crock of gold

As Danny Dowling pointed out in the Story of Glenmore, the exact length of time that man has been in the Glenmore area is difficult to determine. However, the discovery of cist burials containing cremated remains at Haggard, Ballinlammy and Ballygurrim, indicate that the area was inhabited in the Bronze Age which covered the period of time from approximately 2,000 to 500 B.C. After that time various groups have visited and sometimes inhabited the area. It was often believed that these people left valuables hidden in the ground, thus the subject of treasure being unearthed by ploughing was once a favourite subject around the kitchen fires in farmhouses.

In 1980 Danny interviewed John Walsh, of Jamestown, and was informed that in the spring of 1955, whilst ploughing the Glebe Field at Ballygurrim cross, Pat Walsh of Jamestown, uncovered a pottery urn that was buried about eight inches under the surface of the field. When it was first discovered John and Pat Walsh were rather excited as they thought the urn contained gold. The pottery urn was located near the top corner of the field, about 40 yards from the ditch. The plough struck and sliced off what transpired to be the bottom of the pottery urn. The inverted urn was filled with a greyish material resembling ashes tightly packed, and mixed with small pieces of bone, yellowish in colour. The sides of the urn had an overall thickness of a quarter of an inch or slightly less. The urn was decorated with a motif of continuous circles, and it was brown in colour.

There was no stone cist or any type of surround enclosing the urn, only the soil of the field which was tightly packed against it. John Walsh removed the contents of the urn, but found nothing apart from the greyish material containing the yellowish pieces of bone. He did not remove the urn itself owing to its fragility, but filled back the contents, and covered it over with the soil of the field. John Walsh explained to Danny that the burial urn would not have been discovered under normal circumstances. The normal and usual depth for ploughing with a horse was about four inches at that time. On this particular day Pat Walsh was engaged in deep ploughing.  

In January 1958, Danny met Laurence Roche, of Haggard, Glenmore on the Quay in Waterford. Larry Roche related to Danny the story of the hidden treasure he found in about 1938 whilst ploughing in the Townland of Parkstown.  The field belonged to the Roches of Haggard. The field had a slight rise in it and while ploughing over the rise Larry Roche uncovered a burial cist located about one foot beneath the surface of the field although it is not clear that Larry knew that what he uncovered was a burial cist. “It was constructed of four rough flags—one on each side standing up. There was also a flag on the bottom, and it was covered by another on top. The bottom of the cist was roughly 1 ½ feet square.”

Larry explained that when he lifted off the top flag, there was an earthenware urn in an inverted position in the centre of the cyst.  He described it as being about 15 inches high and 7 inches in width at the mouth, and about ½ inch in thickness. There was a black sticky substance at the bottom of the upturned urn. The bottom of the urn, which was upturned, seemed to have been broken. The hole in the bottom of the urn was not big enough to allow a person’s hand to go through it into the urn itself. There were no markings of any description on the urn, and when handled it crumbled into bits of dust. What was left of the cist, Larry placed on top of the nearby ditch.

Per the details provided by Larry, and with Larry’s assistance, Danny sketched the burial cist. The sketch to the right is copied from Danny’s notebook.

Nicholas Forristal, of the Mill, Graiguenakill, Glenmore provided Danny in 1967 with the details of a story involving gold hidden on the Bolger farm in Cappagh, Glenmore. The Bolger family had a farm of 35 Irish acres in Cappagh and were present for a number of generations, long before the Ennetts came.

 James Bolger, was the last owner of the farm in Cappagh. Nicky thought that James Bolger died in the early 1880’s.  Nicky revealed that it was often said that James Bolger was the strongest man in Glenmore. Once when James Bolger was going to New Ross with three bags of wheat when he got to Main Roche’s Hill the horse sulked and refused to pull the cart and the three bags of wheat up the hill. James Bolger did nothing but unyoked the horse and pulled the cart and the three bags of wheat himself up the hill.

A man from the Co. Carlow dreamt repeatedly that there was a crock of gold in this field, opposite a tree in the orchard ditch, so many yards outside in the field. The man’s vision was so vivid that he was able to trace his way to Cappagh, and when he described the vision James Bolger showed him where the treasure was buried or supposed to be buried. It was said that after meeting James Bolder, and getting the information of the gold’s supposed place of burial, the man from Carlow never bothered about the money. Afterwards, the man from Carlow also had no connection with James Bolger. Danny recorded that “further information and tradition tells us that over a number of years, there were several attempts by local men to find it.” However, in the course of the digging for the crock of gold, the activities were suddenly brought to an end by the appearance of a ghostly man on horseback who “stopped the proceedings.” At his appearance the diggers scattered in all directions by fright of the ghostly man on horseback. After a number of these attempts at digging up the gold, the fear of the appearance of the ghostly man on horseback brought all attempts to recover this gold to an end. This treasure is still remembered, but its recovery has never been proven, and it is now part of the folklore the area.

James Bolger never mentioned the stranger and his dream to anyone except to Dick Duggan who was working in Ennett’s at the time. This Dick Duggan’s nephew, Tom Duggan, had the house in Weatherstown where Nick Mernagh’s daughter Jo Doyle is resident. Jo Doyle is 88 years young, and when I spoke to her today she verified that people in Glenmore often spoke of the gold of Cappah and the hunt for it, but she stated that she never heard that anyone found the Cappah gold.

The earliest notation in Danny’s transcribed notebooks concerning the finding of a treasure while ploughing was provided by Jack Power, of Jamestown, Glenmore. Jack Power told Danny that Pierce Butler, of Moulerstown, Glenmore whilst out ploughing a bog in Moulerstown found a gold dollar coin about 1915. Jack stated that Pierce received £70 for the gold dollar. Danny noted in his notebook that Jack Power provided him with the information in the early afternoon of September, 4^th 1955. Jack died suddenly that same night at about 11:30 whilst on his way home from Ballybrahee. Danny expressed surprise at Jack’s sudden passing because Danny noted he thought Jack had at least another 10 years in him.

In August 1956, Matt Aylward, of Ballyfacey, Glenmore, also revealed to Danny that Pierce Purcell, of Moulerstown found gold about 25-30 years ago, or about a decade or two after Jack Power thought it was ploughed up. Matt Aylward said that Pierce Purcell found two gold bangles in a field while harrowing. Matt told Danny that Pierce Purcell took the two gold bangles to Dublin and sold them for £75. Although it is not clear what gold object, or objects, Pierce Purcell found while working in a field in Moulerstown, in the early part of the twentieth century, it was worth approximately £70. Unfortunately it is not known how old the gold object was, but whatever was found represents the only known gold discovered while ploughing in Glenmore.

If anyone has any other Glenmore gold stories please feel free to share the stories or preferably the gold.

Dr. Kathleen Moore Walsh