Category: History

The coming of railways to Ireland (and elsewhere globally) was a game changing event, both economically and socially, as the opportunities that the railway brought for economic expansion and social diversification were enormous.

A throwaway line in this property puff piece gives a hint of how the coming of a railway to a local area had an effect at the macro level.

The property in question is a former gate lodge of Rokeby Hall, Grangebellew, Co. Louth. The article notes:

Marlay was the gate lodge to Rokeby Hall, designed by Francis Johnson. It was single storey initially, but they added a floor when the railway came through and the road was raised.

Irish independent 31 May 2024

This got me thinking – why would the arrival of the railway lead to the road being raised?

I checked the usual map sources and this property is immediately west of the railway line between Drogheda and Dundalk with an overbridge carrying the former access road to Rokeby Hall over the railway. This is the road raising referred to.

I would assume that with the road raised, the original single storey property was below the new road level and the gatekeeper would not have a line of sight to the road to control access to the estate. Adding a second storey in this case would make sense.

The only question I have remaining is whether or not Sir John Stephen Robinson, owner of the estate at the time, received additional compensation from the Dublin & Belfast Junction Railway for the cost of extending the gate lodge.

I found this video on YouTube which is a concise history of the tramways/railway serving the Guinness Brewery in Dublin.

I found this video on YouTube today, which explains what a Cornish design mine engine house is.

Whilst this uses examples from Cornwall, the man engine house in Allihies, Co. Cork, which was successfully conserved by the Mining Heritage Trust of Ireland, is a Cornish design engine house and is the only example of its kind in Ireland.

Of what relevance to IH is car registrations, in Limerick or anywhere?

There is no direct relevance, however, as newfangled and expensive inventions, the first motor cars were, unsurprisingly, owned by people with money and familiarity with machinery.

Per this Limerick Post article, in Limerick, this happened to be members of the Goodbody family, the Quakers from Clara of milling fame. Another early entry on the list of Limerick motor registrations was Cleeve’s Condensed Milk Factory in Limerick.

This is a link to a brief history of the railway from Ballina to Killala.

The Offaly History Blog has announced that they will be publishing a series of 50 articles in 2024 about the Grand Canal in Co. Offaly.

Whilst searching the ‘net last night for something else, I came upon this site, which is a brief history of the railway in Clones.

Interestingly, the page includes a very well designed diagrammatic map of the former station, which can be downloaded at no charge.

As I continue to update the Gazetteer, the question came to mind – which county had the most railway stations (current and former) and which had the least.

The county with the most stations (current and former) is Antrim at 128 and the least number of stations fell to Longford, with only 4. The full list is below:

County	Stations
Antrim	128
Cork	124
Donegal	101
Dublin	96
Down	83
Kerry	59
Derry	52
Tyrone	40
Armagh	37
Meath	32
Clare	31
Wexford	30
Limerick	29
Wicklow	29
Tipperary	28
Galway	25
Leitrim	24
Mayo	23
Fermanagh	22
Kilkenny	22
Louth	22
Kildare	21
Cavan	17
Roscommon	17
Monaghan	16
Sligo	15
Waterford	15
Westmeath	15
Offaly	12
Carlow	8
Laois	8
Longford	4