History of the SS Lochgarry One of Ireland’s most Popular Recreational Diving Wrecks By Martin Baillie-Johnston The first time I dived the wreck of the SS Lochgarry it was a hot day in June and I was sweating in my dry suit as I waited for the skipper to give us the signal to roll in. There…
Fethard Lifeboat Disaster 15 December 2009 A Chara, Last weekend in Rosslare, County Wexford, Ireland a booklet was launched on the Fethard Lifeboat Disaster. David Maloney (Launch Secretary)Rosslare Lifeboat launched the booklet on behalf of the O’Rourke family and the event was covered by the press. The occasion was the gathering of the O’Rourke Family…
ABANDONED SHIP GAVE BIRTH TO IRISH SHIPPING’S WARTIME FLEET This article was first published in the Sunday Express on 19 February 1967. It was reprinted in the Winter 2004 edition of Iris na Mara On the broad chest of the Atlantic the tramp steamer was at first only a speck to the German bomber crew.…
An account of the events of the night of 21st November 1991 Austin Gill, A.B., M.V. Kilkenny. The events of that night are still very vivid in my mind after more than 20 years although I often forget things that happened last week. To start my account I will give you a little background about myself. I…
Mexican Silver Dollars at Galley Head P.O’Sullivan, Bandon – 1 November 2006 Mexican Silver Dollars at Galley Head In 1870, The Liverpool and Mississippi Steamship Company took possession of a new ship, The Crescent City, which had been built at McMillan’s yard in Dumbarton near Glasgow. The Crescent City and her contemporaries had some very unusual features that…
Paddy O’Sullivan 19 November 2009 The Dunworley Slave Ship: Amity 1701 “Trade Goods” The history of slavery is probably as old as that of mankind itself. Hundreds of thousands of slaves built such classical civilisations as Greece, Egypt and Rome. Viking Dublin was a major slave trading port in its heyday. However, for the purposes of this…
THE VASA, FIFTY YEARS ON Illustrated Lecture, (abridged) given to the Maritime Institute of Ireland, by Cormac F. Lowth, in the Stella Maris Club,Thursday, October 20th 2011. Vasa, from port (photo: Peter Isotalo) 2011 is the fiftieth anniversary of the successful raising of the almost intact early seventeenth- century Swedish warship Vasa from the mud…
M.V. Plassy: Rescue The Last Voyage of the M.V. Plassy by Michael Kirwan Originally published in the Winter 2010 edition of the Limerick Journal The 8th March, 2010 marked the 50th anniversary of the grounding of the M.V. Plassy on the Finnis Rock, Inisheer Island, County Galway. The ship is shown on the opening credits…
Lifeboat Mary Stanford A postage stamp was issued in 1974 to mark the 150th anniversary of the RNLI. This depiction of the rescue of the crew of the Daunt Lightship by the Ballycotton lifeboat RNLB Mary Stanford was chosen as the image to be represented on that postage stamp – Oil painting by B. F. Gribble Career…
Lord Cloncurry and the Aid In October 1803 the brig AID left Leghorn in Italy (some reports state the port of departure as Citta Vecchia) bound for Bristol with a general cargo. Some of this cargo was discharged there and more was loaded and the brig headed for Dublin. Buried deep in the hold was…