children

Has it survived?

www.change.org/p/sligo-county-council-save-rathellen-hous...

I think these maybe them
www.census.nationalarchives.ie/pages/1911/Sligo/Sligo_Wes...

“Its History
Rathellen is a two storey, eight bay house that was built in the early 19th Century as a dower house for the Wood family of Woodville.
The house was first resided in 1826 by Capt James Wood, J.P. eldest son of James Wood who was High Sheriff with his widowed mother Judith and 10years later it was occupied by 2nd son of James of Woodville and his two sisters Margareth and Mary.
In 1860 the house was advertised for lease and described as 'a beautiful marine house' with acres and also described as 'the leafy suburban villa'.
In the same year the house was leased to the merchant Henry Lyons, J.P. who was a native to Scotland and came to settle in Sligo in 1835, he was mayor in 1860 and 1867, and a member of the Town and Harbour Commissioner and Corporation.
The house was leased to his son Alexander who sublet the house for a short time to Capt. George A. Bedford, then Roger D. Robinson, then to Patrick C. Howley.
Alexander succeeded his father in 1870, and for the remainder of the century Rathellen was his home. In 1888 he married Ellen Culbertson who was the daughter of Robert Culbertson of Ballisodare Mills.
Alexander was a popular man of his days occupying such positions such as Director of Messrs. Henry Lyons & Co. of the Sligo Steam Navigation Co. and the Sligo Gas Co. and also was Harbour Commissioner, a Grand Juror and a Governor of the Co. Infirmary.
After Alexanders death in 1900, the house was leased to a number of tenants until 1945 when Mary Lyons sold the house and its 12acres to John C.Cleeve and his wife for £3,000.
John was a retired Mayor, he had fought in the Indian Army and the two World Wars.
John died 3years later and the house was sold to Alfred Barrett Woods of Castle Street.
In 2002 the house was purchased by the Sligo Borough Council. It has since remained vacant and vandalised”


www.facebook.com/groups/605357269662532/posts/97396382280...

Suck Diesel "... vacant and vandalised". Not what we wanted to hear. Unless there's been a change more recently than 2002?

Some photos here from Sligo Heritage and History Club on Facebook.

www.facebook.com/groups/605357269662532/?ref=share

25 July 1948 was a Sunday ...

Don't look at the carpet !

A couple more, and an address ...
catalogue.nli.ie/Record/vtls000595244
catalogue.nli.ie/Record/vtls000595245

"Sister Bonaventure, c/o Mrs. Kavanagh, 14, Barrack Street"

Beautifully staged. It must have taken quite a while (probably days) to make this photograph happen.

beachcomber australia What Carpet?

seikinsou I would have thought that Poole would not have given more than 1 hour to get the whole process completed?

Peter Ennis, top row, stands head and shoulders above this gathering of returned prisoners outside Liberty Hall in 1917.

Suck Diesel I am impressed! Please tell more.

A couple of date clues. Restoration was well underway by May 1917.
Evening Herald (Dublin) - Thursday 21 June 1917

The building has been recently undergoing structural alterations, owing to the damage done during the Rebellion, and is now practically restored to its original condition.

Freeman's Journal - Friday 11 May 1917

Republican flags were flown from the scaffolding around Liberty Hall.

and
Labour Leader - Thursday 25 January 1917

We gathered in a bullet scarred and windowless wing of Liberty Hall, and discussed the prospects of a branch.

“Liberty Hall’s courageous caretaker”

“YOU are quite at liberty…” With these words, caretaker Peter Ennis greeted the early morning raiding party at Liberty Hall on Friday 22nd August 1919.

On the Wednesday prior to the raid, Christopher Quigley, a news vendor, had induced Private S Morrison, of the 3rd Battalion, Wiltshire Regiment, to procure a rifle for sale. A deal was struck for £2 and the rifle was passed through a window at the Hall. Quigley’s and Morrison’s subsequent arrests led to the raid.
A detailed account of the 4am raid and Ennis’ trial is documented in the British National Archives at Kew.
Having greeted the raiding party with the words, “You are quite at liberty”, Ennis continued his good humoured banter by asking, “Are you going to pay me overtime for this, sir?” The search uncovered firearms and Ennis, as the only resident, was arrested.
He was registered as prisoner 499 at Mountjoy Prison, where he was also listed as a ‘hunger striker’. An approval by the Chief Secretary of Ireland allowed Ennis to sign union papers while at Mountjoy.
Ennis’ court martial took place on 24th September 1919. He was successfully defended by the eminent republican barrister Patrick Lynch KC, who would later serve as Attorney General. Ennis co-accused Quigley, on the other hand, was sentenced to a year in prison.
In what seemingly was a reprisal for his acquittal, late one evening the Black and Tans ‘lifted’ Ennis from the Hall, brought him to the Custom House railings and beat him mercilessly on the head with revolvers.
Years later, Ennis’ obituary stated that he had “given himself up for dead” at the time. Suffering terribly, he dragged himself back over the cobbles at Beresford Place to the Hall and was able to close the door. According to the obituary, he then “swooned from loss of blood and lay almost unconscious until discovered the next morning”.
His obituary recalled that this was one of “many occasions” that Ennis had “exciting and almost fatal encounters with the armed forces of Dublin Castle”. During the Easter Rising, and under James Connolly’s orders to leave “as the union needed him”, he had staged a dramatic escape from the GPO under machine gun fire to return to Liberty Hall.”

For more, see

siptu.medium.com/liberty-halls-courageous-caretaker-1b5b4...

Image used on front cover of ‘The Impact Of The 1916 Rising: among the nations edited by Ruán O'Donnell, Irish Academic Press, ISBN 978 0 7165 2965’

archive.irishdemocrat.co.uk/book-reviews/impact-of-1916/