Scoil: Naomh Bríghid, Blackwater (uimhir rolla 7036)

Ar an leathanach seo

1. Body-Snatching

   

   Roinn Roinn Postáil

   The body snatchers must have been very busy in this district in the old days. I hear stories of them in every part of the parish.

   John Belvin says they had a gear to open the end of the coffin and pull the body out. His father working at Bolgers' of Ballyvaldon mounted guard for nine consecutive nights, gun in hand, over the buried corpse of his former employer.

   Mr Belvin speaks of a remarkable funeral which incidentally brings in how the people suffered in those days from these ghouls.

   There was a man in the locality (where Denis Dempsey of Ballintubbert now lives, whose name was John Leary. On the day of his father's funeral there was an objection raised by some relatives about the opening of a grave for the corpse in the local cemetery in Ballyvaldon.

   Leary collected his friends, twelve in all got a "spring car" and set out for Donaghmore sixteen miles off. The men handled the coffin in relays of four and these when tired sat on the "side laces" of the car. Mr Behan says the coffin was laid on forms outside Laffins' of Kilmuckridge while all hands consumed a half-gallon of whiskey.

   Now the sequel. Mr Belvin declares emphatically that the above John Leary went to Donaghmore

   (leanann ar an chéad leathanach eile)

   

   Tras-scríofa ag duine dár meitheal tras-scríbhneoirí deonacha.

   Stair Athraigh

   Teanga

   Béarla

   Faisnéiseoir

   John Belvin

   Inscne

   Fireann