Ardclough, officially Ardclogh (; ), is a village and community in the parish of Kill, County Kildare, Ireland. It is two miles (3 km) off the N7 national primary road. It is the burial place and probable birthplace of Arthur Guinness, who is said to have returned to the maternal homestead of the Reads at Huttonread to give birth in the tradition of the time.
Location Ardclough is located below two detached foothills of the Wicklow Mountains, Lyons Hill and Oughterard on some of the most fertile soils in Ireland.Rawson, Agricultural Survey of Co Kildare (1808) The River Liffey passes within a one kilometre radius. The main transport arteries to the south and south west of Ireland pass through, the main railway line to Cork and Tralee, the canal to Shannonbridge, and the N7 which passes nearby.
While the original townland of Ardclough was situated west of the canal in land that is now inaccessible, and contained the site on the opposite bank of the canal of the original (1810) parish church of Lyons and a group of quarries there, the place now referred to Ardclough approximates more closely to the townlands of Tipperstown and Wheatfield, where housing was built in 1876 and 1989. The development of 54 houses on a nearby site was proposed, but has yet to begin. Construction on a new 16-classroom national school began near the original site of Tipperstown House in January 2011.Liffey Champion 14 Jan 2011 A new graveyard is also planned on a site south east of the current centre of the village.
Geology The soil is principally a rich loam, varying from 10 to in depth, and resting on a hard and compact substratum of floetz limestone. The water table is unusually high. The low group of nearby hills, which includes Lyons and Oughterard in County Kildare and Windmill Hill, Athgoe, and Rusty Hill in County Dublin, are composed of clay-slate, grauwacke, grauwaeke-slate, and granite. The grauwacke consists of small and finely rounded and angular grains of quartz, numerous minute scales of mica, small fragments of clay-slate, and sometimes portions of felspar. The grauwacke consists of small and finely rounded and angular grains of quartz, numerous minute scales of mica, small fragments of clay-slate, and sometimes portions of felspar and red sandstone.Lesiw, Samuel, "Topography of Ireland" (1835)
Etymology The name was first recorded as 'Aclagh' on Alexander Taylor's 1783 map. It was the site of the masshouse (later old Ardclough church), school and the three largest of seven local quarries, on the opposite bank of the canal.Taylor, Alexander, "Alexander Taylor's Map of Co. Kildare," in 6 sheets, made for the Grand Jury. Reissued by the RIA in 1983 From 1837 onward it was recorded as 'Ardclogh' and later 'Ardclough'. The name likely comes from Ard Cloch, meaning "high stone or stone building".
Habitat The area provides a combination of hill, wood and water habitats. More than 35 species of birds have been identified and coarse fishing for pike, perch, roach and rudd is common along the canal bank.
Amenities Amongst the settlement's buildings today are a national school, a church, Ardclough GAA Club, and one shop "Buggys". Ardclough also contains the historic round tower at Oughterard.
History
Royal site The earliest evidence of human habitation at Ardclough was the discovery of a flint dated to 4800–3600BC, at Castlewarden below Oughter Ard Hill, rare for a dry-land location from the time.Brady, Niall, Mesolitihic Flint Artefact, JCKAS Vol. XVI No. 4 (1983-84). p376. Lyons Hill was the inauguration site and base for 10 Uí Dúnchada kings of Leinster.Corry, Eoghan and Tancred, Jim "The Annals of Ardclough" pp72-76 (2004) The Battle of Glen Mama, where Brian Boru defeated Máel Mórda king of Leinster and Sitric Silkbeard King of Dublin in 999, is believed to have taken place on the Dublin side of Oughterard Hill.The Battle of Glenn Mama, Dublin and the High Kingship of Ireland: a Millennial Commemoration by Ailbhe Mac Shamhráin (Medieval Dublin, edited by Sean Duffy, 2001 pp53-64).Lloyd, Joseph H.: The identification of the battlefield of Glenn Mama, A.D. 1000, JCKAS Vol. VII, No. 6 (July 1914) pp365-372. The area was accorded its own place-legend in the Dindsenchas, Liamuin.Gwynn, Edward, The Metrical Dindshenchas part iv, (1924), pp.328-331 Lyons subsequently became home to the Aylmer,Aylmer, Hans Hendrick: The Aylmers of Lyons, County Kildare, JCKAS Vol. IV, No. 3 (January 1904) pp179-183FitzGerald, Lord Walter: The Aylmers of Lyons and Donadea [query], JCKAS Vol. I, No. 6 (1895) p406. TyrrellMartin Kelly: The Owners and tenants of Barberstown Castle, JCKAS Vol. XVI No 1 1977-78, pp61-67. and LawlessLyons A Guide (2001)Fitzpatrick, WJ: Life, Times and Contemporaries of Lord Cloncurry (1855). (Online version available) families.
Historic buildings There are five medieval churches and three castles in the area. Most important is Oughter Ard, a seventh-century monastery associated with saints Briga (feast day 21 January) and Derchairthinn (feast day 8 March) and site of a round tower.FitzGerald, Lord Walter: The round towers of the Co. Kildare: their origin and use, JCKAS Vol. I, No. 2 (1892) pp71-94. Recent research has estimated that the ruined church there dates to 1350, not 1609 as previously believed.O'Neill, Mike: Medieval Parish Churches in "Kildare History and Society" (2005) pp176-9 It was the site of a Royal Manor.Hall, DN, Hennessy, M, and O'Keeffe, Tadhg Medieval Agriculture and Settlement in Castlewarden and Oughterard in "Irish Geography" Vol 18 1985 pp16-25 Whitechurch, (Ecclesia Alba, named for the Carmelite order) was granted in 1320, and enfifed in 1508. A single headstone is the only reminder of the church of Castledillon, (1000), once a parish of its own.Fitzgerald, Lord Walter: Castledillon in the barony of South Salt, JCKAS Vol. VI, No. 3 (January 1910) pp206-213. The graveyard beside another disappeared church at Clonaghlis, (pre 1206) is still in useJCKAS Vol. VII, No. 3 (January 1913). FitzGerald, Lord Walter: The Parish of Clonaghlis, County Kildare [note], 190-191. and is associated with female saints Fedhlim and Mughain.Michael O'Clery, John O'Donovan, James Henthorn Todd, William Reeves: The martyrology of Donegal: a calendar of the saints of Ireland (1864) P329 Feidhlim Virgin and Mughain two daughter of Ailill son of dujnlang, and Cill-na-ningean in the west of Magh ife by the side of Liamhain in the name of his place. They are of the race of Cathaoir Mor of Leinster. Castlewarden (c1200) church has disappeared. Reeves Castle, on the Celbridge road, was built in the 14th century.
A mass house built below Oughter Ard hill in 1714 became the site of the first modern Catholic church in 1810 and a school in 1839. Lyons parish was united with Oughterard in 1541 and with Kill in 1693.JCKAS Vol. IX, No. 3 (January 1919) Hamilton, Gustavus Everard: The names of the Baronies and Parishes in the County Kildare (continued), 246-257 The centre of the parish moved to Kill in 1823.Corry, Eoghan and Tancred, Jim "The Annals of Ardclough" pp76-78 (2004) The former Lyons parish church (built 1810, refurbished 1896)Irish Times, 7 May 1896 was deconsecrated in 1985 and is now a private house. It was replaced by a new church in Tipperstown, designed by Paul O'Daly. A marble font, brought from Rome by Valentine Lawless and presented to the church, was removed to Lyons House for safekeeping but remains the property of the parish.Ardclough Church Souvenir Brochure (1985)
A well-preserved moated site at Puddlehall dates to the 13th century and was cited by University College Dublin Professor Sean O Riordain as one of the finest examples of a moated house in Ireland.O'Riordain, Sean "Antiquities of the Irish Countryside" (1939) p46 Lyons, Reeves and Oughter Ard tower houses date to the 14th century. The large houses of Bishopscourt (constructed 1790) and Lyons (constructed 1804-10) provided an economic focus of the community in the 19th century, as did the Grand Canal (reached Ardclough 1763) in the vicinity of the 13th lock.Corry, Eoghan and Tancred, Jim "The Annals of Ardclough" (2004)
Grand canal When work on the Grand Canal began in 1756 Ardclough's was one of the first sections to be dug. The canal reached Ardclough in 1763, when the 13th lock, a double lock built with Pozzuolona mortar, was opened, following the ambitious design of the canal's original engineer, Thomas Omer. After Omer's plans proved too expensive a new engineer, John Trail, took over construction of the canal in 1768, the proposed canal capacity was reduced from 170 ton barges to 40 ton barges. Canal records show that " Lyons or Clonaughles lock" was reduced in size in 1783, but the canal through the thirteenth lock serves as a reminder of Omer's original plan, wide, compared with the width adopted by Trail.Delany, Ruth: "Boating Guide to Grand Canal" (2001)
Ardclough Bridge was named in original plans for the Bruton family of Clonaghlis but constructed with a name plate bearing the name of the Henry family of Straffan. From 1777 a local river, the Morrel was proposed as water feeder for the canal, construction resumed and the first passenger boats were towed to Sallins in February 1779.Delany, Ruth: "The Grand Canal" (2004)
Local landowner The 2nd Baron Cloncurry was a canal enthusiast, constructing the Lyons mill and lockyard village complex in the 1820s and serving as chairman of the Grand Canal Company five times during his lifetime. The canal was an important, if slow, passenger thoroughfare feeding passenger's to John Barry's hotel at Lyons. When in 1834 Flyboats increased the average speed for passenger boats from to Ireland's first railway was already under construction.
The canal peaked at 120,615 passengers in 1846, the year construction started on the Dublin-Cork railway line. When a Dublin-Galway railway line was opened in 1850 the closure of the rarely profitable passenger service followed in 1852. Cargo traffic continued to use the canal for another 108 years, peaking at 379.045 tons in 1865 when an average of 90 barges a day passed through Ardclough. The canal was motorised 1911–24 and closed to cargo in 1960, but is still a thoroughfare for leisure boats. The tracks of the ropes of the horse-drawn barges can still be traced at Ardclough canal bridge. A folk belief prevailed that the canal was haunted at the thirteenth lock because it had been dug through a graveyard,Eilis Ni Dhuibhne: Folk beliefs of the grand canal 26-29 Paddy Dunne of Lowtown UFP in "Canaliana" (1980) p119 a possible reference to nearby Clonaghlis graveyard.
Notable events
The Great Southern & Western Railway (constructed 1844) and Straffan railway station (used until 1947) opened communications to Dublin for cattle and horse dealers. A railway accident on 5 October 1853, the third-worst in Irish rail history, killed 18 people including four children in the townland of Clownings. It occurred in heavy fog when a goods train ran into the back of a stalled passenger train at a point 974 yards south of the former Straffan Station. The goods train smashed the first-class carriage, which was driven a quarter of a mile through station. The tragedy was the subject of a poem by Donegal-born poet William Allingham.Allingham, William: Day and Night Songs (1854) It was the third worst accident in rail history to that date.Freeman's Journal, 6 October 1853, and subsequent editionsHouse of Commons Inquiry into Railway Accidents 1853-4