CAMMOGE Point in Poulnasherry Bay doesn’t betray its tragic past underneath the mid-April sunshine.
Located near Clarefield, not far from Kilkee, the isolated stretch of stony beach was once a short cut from the extreme west of the county to Carnacalla near Kilrush. About three-and-a-half miles could be shorn from the journey to Kilrush by crossing the mouth of Poulnasherry Bay. The route was availed of for hundreds of years and, in fact, a ferryboat operated from Cammoge Point until 1927.

However, the picturesque point was the scene of total devastation on December 12, 1849, when a boat, returning from Kilrush, sank. Forty-one people drowned within a mere 30 yards of completing the journey.

In a detailed contribution to The Other Clare in 2006, historian Paddy Nolan outlined the nature of the tragedy and the context that led to it. On the morning of the multiple drowning, the boat, which was designed to carry 12 people, sailed to Kilrush.

The majority of those on board were hoping to be admitted to the workhouse in the town. The famine had ravaged their homesteads and left them completely destitute.

Paddy believes the 12 children who drowned that winter evening did not last long in the bitter waters of Poulnasherry Bay.

“When I wrote that article for The Other Clare, I said at least the victims got a quick death. Since then I’ve had a look at some of the writings of  [historian] Ignatius Murphy.

“A line of his was that the children who died were better off than the ones that lived under workhouse conditions. He was talking, in particular, about the auxiliary homes in Kilrush,” the retired veterinary surgeon told The Clare Champion this week.

“He said that in 1848 in an auxiliary workhouse in Ballyerra [Kilrush], there were over 1,000 children. They were being looked after by two paupers, who themselves were ordinary inmates,” Paddy added.

After docking in Carnacalla on the morning of December 12, 1849, the famine-stricken occupants disembarked and walked the two-mile trek to Kilrush.

“They found the streets swarming with paupers, while demented shop keepers and house owners tried to steel themselves,” Paddy wrote in his 2006 article in The Other Clare.

“At the workhouse gate they were met by Daniel O’Gorman (relieving office for Moyarta) who told them to wait at the gate while he pleaded for their relief. The result was the admission of a few. It then got so dark that it was necessary to have candles lit. This was the signal, even for diehards, to go home, most of the ferry passengers having already left,” Paddy noted.

Loading the boat at Carnacalla was haphazard, due to the fact that it was the last ferry that day. From halfway, it was noticed that water was coming in.

The ferryman, Thomas Brew, survived the calamity and told an inquest, held the following day, what had transpired.

“When only 30 yards from dry land, she filled and sank under us. I took off my jacket and jumped out and swam about a boats length from the bow of the boat. I returned and took hold of the side and went hand over hand to the stern, where Laurence McNamara was holding,” Thomas Brew recounted.

Laurence McNamara was a boatman and was the last person to board the doomed vessel.

“A boat owned by Mr Cox [local magistrate] came to our rescue and also rescued a woman and a very young child,” Thomas stated in his testimony.

Local press reports starkly described the scene at Cammoge Point.

“Captain Kennedy [Kilrush-based Poor Law Inspector] was early on the spot with Dr O’Donnell, the medical officer of the union. But the night being dark and stormy and the boat being at the other side of the ferry, they were unable to cross. A more fearful sight never presented itself to the human gaze. Old and young, parents and children lay inter-mixed with the seaweed and rocks, where the ebbing tide had left them,” one report said.

Another report was equally moving.

“There were to be seen the mother and her child clung together, the arms of the child clasped around the mother’s neck. Even when brought to land, it was difficult to sever the iron grasp of death,” the report read.

“We cannot be sure where exactly the victims were buried. Many were buried in a mass grave at Kilnagalliagh as suggested by [historian] Ignatius Murphy. The coffins were supplied by Captain Kennedy. It’s possible that if some of the dead were recognised by their relatives, they could have taken the body, with the donkey and car, to their own burial plot,” Paddy suggested.

Just one victim, 20-year-old John O’Brien, was buried in his own plot in Kilnagalliagh graveyard. The inscription on his grave is visible to this day.

The inquest was held the following afternoon. It was heard by Coroner Francis O’Donnell from Kilkee. He had been summoned by Captain Kennedy. It is not certain where exactly the inquest was held, although it may have been held in Mount Pleasant, the home of Magistrate Cox. 

Tim Keane, from Clarefield, said he had been a boatman on the ferry for 15 years although he wasn’t on board when it sank.

“I knew the boat to be leaky for the past month,” he revealed. He also told the inquest the boat had been old when he started working as a ferryman.

In the House of Commons in London, pressure from Poulett Scrope MP resulted in the appointment of a Select Committee to inquire into the administration of the Poor Law in the Kilrush Union. The inquiry started on May 30 1850 and sat for 13 days, usually twice a week.

During Captain Kennedy’s testimony, chairman Poulett Scrope asked him about paupers who had travelled considerable distances but were refused outdoor or indoor relief at the Kilrush Workhouse.

“Was that the case with some of the paupers who were drowned at the ferry in the month of December last?” the MP queried.

Captain Kennedy said the relieving officer, Daniel O’Gorman, had confirmed this before the coroner’s jury. Captain Kennedy was then asked whether those who drowned had been refused relief in Kilrush or had their pleas not been heard?

Captain Kennedy was unable to answer the question, as he had not been present at the workhouse for long enough on December 12, 1849.

“Part of the instructions to a relieving officer was that, in cases of urgent necessity, he should admit an applicant even without seeing a [workhouse] guardian. Some members of the Select Committee fastened on to this in an apparent attempt to scapegoat O’Gorman,” Paddy explained.

Captain Kennedy however told the Select Committee that admissions by a relieving officer were only valid until the next meeting of the workhouse guardians.

Poignantly, some of the older people who drowned at Cammoge Point, had lived through West Clare famines in 1817, 1822, 1830, 1837 and 1842.

“The 50 and 60 year old people who had drowned, had lived through every bit of those famines,” Paddy concluded sadly.

Commemoration to be held next month

A day-long commemoration of the Cammoge ferry disaster will be held on Bank Holiday Monday May 6 as part of the Famine Commemoration in West Clare from May 3 to 12.

It will start with a short ceremony at 11.30am in Moyarta Cemetery, Carrigaholt, followed by a walk to Cammoge Point, where a monument will be unveiled at approximately 3pm.

“When that ceremony is over, 45 people will be brought to Carnacalla, near Kilrush, in five West Clare currachs. Then we’ll continue the walk into Kilrush. The walk will conclude at the creamery in Kilrush,” said Michael O’Connell, who broadcast a documentary on the drowning on Radio Corca Baiscinn.

He lives just two and a half miles from Cammoge Point and recalls hearing about the multiple drowning during his childhood.

“The story captures the incompetence and mismanagement of what happened. People didn’t know that the relief wasn’t available at the Kilrush workhouse. If they had been told, they wouldn’t have gone.

“When they were in Kilrush if they had been given a place to stay in workhouse, they wouldn’t have died. Although, if they had got outdoor relief that evening, they still would have drowned. Anyway, that boat shouldn’t have been in the water,” Mr O’Connell added.

What angers the Querrin man is the fact that there wasn’t a dearth of food in Ireland during the 1845-1850 period, which he refers to as Gorta Mór.

“There was plenty of food in the country. A lot of people forget that. That was the tragedy. In 1846 17 ships left this country laden down with food. One of those ships was from Kilrush. At the same time people were starving in the area and the famine was getting worse,” he said.

“The people were growing the potatoes but the rest of the food was to pay for the rent. People often ask the question, why didn’t they hold on to the food? The answer is that to lose the roof over your head was worse than dying. It’s still in our psyche today. People were funding landlords who were mostly absentee,” Mr O’Connell pointed out.

For more  information on the Famine Commemoration events in West Clare from May 3 to 12, see www.faminecommemoration2013.ie.