Friends of Clonmethan

The Irish Times of Nov 14th 1874 notes a church collection for the Dublin Sunday Hospital Fund. This fund was (as far as we can determine) a charitable fund set up to raise money through church collections for Dublin hospitals. The fund had some notable people at its helm as you can see below – including the Lord Lieutenant, the Earl of Meath and Arthur E Guinness (the great-grandson of Arthur Guinness)

Clonmethan was included in the church collections, as can be seen from this snip from the Irish Times.

The Fund seems to have been quite ahead its time. Charities at this time had no obligation whatsoever to publish any income or expenditure details. An article in the Britsh Medical Journal of May 31 1879 includes a letter from the Fund Secretary, noting how a similar London based fund did not do so (see below).

The Fund did indeed publish some information, as the snip below shows (Irish Times of January 21 1891). The church at Clonmethan contributed £2 14s. In 2021 values, this equates to about €71.

Looking back a century, to 1921, our country was coming to the end of the Anglo Irish war and heading into Civil War. To get a feel for the comings and goings of the time around Clonmethan and Fingal, the testimony of John Gaynor from the military archives is a nice read. Gaynor was a Captain in the Balbriggan Company of the Irish Volunteers.

The map below highlights the locations described. More can be found here.

In 2015, Tarquin Blake published a book “Abandoned Churches of Ireland” – click on the image below to see the book’s website.

The book contains some notes on St Mary’s Clonmethan. We will not reproduce the comments in full here (lest we break copyright), but some words from the book give us some insights in the story of St Mary’s.

According to Blake, the church was first mentioned in 1216. By 1654, the church was in a state of disrepair, but was rebuilt with the help of the Board of First Fruits in 1818. In 1834, the parish population was noted as including eight Church of Ireland members and over 600 Roman Catholics.

Blake nte sthe last marriage in the church was in 1917, and the last baptism in 1933. The church closed in 1960.

Postponed until a later date due to Covid 19 restrictions.

War-time France 1917 and bucolic North County Dublin – it is difficult to imagine two completely different places to work as a clergyman. However, that is what happened when Reverend Frederick Aldhouse swapped his parish in Oldtown for the battlefields of France.

A local community group The Friends of Clonmethan have been working  for some time to improve the churchyard and grounds of Saint Mary’s Church in Oldtown, the parish of Reverend Aldhouse. The church had become overgrown since its closure in 1960 but an active group of people have been working away – mowing the grass, removing ivy and restoring the entrance gates. All the work has been done against the background of Covid-19, while adhering to HSE protocols on Social Distancing.

On Friday 28^th August at 7pm, Archbishop Michael Jackson will bless a new headstone to Reverend FH Aldhouse, the last resident Rector of the parish.  Also in attendance will be Rector Neal Phair from Swords Group of Parishes and Father John Keegan from Rolestown parish.  

A noted writer and poet, Reverend Aldhouse initially came to St Mary’s in 1914.  He saw service as a Chaplain in The First World War, returning to Clonmethan in 1919 where he remained as Rector until his death in August 1949. Frederick Aldhouse provided comfort to soldiers as their Padre during the Great War, to the Church of Ireland members of the village and to his neighbours and friends of all faiths.  Thanks to the efforts of the Friends of Clonmethan, his final resting place is marked with a beautiful headstone inscribed with some of his poetry.

Clonmethan Church is located 750 metres from the village of Oldtown on the R122 in the direction of Naul.