School: Inis (B.) (roll number 15042)
- Location:
- Ennis, Co. Clare
- Teacher: Proinnsias Ó Fionnmhacháin
Archival Reference
The Schools’ Collection, Volume 0610, Page 067
Image and data © National Folklore Collection, UCD.
See copyright details.
DownloadOpen data
Available under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)
- XML School: Inis (B.)
- XML Page 067
- XML “Stories of Famous People - Fireball Mac Namara”
- XML “Stories of Famous People”
Note: We will soon deprecate our XML Application Programming Interface and a new, comprehensive JSON API will be made available. Keep an eye on our website for further details.
On this page
- One of the oldest families in Clare was the Mac Namaras. The most famous of these was "Fireball". He always carried two pistols and was a very good shot. He called his pistols "Bas gan sagart" because anyone at whom he fired never lived long enough to have a priest. The name "Fireball" was put on him because he was such a good pistol shot.
- Collector
- Joseph Ryan
- Gender
- Male
- Address
- Clonroad More, Co. Clare
- Collector
- Patrick Tierney
- Gender
- Male
- Address
- Ennis, Co. Clare
- Informant
- Patrick Healy
- Gender
- Male
- Age
- 75
- Address
- Drumbiggle Road, Co. Clare
- There was a man living in Clarecastle and his name was Fireball Mac Namara. He had a great shot and he always carried two pistols with him. One day there was a man before the court for a crime. "Fireball" was present in the court. The judge said if the man accused was recognised by any gentleman that he would set him free. The man asked Mr Crowe of Dromore to salute him. Mr Crowe did not pretend to recognise him. When Fireball saw this he said "I know that his man is honest." The man was released and was thanking Fireball, Fireball replied, "Put not your trust in Crows or sparrows,(continues on next page)
