https://www.google.ie/maps/place/Whiddy+Island,+Co.+Cork/@51.69274,-9.5071249,11z/data=!4m2!3m1!1s0x48450b33c942ea51:0xe2d24a96b0aad7f3

Lease of 1836, Reenvanagh, Whiddy Island, ‘Covenant to lay out by Lessee (Tobin) Ten Boat Loads  (each containing thirty horse loads) of Best Coral Sea Sand Annually of Premises under a penalty of £10.

Tobins:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/13bW08jLMERwfI5cGHHxXfd4IIHkBbpMYfJBmXA9ROX0/edit

The land on Whiddy is very fertile.  A significant part of the Island was used in 1967 by Gulf Oil to build a major oil tank farm still operational which holds Ireland’s strategic oil reserve.

The reference to one of the lives of a son of a local Catholic Landlord Timothy O’Donovan might suggest their involvement in the coral sand business.  This operated in Bantry until the 1950s.  Until guano from Chile and late chemical fertilisers came in the late 19th century Bantry Bay coral was prized as  a fertiliser.

https://durrushistory.com/2014/09/29/the-use-of-mussel-seed-as-a-lime-substitute-in-kilcrohane-west-cork-to-the-1920s/https://durrushistory.com/2012/08/28/history-of-whiddy-island-bantry-bay-co-cork-from1261-from-paddy-okeeffe-papers/

History of Whiddy Island, Bantry Bay, Co. Cork from 1261, from Paddy O’Keeffe papers

Paddy O’Keeffe was a businessman based in Bantry who had an interest in the history of the locality. He was associated with other local historians John T. Collins and Bernard O’Regan. His papers are now in the Cork Archive collection and this account of Whiddy Island is taken History of whiddy Island, Bantry Bay, from Paddy O’Keeffe papers there

Down Survey 1665-85

http://downsurvey.tcd.ie/down-survey-maps.php#bm=Beara+%26+Bantry&c=Cork&indexOfObjectValue=-1&indexOfObjectValueSubstring=-1&p=Killmackamoge

Proposed Sale of part Bantry Estate

Hermitages on the Mizen, Muinter Bháire, Beara Peninsulas and the Island and the Deserts of Sinai, the Middle Eastern influences of the Book of Kells.

A little while ago I met  an Iraqi, in Ireland for over 40 years.  . I don’t know whether was Christian or Muslim  but he had a great knowledge of early Irish History. He said that the refuges of the early monks in the isolated peninsulas and island have a common tradition with the hermitages of the Middle Eastern Deserts such as Sinai. Some of the old church sites and graveyards are the locations of these hermitages and indeed they may pre date the coming of Christianity to Ireland.

He then drew attention to the calligraphy of the Book of Kells and other such books and said that the decoration was Middle Eastern in origin. He felt that there were connections between Ireland and the…

In Estudios Irlandes Vol 5, there is a fascinating article by Peter Clarke, of UCD, on the history of bookkeeping in Hedge Schools in the 18th and 19th centuries.

In the Report of The Commissioners of Irish Education 1826 it transpired that over 500,000 children over 70% of Irish children were being educated in hedge schools.  Their curriculum was flexible and many included basic business education.

In the 18th century Irish Emigrants to the US including Cornelius Lynch 1740, and Terence O’Neill 1789 taught bookkeeping in New York.  In Australia John Kenny taught double entry book keeping in Sydney in 1793.

Peter Clarke’s article suggests that the hedge schools had an important influence through Irish teachers on the curriculum of the American mid west and frontier.

Click to access Peter_Clarke.pdf

In the online history of the Townsend family of Co. Cork, compiled by Colonel John Townsend in Australia,

http://www.astro.wisc.edu/~townsend/tree/record.php?ref=405

https://www.google.ie/maps/place/Caheragh,+Co.+Cork/@51.6325479,-9.3065158,15z/data=!3m1!4b1!4m2!3m1!1s0x4845a797cbacb2a1:0xa00c7a99731ea90

In the article relating to Samuel Townsend 1768-1836 of Whitehall, Aughadown there is a piece on the post 1798 situation.

The British Government employed Sir John Moore to disarm Co. Cork.  He used a scorched earth policy designed to intimidate people to hand in their arms.  In Caheragh 800 pikes were located as well as 3,400 stands of arms.  The soldiers were billeted on the local population and literally ate them out of house and home.  One exception to this was in Aughadown where the joint efforts of the Catholic Parish Priest Father Timothy O’Sullivan and the Church of Ireland Vicar Joseph Wright ensured that the local commanding officer Samuel Townsend did not billet the soldiers on the local population.