Churchtown Heritage Society held its Annual Sean Clarach commemoration at the Booney  House on Friday April 7th. There was a large attendance present. The local and the visiting artists presented a wonderful evening of entertainment which also including the annual erudite lecture by Denis Hickey on the historic significance of Sean Clarach. Denis also recited a poem he learned almost 70 years ago from Hannie ‘Booney” O’Sullivan in the very house where the commemoration was taking place. The poem was called Lord Ullin’s Daughter.
The preservation of culture and creativity are the main aims of Churchtown Heritage Society and this aim was well served last Friday evening in the Booney House. The music featured was provided by uileann pipers, bag pipers, box button accordion players, fiddle, banjo, accordion, mouth organ and tin whistle, Songs were mainly traditional by young and old. Poems both Scottish and Irish also featured. The support of Mallow Field Club (Charles Mortell) and the Charleville Historic Society (Michael McGrath) was very much appreciated by the organisers.
The MC for the night was Noel Linehan. Performers included: Philip Cotter (Piper), Muireann O’Brien (vocalist), Denis Hickey (Historian), Daithí O’Brien (Tin Whistle), Denis Hawe (Mouth Organ), Deirdre Murphy (vocalist), Owen McKiernan (Accordion), Con Warren (Traditional Singer), Nora Buckley (Pipes and Violin), PJ O’Driscoll (Vocalist) and Peter Lombard (Accordion). The entire proceedings were filmed and a will be made available on DVD and will also be uploaded to YouTube in due course. Churchtown Heritage Society would like to thank Gerry and Dorothy Murphy for the use of the Booney House for this event over the years.
Seán Clárach MacDómhnaill was born at Rath in 1691 less than a mile from Churchtown village. We know that his parents were millers and that the basic structure of their mill still exists and has given rise to the naming of the locality as ‘Windmill’. Their nearby home has defied the centuries and may still be viewed close by the entrance to the ancient cemetery of Kilgrogan.
Following the death of his parents Seán moved to the Kiltoohig area of Charleville where he became a teacher. As a writer, Seán Clárach enjoyed a tremendous advantage over the majority of his contemporaries; as well as Irish, he could speak and write in English and was also from his education in Charleville, fluent in Greek.
Much of Seán Clárach’s writings provide a personal and general metaphor for the plight of the Irish under the yoke of the Penal Laws. He was undoubtedly one of the most prolific writers of his time and we are fortunate that so much of his work survives. Seán Clárach’s most enduring work ‘Mo Ghille Mear’, written as a tribute to his hero Charles Stuart, was dedicated to Jenny Cameron the Prince’s paramour  and one of the unsung  heroines of the Stuart era. We in Churchtown have proudly installed it as our Anthem and it make the rafters ring in Booney’s as Friday’s finale. Seán was laid to rest on the site of a former medieval parish church near his earlier Kiltoohig home in what today is Holy Cross Cemetery.