Michael Dalton, E.S.B. controller in the Ballyshannon Power Station invented a new smoking aid. Realising how distracting it can be when the driver of the car starts fumbling in his pocket for his packet of cigarettes, he produced a neat little bracket which holds the cigarette packet and the matchbox open, and the whole gadget is held neatly and secure by two suction cups on the dashboard in front of the driver.  The invention enables the driver to extract a cigarette, and to light the match while keeping one hand on the wheel.

‘A drive of three miles from Ballyshannon took us to Bunatroohan, a small fishing station on Donegal Bay, where we were to embark in a stout open boat for Killybegs. The little fishing community at Bunatroohan possesses about six boats, the owners of which are hardy and industrious men.  They are sadly in want of a quay, the building of which would cost scarcely £100.  At 6.30 we boarded the boat with the owner and two men. We had three oars and a mast, which could be hoisted in case a breeze sprang up, as it did before we were long out.  It took us two hours and a half to cross the bay to the lighthouse at St John’s Point, to reach and cross another and smaller bay, named McSwyne’s.

This narrows into a noble waterway a mile in length and as straight as Sackville Street, at the head of which nestles Killybegs, under the shadow of its mountains. An object of interest was a whale, which followed us a couple of hundred yards off for half an hour, showing in its gambols every now and then its black back, about twenty feet long, above the sea. On nearing St John’s point we observed that the tip of the peninsula is really an island, separated from the rest of the promontory by a channel of about thirty or forty yards.  At first we thought of shortening the journey by running through this channel, but the rush and roar of the waters in it and the height to which the foam was dashed against the rocks deterred us from the attempt. We gave it a wide berth accordingly, and rounded the island into McSwyne’s Bay at the head of which, some five or six miles distant, we saw a glimmer of the lighthouse that was out guide into Killybegs.  Some sunken rocks lay straight in our course, and manifested their presence by rolling up the elsewhere smooth waters into an angry heap, and sending them furiously scudding eastward half in foam, to the promontory which we desired to skirt. The foam was lifted far higher than our mast, and was driven with a force which would have instantly capsized any small vessel in its way.  We bore away, therefore, to the west, and gave our dangerous friend a wide offing.

By and bye, it became necessary to alter our course from west to north, and as the slight breeze was nearly in our teeth, we took down our mast and threw new energy into the rowing. Night fell, and we spent a tiresome two hours more in pulling up to the second lighthouse, from which our run home into the little harbour of Killybegs was comparatively easy. We were very cold and cramped on climbing the quay, but half an hour’s drying at the kitchen fire of the hotel and a refreshing wash-up sent us with hearty appetites to the excellent supper prepared for us by Mrs Rogers.  Killybegs is at once wild and cosy.  You feel yourself free from all the trammels of gentility, without falling into any of the discomforts of barbarism.  The scenery is charming.  In front of your hotel, a long water-lane, ending in the Atlantic.  A few small craft in the harbour – one of them has brought sawn planks from Sligo, another coal from England, and the rest look like pleasure boats.  There are a couple of hundred houses, small, but substantially built, and most of them neat in aspect.  At the left, as you face the sea, rises the square tower of the Catholic Church, which dominates the straggling little town, and is a fine object of view from sea and land.

It contains a large and excellent replica of Murillo’s Holy Family, presented by a former lord of the soil, and recently well restored by Mr Lesage, of Sackville Street.  There are other interesting monuments in the Church, which the visitor will do well to study with the aid of the Illustrated Hand book of South-Western Donegal, published in 1872 by McGlashan and Gill.  Killybegs is, par excellence, a watering place for a family of boys and girls.  There are no bathing boxes for the latter, but there are plenty of nooks at a little distance from the town where a modest maiden can prepare for her bath, and the boys can have ‘headers’ into deep water at many still more convenient points.

I spent an hour inquiring into the rent of houses and cost of living. You can get a very fair cottage with a sitting room and three bedrooms for £10 a year, unfurnished, or for £20 furnished.  There are plenty of delightful sites which you could get for a nominal sum, and build on at your own discretion, and thus possess a perpetual refuge in the hot summer months, for a sum which would only pay for equal accommodation for a single season at Southport or Brighton.  Butchers’ meat, milk, and butter are about seven tenths of Dublin prices, and boats and donkeys are to be bought or hired at very moderate rates.

• There are no social amusements, but there is plenty of fishing with long lines and with the rod, and there are endless excursions within easy reach by land and water. If the excellent hotel had a billiard table it would pay, and be a great resource.  The post car leaves for Carrick at 1 p.m., and today it started with a companion vehicle and some emigrants, whose relatives bid them adieu with all the lamentations usual on such occasions.  A couple of hours afterwards our party started, not without regret, and after a three hours’ drive up hill and down [dale] and through half a dozen villages unknown to fame, drew up at the handsome and comfortable Glencolumkill Hotel of Carrick.  The day was very hot for Ireland – 78 in the shade, I was told – and a tub was most acceptable before dinner, which consisted of half a magnificent salmon, a tiny roast leg of delicious mutton, good new potatoes, without other vegetables, a pudding, and some really excellent claret, at 3s 3d a bottle’.

Interesting to see the February 1 post on TYFK and the link to the obituary of James McHugh. He was ‘born in Killybegs’ in about 1835, and died in the U.S in 1903.   Some of his great- great grandchildren may still be alive there.  There are no birth records going back to the 1830s that would indicate exactly where James came from.  There were seven McHugh households in the parish of Killybegs in the early 1830s, including the premises where Hegartys’ Spar store is now located on the Diamond.  On the other hand, McHugh may have come from Kilcar, as Killybegs was the Post Town for Kilcar back then and many Kilcar people gave Killybegs as their address.  The name was very often written as ‘McCue’ in the old days, and was very prominent in Kilcar, especially in the townlands of Croaghbeg and Muckross.  Anyway, James got on well in America, as the obituary below makes clear. The American Civil War is very well documented, and a lot of detail about the battles in which McHugh fought can be Googled.

 

FUNERAL OF CAPT. McHugh.   Services to be held at the Church of SS. Peter and Paul tomorrow.  The funeral of James McHugh, who died on Saturday night at his home, Meridian and Twenty-second streets, after two weeks’ illness, will take place tomorrow at 9 a.m. The funeral service will be held at the church of SS Peter and Paul.

He was born in Killybegs, County Donegal, Ireland, sixty eight years ago. He emigrated to this country in 1854, and after a brief sojourn in New York, came to Indiana, settling in Terre Haute.  From that place at the breaking out of the civil war, he enlisted as a private in Company A, Thirty-fifth Indiana Volunteer Infantry, the Irish regiment.  He served four years and two months and came out of the service with the rank of captain, gained by gallantry in the field.  He was made second lieutenant for gallantry at Stone’s river; first lieutenant at Chickamauga, and captain for noted service in the Atlanta campaign.  At the close of the war he settled in Indianapolis and married Miss Elizabeth Burns, who, with one son, William Todd McHugh, survive him. Shortly after their marriage, Captain and Mrs McHugh engaged in the millinery business in South Illinois street.  This business continued until six weeks ago, and in it they acquired a competency.  In 1882 Captain McHugh, who had long been recognised as a quiet but effective Democratic leader, was elected a member of the Indianapolis Board of Aldermen, and in 1892 was elected a State Senator from Marion county.  IN 1893 he was appointed by Governor Matthews one of the commissioners to assist in locating the position of Indiana troops on the field of Chickamauga.   In recent years Captain McHugh had travelled a great deal, both in this country and in Europe. He spent several summers in Donegal, where he took great interest in yachting in Killybegs bay, and was known as the American commodore from the fact that he always flew the American flag from his yacht.  (Indianapolis News, 21 December 1903)

This below is from another paper:

SENATOR McHUGH DIES SUDDENLY AT HIS HOME.Born in Ireland, Prominent in Political Circles and Held Many Offices of Trust.AN EXTENSIVE TRAVELLER, Senator James McHugh died last night at 7.45 at his home on Meridian and Twenty-second streets, of haemorrhage of the stomach after a lingering illness of two weeks. Senator McHugh’s death was quite unexpected for a few minutes before his demise he was talking with the members of his household gathered around his bedside and appeared in best spirits.  Senator McHugh was born in Killybegs, Donegal, Ireland, and emigrated to this country, landing in New York.  After remaining in that city a short time he came West in obedience to the advice of Horace Greeley and after travelling through the West for some time, Senator McHugh settled in Terre Haute, Ind.  Mr McHugh enlisted as a private in Company A, Thirty fifth Indiana Volunteer Infantry, and served throughout the war, winning for himself a great name as a valiant and brave fighter.  At the close of the war he came to this city to reside and shortly after married Miss M. Burns.  Senator and Mrs McHugh opened up a millinery store on Illinois street, which was operated until about six weeks ago. He was planning a trip to the Philippines and the Hawaiian Islands at the time of his death.  Surviving him is his wife and one son, William Todd McHugh.  (Indianapolis Journal, 20 December 1903)

 Captain McHugh is recorded as a judge on the Flagboat at Killybegs Regatta of 1897. He was present again at the 1900 Regatta, where he was Vice-commodore and also a judge.  His yacht, Fusilier, came third in one of the races, but it is not known if he sailed himself. His last visit to Killybegs was for the Regatta of 1902, when he was Vice-commodore and also a judge of the yacht races. On the day before this Regatta, young Hugh Cunningham of Spout Street was drowned from his boat while sailing in the harbour.  As a result, no Regattas were held for several years.

This poem by James Conwell of Killybegs was published in Bygones:

Oh, there’s Diana rising over Carn, full

And on the town of Killybegs her golden light she spills,

Reflecting in the harbour St Mary’s on the hill,

A monument of olden days of faith and hope and skill.

 

Stars are winking earthwards; all is calm and still

Save music sweetly flowing from every brook and rill.

Troutlets ring the crystal pools above their umberbeds

And wild ducks haunt the bracken on the borders of Lough Head.

 

Across the spawn that reaches to Benroe,

From out the purple heather the Moorcock loudly crows;

The cuckoo sweetly calling from the tree tops ever green

And the corncrake is mimicked from Brookhill to Carnaween.

 

‘Tis sweet to gaze on Croaghlin when fading from your sight

And sweeter when illumined by the Rotten Island light;

The waves that dash along its base, they hail from Drimanoo,

They spend their force at Roshin and return full charged anew.

 

There’s music in their dancing, seems a host of angels sing,

Then lustral dews are falling and the Angelus bell it rings;

There is romance in the stillness and a seeming fairy spell

Through the vista near the Rectory and around St Catherine’s Well.

 

There’s a dullness creeping o’er me, and I must seek repose;

For tonight I will be dreaming e’er my sleepy eyes they close.

Of tomorrow in the offing, and the sunshine on the crags,

Reflecting in the harbour and the church and Killybegs.

 

On December 11^th, 1902, Cornelius Cannon was drowned from the yawl Shamrock at Rosbeg, leaving a wife and two small children.

A Disaster Fund was established, and the subscribers’ names were published. An account of the disaster can be found in The Zulu Fishermen, where the first round of subscribers is printed.  Below is an additional list of subscriptions from the Killybegs area:

DAWROS BAY FISHING DISASTER FUND.

ADDITIONAL SUBSCRIPTIONS.

Collected by Miss Bridie Quinn, Killybegs.

 

Very Rev Canon Sweeney, P.P., Killybegs	£0 10 0
Rev Michael Ward, C.C., Killybegs	£0 2  6
Charles Rogers, Esq., J.P., Killybegs	£0 10 0
Captain Gunn, R.N., Killybegs	£0 2  6
Captain Coleman, R.N., Killybegs	£0 2  6
Mr Patrick Quinn, Killybegs	£0 10 0
Mrs P. Quinn, Killybegs	£0 10 0
Mr Michael Murrin, Croaghlin	£0 10 0
Mr Patrick Boyle, Curraghfeighan	£0 5  0
Mrs P. Boyle Curraghfeighan	£0 5  0
Mr James Murrin, Killybegs	£0 5  0
Miss Bridget Harkin, Killybegs	£0 2  0
Mr Daniel Quigley, Killybegs	£0 2  6
Mr John McGarrigle, Killybegs	£0 2  6
Mr Frank Rogers, Killybegs	£0 2  6
Mr P. A. Mulreany, N.T., Killybegs	£0 2  6
A Friend	£0 2  6
A Friend	£0 2  6
A Friend	£0 1  0
Mr A. McGrory, Benroe	£0 2  6
Mr Peter Cannon, Glencolumbkille	£0 1  0
Mr Thomas McKee, Malinmore	£0 1   0
TOTAL	£4 15 0

At Killybegs Petty Sessions on Monday, 10^th October 1921, Mr Byrne, the Officer of Customs and Excise, charged Jean Yves Kergrouch, master of the Lugger, Marie des Anges, and Jules Maria Meleree, master of the Lugger, Turenne, that they did fish in the neighbourhood of Killybegs, within the exclusive fishery limits of the British Isles.  The Luggers were arrested off Malinbeg by H.M. ship Newark. Lobsters were discovered on board; a boat was seen returning to the Turenne, loaded with crab pots.  The Court fined the captain of each Lugger £5, with £5 costs, and ordered that the lobster and crab pots of each vessel be forfeited.

(The HMS Newark was an armed twin-screw minesweeper, built by A & J. Inglis on the Clyde, and launched in June 1918)

January 29, 1903, at the Catholic Church, Killybegs, by the Rev Canon Sweeney, P.P., James Brennan, Crucknasharra, to Bridget, daughter of Mr Pat McLafferty, Largy, Killybegs.

November 24, 1849, at St John’s Church, Killybegs, by the Rev William Lodge, Louisa, daughter of the late James Hamilton, Esq., Fintra House, Donegal, to Lieutenant J. B. Cater, R.N.

September 30, 1870, at St Mary’s church, Killybegs, by the Rev Mr. Stephens, P.P., Mr John Dunne of H.M. Revenue Cruizer, FLY, Killybegs Bay, to Mary Jane, eldest daughter of Capt. James McBrearty, Schooner FASHION, Killybegs.

June 15, 1937, at Pinslip R. C. church, Middlesex, Nurse Catherine Agnes Murrin, second daughter of Thomas Murrin Drumanoo, to Daniel McNern, Cashelogary, Inver.  Given away by her brother, Patrick.  Bridesmaid: Mary Murrin, sister; Best man: Thomas Murrin, brother.