Search Results for 'The Galway Express'

Edward Krumm was 5ft 11in, 26 years old, a bachelor and a member of the Church of England from Middlesex. He was a lorry driver with the Black and Tans and had been in Galway three weeks when he arranged to meet a civilian driver he had come to know in a pub in Abbeygate Street. This man, Christopher Yorke, described Krumm as a “generally reckless fellow who drank a lot”. Krumm was fairly drunk, brandishing a revolver and bragging that he could knock the neck off a bottle at 10 yards' range, and apparently shot at a few bottles in the pub.

Based on the McMahon Report, a survey involving the engineers of the Commissioners of Public Works in consultation with local businessmen and anglers, works were undertaken to improve drainage, to facilitate navigation, and to provide waterpower to the many mills in Galway. Waterpower was the bedrock on which the industry of Galway city was based, and by the mid-19th century there were some 30 mills in the city with associated headraces and tailraces which resulted in an intricate network of small waterways, which greatly added to the charm of Galway.

Anne Root (formerly Browne) was about 16 years-of-age when she went to work for the Blakes at Menlo Castle. She was employed as a housemaid, and joined two other house staff, a parlourmaid, and a cook Delia Earley, with whom she shared an attic room. She and Delia became warm friends, and shared a terrifying ordeal when they were trapped together on the roof of the castle as it burnt in a raging fire on July 26 1910.

On Sunday evening March 25 1866, the two children of the schoolmaster Mr St George, were playing near the fire together in the Mission School (now Scoil Fhursa), when suddenly there was an explosion. The elder child burnt his hand. His injuries put him into a ‘very precarious position’. I am not sure how serious that was, but the story took an insidious turn when it was given out that ‘some malicious person climbed on the roof, and threw a packet of gunpowder down the chimney.’

For much of the 19th century, the Persse family ran one of the most successful distilleries in Ireland. Their product became world famous. They were major contributors to the industrial life of Galway and provided much needed employment. In addition to their staff, they were also supplied by a number of artisans working in the Nuns Island area — coopers, cork manufacturers, printers, carters, case makers, etc.

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At a time of feverish debate about Home Rule, and noisy Sinn Féin meetings, the fact that Christabel Pankhurst addressed a well attended meeting in Galway’s Town Hall on October 21 1911 was an important event in the political history of the town.

Home Rule, the campaign for self-government for Ireland within the United Kingdom, was the dominant political movement of Irish nationalism from 1870 to the end of World War I. It dominated all local and national papers in Ireland. Men fiercely argued its pros and cons while Ulster protested that if Home Rule was introduced it ‘would fight, and Ulster would be right.’