Dublin by Lamplight

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Dublin by Lamplight or the Lamplight Laundry, at 35 Ballsbridge Terrace, Ballsbridge, Dublin, was a Protestant-run Magdalene Laundry, founded in 1856, that like other such laundries housed so-called "fallen women". [1] [2] It was administered by a committee of Anglican women, a matron, and a chaplain who was a Church of Ireland priest. The motto of the asylum was "That they may recover themselves out of the snares of the devil" (II Timothy 2:24). [3] [ better source needed ]

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A chaplain and secretary to the laundry, Rev. Dr. James S. Fletcher DD (parish priest of Brookfield, Milltown Co. Dublin), wrote a paper titled Our Female Penitentiaries can be made self-supporting!, which was discussed at the International Prison Congress. [4]

By 1915, the trustees of the organisation reported that the finances of the organisation were under strain a by February 1917, the trustees had requested that the company be wound-up citing competition from the nearby Swastika Laundry as well as the effects of World War I. [5]

The site later formed part of the 6 acre Johnston, Mooney & O'Brien manufacturing facility with the site again featuring in the Glackin Report following its sale in the 1990s to Telecom Éireann for £9.4m having been acquired by a consortium including Dermot Desmond and JP McManus a few months earlier for £4m by the way of an Isle of Man entity. [6]

The site of the institution has been redeveloped and the site now forms part of the campus of the Herbert Park Hotel and associated apartment blocks and offices. There is a campaign to have the location commemorated with a plaque. [7]

It was mentioned in James Joyce's short story Clay in Dubliners. [8]

See also

References

  1. ↑ Oram, Hugh (2014). The Little Book of Ballsbridge . Dublin: The History Press. p.  68. ISBN   9780750958295.
  2. ↑ Eide, Marian (2011). "James Joyce's Magdalenes" . College Literature. 38 (4). The Johns Hopkins University Press: 57–75. doi:10.1353/lit.2011.0043. JSTOR   41302888. S2CID   220827432.
  3. ↑ Gifford, Don (1982). Joyce Annotated: Notes for Dubliners and A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man . Berkeley, California, USA: University of California Press. ISBN   9780520046108.
  4. ↑ Circular[s] of Information, Page. 235, Volume 10, Issues 1-4 By United States. Office of Education, 1891.
  5. ↑ McNally, Frank. "An Irishman's Diary: James Joyce and Dublin by Lamplight". The Irish Times. Retrieved 10 October 2025.
  6. ↑ "New bakehouse for Messrs Johnston Mooney and O'Brien in Ballsbridge". www.ucd.ie. Retrieved 10 October 2025.
  7. ↑ Whelan, Zuzia (28 November 2018). "The City Should Mark the Sites of All Long-Gone Magdalene Laundries, Some Councillors Say". Dublin Inquirer. Retrieved 30 December 2021.
  8. ↑ Joyce, James (2006). Norris, Margot (ed.). Dubliners . New York, London: W. W. Norton & Company. p.  82, footnote 1. ISBN   978-0-393-97851-3.
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