PHOTOGRAPHED NEAR THE WELLINGTON MONUMENT 11 MAY 2008
The two clubs in my photographs are both close to the Wellington Monument is Phoenix Park and I have not visited the immediate area again since 11 May 2008.
Cricket was introduced to Ireland by the English in the towns of Kilkenny and Ballinasloe in the early 19th century. In the 1830s, the game began to spread; many of the clubs which were founded in the following 30 years are still in existence today. The first Irish national team played in 1855 against The Gentlemen of England in Dublin. In the 1850s, the Englishman Charles Lawrence was responsible for developing the game in Ireland through his coaching. In the 1850s and 1860s, Ireland was visited for the first time by touring professional teams. Ireland’s first match against Marylebone Cricket Club (the M.C.C.) was in 1858.
The game gained popularity until the early 1880s. The land war in the 1880s resulting from the Irish Land Commission and a ban on playing “foreign” games, in practice, British, by the Gaelic Athletic Association set back the spread of cricket. The ban was lifted in 1970, and before then anyone playing foreign games, such as cricket was banned from the Irish games such as hurling and Gaelic football. Irish teams toured Canada and the US in 1879, 1888, 1892, and 1909. On top of this, Ireland defeated a touring South African side in 1904. Their first match with first-class status was played on 19 May 1902 against a London County side including W.G. Grace. The Irish, captained by Sir Tim O’Brien, won convincingly by 238 runs.
In January 2012 Cricket Ireland chief executive Warren Deutrom publicly declared Ireland’s ambition to play Test cricket by 2020. Their desire to achieve Test status was in part to stem the tide of Irish players using residency rules to switch to England for the opportunity to play Test cricket. Deutrom outlined the ambition as he unveiled the new strategic plan for Irish cricket to 2015. The plan set out a series of stretching goals including increasing the number of participants in the game to 50,000, setting a target of reaching 8th in the World rankings, establishing a domestic first-class cricket structure, and reinforcing cricket as the fifth most popular team sport in Ireland.
Deutrom had already sent a letter to the ICC in 2009 stating his board’s intention to apply for Full Membership – a potential pathway to Test cricket – and to seek clarification on the process. Former Australian bowler Jason Gillespie said that if Ireland got Test status it “would be huge news in world cricket, and it would be a massive positive story for the world game”. Following Ireland’s victory over the West Indies in the 2015 Cricket World Cup, former fast bowler Michael Holding said that the International Cricket Council should grant Ireland Test status immediately, saying “they need to be recognised now”. The ICC said in 2015 that Ireland would be granted Test status in 2019 should they win the 2015–17 ICC Intercontinental Cup and beat the 10th ranked Test nation in a four-match Test series in 2018.
However, on 22 June 2017, after more than a decade of playing top-class international cricket, full ICC membership was granted to Ireland (along with Afghanistan) at an ICC meeting in London, thus making them the eleventh Test cricket team. In October 2017, the ICC announced that Ireland’s first Test match would be at home against Pakistan in May 2018. Ireland played their first ‘touring’ Test in India in March 2019 against fellow newcomers Afghanistan, where they lost by 7 wickets. This was followed by a four-day Test match against England at Lord’s in July 2019. According to the ICC Future Tours Programme for 2019–23, Ireland are scheduled to play sixteen Tests, but along with Afghanistan and Zimbabwe, are not included in the first two editions of the ICC World Test Championship.
Phoenix Cricket Club is the oldest in Ireland and believed to be one of the oldest in the world having been founded in 1830. Prior to 1834 the Club members met and practiced in the Phoenix Park but in 1835 the Club moved out of the Park and played its matches in open fields south of the Canal behind Upper Baggot Street. In 1838 the Commissioner of Woods and Forests granted permission for a 150 yards square near the Wellington monument. At that time a temporary rail had to be erected as several players were injured as the ground had been cut up by wandering animals. Permanent rails were subsequently erected of an agreed thickness and painted white so as to be clearly visible to horsemen.
In 1846 when Chesterfield Avenue, the main road through the Park was widened the Club had to move again. A new ground in an adjacent area was recommended and in view of the expense already incurred by the Club the move was financed by the Board of Works at a cost of £73 and Phoenix have remained at the present ground ever since.
The decades, 1950 – 1970 were without the glory of the previous years due to an aging team. Despite 2 cups in the 1950s, the next decade was without a major trophy during the whole of that decade. In the later 1960s a younger squad started to emerge and, after 22 years, Phoenix won the John Player Senior cup in 1973; and in 1974 the club were the inaugural winners of the Wiggins Teape League. In 1975, Phoenix accomplished the Grand Slam (all three trophies and the only club to ever do it). During the entire decade the 1st XI relied on a hard core of 15 players to lift 6 cups, 3 league titles and 2 Wiggins Teape.
Phoenix Cricket Club continues to promote the game of cricket and provides competition and enjoyment for its members and visiting teams as well as providing free sport viewing for the locals and tourists in the wonderful Phoenix Park.
In the early 1860s The Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, decided that public service employees needed some quality rest and recreation so he pushed a Bill through Parliament, granting Civil Servants a cricket ground in Phoenix Park, right beside the Dog Pond, where the Civil Service Cricket Club play to this day.
THE HOLLOW IN PHOENIX PARK FEATURING AN ELEGANT BANDSTAND
The main feature, manufactured by Musgrave & Co. of Belfast, is described as a freestanding octagonal-plan cast-iron bandstand, built c.1890. Concrete podium with later ramped circular stone base, edged with granite kerb. Accessed by concrete steps on south side. Octagonal lead roof supported on eight cast-iron posts with three decorative iron brackets springing from each. Each post has splayed panelled base, inverted fluting on lower section and capital. Timber sheeted ceiling divided into eight sections by ribs, with central hub. Escutcheon marked ‘Musgrave & Co.’ to one post. Set in Phoenix Park surrounded by tarmcadam hard standings, with grass and mature trees beyond.
The most notable building on Blackhorse Avenue is the army barracks. However, I visited the area in order to visit Grangegorman Military Cemetery but the gates were chained and locked so I entered Phoenix Park via the gate across the road from the cemetery.
The other building of importance is the Hole In The Wall. At over 100m from one end to the other, the Hole in the Wall is Europe’s longest pub bar and it also one of the oldest pubs in Ireland. It is most that the “hole in the wall” refers to the pedestrian gate into the Park but the commonly told story is that the pub used to serve pints through an actual hole in the wall to soldiers stationed nearby.
The construction of a barracks on Blackhorse Avenue began in 1888 and took approximately 4 years to finish. It was originally named Marlborough Barracks and housed approximately 900 horses of the British forces. The barracks was home to several different British units throughout its history but was primarily for Cavalry units.
Marlborough Barracks was handed over to the Irish Free State army in 1922 and retained its name until 1926 at which point it was renamed McKee Barracks. This renaming was to honour Dick McKee from Finglas, Dublin.
Grangegorman Military Cemetery is a British military cemetery in Dublin, Ireland, located on Blackhorse Avenue, off the Navan Road and beside the Phoenix Park.
Battalion badges are marked on the headstones along with the name of the person buried, their rank and the date of their death, while a very few have personal inscriptions. The Royal Dublin Fusiliers have a large number of their members and their closest relatives buried in the graveyard. Mature trees and well-maintained lawns create a reflective atmosphere. Situated beside the Phoenix Park, the cemetery’s current comparative anonymity has more to do with those buried there than with its location. It was forgotten after independence in a country forged from a bitter conflict with Great Britain, as many viewed Irishmen who had fought in the British Army as traitors.
Some of the graves were re-located to this site at a later date (nine from King George V Hospital grounds, two from Trinity College grounds, three from Portobello (Barracks) Cemetery, two from Drogheda (Little Calvary) Cemetery and one from Oranmore Old Graveyard).
The Irish Times posited upon “one of the 1916 Rising’s unresolved mysteries. Why did the bodies of five British officers lie, apparently unclaimed and forgotten, in waste ground in central Dublin for 46 years?” Their bodies were then discovered and interred in Grangegorman.
The Irish National War Memorial Gardens dedicated to the memory of the 49,400 Irish soldiers who gave their lives in the “Great War, 1914–1918” is approximately 1 km away in Islandbridge at the other side of Phoenix Park. A Screen Wall Memorial of a simple design standing nearly two metres high and fifteen metres long has been built of Irish limestone to commemorate the names of those war casualties whose graves lie elsewhere in Ireland and can no longer be maintained. Arranged before this memorial are the headstones of the war dead buried in Cork Military Cemetery but now commemorated here.
A Turkish Hazel was planted in the cemetery in 2005 by the ambassadors of Turkey, New Zealand and Australia to Ireland to mark the 90th Anniversary of the Gallipoli landings on 25 April 1915. The cemetery is currently managed by the Office of Public Works to Commonwealth War Graves Commission standards and is the largest military cemetery in Ireland.
WELLINGTON TESTIMONIAL ALSO KNOWN AS THE WELLINGTON MONUMENT IN PHOENIX PARK DUBLIN
The Wellington Testimonial was built to commemorate the victories of Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington. Wellington, the British politician and general, also known as the ‘Iron Duke’, was born in either counties Meath or Dublin. Originally planned to be located in Merrion Square, it was built in the Phoenix Park after opposition from the square’s residents.
The obelisk was designed by the architect Sir Robert Smirke and the foundation stone was laid in 1817. In 1820 it ran out of construction funds and therefore remained unfinished until 18 June 1861 when it was opened to the public. There were also plans for a statue of Wellesley on horseback but the shortage of funds ruled that out.
There are four bronze plaques cast from cannons captured at Waterloo – three of which have pictorial representations of his career while the fourth has an inscription. The plaques depict ‘Civil and Religious Liberty’ by John Hogan, ‘Waterloo’ by Thomas Farrell and the ‘Indian Wars’ by Joseph Robinson Kirk. The inscription reads:
Asia and Europe, saved by thee, proclaim Invincible in war thy deathless name, Now round thy brow the civic oak we twine That every earthly glory may be thine.
It is a long time since I last visited Farmleigh House and Gardens.
Farmleigh is the official Irish state guest house. It was formerly one of the Dublin residences of the Guinness family. It is situated on an elevated position above the River Liffey to the north-west of the Phoenix Park, in Castleknock.
The estate of 78 acres (32 ha) consists of extensive private gardens with stands of mature cypress, pine and oak trees, a boating pond, walled garden, sunken garden, out offices and a herd of rare native Kerry cattle. It was purchased by the Government of Ireland from the 4th Earl of Iveagh in 1999 for €29.2 million. A state body—the Office of Public Works (OPW)—spent in the region of €23 million restoring the house, gardens and curvilinear glasshouses, bringing the total cost to the state to €52.2 million. Farmleigh was opened to the public in July 2001.
The estate was purchased from The 4th Earl of Iveagh by the State in 1999. The official purpose for the €29.2 million purchase, and subsequent expenditure of €23 million in refurbishment, was that it would be used for state purposes. Specifically, it is designated as “an official State guest house for visiting heads of State and dignitaries. Some notable visitors have been hosted at Farmleigh including the Chinese Prime Minister, the Prime Minister of Ethiopia, the King of Malaysia, British Prime Minister Tony Blair, the Governor-General of New Zealand, and Queen Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom. However, the estate only hosted seven visiting dignitaries in 2006 (the most in one year), six in 2008, and only two the following year. Also in 2009, 246,000 members of the public visited the estate.
In 2006 it was announced by the Office of Public Works (OPW) that the Steward’s Lodge which is located in the grounds of Farmleigh had been renovated. It was speculated at the time that the lodge was to become an official residence of the Taoiseach. Former Taoiseach Brian Cowen used the lodge for this purpose on occasion, staying at the lodge while in Dublin. His successor, Enda Kenny, has also stayed on occasion at the Steward’s Lodge.
Today Farmleigh is operated by the OPW and the estate and gardens are largely open to the public, with the house closed except for organised tours. Seasonal events, such as craft and food markets, are held on the grounds. The estate has also been used as the venue for the RTÉ proms, a public concert series that took place each summer in a large marquee erected on the grounds.
You must be logged in to post a comment.