This wonderful aerial view of the city looking across Lough Athalia was taken c1952. Lough Athalia is the anglicisation of Loch an tSáile, the Salt Lake, a tidal lake. There are so many changes to this cityscape since then, it is hard to know where to begin.
The one thing that has not changed is the Forthill Cemetery. In 1508, Margaret Athy, the wife of the then mayor, invited the Augustinians to a house on the hill there, and she built a church and steeple there for them. In 1588, some 300 men from the Spanish Armada were washed ashore, taken to Galway and slaughtered. They were all buried in this cemetery. Later, because of a threat of a Spanish invasion, a strategic defensive fort was built there which dominated the town. Then, because of a Cromwellian threat, this fort which could be a major asset to the potential invader was demolished. It is hard, looking at this photograph, to imagine a large fortification on the top of Forthill.
The little cottage on the shore opposite the cemetery belonged to a single man who was left homeless when Hurricane Debbie swept his home away in September 1961. The area beside this cottage was the cause of much concern for the Lough Athalia residents in 1965 when it was being filled with rocks that were dumped by the Harbour Scheme. They were afraid that the rock had all but blocked up the flow of water between Lough Athalia and the bay, and that the resultant build-up of sewage in the Lough could cause an epidemic to break out. The warnings were heeded and the rock dumping continued in a way that did not affect the flow, and happily, an epidemic was avoided.
McDonogh’s had a yard at the corner (which was actually round ) of Lough Athalia Road and the docks. The corner was known locally as McDonogh’s Corner. The strip of land between two high walls, next to the cemetery, was a coal yard owned by P. Donnelly and Sons. In the late 1960’s, CDL, who were Dublin coal merchants, took over this yard and sent Brendan Clery to Galway to manage it. He expanded it and when some of the land on the lake side of the road was reclaimed, he bought it and transferred the coal yard there. Just about visible at the corner on the lake side was a building where they stored asbestos, a widely used product in the building trade at the time which was imported through the docks. This unit was run by a Mr.McLoughlin
The Railway Bridge is just out of picture on the right as is the station complex which is undergoing major change right now. You can see the remains of the track of the Clifden railway veering off to the right. The area to the left, where the Guinness headquarters is, is also undergoing major change at the moment.
The area to the right of ‘New Docks’ was the extensive site of The Gas Works complex and behind it, you can see Queen Street with some of the houses tucked in under the wall of the cemetery. Virtually all of the buildings facing the docks, mostly warehouses, have been replaced by new and more contemporary structures.
The entire centre section of the photograph that we see was decimated in the great fire of 1971.Almost all of the buildings, again mostly warehouses, in an area bounded by Lower Abbeygate Street, Merchant’s Road, Ball Alley Lane and Williamsgate Street were burnt to the ground. Some years later, a major rebuilding programme completely transformed that part of the city.
This image was originally taken by a photographer named Norman Ashe who had served with the R.A.F. during the war. When it finished, he moved to Dublin and set up a photographic business there which eventually became the biggest studio in town. One of his specialities was aerial photographs which he took all over the country between 1948 and1953. He emigrated to the USA and died there in 1965. His aerial negatives were thought lost until recently when Patrick Kiersey discovered a collection of them. He has gradually been putting them online and we should all be grateful to him. If you google Norman Ashe aerial Photography you will see what I mean.
Our thanks to Kevin Clery for his help with this article and our thanks also to all those who gave us photographs, drawings, advice, suggestions, criticisms throughout the year. There would be no Old Galway column without you.
Blian nua fé shéan is fé mhaise díbh ar fad.
