Drogheda from St. John's Hill by Francis Place, 1698

County Louth Archaeological and History Society

Drogheda from St. John's Hill by Francis Place, 1698Author(s): Kieran CampbellSource: Journal of the County Louth Archaeological and Historical Society, Vol. 26, No. 4(2008), pp. 473-478Published by: County Louth Archaeological and History SocietyStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/27730017 .

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Drogheda from St John's Hill by Francis Place, 1698

By Kieran Campbell

In the early 1930s, John Maher published two papers in the Journal of the Royal Society of

Antiquaries of Ireland concerning the topographical drawings made by the English artist, Francis

Place, during his travels in Ireland in 1698-9 (Maher 1932, 1934). The drawings, reproduced in the

two papers, included panoramic views and drawings of individual buildings mostly in Dublin,

Drogheda, Kilkenny and Waterford. Some of the Irish drawings and two sketch-books had been

acquired by the Victoria and Albert Museum at a sale in Sothebys in June 1931, authorised by the

trustees of Patrick Allan-Fraser of Hospitalfield, Arbroath. Some years later, a roll of nine addition

al drawings were found 'in a drawer of a disused sideboard' in the basement of the same house and

these were the subject of an article by Theo Moorman in the Burlington Magazine (1952). Among the newly-discovered drawings

were views of Drogheda and Kilkenny, both reproduced by

Moorman, and an unfinished view of Dublin. The Kilkenny drawing, entitled 'Kilkenny from Wind

Gap Hill', appears to be an earlier version of the view published by Maher (1934, Plate XII) as it

lacks some of the detail in the latter view. The drawing of Drogheda is a stunning panorama of the

town as viewed from Ballsgrove and bears the title 'Droghough from St John's hill - 1698'. It is

executed in pen, sepia ink and grey wash on two sheets of paper, joined at the centre, and measures

914mm by 368mm. Since 1956, the drawing has been in the collection of the Fitzwilliam Museum,

Cambridge, with whose permission it is reproduced here. Despite being published over fifty years

ago, this important drawing has somehow escaped the attention of students of Drogheda's history

and archaeology up to now, and its publication should be of considerable interest to all those with

an interest in the town's past.

Francis Place (1647-1728), topographical draughtsman, printmaker and ceramicist, was born

into a landowning family in Dinsdale, Co Durham. Apprenticed to study law in London he left on

account of the plague to work as an artist and was

acquainted with the celebrated Czech draughts man and etcher, Wenceslaus Hollar. On the death of his father in 1681, and particularly

on his

remarriage in 1693, he became of independent means but continued his artistic endeavours for his

own interest. Settled in York, he toured widely making topographical drawings, visiting Ireland in

1698-9 (Maher 1932, Moorman 1952). The six Place drawings previously published by Maher consisted of a panorama of 'The West

side of Drogheda', viewed from Mell, a view of 'The ruines of St Maries Abie att Drogheda', with

the town wall, Duleek Gate and Millmount in the background, two views of 'The Sunday Port', i.e.

St Sunday's Gate in Magdalene Street, and two views of unidentified towers on the town wall

labelled simply 'At Drogeda' (1934, Plates IV, V, VI and VII). These and other Irish views by Place

were acquired by the National Gallery of Ireland in 1972. The view from St John's Hill is more than

twice the size, in length and height, of the two largest of the above drawings, namely the 'West side'

and 'St. Maries', which in turn are twice the size of the other four drawings. The large format

enabled Place to show the town in considerable detail and to capture a view of the entire town from

West Gate to Duleek Gate. His viewpoint was a short distance to the east of the present Ballsgrove

House on the hill overlooking the south end of the Bridge of Peace, a view no longer possible due

to the mature wood now growing along this slope. In succeeding years the artists Van der Hagen,

in c. 1718, and Ricciardelli in 1753, painted similar views from positions further east along the same

ridge (reproduced in Bradley 1997).

473



474 County Louth Archaeological and Historical Journal

In addition to the title and date at the bottom margin, Place has provided, in the top right corner,

a key to some of the principal buildings, which reads as follows:

A St Maries Abie b the Mount C St Johns Gate E the Towers of the Bridg F the Tolsell G St Lawrences Gate

H the Church where they hold ser (vices) I the Irish or North Gate

K the west gate L the Maiden tower

All the buildings listed date to the medieval period and the town presents much as it probably looked during the preceding centuries, i.e. a walled town dominated by Millmount and the towers

of religious houses. An almost contemporary view of the east side of the town, taken from a position

diagonally opposite at Scarlet Street, is the 'Prospect of the Town of Drogheda' drawn by Thomas

Phillips in 1684-5, the original of which is in the British Library (Branigan 1931). The two earliest

maps of the town, by Goche in 1574 and Newcomen in 1657, similarly depict Drogheda as still essen

tially a medieval town (Thomas 1975; Conlan 1987). There were significant changes during the

mid-eighteenth century when many leases came up for renewal (Casey 1992). The rebuilt St Peter's

Church, new municipal buildings and large private houses feature on Ravell's map of 1749 and

Taylor and Skinner's manuscript map of the town of 1778 although the town walls and gates largely

survived into the last decades of the century. Place's views are coeval with the published early

minutes of the Corporation of Drogheda and just a year later than the town charter of William III

both of which documents contain many references to buildings and places shown (Gogarty 1915).

Town wall, gates and towers: In 1698 the river wall still stood on the north side although in a dilapi

dated state. At least eight, and possibly nine, towers are shown between Dyer Street and the corner

tower below West Gate. This view gives their number and allows their positions to be located

accurately for the first time. A large pigeon house at the bottom of Stockwell Street is depicted also

on Van der Hagen, with white doves on the roof, but is roofless on Ricciardelli. Its probable origin as a defensive tower is suggested in a lease of 1664, by the Corporation

to Thomas Stoker, where it

is described as 'the old pidgeon house' and with a condition that Stoker 'must expect noe

reparacon if the army have use for it' (Gogarty 1915, 120). In 1697, the town charter lists 'one house

garden and pidgeon house at the west end of Deerstreet... in the occupation of the Widow Tookes'.

East of the pigeon house a possible timber structure overhangs

a small semi-circular tower. On

Ricciardelli, this appears to be on stilts and was possibly a

garderobe.

A small garderobe and four towers are shown in the area later reclaimed for Wellington Quay, one more than in 1718 when Van der Hagen shows that the small ruined westernmost tower had

been replaced by a

garden wall with semi-circular crenellations. By St Mary d'Urso, an orchard has

towers at the two riverside corners, one at the end of Patrickswell Lane and the other almost directly

south of the church tower. Portions of the river wall were uncovered here during excavations for

the Interceptor Sewer in 1997 (Murphy 1998, 128). A good view is given of the corner tower, unclear in Place's 'West side' view and missing

on Ravell's map of 1749. A c. 100m length of the town

wall between the river and West Gate, shown in a side-on view, still survives today though graffiti

covered and in a neglected state. Excavations here in 1994 and 1996 revealed that the wall survives

to its full height of 6-7m but is now partly obscured by the later build-up in ground level (Campbell 1995, 63; Murphy 1997, 76). The West Gate is sketchily drawn but appears to show a tall barbican



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Drogheda from St John 's Hill by Francis Place, 1698 475

with a low gatehouse, perhaps for the collection of tolls, inside the walls. On the evidence of Place's

'West side' view, the barbican was a similar structure to St Laurence's Gate. In 1790 the directors of

the Dunleer to Dublin turnpike road were given permission by the Corporation to take down both

West Gate and St James's Gate and to use the stone for making roads on the approaches to the town

(Corcoran 1992,20). A mural tower at the north end of the west wall, a

fragment of which survives in the garden of

No. 100 George's Street, is not shown by Place in this view and is probably obscured by the tall West

Gate (Reilly 1995). The tower shown next above West Gate stood at the present-day junction of

Patrick Street, Rope Walk and Bolton Street. Unnamed on Ravell, Garry calls this the 'Bolton or

Boulting Tower' and it was evidently a minor gate as Newcomen shows several paths leading to it

(1996, 15). The Bolton name in this area dates to at least the late-seventeenth-century; the 1697

town charter lists two properties in Bolton Lane, one an orchard on the corner with Fair Street.

All the early maps and views show three towers on the north-west circuit of wall between Bolton

Street and St Sunday's Gate. Place has a circular mural tower in the area now occupied by the raised

grassy bank between Rope Walk and Patrick Street. The O.S. 1:1056 manuscript town plan shows

several sections of the town wall here in 1835 but recent test excavations for Drogheda Town

Council indicated that the wall has been completely removed (pers comm. Ian Russell, ACS Ltd.).

Two towers on the wall adjacent to the Magdalen Tower may have been part of the Dominican

priory. On Newcomen's map the westernmost of the two towers is located at the junction of the

precinct wall of the priory with the town wall. The low rectangular castellated tower also appears in

the background in one of Place's two detailed views of 'The Sunday Port' which in the key to this

drawing he calls 'the Irish or North Gate' (Maher 1934, Plate VI, figs. 1, 2). The materials of the

gate were sold at auction by the Corporation in 1795 (Corcoran 1992, 20). East of Sunday's Gate is the Tooting Tower, the corner tower at the junction of the north and

east walls. Two towers on the east wall between Tooting's and St Laurence's Gate, one with battle

ments and one with a pointed roof, are

presumed to be Taylor's Hall and the Pigeon Tower as

named on Ravell although they appear to be too close together. St Laurence's Gate is similar to its

appearance today though with additional height, perhaps a turret, on the eastern tower as also seen

in the Van der Hagen and Ricciardelli views.

On the Meath side, Millmount and the town fortifications dominate the scene. There is a distant

view of St James's or Dublin Gate and a large tower on

Corry's Hill, also shown on Phillips' view.

The town wall on the west side, from Duleek Gate to the river, is similar to the view in Place's 'West

side of Drogheda' though drawn from a different perspective. From the tall twin-towered Duleek

Gate the wall, with a mural tower, follows Sarah's Avenue where some remnants still survive at

ground level (Reilly 1995). Portion of the tower on the south-west corner of the bailey at Millmount

is still evident, with several long stone projecting corbels. Between Millmount and the river are

Butter Gate and St John's Gate, the first of these reduced to its present state as recently as 1958

(Corcoran 1992, 22). St John's Gate, named in the key, is shown as a rectangular

structure with a

low projecting barbican or gatehouse. Substantial masonry foundations of the gate, and the wall

leading south from it, were exposed in large trenches excavated as part of the dual-carriageway

construction works in 1976 but unfortunately no

archaeological excavations were undertaken on

that scheme. Until its demolition in 1976, a section of town wall stood to full height immediately south of St John's Gate; foundations of the wall were later recorded in excavations by Murphy

(1997). A riverside tower, shown ruined in 1698, is not indicated on the O.S. 1835 plan but appears to resurface as a semi-circular structure on the 1:1250 town plan surveyed in 1908. Excavations by

Conway on the site between St John's Gate and the river did not uncover either the tower or the

town wall although the excavator suggested that the wall could yet survive below the level reached

by the excavation (Conway 2000).




Churches and religious houses: Prominent on the left side of the drawing is the tower of the Hospital of St Mary d'Urso, or 'Old Abbey', founded c. 1206 and dissolved on 10 October 1540. In 1697 the

'old abbey walls of St. Mary Hospital the houses and the gardens thereunto belonging lying next

the town wall' were leased by the Corporation to Edward Singleton (William III charter). Place has

exaggerated the height of the tower which in reality has a more squat appearance. A gateway

opening south, to the east of the tower, is shown as a lean-to structure on Grose's print of 1791

(Grose, ii, plate 46). The ground between church and river is blank, apart from a path, although

extensive excavations in this area by Halpin uncovered the outline of the cloister, of which some

portions survived above ground, incorporated into later buildings, and are now retained in the

grounds of the new Garda station (Halpin 1996). North of the church, on the line of present-day

Narrow West Street, a row of houses may be identified as 'Newrow', tenements listed in the 1697

charter as lying between Patrickswell Lane and the West Gate. Not evident is the late Augustinian

Friary which also lay in this area, fronting on to Patrickswell Lane (Kelly 1941, 31) and in 1697 was

in the occupation of William Graves (William III charter).

Apart from a fragment of the church adjoining

on the east, the Magdalen Tower of the

Dominican Priory appears much as it looks today. Nearby, and noted in the key, is the gable of the

medieval St Peter's church, in ruins since Cromwell's assault of 1649. Van der Hagen shows the

gable in similar detail and also a roofed tower, adjacent on the south, of a rebuilt church 'where

they hold services'. Towards the centre of the drawing, to the right of the Tholsel, a bulky tower

stands out above the surrounding houses. On Van der Hagen's view, this appears to be part of the

Tholsel but here it is shown as a separate building resembling an urban tower house. The location

would also fit with 'the strongly built high tower' of the Franciscan Friary church, as described by Fr Mooney in 1629-32 (Kelly 1941, 37). Rising above the town wall to the east of Millmount, is the

tower of St Mary's church, reduced by cannon in the siege of 1649. The substantial ruins of the

church are the subject of another drawing by Place (Maher 1934, Plate V).The register of St. Mary's

records that on 6 April 1765 'the upper part of the old Steeple of St. Mary's blown down'. Another

possible church tower may be seen in the cluster of buildings by the river on the Meath side, in a

location approximating to the Bull Ring. A Corporation lease of 1814 places St Nicholas' church on

the south side of the Bull Ring, on the east side of the 'old Tholsel' or Castle of Comfort at the foot

of Pitcher Hill (Allen 1943, 242). St Nicholas' was granted to Llanthony Secunda in 1211 who

continued in possession until 1541 (Hogan 2008, 193). Counting against this identification,

however, the church does not appear on other maps of the period, e.g. Rave 11 or the Taylor and

Skinner manuscript map of the town.

Other buildings and locations: Unlike in Van der Hagen and Ricciardelli, St Mary's Bridge does not

feature in this view. However, two slender pinnacles, identified in the key as 'the Towers of the

Bridge', belong to the gate which stood on the north side of the bridge. One tower with a similar

conical roof is depicted on Newcomen's map. After years of repair

to the old bridge, and many false

starts, a new bridge

was erected in 1722 (Corcoran 1977).

Marked 'F', the tall clock tower of the Tholsel, with its weather cock, stood at the junction of the

four main streets on the Louth side. A detailed view of this timber building, replaced in 1770,

appears in an architectural vignette on Ravell's map. Few other individual buildings and no streets

can be discerned. Many houses feature dormer windows and tall chimney stacks, with one particu

larly large house, of three storeys with an attic, on the river at Dyer Street. Several cottages are

arranged around a yard, with haystacks, at the top of present-day Dominick Street. Linen is laid out

in a field by the river, shown as 'The Green' on Ravell's map and, from 1774 until 1974, the site of

Drogheda's Linenhall (Garry 1996, 60). From the linen green, three figures run down a causeway

to greet a small boat fitted with a mast and a tiller.



Drogheda from St John 's Hill by Francis Place, 1698 477

As with other Place drawings (Maher 1932, 9), this view was left unfinished and accounts for the

large blank area in the north-west quarter of the town, west of Peter Street and north of West Street.

Part of this area is shown as open ground on Newcomen's map and it was

probably underdeveloped

compared to the rest of the town, but Fair Street and Rope Walk were in existence since at least the

fourteenth century (Bradley 1978, 113) and both are shown on Goche's map of 1574 (Thomas

1975, 184). Maher surmised that Place may have intended to produce

a set of engravings from his

drawings made in Ireland and, to this end, some drawings have pencilled instructions for later

corrections (Maher 1932, 2). On the town wall between Butter Gate and St John's Gate, he has

written 'Shorten this wall' and on the horizon, above the Maiden Tower, is written 'make this

ground lower by half an inch'. It does not appear that this project was carried out but, as Maher

states, we are thankful to Francis Place for the unique record he has left while also wishing he had

left a little more.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Allen, W.P. 1943 'Some Notes on the Old Fortifications of Drogheda', C.L.A.J, x, 3, 233-44.

Bradley, J. 1978 'The Topography and Layout of Medieval Drogheda', C.L.A.H.J, xix, 2, 98-127.

Bradley, J. 1997 The Topography and Layout of Medieval Drogheda. Revised edition published by Old

Drogheda Society.

Branigan, L. F. 1931 'An Old View of Drogheda', C.L.A.J, vii, 3, 406.

Campbell, K. 1995 'Drogheda Town', in I. Bennett (ed.), Excavations 1994, 63. Bray.

Casey, C. 1992 Joseph Ravell's A Map of the Town and Suburbs of Drogheda 1749\ C.L.A.H.J., xxii, 4, 361-3.

Conlan, P. 1987 The Franciscans in Drogheda. Drogheda.

Conway, M. 2000 John Street, Drogheda', in I. Bennett (ed.), Excavations 1999, 195-7. Bray.

Corcoran, M. 1977 'The "1722" Bridge', Journal of the Old Drogheda Society, No.l, 19-24.

Corcoran, M. 1992 'When the Walls came tumbling down', Journal of the Old Drogheda Society, No. 8,

18-25.

Garry, J. 1996 The Streets and Lanes of Drogheda. Drogheda.

Gogarty, T. 1915 Council Book of the Corporation of Drogheda Voll: from the year 1649 to 1734. Drogheda. Grose, F. 1791 The Antiquities oflreland. London

Halpin, E. 1996 'Excavations at St. Mary d'Urso, Drogheda, County Louth', C.L.A.H.J., xxiii, 4, 452

509.

Hogan, A. 2008 The Priory of Llanthony Prima and Secunda in Ireland 1172-1541. Dublin.

Kelly, M. 1941 'Three Monasteries of Drogheda', C.L.A.J., x, 1, 25-41.

Maher, J. 1932 'Francis Place in Dublin', JR.S.A.I., 62, 1-14.

Maher, J. 1934 'Francis Place in Drogheda, Kilkenny and Waterford, etc' JR.S.A.I., 64, 41-53.

Moorman, T. 1952 'Some Newly Discovered Drawings by Francis Place', The Burlington Magazine,

Vol. 94, No. 591 (June 1952), 159-61.

Murphy, D. 1997 'Moneymore, Drogheda: medieval urban', in I. Bennett (ed.), Excavations 1996,

76-7. Bray.

Murphy, D. 1998 'Moneymore, Drogheda: medieval urban', in I. Bennett (ed.), Excavations 1997,

127-9. Bray.

Register Book St. Marys Drogheda 1764 (volume in R.C.B. Library, Dublin).

Reilly, T. 1995 Tracing Drogheda's Medieval Walls. Drogheda Monuments Preservation Committee,

Drogheda.

Thomas, A. 1975 'Drogheda, 1574', C.L.A.H.J, xviii, 3, 179-86.

William III charter, typescript copy in possession of author.




ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I wish to record my thanks to the following: the Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge for providing a copy of the drawing and for permission

to reproduce; the National Gallery of Ireland for infor

mation on the Francis Place drawings in their collection; Ned McHugh for help in deciphering the

seventeenth-century script; Tom Reilly for useful discussion; Anto Kerins for source material; and

Noel Ross for bibliographical and editorial assistance and for his patience.

[Full size-size copies of the drawing are available from the Society, see back cover for details.]



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Drogheda from St. John's Hill by Francis Place, 1698