Cavanalee River (Milltown Burn) 24 March 2024 - v1
The Cavanalee River, known locally as the Milltown Burn lies in the electoral division of Camus, in Civil Parish of Camus, in the Barony of Strabane Lower, in the County of Tyrone.
The Cavanalee River enteres the River Mourne close to the old Academy School on the B72 Liskey Road. The river is approximately 3.88km (2.4 miles) long from it confulence with the River Mourne to its furthermost southern source.
The towland of Cavanalee is situated between 1 mile (1.5 km) and 4 miles (6.5 km) southeast of Strabane as featured on a variety of maps. The area of Cavanalee is 1098.5 acres (444.5 ha). Cavanalee stretches 3 miles (5 km) from the River Mourne to the 1,000ft (300m) high television transmitter mast on Koram Hill, (See link to photo) www.flickr.com/photos/152221785@N07/52405299823/in/datepo...) just beyond the eastern boundary of the townland, a landmark since the early 1960s.
The Strabane to Plumbridge road enters Cavanalee at the Cavanalee Bridge, passes through the higher parts of the townland, past the television transmitter mast at a height of 900ft (275m) on its way to Ligfordrum, Plumbridge and the Glenelly valley. At the western end of the townland is the Strabane to Victoria Bridge, Liskey (B72) Road at Milltown, the location of the old Strabane Grammar School (Academy), established in 1967. The Cavanalee River enteres the River Mourne close to the old Academy School. Only minor roads pass through Edymore. The road named by the Post Office as Bearney Road continues to Douglas Bridge, whilst the Carrigullin Road meets the road which links Douglas Bridge to the Strabane to Plumbridge Road at Ligfordrum.
The townland is at the western end of the foothills of the Sperrin Mountains, an area of metamorphic rock overlain with deposits of schist and quartzite resulting from the melting of the glaciers at the end of the last ice-age some 10,000 years ago. The glacio-fluvial deposits choked most of the valleys, resulting in steep-sided valleys, even gorges, being formed by the melt-water. An example of this can be seen in the last mile of the Cavanalee River before it reaches the River Mourne. (See link to photo)
(www.flickr.com/photos/152221785@N07/53609119421/in/photos...)
In the lower reaches of the valley of the Cavanalee River are some significant, almost drumlin-like, hills of gravel and sand.
Remains of some small gravel quarries can still be seen at various locations in both townlands of Cavanalee & Edymore. The vagaries of the Cavanalee River are noted in the 1756 Rent Assessment and Land Valuation Survey (Appendix 2), where it records that along its upper reaches the Cavanalee River often changed its course annually and sometimes after every new flood. The results of such changes can be seen on later Ordnance Survey maps, where the townland boundary is not always shown as the centre of the river.
All through the centuries it has been possible to walk to Strabane in an hour or less from most parts of the two townlands of Cavanalee & Edymore, so farmers and their families were able to avail themselves of the services, fairs, markets (later shops) and take part in the social life of the town. The latter was usually linked to their respective churches. Strabane developed into an important market town following the development of the national road network; the opening of Strabane Canal (1796) providing water transport for goods to and from Derry; the arrival of the railway (1847) providing an even quicker journey to and from Derry, and later, when extended beyond Omagh, to many towns throughout Ireland.
On the north bank of the Cavanalee River in its lower reaches is the townland of Liskinbwee. It had two Sessiaghs, firstly, Gortegaddery (Gort Gadraigh, field of the withies). Withies are tough flexible shoots of willow, which when dried can be used for making hurdles for fencing. They would have been essential for use on the Cavanalee / Edymore cattle ranchs as mentioned later). Secondly, Dromrollaghe or Droim Roilleach (ridge of the oyster-catchers), or Droim Rollach (rolling ridge). The 1777 Abercorn estate map confirms the latter’s location and certainly the topography is a ‘rolling ridge’, whilst the alternative meaning would certainly have been a possibility. This name survives to the present time, as the district of Strabane to the north of Milltown is known as “Drumrallagh”. None of the sessiagh names in Cavanalee or Edymore have survived.
The Devil's Coffin
Ireland is a very old country and is a place simply brimming with myths, legends and folklore. Famous for its oral stories which have been passed down through the generations, as told at the fireside and inevitably these stories change and vary by locality. Some are often linked to landscapes, either a specific spot like Finn McCool of the Giant’s Causeway, or a person, like Darby O'Gill and the Little People (the leprechaun of Ireland), Cuchulain, Hound of Ulster to Dracula’s Irish origins.
There’s no way to substantiate why the pool below the waterfall on the Cavanalee River was named "The Devil's Coffin". Locals, suggest that at night the pool looks very similar to a dark deep hole in the ground similar to a grave or tomb where you might place a coffin and the eery connotation evokes the mystique and fear that its the devil’s coffin. (See link to photo)
www.flickr.com/photos/152221785@N07/53610390887/in/photos...
Gaelic chiefs counted their wealth by the size of their herds of cattle. It was recorded that in 1601 Cormac McBaron O’Neill (d.1613), the half brother of Sir Art O’Neill (d.1592), the son of Turlough Luineach (b.c.1530 d.1595), together with his nephew Turlough McArt and cousin, Neil O'Neill, (b.1658 d.1690) 2nd Baronet of Killeleagh, possessed 2,000 cattle each, some of which may well have been given to Turlough Luineach by minor chiefs as tribute. He and his successors would have needed suitable places where they could keep the cattle, a place to raise calves, keep horses, and practise basic husbandry to provide food for their families and followers. Cavanalee, linked to the sheltered valley of the Back Burn in Edymore, with its boundaries of river, streams, steep and boggy hills, the occasional ravine and narrow lowland entrance was a naturally secure location needing the minimum of enclosure for a substantial agricultural operation. It was an ideal location for a cattle-ranch type of operation able to accommodate a substantial herd. Clues to substantiate this are to be found in the pre-1600 Irish names of the Cavanalee “Ballyboe” and “Sessiaghs”. Cavanalee, the anglicised Cabhán na Laoigh, could be translated as ‘hill/hollow of the calves’. In this sense it would include all ages and kinds of cattle.
Sessiagh, Irish: séú cuid, meaning sixth part of a quarter or 20 acres.
Ballyboes, Irish: baile bó, meaning "cow land", and represented an area of pastoral economic value. Townlands throughout most of Ulster were known as "ballyboes".
The O’Neills
At the end of the sixteenth century Strabane was just a small village surrounding the O’Neill castle, one of three in the area. Strabane castle was destroyed in 1583 and after its rebuilding in 1591. Turlough Luineach O’Neill, (b.c.1530 d.1595), who was “The O’Neill” from 1570 to 1593, owned the three castles at Strabane, Dunnalong and Newtownstewart. It was destroyed again in 1598. In the early 1570s, after becoming The O’Neill, he married Lady Agnes Campbell (b.1526 d.1601), daughter of Colin Campbell, (b.c.1486 d.1529), 3rd Earl of Argyll and his wife, Lady Jean Gordon, daughter of Alexander Gordon (d. 1524), 3rd Earl of Huntly.
Lady Agnes brought mercenaries (New Scots) from the west of Scotland who would first have been based at Dunnalong fort and used to supplement O’Neill’s and his successors’ own forces during the various encounters which occurred before and during the Nine Years’ War, 1594 to 1603. Like mercenaries over the centuries, many stayed on and married local women. Whilst Turlough’s successor, Sir Hugh O’Neill (b.c.1550 d.1616), 2nd Earl of Tyrone, was based at Dungannon, members of Turlough’s family continued to play varying roles in north Tyrone during the latter part of the Nine Years’ War.
After the Flight of the Earls, Tír Eoghain (Co. Tyrone) and Tír Chonaill or Tyrconnell (Co. Donegal), to permanent exile on the Continent in 1607, much of Ulster was ripe for plantation (colonisation). One more event speeded up the process, this was the revolt by Sir Cahir O’Doherty of Inishowen (b.1587 d.1608), who with about 100 men attacked both Londonderry and Strabane in 1608. Strabane was again burnt down and the colony of between 60 and 80 Scots living there fled across the river Foyle to the fort at Lifford, Co. Donegal. This revolt was put down by a force of 200 soldiers sent from Scotland under the command of Captains William Stewart (b.c.1570 d.1646), 1st Baronet Stewart of Ramelton along with Patrick Crawford (d.1614).
Sir Phelim O’Neill (b.604 d.1653) beseiged the castle of Strabane in 1641, which he destroyed. It was defended by Lady Strabane b.c.1601 d.1668 (aka: Lady Jean Gordon) who has expended £1,000 and upwards on it, she was the mother of the then owner, James, 3rd Lord Strabane, who died on 16th June 1655, aged about 22 after being downed in the River Mourne at Ballyfatten near Strabane, the river location, is part of the fishing controlled by Sion Mills Angling Club and is now know as “The Lords Pool”. (See link to photo)
www.flickr.com/photos/152221785@N07/52020623018/in/datepo...
Jame's estates were forfited, however where later restored to the family, he had never married and was succeeded by his younger brother George (b.1636/7 d.1668) as the 4th Baron of Strabane.
Lady Strabane, the mother of James, on Nov 1649 married Sir Phelim O’Neill and had a son (presumably) Colonel Gordon O’Neill, (b.c.1650 d.1705) who was King James II’s, Lord Lutenient of Tyrone and M.P. for it in the Paraliment of 1689.
Sir Phelim O'Neill was captured on 4 February 1653 by William Caulfeild, (b.1624 d.1671) 1st Viscount Charlemont on a crannog (artificial island) in Roughan Lough next to Roughan Castle, Newmills, Co. Tyrone where he had taken refuge. He was taken to Dublin for trial, was found guilty of treason and for his alleged role in the rebellion of 1614 which included the massacres of protestant civilians, was executed on the 10th March 1653, hanged, drawn, and quartered and the authorities impaled his remains on the gates of Dundalk, Drogheda, and Dublin.
Lady Strabane was reduced to poverty, accepting a grant of £5 from the state.
Most of this test is from the book “Overlooking the River Mourne” Four Centuries of Family Farms in Edymore and Cavanalee in County Tyrone by Michael Cox.
Cavanalee River (Milltown Burn) 24 March 2024 - v1
The Cavanalee River, known locally as the Milltown Burn lies in the electoral division of Camus, in Civil Parish of Camus, in the Barony of Strabane Lower, in the County of Tyrone.
The Cavanalee River enteres the River Mourne close to the old Academy School on the B72 Liskey Road. The river is approximately 3.88km (2.4 miles) long from it confulence with the River Mourne to its furthermost southern source.
The towland of Cavanalee is situated between 1 mile (1.5 km) and 4 miles (6.5 km) southeast of Strabane as featured on a variety of maps. The area of Cavanalee is 1098.5 acres (444.5 ha). Cavanalee stretches 3 miles (5 km) from the River Mourne to the 1,000ft (300m) high television transmitter mast on Koram Hill, (See link to photo) www.flickr.com/photos/152221785@N07/52405299823/in/datepo...) just beyond the eastern boundary of the townland, a landmark since the early 1960s.
The Strabane to Plumbridge road enters Cavanalee at the Cavanalee Bridge, passes through the higher parts of the townland, past the television transmitter mast at a height of 900ft (275m) on its way to Ligfordrum, Plumbridge and the Glenelly valley. At the western end of the townland is the Strabane to Victoria Bridge, Liskey (B72) Road at Milltown, the location of the old Strabane Grammar School (Academy), established in 1967. The Cavanalee River enteres the River Mourne close to the old Academy School. Only minor roads pass through Edymore. The road named by the Post Office as Bearney Road continues to Douglas Bridge, whilst the Carrigullin Road meets the road which links Douglas Bridge to the Strabane to Plumbridge Road at Ligfordrum.
The townland is at the western end of the foothills of the Sperrin Mountains, an area of metamorphic rock overlain with deposits of schist and quartzite resulting from the melting of the glaciers at the end of the last ice-age some 10,000 years ago. The glacio-fluvial deposits choked most of the valleys, resulting in steep-sided valleys, even gorges, being formed by the melt-water. An example of this can be seen in the last mile of the Cavanalee River before it reaches the River Mourne. (See link to photo)
(www.flickr.com/photos/152221785@N07/53609119421/in/photos...)
In the lower reaches of the valley of the Cavanalee River are some significant, almost drumlin-like, hills of gravel and sand.
Remains of some small gravel quarries can still be seen at various locations in both townlands of Cavanalee & Edymore. The vagaries of the Cavanalee River are noted in the 1756 Rent Assessment and Land Valuation Survey (Appendix 2), where it records that along its upper reaches the Cavanalee River often changed its course annually and sometimes after every new flood. The results of such changes can be seen on later Ordnance Survey maps, where the townland boundary is not always shown as the centre of the river.
All through the centuries it has been possible to walk to Strabane in an hour or less from most parts of the two townlands of Cavanalee & Edymore, so farmers and their families were able to avail themselves of the services, fairs, markets (later shops) and take part in the social life of the town. The latter was usually linked to their respective churches. Strabane developed into an important market town following the development of the national road network; the opening of Strabane Canal (1796) providing water transport for goods to and from Derry; the arrival of the railway (1847) providing an even quicker journey to and from Derry, and later, when extended beyond Omagh, to many towns throughout Ireland.
On the north bank of the Cavanalee River in its lower reaches is the townland of Liskinbwee. It had two Sessiaghs, firstly, Gortegaddery (Gort Gadraigh, field of the withies). Withies are tough flexible shoots of willow, which when dried can be used for making hurdles for fencing. They would have been essential for use on the Cavanalee / Edymore cattle ranchs as mentioned later). Secondly, Dromrollaghe or Droim Roilleach (ridge of the oyster-catchers), or Droim Rollach (rolling ridge). The 1777 Abercorn estate map confirms the latter’s location and certainly the topography is a ‘rolling ridge’, whilst the alternative meaning would certainly have been a possibility. This name survives to the present time, as the district of Strabane to the north of Milltown is known as “Drumrallagh”. None of the sessiagh names in Cavanalee or Edymore have survived.
The Devil's Coffin
Ireland is a very old country and is a place simply brimming with myths, legends and folklore. Famous for its oral stories which have been passed down through the generations, as told at the fireside and inevitably these stories change and vary by locality. Some are often linked to landscapes, either a specific spot like Finn McCool of the Giant’s Causeway, or a person, like Darby O'Gill and the Little People (the leprechaun of Ireland), Cuchulain, Hound of Ulster to Dracula’s Irish origins.
There’s no way to substantiate why the pool below the waterfall on the Cavanalee River was named "The Devil's Coffin". Locals, suggest that at night the pool looks very similar to a dark deep hole in the ground similar to a grave or tomb where you might place a coffin and the eery connotation evokes the mystique and fear that its the devil’s coffin. (See link to photo)
www.flickr.com/photos/152221785@N07/53610390887/in/photos...
Gaelic chiefs counted their wealth by the size of their herds of cattle. It was recorded that in 1601 Cormac McBaron O’Neill (d.1613), the half brother of Sir Art O’Neill (d.1592), the son of Turlough Luineach (b.c.1530 d.1595), together with his nephew Turlough McArt and cousin, Neil O'Neill, (b.1658 d.1690) 2nd Baronet of Killeleagh, possessed 2,000 cattle each, some of which may well have been given to Turlough Luineach by minor chiefs as tribute. He and his successors would have needed suitable places where they could keep the cattle, a place to raise calves, keep horses, and practise basic husbandry to provide food for their families and followers. Cavanalee, linked to the sheltered valley of the Back Burn in Edymore, with its boundaries of river, streams, steep and boggy hills, the occasional ravine and narrow lowland entrance was a naturally secure location needing the minimum of enclosure for a substantial agricultural operation. It was an ideal location for a cattle-ranch type of operation able to accommodate a substantial herd. Clues to substantiate this are to be found in the pre-1600 Irish names of the Cavanalee “Ballyboe” and “Sessiaghs”. Cavanalee, the anglicised Cabhán na Laoigh, could be translated as ‘hill/hollow of the calves’. In this sense it would include all ages and kinds of cattle.
Sessiagh, Irish: séú cuid, meaning sixth part of a quarter or 20 acres.
Ballyboes, Irish: baile bó, meaning "cow land", and represented an area of pastoral economic value. Townlands throughout most of Ulster were known as "ballyboes".
The O’Neills
At the end of the sixteenth century Strabane was just a small village surrounding the O’Neill castle, one of three in the area. Strabane castle was destroyed in 1583 and after its rebuilding in 1591. Turlough Luineach O’Neill, (b.c.1530 d.1595), who was “The O’Neill” from 1570 to 1593, owned the three castles at Strabane, Dunnalong and Newtownstewart. It was destroyed again in 1598. In the early 1570s, after becoming The O’Neill, he married Lady Agnes Campbell (b.1526 d.1601), daughter of Colin Campbell, (b.c.1486 d.1529), 3rd Earl of Argyll and his wife, Lady Jean Gordon, daughter of Alexander Gordon (d. 1524), 3rd Earl of Huntly.
Lady Agnes brought mercenaries (New Scots) from the west of Scotland who would first have been based at Dunnalong fort and used to supplement O’Neill’s and his successors’ own forces during the various encounters which occurred before and during the Nine Years’ War, 1594 to 1603. Like mercenaries over the centuries, many stayed on and married local women. Whilst Turlough’s successor, Sir Hugh O’Neill (b.c.1550 d.1616), 2nd Earl of Tyrone, was based at Dungannon, members of Turlough’s family continued to play varying roles in north Tyrone during the latter part of the Nine Years’ War.
After the Flight of the Earls, Tír Eoghain (Co. Tyrone) and Tír Chonaill or Tyrconnell (Co. Donegal), to permanent exile on the Continent in 1607, much of Ulster was ripe for plantation (colonisation). One more event speeded up the process, this was the revolt by Sir Cahir O’Doherty of Inishowen (b.1587 d.1608), who with about 100 men attacked both Londonderry and Strabane in 1608. Strabane was again burnt down and the colony of between 60 and 80 Scots living there fled across the river Foyle to the fort at Lifford, Co. Donegal. This revolt was put down by a force of 200 soldiers sent from Scotland under the command of Captains William Stewart (b.c.1570 d.1646), 1st Baronet Stewart of Ramelton along with Patrick Crawford (d.1614).
Sir Phelim O’Neill (b.604 d.1653) beseiged the castle of Strabane in 1641, which he destroyed. It was defended by Lady Strabane b.c.1601 d.1668 (aka: Lady Jean Gordon) who has expended £1,000 and upwards on it, she was the mother of the then owner, James, 3rd Lord Strabane, who died on 16th June 1655, aged about 22 after being downed in the River Mourne at Ballyfatten near Strabane, the river location, is part of the fishing controlled by Sion Mills Angling Club and is now know as “The Lords Pool”. (See link to photo)
www.flickr.com/photos/152221785@N07/52020623018/in/datepo...
Jame's estates were forfited, however where later restored to the family, he had never married and was succeeded by his younger brother George (b.1636/7 d.1668) as the 4th Baron of Strabane.
Lady Strabane, the mother of James, on Nov 1649 married Sir Phelim O’Neill and had a son (presumably) Colonel Gordon O’Neill, (b.c.1650 d.1705) who was King James II’s, Lord Lutenient of Tyrone and M.P. for it in the Paraliment of 1689.
Sir Phelim O'Neill was captured on 4 February 1653 by William Caulfeild, (b.1624 d.1671) 1st Viscount Charlemont on a crannog (artificial island) in Roughan Lough next to Roughan Castle, Newmills, Co. Tyrone where he had taken refuge. He was taken to Dublin for trial, was found guilty of treason and for his alleged role in the rebellion of 1614 which included the massacres of protestant civilians, was executed on the 10th March 1653, hanged, drawn, and quartered and the authorities impaled his remains on the gates of Dundalk, Drogheda, and Dublin.
Lady Strabane was reduced to poverty, accepting a grant of £5 from the state.
Most of this test is from the book “Overlooking the River Mourne” Four Centuries of Family Farms in Edymore and Cavanalee in County Tyrone by Michael Cox.