BLESSINGTON
(St. Mary), or BURGAGE, a, market and post-town, and a parish,
in the barony of LOWER TALBOTSTOWN, county of WICKLOW
and province of LEINSTER, 6¼ miles (E. S. E.) from Naas
(Co. Kildare) and 14 (S. S. W.) from Dublin city; containing,
with Burgage, 2677 inhabitants, of which number, 426 are in the
town.
This place
is situated on the river Liffey, and on the high road from Dublin,
by Baltinglass, to Wexford,
Carlow, and Waterford. The town occupies a rising ground
on the north-western confines of the county, and was built by Archbishop
Boyle in the reign of Chas. II. : it consists only of one street,
and contains about 50 houses, which are mostly of respectable appearance,
and a good inn or hotel. Considerable improvement has taken place since
the construction of the new turnpike road from Dublin to Carlow, by
way of Baltinglass, in 1829, by which the Waterford mail and the Kilkenny
day mail, and several coaches and cars to the counties of Wexford and
Carlow, have been brought through it. The celebrated waterfall called
Poul-a-Phuca, about three miles distant on the road to Baltinglass,
and described under the head of Ballymore-Eustace, is generally
visited from this place. The market is on Thursday ; and fairs are held
on May 12th, July 5th and Nov. 12th. Here is a station of the constabulary
police ; and the chief officer of the peace preservation force resides
in the town.
The inhabitants
were incorporated by charter of the 21st of Chas. II. (1669), granted
to Michael Boyle, Archbishop of Dublin and Chancellor of Ireland,
and certain forfeited lands assigned to him were at the same time erected
into a manor, to be called the manor of Blessington. This charter
empowered the archbishop to hold before the seneschal of the manor a
court lee: with view of frankpledge twice in the year ; a court baron
every three weeks, or less frequently, for claims not exceeding 40s.;
and a court of record when and where he should think proper, with jurisdiction
not exceeding £10 : and prescribed the style, constitution, and
mode of electing the officers of the corporation. The corporation was
styled "The Sovereigns, Bailiffs, and Burgesses of the Borough
and Town of Blessington ;” and consisted of a sovereign, two bailiffs,
and twelve burgesses, with power to a majority to admit freemen and
choose inferior officers, and the archbishop was authorised to appoint
a recorder and town-clerk. The borough returned two members to the Irish
parliament till the Union, when the £15,000 awarded as compensation
for the loss of the franchise was paid to Arthur, Marquess of Downshire
; the right of election was vested in the corporation at large, which
from that period has been extinct. Petty sessions are held on alternate
Saturdays; and the Marquess of Downshire, as proprietor of the
town, has power to hold a manorial court for the recovery of small debts.
The parish,
which, previously to the erection of the town and church in 1683, was
called Burgage, comprises 17,570 statute acres. The land is chiefly
under tillage and pasturage, and there are some large tracts of mountain
waste, on which are turf bogs ; the state of agriculture has considerably
improved. The subsoil is chiefly limestone gravel ; and the mountains
abound with granite, which is quarried and sent to Dublin for public
buildings. The Marquess of Downshire had a handsome mansion and
demesne of 410 statute acres, with a deer park of 340 acres, all surrounded
by a wall, and situated on the right of the road from Dublin : the mansion
was originally built by Primate Boyle, the last ecclesiastical
chancellor of Ireland, who held his court of chancery here, and built
houses for the six clerks, two of which yet remain ; the interior wag
burnt by the insurgents in 1798 and has not been restored ; the dernesne
is richly embellished with fine timber.
About
two miles from the town, on the road to Baltinglass, is Russborough,
the elegant seat of the Earl of Miltown : the mansion, erected
after a design by Mr. Cassels, architect of the Bank of Ireland,
is in the Grecian style, and consists of a centre and two wings, connected
by semicircular colonnades of alternated ionic and Corinthian pillars,
and presenting a noble facade of hewn stone 700 feet in extent ; the
interior is fitted up in a style of sumptuous magnificence ; the doors
of the principal apartments are of polished mahogany, and there is an
extensive and valuable collection of paintings, chiefly of the Italian
school, arranged in seven apartments appropriated to its reception:
the demesne comprises 405 statute acres tastefully laid out and planted.
Russellstown, the seat of J. Hornidge, Esq., is also in
the parish.
The living
is a vicarage with Burgage, in the diocese of Dublin and Glendalough,
to which the vicarages of Boystown
and Kilbride were united
by act of council in 1588, forming the vicarial union of Blessington,
in the patronage of the Archbishop ; the rectory is united to those
of St. Andrew's and Ardree, and part of Lusk, together
constituting the corps of the precentorship in the cathedral church
of St. Patrick, Dublin. The tithes, including those of Burgage,
amount to £218. 10s., of which also is payable to the precentor,
and the remainder to the vicar, and the gross tithes of the benefice
amount to £2l0. 19s. 5d. The lands of Great Burgage, comprising
670a. 3r. 10p. statute measure, let on lease at a rental of £64.
12s. 3¾d., form part of the endowment of the precentorship. The
church, a neat edifice with a lofty square tower, was erected at the
expense of Primate Boyle, who also gave a ring of bells; it is
neatly fitted up, and an organ was erected by the grandfather of the
present Marquess of Downshire, who allows the organist a salary
of £40 per ann., to which £10 was formerly added by the
parish, and now by the new Ecclesiastical Board : a monument to the
memory of the founder records his benefactions to the town, and the
inscription concludes with the motto, “Abi, et fac tu similiter''
During
the disturbances of 1798 the church was used as a barrack. Viscount
Blessington, a descendant of Primate Boyle, in 1786, endowed
the living of Blessington, otherwise Burgage, with 180 statute acres
of land in the adjoining parish of Tipperkevin, subject to the
payment of £5 per annum by the incumbent to the school : there
is neither glebe-house nor glebe.
In the
Roman Catholic divisions this parish is partly included in the
union or district of Blessington, partly in that
of Blackditches, and partly in that of Ballymore-Eustace
: the first union comprises also the parishes of Rathmore, Kilbride,
and Kilteel, and contains three chapels, situated at Cross
and Eadestown, in Rathmore, and at Kilbride.
A neat
building, the upper part of which is used as a girls' school, and the
lower as a court for holding the petty sessions, with a house for the
master and mistress, has been erected at an expense of £800 by
the Marquess of Downshire, who allows a salary of £20 to
the master and £10 to the mistress, the latter of whom also receives
the £5 payable by the incumbent : there are about 20 boys in the
school, who are taught in a school room a short distance from the building,
and 30 girls. There are also five hedge schools in Blessington
and Burgage, in which nearly 150 children are taught.
A dispensary
is supported in the customary manner.
There
are some ruins of the old church of Burgage, and in the churchyard
are the remains of a castle, and on the outside is a very fine cross,
hewn out of one large block of granite, and about 14 feet high. On the
townland of Crossacool Harbour, near Liffey Cottage, are
a burial place and a holy well, the latter of which is much resorted
to in June for its reputed efficacy in healing various diseases. On
the townland of Three Castles are some remains of one of the
ancient fortresses from which it has derived it’s name.
Blessington
gave the title of Earl to the family of Gardiner, now
extinct ; and Russborough gives the inferior titles of Viscount
and Baron to the Earl of Miltown.
