Glenarm
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Glenarm (in Irish: Gleann Airm, ie Glen of the Army) is a village in County Antrim, Northern Ireland. It lies on the North Channel coast north of the town of Larne and the village of Ballygalley, and south of the village of Carnlough. It had a population of 582 people in the 2001 Census. Glenarm takes it name from the glen in which it lies, the southernmost of the nine Glens of Antrim. It is in the Larne Borough Council area.
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[edit] History
Dating back to Norman times, the village is the family seat of the MacDonnells, who once occupied Dunluce Castle on the north coast. The village is now a Conservation Area, and its main street (Altmore Street) leads directly to Glenarm Forest, from which can be seen Glenarm Castle, on the far bank of the little river which runs through the village to the sea. The imposing entrance to Glenarm Castle, the Barbican Gate, is at the heart of the village. The Castle dates from 1750, with early 19th century alterations. Glenarm claims to be the oldest town in Ulster having been granted a charter in the 12th century.
History below added by local Archaeologist:
At the opening of Irish history in the 5th to 7th centuries (the beginning of Early Christian period), Glenarm lay within the territory of a kingdom or tribe known as Dalriada, (also spelled Dal Riada and Dal Riata), who occupied coastal County Antrim from Glenarm to Bushmills. The inland boundary of that part of Dalriada’s lands between Ballycastle and Glenarm was formed by the watershed along the top of the Antrim hills. This territory was roughly of the same extent as the baronies of Lower Glenarm, Cary and that small part of the baronies of Dunluce that lay north or east of the river Bush. The Antrim coast south of Glenarm and west of Bushmills, as well as the lands south of the Bush, was not apparently within Dalriada. Instead, they lay within the territories of another group of tribes called the DalnAraide (pronounced Dalnary), who occupied the rest of Antrim. A branch of the latter tribe, known as Latharna, seems to have occupied the coast from just south of Glenarm to Carrickfergus and beyond.
The area at one point came under threat from the Vikings. It is generally thought that the Vikings established a base at Larne for a time. According to Snorro, the Norse historian, Connor king of Ireland defeated the raiding Orkney Vikings at Ulfreksfjord in 1018. This suggests a Norse origin for one of the Anglo-Norman names for the Larne area - Wulfrickford.
The 11th century ‘Book of Rights’ mentions the territories of Lathairne and Seimhne (Island Magee). This shows that the kingdom survived the Viking onslaught. The very fact that Island Magee is listed separately in this document (as Seimhne) suggests that this was a very politically fragmented area. A separate king of Latharna is not noted and it is likely that it was then ruled by an overking from the Mag Line branch of the DalnAraide. The marginal status of Latharna is shown by the fact that it only features three times in the Irish annals. Indeed, most of the available references (all in the late ‘Annals of the Four Masters’) are set in the pre-historic period and are clearly mythological. The area is also mentioned in the ‘Tripartite Life of Patrick’, which states that he founded the churches of Cell Chonadhain (St Cunnings) and Gluaire (Glore in Glenarm) in the territory. A third early church is also within this area, that of Solar, which is first mentioned in the tower of London Rolls, from the reign of Edward I, ‘AD 1278, it was found that John Byset held, in capite, of the Bishop of Down and Connor, two parts of the land of Psallor’. The church is believed to date to some time shortly after St. Patrick’s death.
During the 10th and 11th Centuries Glenarm was part of the kingdom of Dal n Araide but with the expansion of the Ui Tuirtre into county Antrim they came increasingly under pressure. In 1176AD the Annals of Ulster record that O’Flynn, the king of the Ui Tuirtre, was also king of the Fir Li and the Dal n Araide. We can therefore assume that at some point before this the Ui Tuirtre had defeated the Dal n Araide and taken control of their lands, including Glenarm.
In 1210 AD King John granted the town of Larne to Duncan (de Galloway of Carrick), together with 50 ‘ploughlands’ from Larne to Glenarm. This grant was confirmed in 1219 and 1224. Indeed, all the lands of coastal Antrim, north of Larne, were granted to members of the de Galloway family. Records show that this was strictly theoretical and indeed evidence suggests that Glenarm only came under the control of de Galloways around 1217 AD when O’Flynn was killed by the English. The O’Flynns apparently retained control of the upper half of Glenarm glen.
However, these lands were granted directly from the crown, not by Hugh de Lacy, the Earl of Ulster. This worried Hugh de Lacy, who wanted to remove these potential rivals. Consequently, de Lacy expelled/assimilated the de Galloways and granted their lands to the Bissets who were arch-enemies (a feud begun in Scotland) of the de Galloways. The Bissets had probably gained these lands before 1242 AD and held them from the Earl rather than the crown. This family became associated with the glens of Antrim, known in documentation as the Glynnes or even ‘barony of the Glynnes’. An inquisition of 1279 found that John Bisset held Carncastle, Glenarm, Droagh, near Drains Bay and Corkermain, at or near modern Ballygally, and land to the south of Larne. The Bissets also controlled Rathlin and the area around Ballycastle, but the territory in between belonged to the Ui Tuirtre. This shows that the territory of the Glynns extended much further south than the area now thought of as the glens of Antrim (which occupies the coast from Glenarm to Ballycastle). This ancient territory included what are now the baronies of Glenarm Upper and Lower as well as Cary. The Bissets were known to the Irish as the MacEoins ‘sons of John’ after John Bisset who had first received the lands of the Glynnes. The Bissets seem to have shared power in the Glens with the Ui Tuirtre and then the MacDonnells, who superseded the Ui Tuirtre in the middle of the 14th century. This relationship must have been very amicable for in 1259 AD Hugh Bisset is recorded as capturing cows for O’Flynn (De Lisle and Dudley mss I). The Bissets briefly lost their lands in 1319 after switching to support Edward Bruce during his invasion. After a twenty year period, when they were granted first to another Norman, John de Athy, then to Richard de Mandeville, who was brother of Sir Henry de Mandeville, seneschal of Ulster, before they were returned.
The Bissets by 1260 had been given the grant of church lands at Solar, Templeoughter (an area just north of the river, near the present castle in Glenarm) and other associated church lands by the Bishop of Down & Connor. These other church lands may have included St. Cunning and the Glore, which was later named Tickmacrevan (the House of MacCrevin) and gave the parish its moniker. These lands included churches at Glore, Solar and St. Cunning and though only Glore and Solar are listed in the ‘Taxation of Pope Nicholas’, 1306AD, it is likely that St Cunning was also in use, but as it was the property of the Knights of St. John it was exempt from taxation.
In 1445 AD, after a petition by Donald Macagaill, Pope Eugenius IV sent a letter to the Archdeacon of Connor permitting him to build the Church of St. Mary the Virgin for the Friars of the Third Order of St. Francis in his diocese. This small Oratory was the Church of St. Mary’s, Templeougher and appears to have been the first ecclesiastical building built on the church lands at Templeougher. Twenty years later another papal document indicates that this small Oratory was now inadequate and granted permission for a full friary to be built. Robert Bisset, who had petitioned for this larger friary, donated a piece of land on the northern side of the estuary of Glenarm River for the construction of this friary. The last dateable reference to the friary being active was in 1567, when friars were dispatched from Armagh to bring the remains of Shane O’Neill back home. However, a 17th Century epitaph says that ‘a certain friar of that order was hanged by the English Heretics when they were ravaging Ireland by fire and sword. Father Edmundus Cana, priest and confessor of our Order, was an eye-witness to this.’ Father Edmundus Cana was a Franciscan missionary to the Western Isles between 1619 and 1637 and was still alive in 1647, it is therefore quite likely that the friary remained in use for some time after 1567; at least as late as the 1584 raid to which this epitaph refers. The friary had certainly ceased to function by the 17th Century. The Church of Templeougher may have remained in use for a short time after the construction of the Friary, but by 1622 the ‘Visitation book’ reports the ‘Grange de Temple Aughtragh de Glenarm – utterly decayed’, it also states that the church at Glore was decayed and that the Solar had no church, nor glebe, but did have a rectory. A parliamentary commission of inquest, held in Antrim town in 1637, found that ‘St Cunning, a small impropriate Grange’ ‘hath no church, glebe, nor incumbent.’
The first castle at Glenarm is recorded in a 1270 Inquisition where it is shown as being let to John or Robert Bisset by the Bishop of Down & Connor. As the Bissets are shown as tenants of the castle it is likely it was built some time previously, probably by the de Galloways. It was situated on the site of the present day Baptist church.
The end of the 15th Century saw the Bissets harried by invading forces. The ‘Annals of Ulster’ show that in 1512 AD ‘a hosting by Gerald (Garret More Fitzgerald) Earl of Kildare, namely, the justiciary of Ireland, against Trian-Congail, whereupon he took the castle of Bel-Fersti and broke down the castle of Mac Eoin (Bisset) and harried the Glens and much of the country’ and in 1513 AD ‘A hosting by (the) O’Neill, namely Art, son of Aodh, into Trian-Conghail, whereon he burned Magh-Line, and raided the Glens’. The final Bisset was killed in battle with the O’Donnells in 1522 AD. The neighbouring MacDonnells, who by this stage were related through marriage to the Bissets, only avoided this fate by becoming Gallowglass captains to the O’Donnells.
The MacDonnells, though vassals of the O’Donnells for much of this time, took control of most of the Bisset’s land and retained a presence in Glenarm until 1597. At this point they partially pulled down the castle and retreated to Dunluce.
After a long war with Elizabeth I of England, political intrigues and the flight of the Irish chiefs overseas at the start of the 17th century, the area was earmarked for plantation by loyal British Protestant subjects. This was an ad-hoc private enterprise in Antrim and north Down and mainly lowland Scottish in character. In 1603 AD Sir Randall MacDonnell, who in the intervening years had made peace with King James I, used his new found influence to persuade him to not only grant him his native Glens of Antrim but also the north Antrim Route. However, Larne and its immediate environs were obtained by the English Lord Sir Arthur Chichester.
On their return to Glenarm, a new castle began to be built on the opposite side of the river from the old one, on the site of the present castle. This new castle continued to be improved and added to until Sir Randal MacDonnell’s death in 1636. The old castle must also have been repaired during this period as it was leased to the Donaldsons, who were kinsmen of the MacDonnell’s, at the start of the 17th Century. Records show they still held the castle tenement in 1779, but it must have been abandoned before 1835 as a letter from this date refers to the 'foundations of a very extensive old castle which stood in the centre of the town until a few years ago’.
During the rebellion of 1641, Alexander MacDonnell, the Earl of Antrim’s brother, who was in charge of and resided in Glenarm, fought on the Irish side. He raised several regiments who were garrisoned in Glenarm under the command of Alester McColl. In 1642 when an invading Scots army, under the command of General Robert Munro, was sent by parliament to deal with the rebels they burnt Glenarm, including the new castle. They captured both Alexander and the Earl and they were imprisoned in Carrickfergus Castle. When peace was brought about the ‘Acts of Settlement and Explanation’ restored all the MacDonnell’s land to them. They did not, however, rebuild the castle in Glenarm at this time, but moved to Dunluce Castle and later Ballymegarry.
In the 17th Century the religious needs of Glenarm were served by a small church and graveyard on Castle Street, at the site of the converted schoolhouse. The foundation date of this church is unknown, but Richard Dobbs, in his 1683 ‘Descriptions of the county of Antrim’, describes the church as being one of only three slate roofed buildings in the village. The Bridge into the Castle grounds was constructed beside this church and was completed in 1682. Dobbs also states that a Presbyterian meeting house was to be found at some distance from the town. The position of this building is unknown, but map evidence suggests that it was in the vicinity of, or more likely under, the current non-subscribing Presbyterian Church. Though no Catholic church was present it is known that Fr. Edmund O’Moore became Glenarm’s first parish priest. He was ordained in 1669 and began officiating in Glenarm the next year. Due to religious suppression Catholic masses were often held in isolated spots, there are several sites around Glenarm believed to have been used during these times. The closest site to Glenarm is called the ‘Priest’s Knowe/Green’ and it lies close to the Straidkilly Road, less than a mile from the village. An alter stone was known to exist here into the 19th Century.
The 18th Century saw the return of Lord Antrim to Glenarm and with his funding a number of major construction works were begun. A new castle was built over the remains of the castle destroyed in 1642. An inscribed stone shows that the castle was ‘rebuilt by Alexander the present Earl in the year 1756’. This castle can still be seen as the central block of the current, much expanded, castle. The (non-subscribing) Presbyterian Church was built in 1762 as a replacement for the Presbyterian Meeting House. In 1763 an agreement was reached between Lord Antrim and Mr. William McBride for the construction of St. Patrick’s Church of Ireland on the site of the domestic quarters of the abandoned Franciscan friary. The grounds around the friary appear to have already been used as a graveyard at this time and this new church may have been partially built onto burials. The church was consecrated in 1769 and was built with much of the remaining walls of the friary. It was small in scale, having a simple nave, three sided apse, tower and spire. It was expanded in 1823 with the building of a gallery, vestry and south transept; and again in 1878 and 1892 with the construction of the porch, alterations to the vestry and an extension to the chancel.
The construction of this church led to the abandonment of the church and graveyard on Castle Street. In 1825 Edmund MacDonnell, the Lord at the time, levelled the church and removed the graveyard to allow for the building on the schoolhouse. Only one portion of the graveyard remained at the turn of the century, a small stone wall enclosure surrounded a tombstone with the family name Cooch lay at the west gable of the school. However, this has been destroyed since and the tombstone was moved to St. Patrick’s graveyard.
At the end of the 18th Century Lord Antrim, the sixth Earl, resided almost exclusively in Dublin, so when a number of men in Glenarm joined the 1798 rebellion he was absent. On the 7th June 1798 Reverend Robert Acheson set Bellair Hill, a hill above Glenarm overlooking both Glenarm and Carnlough, as a rallying point for the men of the Glens to join the rebellion. As the insurgents began to congregate on the hill Captain George Stewart and the small detachment of Tay Fencibles billeted in the village decided upon a pre-emptive strike. They seized Acheson and two other potential leaders, William Coulter and Hugh McCoy, and occupied the castle. The rebels, on hearing this, seized the wives of the Glenarm Yeoman and over the next few hours captured a number of other loyalists, including several members of the Larne Yeomanry. Later in the same day Squire Edward Agnew, of Kilwaughter, rode to Glenarm and managed to negotiate a parley with the rebels. Prisoners were exchanged and Rev. Robert Acheson took command of the thousands of rebels who had formed on Bellair Hill. That evening Squire Agnew brought news of the defeat of the main rebel force in Antrim and persuaded Acheson to seek pardon and use his influence to disperse the crowds. On the morning of Friday the 8th June more prisoners were exchanged and an agreement was reached between Acheson and Captain Stewart whereby all arms would be laid down by twelve o’clock on Monday 11th. The crowds dispersed and Acheson and several of the other leaders were put on trial in Belfast; they were eventually acquitted.
Stewart, in a letter written the week after the rebellion, requested that all should be forgiven for the events of the previous Thursday, except for those that had committed atrocious crimes ‘such as murder or burning houses’. No record of large-scale violence is noted within the Glens during this rebellion and this letter seems to suggest that only sporadic small scale acts of Rebel aggression occurred. It should not, however, be assumed that only the rebels were involved in violence. James Hope, in his autobiographical memoir; writes of James Hunter, a Glenarm rebel, whose house was burnt out a few days after the rebellion by Yeoman under the command of Squire Boyd of Ballycastle. He only escaped the lynching that the yeoman had planned for him by running to the hills.
In 1813 a new bridge was built on the Coast road, beside St. Patrick’s Church. This was to allow Lord Antrim to construct the Barbican gate at the old bridge on Castle Street and to wall off his demesne, thus restricting access to his estate. Other major buildings constructed in the 19th century were the aforementioned Schoolhouse, 1825; the Presbyterian Church in Altmore Street, 1836; the Antrim Arms hotel in Toberwine Street, 1840; the Castle Stables, 1875 and the Church of the Immaculate Conception, 1875. The Courthouse, currently the Baptist Church, was built sometime between 1835, when the Castle ruins were still visible, and 1843 when Thackeray, in his Irish Sketchbook, noted a ‘town-house with a Campanile in the Italian taste’. The existing harbour was enlarged and improved to its current dimensions around 1868 and the Antrim coast road, was completed in 1842. Prior to its construction all access to Glenarm from the south was via the Dickeystown Road. In 1832 Lieutenant Thomas Harris wrote that this road, ‘commonly called the path’, ‘is of frightful steepness and great length, after surmounting the difficulties of the ascent, those of the descent become, if possible, worse’, which gives some idea of the difficulties of access to the village prior to the Coast Road’s construction.
The Os memoirs of 1835 state that Glenarm contained ‘145 houses of which one is three storeys, 97 are two storey and the remainder are one storey high’, ‘ are all built of stone and nearly all slated’. Many of the upstanding buildings in the central part of Glenarm are those mentioned in these memoirs, while the vast majority of the rest are also 19th Century in date.
Probably one of the most important historical events in Ireland’s history was the 1845-47 potato famine. The Glens of Antrim did not, however, fare as poorly as the rest of Ireland during this period. The Earl of Antrim, now resident in Glenarm, and the Marchioness of Londonderry organised relief schemes of food and money for their tenants and built soup kitchen throughout the Glens. Glenarm’s soup kitchen is believed to have been to the rear of Altmore Street, along the river. The only other major historical event to occur in Glenarm during this period was in 1854, when a cholera epidemic afflicted the town. The epidemic began in the Bridge End Tavern and rapidly spread from house to house. A large percentage of the population eventually succumbed to the disease and was buried in a mass grave near the back wall of St. Patrick’s Church Graveyard.
[edit] Places of interest
Glenarm Forest Park is an 800-acre nature preserve once part of the demesne of Glenarm Castle, but now in public and maintained by the Ulster Wildlife Trust. Other notable features include a salmon fishery and Glenarm Castle. The most recent addition to the village is the restoration of its distinctive limestone-built harbour. The following is an old picture of the quay before it collapsed, taken in 1965.
[edit] 2001 Census
Glenarm is classified as a small village or hamlet by the NI Statistics and Research Agency (NISRA) (ie with population between 500 and 1,000 people). On Census day (29 April 2001) there were 582 people living in Glenarm. Of these:
- 23.9% were aged under 16 and 21.1% were aged 60 and over
- 49.1% of the population were male and 50.9% were female
- 46.6% were from a Catholic background and 52.2% were from a Protestant background
- 6.3% of people aged 16-74 were unemployed.
For more details see: NI Neighbourhood Information Service
[edit] Famous People
Connor Duffy
