Murragh

MURRAGH, or MORAGH, a parish, in the barony of KINALMEAKY, county of CORK, and province of MUNSTER, 6 miles (N. W. by W.) from Bandon, on the mail coach road to Dunmanway; containing 3270 inhabitants. About two-thirds of it are under cultivation; the land, though mostly light, is good, but very badly tilled, agriculture not being systematically followed, except by a few gentlemen. An extensive and valuable bog at Maulnadrought, the property of Sir Augustus Warren, Bart., supplies this part of the country with fuel. Here are extensive flour-mills, the property of A. B. Bernard, Esq., employing 20 persons, and grinding, with those of Morah Bridge, 12,000 barrels of wheat annually. Nucestown, which was sacked and destroyed in the war of 1641, has ever since remained a poor, neglected, and ruinous place; it is a constabulary police station, and has fairs on Jan. 8th, Whit-Tuesday, Oct. 15th, and Dec. 14th, for cattle, pigs, pedlery, and farming implements. The river Bandon bounds the parish on the south; and the formation of a canal from Collier's quay, about four miles below Bandon, to Dunmanway, a line of about 18 miles, passing through this parish, has been contemplated; but the design appears to be for the present suspended. The principal seats are the glebehouse, the residence of the Rev. R. K. St. Lawrence; Farnalough, of H. Herrick, Esq.; and Killyneas Cottage, of the Rev. J. Murphy.

The living is a rectory and vicarage, in the diocese of Cork, and in the patronage of the Bishop: the tithes amount to £851. The glebe-house is a handsome and commodious residence, built by aid of a gift of £100, and a loan of £850, in 1810, from the late Board of First Fruits; it is situated in a beautifully picturesque part of the vale of Bandon, and is designed and embellished with much taste: the glebe comprises 37 acres. The church, situated at Farren-Thomas, is a large neat edifice, in the early English style of architecture, with a square tower; it crowns the summit of the lofty ridge which rises from the north side of the river Bandon, and is nearly in the centre of the parish; it was erected by aid of a loan of £550 from the same Board, in 1810. In the R. C. divisions the parish is the head of a union or district, comprising also the parish of Kinneigh, and containing two chapels; that of Murragh, situated at Nucestown, is a spacious edifice. About 20 children are educated in the parochial school, which has an acre of ground rent-free: there are four private schools, in which are about 130 children, and a Sunday school under the rector. Robert Lisson, Esq., by will, gave £5 per annum to poor Protestant parishioners, which was to be paid out of his estate of Roughgrove, in the parish of Kilbrogan, and distributed annually by the incumbent. In the churchyard is a large sepulchral tumulus, of unknown origin. The former church stood close to the edge of the river; the waters, in consequence, gradually undermined the bank, and destroyed the building, though it had not been many years erected the present church, built on a different site, forms a conspicuous object for many miles round.

from Lewis's Topographical Dictionary of Ireland, 1837.