Search Results for 'Charles II'

Belcarra was bathed in the sunshine last Friday. The air conditioning in the car was insufficient to combat the record-breaking temperatures, so a stop off at Cunningham’s Costcutter for a cold drink on the way to the historic Ballinafad House was required. The beauty and tranquillity of this carefully manicured, quiet, rural hamlet belie the fact that Belcarra was at the centre of the justice system in the county for a brief time in the seventeenth century.

In 1831 Patrick Broderick, from Loughrea, was charged with insurrectionary crimes at the Galway Assizes, and cruelly sentenced to spend the rest of his life in a criminal colony ‘beyond the seas’ in New South Wales, Australia. He was barred from ever returning to his native land. His wife Mary, son John and daughters Ann and Catherine, were left destitute on the infamous Clanricarde estate, one with more than 2,000 tenants.

What is your idea of perfect happiness?

SIMON ARMITAGE combines an ability to speak to a broad, non-specialist audience – he is one of the few living British poets the bloke down The Dog and Duck might be able to name – with a knack for acquiring establishment accolades.

We came across this drawing in the National Library titled “A narrow street in Galway, c.1840-1850”. The clue is in the handwriting at the top of the image, ‘Castle Bank’. In fact, it was a courtyard, not a street, looking at the back of Banks Castle off High Street. Our photograph (courtesy of the Chetham Library in Manchester), shows us much the same view about 25 years later. The property is now part of the King’s Head.

“This fine building, which is superior to most provincial seats of justice, stands at Newtown-Smith, on the site of the ancient and venerable abbey of the Franciscans, which by the Charter of Charles II ‘is to be and remain part of the County of Galway forever’. It was commenced in 1812, and on 1st of April, 1815, was opened for the reception of the then going judges of assize.

FOR THE Love Of Chocolate is an attempt at an entire history of chocolate across the 4,000 years since the Mokaya people, in what is now Mexico and Guatemala, began cultivating the cacao tree, the beans of which produce chocolate.