I am at Rathfriland on the Hill. I used to come here very regularly as a lad. I haven't been here for many years, so I'm on a sort of sentimental journey.
I'm trying to trace down the story of my mother's family
( grandmother's maiden name Gilmour and grandfather's name Peters ) who lived in Rathfriland. I recently found out, to my complete surprise, that my grandmother who lived in School road was only one of a number of siblings. I had great uncles and aunts that I had never heard of. Indeed I had 3 Rathfriland born, great uncles who served in the New Zealand Expeditionay Force in the 1st World War. One of them, great uncle Frank Gilmour, died in France in September 1918 shot I believe by a German sniper. He is remembered on the town war memorial and at an monument in front of Rathfriland Reformed Presbyterian Church ( The Rock ).
More of Rathfriland
Rathfriland (from Irish: Ráth Fraoileann, meaning "ringfort of Fraoile") begancenturies ago as a hilltop Plantation of Ulster settlement. It sits on a height between the Mourne Mountains, Slieve Croob and Banbridge. ( pop approx 4000 )
In older English documents, the village's name was usually spelt Rathfylan or Rathfrilan. It was once the capital of the Magennis family, the Gaelic lords of Iveagh. They built a castle there in the late 16th century. The ruins (south gable 30 ft x 25 ft) may still be seen on the hill upon which Rathfriland sits.
The castle was battered down during the Irish Confederate Wars and much of the remainder was carried off by William Hawkins of London, the first Protestant landowner there after the war. The stones were used to build the Town Inn (the building of which still stands on the corner of The Square and Newry Street) and other houses in the village.[3] In 1760 the Market House, which dominates the main square, was built for the linen market by Miss Theodosia McGill. An old map of 1776 prepared for the Meade Estate shows streets, lanes, tenements and gardens forming the early village.
Notable people
Patrick Brontë, the father of the Brontë sisters (Charlotte, Emily and Anne) was born in 1777 in a cottage in Edenagarry on the outskirts of Annaclone, where he lived until a local vicar paid his way to Cambridge University in 1802. While studying at Cambridge, he changed his name from Brunty to Brontë. He preached and taught at Drumballyroney Church and School House, between Rathfriland and Moneyslane. The Brontë Homeland Interpretative Centre is at Drumballyroney.
Andrew George Scott (alias "Captain Moonlight") was born in Rathfriland in 1842 in a house on Castle Hill. A notorious Australian bushranger.
Margaret Byers (née Morrow) was born in Rathfriland in 1832. Margaret Byers was a teacher, a businesswoman, a pioneer of higher education for girls, a philanthropist and a suffragist. She said: "My aim was to provide for girls an education...as thorough as that which is afforded to boys in the schools of the highest order." In 1905 she was given an honorary degree by Trinity College, Dublin and in 1908 Queen's University, Belfast appointed her to its senate.
Theodosia Meade, Countess of Clanwilliam.
Rathfriland is a town in County Down Northern Ireland
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