familiar with
much of the local folklore. It was a sort of an isolated existence – not exactly
old-fashioned or modern but a merging of the elements of both in such a way that
it was hard to distinguish one from the other.
I went to school in Drumucklagh just a few weeks short of my fifth birthday. I
remember feeling intimidated at the size of the school. Everything looks huge to
a small child.
The school was partitioned in two. Junior and High Infants, First Class and
Second Class were all put together in one room. Ethna McCloskey was my first
teacher. It was only when I went into the room for the higher class that I
realised that there was more to the world that just Ireland. Prior to then, I
thought Ireland was the only country there was.
Maths was my most detested subject and I can clearly remember the sums marked
out on the board as Tens and Units. I was no fan of Irish either. Religion was
very elementary and we got stickers with prayers and pictures to put in a book
reminiscent of a scrap book. Miss McCloskey used Ice Cream wafers to train us
for First Communion. As far as I was concerned, that was my Communion! I
perceived the real First Communion more as an excuse for receiving gifts of
money!
There was a well in a field nearby. Pupils were sternly warned to stay away from
it but that only planted in us the desire to go to it. I was caught trying to
make my way to it alone. Another rebellious thing I did was refusing to eat my
lunch. Lunch was bread jam and butter with a bottle of milk. The wooden floor
came in handy if I decided I wanted to bang my feet on it to make a racket.
We were warned that when playing with plasticine not to mix the different
colours together. We did and it became a bland brown colour.
I progressed rapidly in English and never was fond of games and just wanted to
read instead. I had a strange longing for a day when information could come at
the touch of a button. Little did I know that those days were coming.
My townland had strong traditions of occult lore such as ghosts and visits from
the Devil. The story of men playing cards nearby down a lane and the Devil
dressed in black coming to play was a scary one. The story of a neighbour and
two others meeting a woman dressed in white on the road near Carrickmore was
another chiller. The neighbour was undisturbed by what she saw but one of the
other witnesses was, as a consequence, psychologically troubled afterwards.
Another chiller was the Stumpy’s Brae story – a ghoulish resurrection story of a
man returning for his vengeance against his avaricious killers. The story of my
Uncle Bob having cycled over the Brae one night made it seem so real. He arrived
home in a state of incoherent terror but proved reticent in saying what scared
him at the Brae. I didn’t like to fear that there was something behind the tale.
I was prone to horrific nightmares as a child – maybe the ghostly tales had
something to do with that!
The Devil seemed to be feared so much that babies were never taken out of the
house except for the christening as it was thought to be bad luck. Christenings
took place as soon as possible after birth.
The bulb of some species of grass was known as Wee Folks Purdies. Having tasted
the bulb I began to doubt that the Wee Folk really boiled them for their spuds!
Reading the stories of changelings in Ireland’s Own issues with the Green Cover
was bittersweet. The changeling was one folklore tale I didn’t want to be true.
There were some people who I heard were classed as changelings. The changeling
was a wizened and sickly fairy child. A fairy woman would steal the baby from
the cot and take it away forever. She replaced the baby with her own child, the
changeling. Placing fire tongs nearby was a charm that allegedly deterred this
ghostly child-snatcher.
Despite the tradition that the Guinea Hen was bad luck, we got one. It got out
of my arms and was never seen again. Some would say that was luck! I believe I
was told to cut the feathers off one wing so it couldn’t fly. To be sure, my
contrarian self cut two wings but badly and it still got away like hopping.
Neighbours thought they could hear it on the hill for some time afterwards.
I liked the dock leaf for it had a reputation for healing and soothing nettle
stings. Sometimes I stung myself on purpose to try the dock on it. It really did
seem to work.
Washing the hair on Good Friday was thought to work as charm against getting
colds and flu.
Despite the warnings that it was bad luck, I did like to gather snowdrops and
take them into the house!
I remember my first visit to Mongavlin Castle. It was not the castle from the
fairy-tales that I kind of hoped I’d see. It was a ruin that even on a nice day
radiated gothic horror. I knew the rudiments of the tale of the wealthy and evil
lady who built it. She reputedly had a harem of Crawfords and her ghost enrobed
in white allegedly haunts the site and has been spotted even in houses nearby! I
remember feeling it was not a place I’d even want to think about at night!
It is interesting how the folklore and superstition I remember seems to have
disappeared today. Then I think how they have really just changed form and are
still with us in principle. They tend to be fads that come, morph and go in a
flash. Today’s folklore and superstition has a more scientific veneer! Like the
thought that you become immune to multi-vitamins if you take them beyond a few
months! How things change in so little a time!
FROM THE BOOK CELEBRATING THE RESOURCE CENTRE'S FIRST DECADE AN OPEN DOOR
Patrick Gormley
My name is Patrick Gormley and I am a St Johnston man and have lived here most of my life. The Resource Centre started off as St Johnston and Carrigans Resource Centre and a few years later it became St Johnston and Carrigans Family Resource Centre. The presence of the centre has been pivotal in my educational, social and working life.
The centre had been in use prior to its official opening. One evening in May 2000, the doors were opened and I joined members of the community to see the new centre for the first time. An evening of speeches and refreshments was held in the Main Hall. At that time, the Playgroup and the Health Centre was up and running too. I recall a talk about how the centre was the fruit of the work of the St Johnston and Carrigans Resource Group which was founded in 1995. The function of the centre was discussed and what stood out to me was the implementing of the Community Employment Scheme. This sounded like an impressive development for an area greatly disadvantaged by unemployment.
President Mary McAleese officially opened the Resource Centre on 9 May 2001. I remember the buzz and excitement leading up to the big day. It was a great honour to the St Johnston and Carrigans area to have such a distinguished visitor. Though I was unable to be there on the day, the people were able to fill me in on what happened. There was a guard of honour formed by the pupils of St Johnston, Castletown, Coxtown and Monreagh Schools. It was a day when local artists, community groups and Bridie Lynch, special Olympic gold medallist were given the honour of participating in the occasion.
In my earlier days, I heard much about the oral history of the St
Johnston and Carrigans area but unfortunately I was rather late in
attaining a perception of how important this history was and is. In
due course, however, I realised that much of the St Johnston and
Carrigans heritage and tradition was vanishing. The decline of the
senior populace, the growing impact of modernity which produced a
sense of rupture with the past were the chief determinants. This
gave me a desire to do my part to help preserve as much of the rich
history as I could. I had to educate myself in the essentials of
being an amateur historian and learn how to investigate the past
investigating and cross-check the information given.
In 2003, my concern for the rapid erosion of local oral history
deepened and I set in motion some initial plans to help stem this. I
soon decided that the best way to achieve this was through the help
of St Johnston and Carrigans Family Resource Centre. It provided a
locus where information could be gathered and contacts could be
established.
In that year, I was responsible for the St Johnston and Carrigans
Newsletter and for providing informal and formal computer training.
These roles created a context in which people could approach me and
provide essential information.
Gradually the thought that some medium through which this knowledge
was communicated to the wider community needed to be established
took hold of me. Was it going to be a book or a website? I settled
on the latter as I knew that a website by nature would be fluid and
malleable and could be continually improved on.
I attended the AGM of St Johnston and Carrigans Family Resource
Centre in 2004 and became a member of the Management Committee with
a view to volunteering my time to accomplish my goals pertaining to
St Johnston and Carrigans history. Shortly after that, I formed the
informal St Johnston and Carrigans Heritage Group. I left the
committee to commence employment as IT Worker in the centre. This
role enabled me to carry on my work of collecting information about
the past. I spent a considerable amount of time scanning and copying
photographs from times gone by both in my job and outside my job in
a voluntary capacity.
My work was exhibited during the Beltaine Festival in the Centre in
2005 and the first practical though slightly faltering steps towards
creating a website for the area were taken. Through the years when I
compiled and edited the newsletter and the St Johnston and Carrigans
community notes, I frequently invited further information and drew
attention to the website. The website www.stjohnstonandcarrigans.com
went online in September 2005 and has been revised slowly but surely
since then and enhanced. The revamped website went live in February
2011.
I wish to thank the Centre, staff and users and visitors. The
Resource Centre funds the presence of the website on the internet
and I am grateful to be able to volunteer for the centre to look
after the website. The website has a special page to thank every one
of the contributors and people who assisted me with information and
photographs. Without the outstanding help I have received, none of
this would have been possible. Thanks again everyone.