Chapter 15: In Dublin's Fair City

Sláinte!

In Dublin's fair city,

where the girls are so pretty,

I first set my eyes on sweet Molly Malone,

As she wheeled her wheel-barrow,

Through streets broad and narrow,

Crying, "Cockles and mussels, alive, alive, oh!"

"Alive, alive, oh,Alive, alive, oh,"

Crying "Cockles and mussels, alive, alive, oh."

She was a fishmonger,

And sure 'twas no wonder,

For so were her father and mother before,

And they each wheeled their barrow,

Through streets broad and narrow,

Crying, "Cockles and mussels, alive, alive, oh!"

(chorus)

She died of a fever,

And no one could save her,

And that was the end of sweet Molly Malone.

Now her ghost wheels her barrow,

Through streets broad and narrow,

Crying, "Cockles and mussels, alive, alive, oh!"

We take the bus from our hotel in Sword to O'Connell Street, Dublin. O’Connell Street is Dublin's main thoroughfare, or at least it has been since the eighteenth century. O'Connell Street is a lively, unusually broad street, late-Georgian in design, with a sculpture-filled median for pedestrians.

My memories of Dublin from 1965 are cloudy: I arrived under a deportation order from Galway, forbidden to get off the train. But I do remember being annoyed that I could not follow the journey of Leopold Bloom on 16 June 1904. "Bloom's Day" is celebrated by hundreds of citizens and visiting James Joyce fans who turn out in authentic period attire to follow Bloom's meanderings about Dublin and read appropriate passages from Joyce's masterwork, Ulysses. I must have read Ulysses while still in high school to be so aware of the book. Neither then, nor on this trip could I follow the day's experiences of Bloom. Some other time I will do a literary tour of Dublin, whose writers I learned about later, at Acadia University, where my favourite professor was William Bittner, an Irishman, who told us stories of Ireland and Irish writers, some of whom were drinking buddies. Dr. Bittner sometimes took us drinking instead of having us spend an afternoon in a classroom! Signs of Dublin's respect for its writers are everywhere, in street names, in statuary, in museums, in every corner of the city.

The spot formerly occupied by Nelson's Pillar, and now by The Spire, traditionally has been seen to mark the city centre, or An Lár in the Irish. The Spire is a 120-meter-tall tapered metal pole, the tallest structure of Dublin city centre, visible for miles. In fact, The Spire is the tallest sculpture in the world. Some of Dublin’s modern development was encouraged by Ireland's dominant nationalist ideology of the era, which wanted to wipe away all physical reminders of Ireland's colonial past. An extreme example of this kind of thinking was the destruction by the IRA of Nelson's Pillar in 1966. This statue of the famous British admiral was a Dublin landmark for a century, but was blown up by a small bomb shortly before the 50-year commemorations of the Easter Rising. In 2003, the Pillar was replaced as a landmark by the Dublin Spire which was erected on the same spot.
Dublin is a city of bridges, the River Liffey marking the boundary between the north side and the south side. The first we cross on our open bus tour is the O'Connell Bridge. Daniel O’Connell, after whom the street and bridge is named, was the 19th century nationalist leader.

The Liam Mellows Bridge. He was one of the four republican leaders executed in 1922.
Another republican executed that day in 1922, has a bridge named in his honour: The Rory O'More Bridge.
The Sam Heuston Bridge, formerly known as the King's Bridge.
The Joyce Bridge.
The Ha'Penny Bridge.

We pass by the Temple Bar district, but leave walking through for another time. Temple Bar (Barra an Teampaill) is an area on the south bank of the River Liffey in the central part of the city. Unlike the areas surrounding it, Temple Bar has preserved its medieval street pattern, with many narrow cobbled streets. It is promoted as "Dublin's cultural quarter" and has a lively nightlife and has traditionally been the residence of many artists.
Temple Bar district.

The first thing we notice about the institutional buildings of Dublin compared to those in Edinburgh is their colour: Edinburgh's great buildings are brown, streaked black, while in Dublin the predominant colour of the stone is grey. Here we see Christchurch Cathedral and then St. Patrick's, under extensive renovation.

Collins Barracks is the oldest inhabited barracks in Europe and once one of the largest. In recent years the National Museum of Ireland has taken over the Calvary Square ranges to display more of its large collection. In front is Croppies Acre, named after the Croppies (Croppys), a derogatory nickname given to Irish rebels during the period of the 1798 rebellion. A visitors' centre and, below, rebel graves, are featured on Croppies Acre.

Although many of Dublin's Georgian buildings were destroyed in misguided urban renewal, some good examples remain, including the one above.
Dublin Castle (Irish: Caisleán Bhaile Átha Cliath) off Dame Street is a major governmental complex, formerly the fortified seat of British rule in Ireland until 1922. Most of the complex dates from the 18th century, though a castle has stood on the site since the days of King John, the first Lord of Ireland. The Castle served as the seat of English, then later British government of Ireland under the Lordship of Ireland (1171–1541), the Kingdom of Ireland (1541–1800), and the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland (1800–1922). Upon establishment of the Irish Free State in 1922, the complex was ceremonially handed over to the newly formed Provisional Government led by Michael Collins.

A street scene in Dublin.

Perhaps the most famous building in Dublin is the General Post Office. The GPO is the centrepiece of O'Connell Street. As well as its imposing neo-classical facade, it played a central part as the headquarters of the republican army in the 1916 rising, one of the most significant events in Ireland's history. Bullet holes can still be seen in the building's columns as well as in many of the statues along the street. The building still functions today as Dublin's Post Office.

Easter Rising 1916
In April 1916 about 1250 armed Irish republicans under Padraig Pearse staged what became known as the Easter Rising in Dublin in pursuit not of Home Rule but of an Irish Republic. One of the rebels' first acts was to declare this Republic to be in existence. The rebels were composed of Irish Volunteers and the much smaller Irish Citizen Army under James Connolly. The rising saw rebel forces take over strong-points in the city, including the Four Courts, Stephen's Green, Bolands Mill, the South Dublin Union and Jacobs Biscuit Factory and establishing their headquarters at the General Post Office building in O'Connell Street. They held for a week until they were forced to surrender to British troops. The British deployed artillery to bombard the rebels into submission, sailing a gunboat named the Helga up the Liffey and stationing field guns at Cabra, Phibsborough and Prussia Street. Much of the city centre was destroyed by shell fire and around 450 people, about half of them civilians, were killed, with another 1,500 injured. Fierce combat took place along the grand canal at Mount street, where British troops were repeatedly ambushed and suffered heavy casualties. In addition, the rebellion was marked by a wave of looting and lawlessness by Dublin's slum population and many of the city centre's shops were ransacked. The rebel commander, Pearse surrendered after a week, in order to avoid further civilian casualties. Initially, the rebellion was generally unpopular in Dublin, due to the amount of death and destruction it caused, the opinion by some that it was bad timing to irreverently hold it at Easter and also due to the fact that many Dubliners had relatives serving in the British Army.
Though the rebellion was relatively easily suppressed by the British military and initially faced with the hostility of most Irish people, public opinion swung gradually but decisively behind the rebels, after sixteen of their leaders were executed by the British military in the aftermath of the Rising. In December 1918 the party now taken over by the rebels, Sinn Féin, won an overwhelming majority of Irish parliamentary seats. Instead of taking their seats in the British House of Commons, they assembled in the Lord Mayor of Dublin's residence and proclaimed the Irish Republic to be in existence and themselves Dáil Éireann (the Assembly of Ireland). Damage from the bullets is still visible at the post office, damage from the Easter 1916 siege.
The Irish National Bank

The Clarence Hotel.
The Clarence Hotel, on the River Liffey edge of the trendy cultural Temple Bar District, is owned by U2’s Bono. Bono, whose name at birth was Paul Hewson, bought the 49-room hotel in 1993 with U2 guitarist David Evans, better known as The Edge. (I remember seeing media coverage of a U2 "concert" on the roof in 2000.) In August 2008 it was announced that approval has been given for the owners to completely gut and rebuild the 177-year-old Clarence. The U2 members along with property developer Paddy McKillen can now begin work on the €150m ($237.2 million) project to quadruple the size of the building and transform it into a nine-storey, 140-bedroom, five-star hotel, designed by Gherkin architect Lord Norman Foster. The controversial project has caused outrage amongst conservationists because it involves the destruction of the 19th century art-deco listed building and several other attached buildings. Many claim that Bono was granted this exceptional permission because of his significant political clout. But the approval requires that developers are not to touch the facades of the six buildings: the original art deco hotel and another five adjacent Victorian and Georgian properties. An archaeologist also needs to be on site permanently while construction is under way.

Everyone had told us not to miss the tour of the Guinness Brewery, to climb to the Gravity Bar at the top of the beer-glass-shaped Guinness Storehouse.We make it a key part of our day in Dublin and do not regret the choice. We learn everything there is to know about how Guinness is made, about its history and its advertising campaigns. We are given an opportunity for a taste test. One fascinating display of the process is the waterfall symbolising the purity of the water, coming from the nearby Wicklow Mountains, which is a basic element to the quality of the beer. Guinness uses eight million litres of water every day.

The Gravity Bar at the top of the tourist site offers a 360-degree view of the city, the windows marked with literary references to some of the key elements in the cityscape. (It was here that we were given our free Guinness--or, in our case, free sodas. Wink, wink, nudge, nudge.)

The Wellington Monument is located in Phoenix Park. This 1,760-acre green space is also the location of Aras an Uachturain, home of the President of Ireland, built in 1751. (The guide said it is the inspiration for the White House.) Dublin was originally called Dubh Linn meaning Black Pool. Much of that waterway is now under the city, but the original pool now forms the centrepiece of the penguin enclosure at Dublin Zoo, located in the park.
A fascinating thing about Ireland is the awareness of the past and a desire to share it with visitors. Some claim the architectural development of the city at times has tried to hide the past, but elsewhere there is more evidence that the past is respected. That is certainly true in the abundance of historical and literary allusions, direct and metaphorical, but also in small details, such as this 1926 sign in Phoenix Park.

Below, The Trinity College Camanile.
My travel companions, Cindy & Gary Parrish of Kentville, have a special interest in Trinity College because one of her ancestors was directly involved with the college in the 1700s. Although my heritage includes Irish families, I am not sure about where they may have lived or studied. The Irish diaspora is thought to contain over 80 million people scattered all over the globe, and my paternal Newfoundland ancestry surely includes people from this great displacement. The only name of which I have certainty is my 3rd great-grandfather (on my mother's side), Sgt. Major William H. McHenry, born in 1789 in County Antrim. He later resided at the Fredericton, N.B. Barracks, where my 2nd great-grandfather, Thomas McHenry, was born.

Later, when we visit Galway, I might say more about my adventurous arrival in Ireland in 1965, when, as a sixteen-year-old Boy Scout, I was illegally landed from a pulp boat carrying some of Roy Joudrey's lumber from Nova Scotia to Europe. Below is the Dublin trainyard, through which I was taken when the Irish threw me out of the country, as a consequence of my illegal arrival, putting me on the train in Galway for Holyhead, saying that the British would have to deal with me.

The train station, below, which I never saw in 1965 from the outside. When I tried to sneak off the train, I was "captured" by the constabulary before I got across the platform and forced to remain on the train. I remember looking across to Howth Head, thinking about Leopold's proposal to Molly Bloom, cursing my bad luck, but aware that further adventures were ahead in England and Europe.

"May you be half an hour in heaven before the devil knows you're dead." (One of hundreds of traditional Irish toasts.)

May the road rise up to meet you,
May the wind be always at your back,
The sun shine warm upon your face,
The rain fall soft upon your fields,
And until we meet again.