Macroom

The area around Macroom contains a number of Stone Age megaliths. This standing stone is part of a 3500-year-old complex in Knocknakilla between Macroom and Millstreet

Evidence of pre-history human activity in the Macroom area survives in the many Iron Age burial monuments; the area is unusually rich with standing stones, dolmens and stone circles.[5] Later, in the early Dark Ages, Macroom seems to have been a centre for Bardic conventions and a base for the Druids of Munster.[6] The first historical reference to Macroom dates from the 6th century, when the townland was known as Achad Dorbchon and held within the kingdom of Muscraighe Mitine.[7]

The Eóganachta were then the dominant clan of Munster and held kingdoms from Muscraighe Mitine to the midlands town of Birr. At some point, they were replaced by the Uí Floinn, who commissioned a castle in Macroom so as to establish Raithleann as capital of Muskerry.

Muscraighe Mitine underwent three invasions during the 13th century. The Murcheatach Uí Briain and Richard de Cogan arrived in 1201 and 1207 respectively; the MacCarthys became the dominant and most powerful family and held Macroom Castle until the mid-17th century.[8] From the 14th century, Macroom became the capital of the Barony of Muskerry and the centre for trade, burial and religious worship. It was one of the earliest Irish milling centres, and from the end of the 16th century the town grew from a village to a functionally diverse urban centre. The locality grew outwards from the castle. The MacCarthys established the town as a centre for markets and fairs, and in 1620 a market house was built to the east of and facing the castle. The family introduced a plantation scheme which aimed to attract new agriculture and industrial techniques and methods to the area.

By the mid-17th century, Anglo-Irish families owned approximately one-third of the town in value terms.[9] The Protestant families introduced butter making, a labour-intensive industry. A 1750 tenement list details 134 buildings and 300 families, with a population ratio of 6 to 1 between Catholic and Protestants. The town had developed from a locality of mud cabins in the early 1660s to a linear shaped urban settlement of mainly thatched cabins, which were later replaced by solid cottages following a campaign by the Irish Land and Labour Association (ILLA). Macroom Castle was for a period owned by Admiral Sir William Penn, a Royal Navy officer and father of William Penn, after whom the U.S. state of Pennsylvania is named.

The 1650 Battle of Macroom was waged as part of the Cromwellian conquest of Ireland, when English Parliamentarian forces led by Roger Boyle defeated an Irish Confederate force under David Roche. Bishop Boetius MacEgan, acting on behalf of the MacCarthys, failed to hold the castle. He was taken prisoner by Parliamentarian forces and executed by hanging at Carrigadrohid.[10]

c. 1894 mass meeting, organised by the ILLA supported by small tenant farmers and agrarian labourers in the Market Square

Macroom was the main base in Cork for the Auxiliary Division of the Royal Irish Constabulary (RIC) during the Irish War of Independence. The Irish Republican Army (IRA) was highly active in the county, especially in the areas around Macroom, Bandon and Dunmanway. RIC policemen in the town described the area as "practically in a state of war". After a series of burnings of local RIC barracks and courthouses a curfew was imposed on the town, with a ban on public meetings and market fairs.[11] A local IRA volunteers wrote of a "hinterland unpoliced and unwatched". Local RIC policemen felt they had lost control and the Auxiliaries were called to reinforce them. The townspeople of Macroom treated the Auxiliaries with hostility, and there were instances of their patrols being stoned. The British were embroiled in a guerrilla battle in the Muskerry hills, coming under fire from the Ballyvourney IRA cell, and lost three men – two of them officers – in one attack.[12]

On 28 November 1920 at Kilmichael, on the road between Macroom and Dunmanway, a convoy consisting of 18 Auxiliaries in two lorries were ambushed by IRA volunteers from the 3rd Cork Brigade under the command of Tom Barry. 16 Auxiliaries were killed and 1 wounded, while the IRA suffered no casualties. After the ambush, the Auxiliaries increased their mistreatment of the County Cork populace, and martial law was declared in the counties of Cork, Kerry, Limerick and Tipperary, which led Macroom to fall under martial law for a period of time.[13] Macroom Castle was burned out on five separate occasions; the last occasion was on 18 August 1922, following the evacuation of the Auxiliaries from the town. Volunteers from the anti-treaty IRA, including Erskine Childers and Frank O'Connor, retreated from Cork City to Macroom, burning the castle before leaving during the Irish Civil War.

The ruined home of the Cork branch of the Massey family, burned out and abandoned during the War of Independence. The hill on which it is located is known as "Mount Massey".

Mount Massey which is now ruined, was the 18th and 19th century home of the members of the Massey family, and is located north by Kilnagurteen and gave the townland of Masseytown its name. The family were major landowners with land covering 13,363 acres, extending from Clondrohid to Drishane. During the 19th century, the family tried to temper growing Irish nationalist sentiment by sponsoring the local town fair. Later their home and estate was besieged and burnt in December 1920 by IRA volunteers during the Irish War of Independence.[14]

IRA volunteer and politician Michael Collins was killed in 1922 in an ambush near Béal na Bláth. Lady Olivia Ardilaun, a descendant of the McCarthys, and widow of Lord Ardilaun, sold the castle demesne in 1924 to a group of local businessmen, which they put in trust for the town.[15]

View of the back square, showing the late Gerard Golden's public house; commonly "the pub that never served a fool"

Tourist attractions include the town centre, an 18-hole golf course, and the Castle Grounds, with fishing and golfing grounds. The town's surroundings contain large amounts of megalithic monuments, early Christian holy wells, churches and sacred sites associated with ancient visionaries and healers. Mushera Mountain is located a few kilometres to the north of the town, near Millstreet Country Park. It contains the ancient Saint John's Well. Carrigaphooca Castle a tower house 6 km west of the town no longer accessible to the public.

The Castle Arch, the centerpiece of the old castle grounds, admits walkers to the demesne parklands. It is held in trust to, and in the possession of the people of Macroom. Its large park contains riverside walks among mature oak and beech trees.

The Gearagh, a submerged oakwood forest 1.5 km east of the town

The Gearagh is a national nature reserve on an inland delta, is located 1.5 kilometres (0.93 mi) south of Macroom. It comprises a series of small islands, separated by anastomosing, mostly flat, river channels or streams,[18] and is bounded by Toon Bridge, Illaunmore, and Anahala Bridge. The area is thought to have been wooded since the end of the last Ice Age c. 8,000 bc.[19] The alluvial woodland extended as far as the Lee Bridge, and consisted of a large number of mature oak and ash trees.[20]

The reserve was gutted in 1954 when the Lee hydro-electric scheme led to extensive tree-felling and flooding. Now submerged houses are visible from the area around Two Mile Bridge. The scheme resulted in the loss of sixty percent of the former oak woodland.[19] Today, the Gearagh is of interest and importance due to its rich and rare diversity of wildlife, and represents the only extant extensive alluvial woodland in Western Europe.[21]

Main pathway from the entrance

The Gearagh is primarily of interest and importance due to its rich and rare diversity of wildlife, and it represents the only extant extensive alluvial woodland in Western Europe.[22] It hosts numerous rare plant species including marsh marigold, meadowsweet and nightshade,[23] and 62 species of moss and liverwort. While oak and ash trees once pre-dominated, today there are a number of willow and alder trees on the higher islands and inlets.[24] It hosts a large diversity of birds and wildfowl and attracts both summer and winter migrants. Examples include mallards, wigeon, Greylag geese, herons and coots.[23] It also hosts Atlantic salmon and the near extinct freshwater pearl mussel. The area is protected under the international Ramsar Convention.

Today the Gearagh comprises wide but shallow water enclosing a series of small islands separated by anastomosing, mostly flat, river streams.[25] It remains an area of outstanding natural beauty, with a diverse ecological system[26] and wide variety of plants, birds and fish, including freshwater pearl mussel, Atlantic salmon, whooper swans, kingfishers and otters.

Carrigaphooca Castle from the north east

Carrigaphooca Castle is a ruined five storey rectangular tower house situated on a steep-sided rock overlooking the River Sullane. It is located 6 km west of Macroom, in an area once known as Gleann na n-Dearg (Valley of the Reds).[27] The tower dominates the landscape of Lissacresig (Fairyland) in Clondrohid, and Lower Shanballyshane, in Kilnamartyra.[28] Carrigaphooca is made of sandstone and limestone and was built as a defensive tower by MacCarthy clan member Donal MacCarthy of Drishane c. 1336–51.[27] Cormac Teige McCarthy, the Lord of Blarney took refuge in the tower after he had sided with the Irish during the Siege of Kinsale in 1601. He stayed there until he was forgiven by Elizabeth I after he had written a personal letter of apology to her.[29] In 1602, the castle was attacked and taken by Donal Cam O'Sullivan Beare[30] and another member of the extended McCarthy family. After a protracted siege, their forces broke through the outer wall and burned the timber door at the north face entrance. The defenders surrendered and were allowed to go free.[31]

Carrigaphooca is positioned in an area rich with neolithic monuments; a stone circle lies two fields to the east.[32] The tower is located on private property, and no longer accessible to the public, although it is owned by the state and maintained by the Office of Public Works.[33]

From 1976 to 1982 Macroom hosted the annual Mountain Dew festival, organised by young local business people. The festivals attracted up to 20,000 attendees each year, with lineups that included Rory Gallagher, Thin Lizzy and Van Morrison. It was the first of its kind for Ireland, and was intended to reinvigorate a town that was then stagnant economically.[34] According to one of the organisers, Martin Fitzgerald, "The town needed a bit of shake rattle and roll to tempt not just international investors but Irish people to rest there a bit long...a rock concert fitted the bill".[35] Line ups included Rory Gallagher, Phil Lynott, Elvis Costello Van Morrison, Marianne Faithfull and Horslips, and was attended by John Lydon of the Sex Pistols.[36]