Drumcondra Droim Conrach | |
---|---|
Inner suburb | |
Coordinates: 53°22′05″N6°15′22″W / 53.368°N 6.256°W | |
Country | Ireland |
Province | Leinster |
County | Dublin |
Local authority | Dublin City Council |
Elevation | 25 m (82 ft) |
Population (2006) [1] | |
• Urban | 8,637 |
Irish Grid Reference | O158368 |
Drumcondra (Irish : Droim Conrach, meaning 'Conra's Ridge') is a residential area and inner suburb on the Northside of Dublin, Ireland. It is administered by Dublin City Council. The River Tolka and the Royal Canal flow through the area.
The village of Drumcondra was the central area of the civil parish of Clonturk, and the two names were used equally for the religious and civil parishes, but the modern suburban district of Drumcondra also encompasses the old Parish of St. Mary. Clonturk had been an alternative name for Drumcondra and the wider area for some time. [2]
The Cat and Cage Pub, on the corner of Drumcondra Road and Church Avenue, [3] was the site of an old postal stop and the point at which rebels, during the 1798 rebellion, seized a postal cart in order to signal to others in North County Dublin to revolt.
The southern stretch of the Slige Midluachra passed through Drumcondra and on into the City where it crossed the Liffey at a location known as the "ford of the hurdles". The present-day Drumcondra main road is built on top of the exact route the ancient highway took, the road was one of five ancient roads to meet at Tara, albeit in myth only; in reality, the five roads may have met at a point on the River Liffey in Dublin.
The Richmond Road connects Fairview with Drumcondra on the northern side of the River Tolka and was laid out to provide access to Drumcondra Castle. The thoroughfare was a laneway until reputedly a jeweller and merchant called Francis Jacob Grose built a house called Richmond House in the mid-1700s, [4] from which the road is thought to take its name. His house was on the site now occupied by St. Vincent's Hospital, Fairview. Kingston suggests that he named his house for Richmond, London. Grose's son was the antiquarian, Francis Grose, who is buried at Drumcondra Church. [3] Richmond House was bought by the Daughters of Charity and incorporated into St Vincent's. [4]
Ireland as a whole yet specifically Dublin, was experiencing a large housing crisis during the 19th century. However, it was only in the late 19th and early 20th century that local authorities began to take action to fix the issues. The Irish Sailors and Soldiers Land Trust (ISSLT) was created originally in order to generate housing for ex-servicemen however due to WWI and war veterans now a factor, its priorities changed. The ISSLT was established in 1923 after the Land Trust Act was passed and was set up as an imperial trust working across Ireland. After a statement made by the Minister for Finance at the time Ernest Blythe, it was declared that there would be no contribution to the trust from the Free State and that the entire cost must be covered by the British government. Although this led to issues with the trust obtaining land, the ISSLT continued to construct houses across the Free State. They surpassed their targets and went on to build 2,720 cottages by 1930 across Dublin. They focused on creating housing for war veterans and focused on moving outside of Dublin's city centre. Once the Trust completed its main building there were 20 separate housing schemes across the county of Dublin. Drumcondra was one of the top 3 major schemes they took on with 66 dwellings as part of the scheme. Although the size does not compare to that of Killester, its housing scheme was better integrated into the neighbouring development projects. [5]
The housing built by the ISSLT in Drumcondra was constructed on land provided and serviced by Dublin Corporation, forming part of a 'Reserved Area' north of Dublin Corporation's housing scheme. The ISSLT purchased four and a half acres of the Drumcondra Reserved Area for its housing scheme. These houses built along what is now known as Lambay Road are conventional in design and built in blocks of four with some semi-detached cottages. These houses have extensive gardens in the front and back of each and look similar and therefore blend in with those of the Reserved Area scheme already set out by the Corporation. The ISSLT's identity is clearly marked in Drumcondra by plaques displayed on houses through Lambay Road. [5]
The Drumcondra, Clonliffe, and Glasnevin Township Act 1878 was a local act of the Westminster Parliament, sponsored by businessmen in Drumcondra, and created a township called Drumcondra, Clonliffe and Glasnevin, encompassing Drumcondra and the neighbouring districts of Clonliffe and Glasnevin, governed by a body of town commissioners. [6] The portion of the district electoral division of Drumcondra outside the township was renamed Drumcondra Rural. The Dublin Corporation Act 1900 (63 & 64 Vict. c. cclxiv) absorbed the township into the county borough of Dublin as the wards of Drumcondra and Glasnevin. [7] [8] Part of Drumcondra Rural district electoral division was transferred to the city in 1931. [9] The remainder was split into Drumcondra Rural Number One and Drumcondra Rural Number Two in 1971. [10]
One of the main sights of Dublin is Croke Park, where Ireland's national games of Gaelic football and hurling may be seen. It has a capacity of 82,300 people, it is one of the largest sports stadiums in Europe. [12] 'Croker' (as it is colloquially known) is the headquarters of the Gaelic Athletic Association and also houses the official GAA Museum (on St Josephs Avenue, which is off Clonliffe Road). [13] The stadium hosts the finals of the All-Ireland Senior Football Championship and All-Ireland Senior Hurling Championship. The stadium is a 20-minute walk from Dublin city centre or a 5-minute bus ride.
Fagan's Public House, Drumcondra Road Lower, where Bertie Ahern took U.S. President Bill Clinton in September 1998. Kennedys Pub on Lower Drumcondra Road is one of the oldest pubs in Drumcondra, predating Fagans by a number of years. Formerly called McPhillips, it has been named Kennedys since 1961.[ citation needed ]
Tolka Park, the home of League of Ireland side Shelbourne since 1989, is situated on Richmond Road. The site has been used as a soccer pitch since the 1920s, initially by Drumcondra Football Club (Drums) and from 1972 by Home Farm Football Club. [14]
The National Council for the Blind of Ireland (NCBI) at Whitworth Road was previously Drumcondra Hospital and is located adjoining the cemetery of St. George's, whose former parish church is located at Temple Street. [14]
Belvidere House, formerly the home of the Coghill family, this late 17th-century building became the residence of the Superior General of the Irish Christian Brothers, and a training centre for the order, in 1874. The house was bought by the Coghills in the early 1700s when it was known as Drishogue. [3] In 1881, the Congregation bought and moved to Marino House, and sold Belvidere House to Cardinal Cullen. St Patrick's College, Dublin which had been founded in 1875 at 2 Drumcondra Road Lower, relocated to Belvidere House in 1883. New college buildings were constructed, while the house became the residence of the Vincentian Fathers who ran the college. It now provides offices and meeting rooms for the St Patrick's Campus of Dublin City University, into which the former college was incorporated in 2016. [15]
Clonturk House on Ormond Road was built prior to 1820, although its current appearance owes much to its renovation in 1880, at which time the stone balustrades from James Gandon's Carlisle Bridge (O'Connell Bridge) were moved to Clonturk by its owner. [3] [16] In the early twentieth century it moved from private residential to institutional use, initially as the Ormond Commercial School for Boys and subsequently as a female orphanage run by the Presbyterian Church. In 1959 it was purchased by the Rosminian Fathers as a home for blind men. Well-known Dublin character Thomas Dudley ("Bang Bang") was a resident until his death in 1980. [14]
Originally the site of an Elizabethan castle built circa 1560, the castle was built by Meath man James Bathe on ecclesiastical land (belonging to the Priory of the Holy Trinity), granted to him. It was owned for many years by the Bathe family. In 1591, when the Castle was the residence of Sir William Warren, who had married the widow of John Bathe, thus acquiring the lands in Drumcondra for his lifetime. Hugh O'Neill, Earl of Tyrone married his third wife Mabel Bagenal here after he had eloped with her. [17]
In 1677, James II granted the Drumcondra property to a Giles Martin and in 1703 it was purchased by Captain Chichester Philips. In 1870 it became St. Joseph's Asylum for the Male Blind when the Carmelites bought the lands of Drumcondra Castle. [18] [19] The Rosminians were appointed by the Archbishop of Dublin to run services for the Blind in St. Joseph's, Drumcondra, Dublin in 1955, the School, and since 2012, it is known as ChildVision, in 2014 the Rosminian order sold the lands in St. Joseph's, but took out a 25-year lease on the houses and buildings which it will use for ChildVision. [20] The Grace Park Woods housing estate was built on the former St. Joseph's lands.
Drumcondra House was purchased by Rev. John Hand and in 1842 All Hallows College was established. [19] Daniel O'Connell played a part in the purchase of Drumcondra House for All Hallows, from Dublin Corporation. Designed by the architect Sir Edward Lovett Pearce and was built in 1726 for Sir Marmaduke Coghill, from the nearby Belvedere House. The Coghills rented out the house for a time. [3] All Hallows was sold to Dublin City University by the Vincentian Order in 2016.
For 150 years Hampton House and its lands held the Carmelite Monastery of the Incarnation on Grace Park Road, housing members of this enclosed order of nuns. The order, which had been based in Blanchardstown, purchased Hampton House and moved in during 1858. [21] Prior to it being a convent, Hampton Lodge was the residence of Thomas Williams, the first secretary of the Bank of Ireland, and his wife Mary Ann Williams; their son Richard Williams lived in Drumcondra Castle. The land and buildings were sold by the order in 2016 and were redeveloped as houses and a nursing home.[ citation needed ]
A distillery, the Dublin Whiskey Distillers (D.W.D.), was founded in the 1870s on the banks of the River Tolka, and known as the Jones Road Distillery (Distillery Road is a continuation of Jones Road). The distillery closed in 1946 and the property was sold. A number of buildings were built and are still standing and a number of buildings although redeveloped retain the names connected with the distillery such as The Corn Mill, The Granary, The Grainstore and Distillery Lofts.
Two campuses of Dublin City University are located in Drumcondra:
The oldest church in the district is Drumcondra Church (Church of Ireland), located at the end of Church Avenue, abutting All Hallows College. Several notable people including Georgian-period architect James Gandon are buried in the adjoining graveyard.
The "Old Church of St. George" was built about 1668 in Lower Temple Street (changed to Hill Street in the 1800s), then a part of Drumcondra. The Tower of the Old Church of St. George can still be seen on Hill Street and its gravestones are around the walls of what is now a playground. [23] [24] [25] [26] [27]
The "New Church of St. George" was built on the square further up the road at the end of Temple Street in the early 1800s. The original site acquired for the new church was on Whitworth Road, but then the present site was selected, which at the time was open fields. A temporary chapel was built on the Whitworth Road site and its churchyard was retained when St. George's was completed – this site was later taken over by the Whitworth Hospital (later named Drumcondra Hospital). The gravestones can be seen behind the hospital. [28] [29]
Drumcondra is a parish in the Fingal South West deanery of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Dublin, served by the Church of Corpus Christi at Home Farm Road. The palace of the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Dublin is situated alongside Clonliffe College (the diocesan seminary). Together they occupy an extensive site bounded by Clonliffe Road and Drumcondra Road (to the South and West) with the River Tolka at the northern extremity.
The Respond! Housing Association has its Dublin office located in High Park, Drumcondra, where it also runs training courses in Housing and Social care provision.
The Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church (Ukrainian Church in Ireland of Bishop Nicholas the Miracle Worker) holds services in Holy Cross College, Clonliffe. [30]
There are a number of small burial places in the Drumcondra area
Drumcondra is home to Croke Park and Tolka Park soccer stadium, the permanent home of Shelbourne F.C. since 1989, 'The Reds' have hosted major European clubs such as Panathinaikos and Steaua Bucharest in the Drumcondra venue. The club has won the league six times and the FAI Cup four times since moving to Tolka Park. The park was also the base for Drumcondra F.C. (Drums) which was a League of Ireland club from 1928 to 1972 before it was merged with fellow Dublin club Home Farm, now based in nearby Whitehall. Drumcondra FC, who played their home games at Tolka Park stadium, was a successful side in the post World War II years, winning five Irish league titles between 1948 and 1965 as well as competing in the European Cup and Inter-Cities Fairs Cup on several occasions. [31]
The name lives on today in the shape of Drumcondra FC. [31]
The Ierne Sports and Social Club is situated off Grace Park Road, Rosmini Gaels (GAA) is also based in Drumcondra.
Glasnevin is a neighbourhood of Dublin, Ireland, situated on the River Tolka. While primarily residential, Glasnevin is also home to the National Botanic Gardens, Glasnevin Cemetery, the National Meteorological Office, and a range of other state bodies, and Dublin City University has its main campus and other facilities in and near the area. Glasnevin is also a civil parish in the ancient barony of Coolock.
Finglas is a northwestern outer suburb of Dublin, Ireland. It lies close to Junction 5 of the M50 motorway, and the N2 road. Nearby suburbs include Glasnevin and Ballymun; Dublin Airport is seven km (4.3 mi) to the north. Finglas lies mainly in the postal district of Dublin 11.
All Hallows College was a college of higher education in Dublin. It was founded in 1842 and was run by the Vincentians from 1892 until 2016. On 23 May 2014, it was announced that it was closing because of declining student enrollment. The sale of the campus in Drumcondra to Dublin City University was announced on 19 June 2015 and completed on 8 April 2016. The college closed on 30 November 2016, becoming the All Hallows Campus of Dublin City University.
Fairview is an inner coastal suburb of Dublin in Ireland, in the jurisdiction of Dublin City Council and in the city's D03 postal district. Part of the area forms Fairview Park, a recreational amenity laid out on land reclaimed from the sea.
Whitehall is a Northside suburb of Dublin City, Ireland.
Santry is a suburb on the northside of Dublin, Ireland, bordering Coolock, Glasnevin, Kilmore and Ballymun. It straddles the boundary of Dublin City Council and Fingal County Council jurisdictions.
Ballybough is an inner city district of northeast Dublin city, Ireland. Adjacent areas include the North Strand and Clonliffe.
Clonliffe is an area on the Northside of Dublin, Ireland, between Ballybough and Drumcondra in the Dublin 3 postal district.
The River Tolka, also once spelled Tolga, is one of Dublin's three main rivers, flowing from County Meath to Fingal within the old County Dublin, and through the north of Dublin city, Ireland. By flow of water, the Tolka is the second largest river in Dublin, following the Liffey, but runs more slowly than the Dodder.
Marino is an inner suburb on the Northside of Dublin, Ireland. It was built, in a planned form, on former grounds of Marino House, in an area between Drumcondra, Donnycarney, Clontarf, and what became Fairview. The initial development featured around 1,300 concrete-built houses.
The Parish of Raheny is the modern successor in the Roman Catholic Church to an early (1152) parish, in Raheny, a district of Dublin, Ireland, reputed to be a site of Christian settlement back to at least 570 A.D. Today's parish, within the Howth Deanery of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Dublin, comprises Raheny village and the central portion of the district, parts of which are also served by the parishes of Killester, Grange Park and Kilbarrack-Foxfield. The parish has a membership of around 10,000 Catholics. Similarly centred, and covering a greater land area but a much smaller membership, is the Church of Ireland parish of the same name.
Holy Cross College, located on Clonliffe Road, Drumcondra, was founded in 1854 as the Catholic diocesan seminary for Dublin by Paul Cullen, Archbishop of Dublin (later created, in 1866.
Drumcondra Church of Ireland is a Church of Ireland church located in Drumcondra, Dublin, previously in the Civil Parish of Clonturk. The church and its churchyard contain memorials to a number of notable historical figures.
Marmaduke Coghill (1673–1738) was a member of Parliament for Dublin University, judge of the Prerogative Court and Chancellor of the Exchequer of Ireland.
Drumcondra House is a Georgian house with gardens in Drumcondra, Dublin, Ireland which as of 2022 forms part of DCU's All Hallows Campus, having been part of All Hallows College. It was designed by the architects Sir Edward Lovett Pearce and Alessandro Galilei and was built in 1726 for Marmaduke Coghill, who had originally lived in Belvidere House, which now forms part of DCU's St Patrick's Campus.
Clonturk is an area on the Northside of Dublin, in Ireland. It is located in the south of the suburb of Drumcondra, just north of the River Tolka, but previously, Clonturk had been an alternative name for Drumcondra and the wider area. Clonturk lies within the Dublin 9 postal district. The name Clonturk translates from the Irish as "Pasture of the boars". There is some evidence that the name originally was Ceann Torc or the "Headland of the boars", but had changed to Clonturk by the middle of the 16th century, perhaps under the influence of the more famous neighbouring placename Clontarf.
Coolock is one of the baronies of Ireland. It was constituted as part of the old county of Dublin. Today, it covers much of the northern parts of the city of Dublin and the south-eastern part of the modern county of Fingal. At the heart of the barony is the civil parish of the same name - Coolock - which is one of twenty civil parishes in the barony.
Griffith Park is a 7.5-hectare (19-acre) park located on the banks of the River Tolka in Dublin city between Glasnevin and Drumcondra. The park is a short distance downstream of Ireland's National Botanic Gardens, and upriver of Our Lady's Park, and has been noted by Discover Ireland as "one of the premier north city parks". The park closes at different times of the year, dependent on the hours of dusk.
Our Lady's Park is a small 0.37-hectare (0.91-acre) boomerang-shaped park located on the banks of the River Tolka in Dublin city next to Frank Flood Bridge in Drumcondra. The park is notable for its statue of the Virgin Mary, presumably erected in 1954 for the Marian Year which had been declared by Pope John XXIII.
The Drumcondra ambush was an attempted ambush carried out the Irish Republican Army (IRA) in Drumcondra, a suburb in northern Dublin, during the Irish War of Independence. On 21 January 1921, an IRA active service unit (ASU) initially set up an ambush near the Royal Canal in preparation for a British lorry which was travelling through the area. When the lorry failed to arrive, Frank Flood, the unit's commander, relocated his men up to a new position along the Tolka river. However, the IRA unit was spotted as they were setting up their new positions and a force of Auxiliaries was sent out, which resulted in 1 volunteer being killed and 5 others being arrested as they were attempting to escape.
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