Lough Swilly Research Articles

DEEP FUTURES: FANTASTICAL BORDERLANDS OF IRELAND AND NORTHERN IRELAND, 2200

The long-term effects of climate change will supersede the implications of political demarcations and divisions. Within this context, “Fantastical Borderlands” proposes a rewilded territory, a landscape of slowness, for the Irish Northwest that encapsulates the northern borderlands between Ireland and Northern Ireland. This landscape emerges as a result of the significant reduction of grazing and the anticipated flooding of low-lying lands between Lough Foyle and Lough Swilly. The narrative process considers how flood risk might be managed in conjunction with the initiation of an ambitious rewilding scheme, while remaining sensitive to landscapes of deep cultural connection. By the “reverse time capsule” with performance and exhibition, “Fantastical Borderlands” is narrated from 2200 via a series of vignettes that reflect actions taken during the two centuries prior; the years surrounding Brexit serve as a catalyst for landscape change for the border landscape. The project is liberated from its constraints to near-term planning propositions, instead enabling a focus on landscape impacts that are revealed only at extended timeframes. Ultimately, the project asks: What is the role of storytelling and mythmaking in illuminating current realities and distant futures?

Intertidal Fish Traps from Ireland: Some Recent Discoveries in Lough Swilly, Co. Donegal

Fish traps are one of the most widespread and enduring features of the maritime landscape. Recent research in Ireland has identified a great number of traps, most of which date from the early to late medieval periods. This paper presents the findings of a recent survey of Lough Swilly in north-western Ireland where a series of fish traps offers new insights into the survival, diversity and role of these sites in the post-medieval period.

The Writings of Theobald Wolfe Tone 1763-98, Volume III: France, the Rhine, Lough Swilly and Death of Tone, January 1797 to November 1798 - Edited by T. W. Moody, R. B. McDowell and C. J. Woods

The Writings of Theobald Wolfe Tone 1763-98, Volume III: France, the Rhine, Lough Swilly and Death of Tone, January 1797 to November 1798 - Edited by T. W. Moody, R. B. McDowell and C. J. Woods

Morphogenetic diversity and biotoxin composition of Alexandrium (Dinophyceae) in Irish coastal waters

The diversity of Alexandrium spp. in Irish coastal waters was investigated through the morphological examination of resting cysts and vegetative cells, the determination of PSP toxin and spirolide profiles and the sequence analysis of rDNA genes. Six morphospecies were characterised: A. tamarense, A. minutum, A. ostenfeldii, A. peruvianum, A. tamutum and A. andersoni. Both PSP toxin producing and non-toxic strains of A. tamarense and A. minutum were observed. The average toxicities of toxic strains for both cultured species were respectively 11.3 (8.6 S.D.) and 2.3 (0.5 S.D.) pg STX equiv. cell −1. Alexandrium ostenfeldii and A. peruvianum did not synthesise PSP toxins but HPLC–MS analysis of two strains showed distinct spirolide profiles. A cyst-derived culture of A. peruvianum from Lough Swilly mainly produced spirolides 13 desmethyl-C and 13 desmethyl-D whereas one of A. ostenfeldii, from Bantry Bay, produced spirolides C and D. Species identification was confirmed through the analyses of SSU, ITS1-5.8S-ITS2 and LSU rDNA genes. Some nucleotide variability was observed among clones of toxic strains of A. tamarense, which all clustered within the North American clade. However, rDNA sequencing did not allow discrimination between the toxic and non-toxic forms of A. minutum. Phylogenetic analysis also permitted the differentiation of A. ostenfeldii from A. peruvianum. Resting cysts of PSP toxin producing Alexandrium species were found in Cork Harbour and Belfast Lough, locations where shellfish contamination events have occurred in the past, highlighting the potential for the initiation of harmful blooms from cyst beds. The finding of supposedly non-toxic and biotoxin-producing Alexandrium species near aquaculture production sites will necessitate the use of reliable discriminative methods in phytoplankton monitoring.

A-level Geography Decision-Making Exercises in a Virtual Learning Environment

This article examines a pilot project of collaborative group work and decision-making exercises (DMEs) in A-level geography, within a Virtual Leanzing Environment (VLE). The DME was developed specifically for this project and examines the issues surrounding aquaculture in Lough Swilly in County Donegal. The VLE allowed pupils from two geographically distant schools to have access to a range of content and communication tools. The pupils collaborated electronical~y within groups of four (two pupils from each school) over a period of twelve days to prepare a presentation about their decisions in relation to the case study. Levels of JCT skills, and of collaborative engagement with this DME, varied across the groups, but in both there was evidence that the process was valuable. Ways in which the project can be developed are suggested.

Heroines or Victims? The Women of the Flight of the Earls

New Hibernia Review 7.1 (2003) 69-74 [Access article in PDF] Heroines or Victims? The Women of the Flight of the Earls Jerrold Casway [Figures] The Flight of the Earls in September, 1607, was a miscalculated strategem neither anticipated nor welcomed by Catholic Europe. No vindications can refute that the earls, intimidated by the course of their failing political circumstances, hoped their appearance on the Continent would elicit greater support from their alleged benefactors, Europe's Catholic monarchies. A neglected side of this event has been the roles of the women caught up in this intemperate exodus. 1 Drawing on contemporary accounts and participant lists, it can be deduced that "3 score soldiers," including the crew of a "French barque," 2 took about sixty-five to seventy people to the Continent. 3 Among the refugees who boarded the eighty-ton vessel at Lough Swilly, seventeen passengers were women. Four can be identified by name, three through marital ties, and ten by their service affiliations. "That foreign ship has three of our women, of the nobles of the soil of Banba, the gentle ladies from Erin for whose loss all sorrowed." [End Page 56] 4 Catherine, Countess O'Neill, daughter of Sir Hugh Magennis and sister to Sir Arthur Magennis, the first viscount of Iveagh, became Hugh O'Neill's fourth wife in 1598. By the time of the flight, Catherine had given birth to three sons: Sean (John), Brian (Bernard) and Con (Constantine). The second woman was Nuala O'Donnell, the sister of Hugh Roe O'Donnell, lord of Tyrconnell and aunt of Rory O'Donnell, earl of Tyrconnell. Eldest of the noble women, Nuala O'Donnell had formerly been married to her first cousin Nial Garve O'Donnell. After ten years of marriage, she left her husband in 1600 after he had made a separate peace with the English. Finally, there was Rosa O'Dogarty, daughter of Sir John O'Dogarty, lord of Inishowen, and sister to Sir Cahir O'Dogarty, who married Cathbar, the earl of Tyrconnell's brother. They had one child, Hugh, after three years of marriage. Among the other women identified by name is Caecilia O'Gallagher. She and her husband were the foster parents of Rory O'Donnell's son, Hugh. Caecilia served as the child's wet nurse and looked after the youngster until February, 1608, when he was given over to the Convent of the Dames Blanches in Louvain. Another nurse to the infant O'Donnell is known, Anna ny Madden, the wife of Dennis O'Kelly. There is no evidence, however, that she accompanied the earls abroad. 5 The other women can be identified by their spouses. They include a nurse, the wife of Tyrconnell's steward, Edward "Groom" MacDavid. 6 The other two affiliated women were the spouses of Sean O'Hagan, Tyrone's rent collector, and Art Oge O'Neill, Tyrone's nephew, the son of Sir Cormack MacBaron O'Neill. The remaining ten ladies are unnamed servants who attended the children and the three noble women. Catherine O'Neill had two "amas" [nurses] and three "criadas" [maidservants], Nuala O'Donnell had one "dama" [lady-in-waiting] and one criada, Rosa O'Dogarty had one criada and Tryconnell's infant son was attended to by the aforementioned Caecilia O'Gallagher and two criadas. 7 The class, status, and role of these women are made plain in the record. Four of the women were of noble rank and three came from affiliated client classes. All were northern native Irish, aligned by blood, marriage, and service to the Ulster lords. Of the women not in service, Nuala O'Donnell stood apart because [End Page 57] [Begin Page 59] her status was not based on marriage, children, or clientage. She was the only woman born to either of the two ruling northern families and was a decade older than the other noble ladies. It is also conceiveable that only Nuala had the opportunity to decide for herself whether to participate in the Flight of the Earls. Had the other women resisted or...

The Royal Navy and the Irish Civil War

Historical study of the Irish Civil War of 1922–3 has hitherto concentrated overwhelmingly on internal matters — the actual internecine struggle on the ground for ideological and political control. While the value of this approach is obvious, it has inevitably failed to focus on the continuing role of the British armed services; furthermore, an exclusive concern with land-army affairs, whether Irish or British, must result in a distorted picture. It is thus particularly unfortunate that the activities of the Royal Navy during the revolutionary period have been largely neglected. Here it is hoped to demonstrate that the Royal Navy, beyond its expected role of gun-running prevention, did have an influence on the early course of the Civil War, an influence that was, in part, determined by the wider protection of imperial interests once British troops had withdrawn from the localities in May 1922. The fragmentation of southern Irish politics and society, in the wake of the treaty settlement of December 1921, came as a genuine surprise to the Admiralty. At the time, it had taken the promise of peace at face value, making it known that, pending negotiations on certain properties and signal stations, it had little future interest in Ireland provided the three southern ‘treaty ports’ (Cóbh/Queenstown, Berehaven and Lough Swilly) were safeguarded and visiting rights upheld. In such circumstances, there was seen to be no need for the standard Irish Patrol of three destroyers, naval forces being ‘ultimately’ reduced to just two fishery protection vessels. Nor, as future area command was to pass to C.-in-C. Plymouth, was there technical need or political advisability in the retention of the two flag officer commands at Buncrana (C.-in-C. Western Approaches) and Kingstown (Dún Laoghaire).

Wolfe Tone's death: suicide or assassination?

The final events of Wolfe Tone's short and stormy life are fairly common knowledge. He was captured on board the French flagship Hoche when the vessel surrendered to a superior British naval force off Lough Swilly on October 10, 1798. Despite his protests that he was entitled to normal prisoner-of-war treatment, he was brought in irons a month later to Dublin. A court martial was hurriedly convened and he was found guilty of treason on Saturday November 10 and condemned to be hanged two days latter. According to the generally accepted version of subsequent events he cut his own throat early on the Monday morning. The assistant surgeon of the 5th Dragoon Guards dressed the wound "-but only with a view to prolong life until the fatal hour of one o'clock". This surgeon was Benjamin Lentaigne, a Royalist emigre from France. Despite the pleas of John Philpott Curran, a leading advocate of the day, the military authorities refused to allow any consultation with a civil surgeon. Was this just bloody mindedness or was there an even more sinister reason? Two possibilities come to mind. One was that the wound had been so incompetently treated that a consultant would have been forced to make adverse comments, the other that the throat wound was not due to a cutting injury but, to a bullet fired either deliberately or accidently and a knife or razor was then used to try and camouflage the original trauma. In 1812 Lentaigne published a pamphlet in Latin in which he made reference to an unusual neck would stating that "-the bullet passed through his throat...." There is no direct evidence that the victim was Tone, why did the writer not make this clear? It may be he was reluctant to expose the medico-military inefficiency or callousness or to jeopardise his son's career. Whatever the true facts, the verdict must remain the Scots one of "Not proven".

Select documents XL: An address to Aodh Ruadh Ó Domhnaill in captivity, 1590

Shortly before Michaelmas, 1587, when he was not yet fifteen years old, Aodh Ruadh Ó Domhnaill along with four companions went on board a vessel moored opposite Rathmullen in Lough Swilly, enticed mainly by the promise of wine. But the crew under one Nicholas Skipper of Dublin were decoys posing as merchants who, on instructions from Lord Deputy Sir John Perrot, brought the youths in captivity to Dublin. Aodh Ruadh and three of his companions were then lodged in prison in Dublin Castle. A first attempt at escape was made a little over three years later in January 1591 ending with O’Donnell’s prompt recapture, an event said to have caused widespread gloom among the Irish. But a second attempt a year later was successful. Aodh Ruadh returned to Ulster and, following a brief period of recuperation, was installed in the lordship of Tirconnell in the summer of 1592, in succession to his father who resigned in his favour A celebrated career ensued which was cut short by the defeat at Kinsale and his subsequent premature death at Simancas in September 1602.

Historical revision

On 4 September 1607 the two Ulster earls, Tyrone and Tyrconnell, and the lord of Fermanagh, Cuconnaught Maguire, accompanied by their respective kinsmen, embarked from Lough Swilly for continental Europe. They never again returned to the lands they had striven so hard to hold. Their departure was a tragedy for Gaelic Ireland; their former dependants were left leaderless and unprotected, and what remained of the Gaelic way of life was soon undermined by the plantation in Ulster. The ‘ flight of the earls ’ is one of the black pages of Irish history and the event marks the end of an age.What occasioned this sudden and mysterious departure? Of the many answers suggested almost all have been coloured by prejudice and the picture, consequently, remains clouded. Professional historians, with few exceptions, have shied away from the subject, and have contented themselves with qualified versions of the explanations offered by such writers as Fr Meehan, T. M. Healy, and Seán O'Faoláin. An essay in revision is certainly long overdue.