Sitting in a Dublin pub nursing a pint of Guinness, I got speaking to a fella who informed me what regarded to be an fantastic and implausible story.
It changed into approximately a lady from County Mayo who become a pirate and a pandemic of eire‘s west coast, inside the way that Black Beard were the scourge of the Spanish essential. The time become 16th-century ireland, while education turned into uncommon and girls spent maximum of their existence rearing youngsters and searching after family affairs. but that became not the lifestyles of Grace O’Malley, sailor, captain, plunderer, mercenary, rise up, pirate – as well as wife and mom.
A picture step by step emerged of her charismatic personality, her wild lifestyles and push aside for social mores.
a little research speedy confirmed that this become no longer just Guinness-fuelled pub ramblings, however a captivating tale that belies the whole lot we generally take as a right approximately the Elizabethan generation, whilst ladies hardly ever had a existence beyond their domestic. I desired to look where O’Malley lived, and hear more memories about her exploits.
i used to be soon trundling west from Dublin on a sluggish educate across lush and wealthy pasture. 90 minutes into the journey we rattled throughout the river Shannon at the city of Athlone, ireland’s geographical coronary heart, into the province of Connaught. The panorama modified from fertile fields to wild and bleak – yet stunning – peat bogs.
Clew Bay is scattered with loads of drowned drumlins
Clew Bay is scattered with masses of drowned drumlins (credit score: George Karbus photography/Cultura RM/Alamy)
every other 90 minutes later, I arrived within the County Mayo city of Westport, staring down at the stunningly lovely Clew Bay and the Atlantic past. The bay is scattered with masses of drowned drumlins (small low lying islands which can be made of glacial debris left from the closing Ice Age). The most well-known of the typically uninhabited islands is Dorninish, sold through John Lennon as a hideaway at the height of Beatlemania.
My B&B turned into a few steps from Matt Molloy’s, the famous pub owned via the world–famend musician with the Chieftains. In here, all of the locals knew stories approximately Grace O’Malley, or Granuaile (pronounced Gran ya Wale) in Gaelic. The land around Clew Bay become once managed by using the powerful O’Malley circle of relatives; and although Westport did no longer exist again then, she turned into born on Clare Island, some miles west on the mouth of the bay, and her legend lives on within the place.
Grace O’Malley turned into born in this tower house on Clare Island
Grace O’Malley changed into born in this tower residence on Clare Island (credit score: Peter Lynch)
The memories came thick and speedy. now not everyone agreed on the statistics, however a photograph steadily emerged of her charismatic personality, her wild existence and dismiss for social mores. i used to be advised that she turned into the chief of two hundred combating men on a small fleet of ships and might fight alongside them. Others stated she might waylay passing service provider ships and demand a tax for secure passage – in the event that they did now not pay she plundered them. i was eager to realize more, and someone gave me the number of a sailor named Aaron O’Grady who became also born on Clare Island and is something of a nearby professional on O’Malley. “he’s your man,” become the overall consensus.
O’Grady runs fishing and diving charters in eire‘s western waters and become placing off down the coast to Kerry the following morning, calling in at his home on Clare Island at the way. I arranged to fulfill him at the jetty at dawn.
It become a blustery, wet morning, however as we set sail, the wind dropped, the rain eased and the solar subsequently regarded as we carefully manoeuvred around the multitude of small islands and sand bars.
Aaron O’Grady’s 54ft yacht, The Explorer
Aaron O’Grady’s 54ft yacht, The Explorer (credit: Peter Lynch)
“it’s dangerous crusing for the unwary”, O’Grady said, as the 54ft yacht The Explorer yawed 40 levels. “it’s why the bay became a secure haven for Grace; she changed into born in that tower residence we are coming near and grew up on those waters.”
Pointing north throughout the bay, he introduced, “in case you weave your manner among a dozen drumlins and keep away from the sandbars and rip tides, you will come to Carrickahowley fortress, a grand hideaway that her enemies located hard to reach. She was an elusive individual and had other fortress hideaways on Achill Island and Lake Corrib near Galway.
The O’Malley family had been hereditary lords of the Mayo coast, and more than 500 years on, the tower residence wherein she was born continues to be the tallest building on Clare Island. The gate to the historic monument became swinging extensive open after I arrived, so I strolled in to what seemed a bleak home – however became likely considered pricey while O’Malley turned into born in 1530. The higher flooring have collapsed, leaving the residence a hollow shell. there was a haunting presence in its historical material.
A currach in Clew Bay
A currach in Clew Bay (credit score: Gareth McCormack/Alamy)
As a toddler, O’Malley likely learned to deal with a currach (a slender hide–protected rowing boat), which kids have been nevertheless getting to know to row in Clew Bay. I’d been informed that she became usually wayward: as a younger girl, having been refused permission to join her father on a crusing expedition, she reduce off her hair, dressed as a boy and snuck on board his deliver.
O’Malley married neighborhood chieftain Donal O’Flaherty at 15 and bore three youngsters. After her husband’s early dying, she took lots of his followers (he had ships and sailors for buying and selling up and down the west coast) and lower back to her ancestral home on Clare Island. here she started out crusing the seas, buying and selling fish, fur and hides, and robbing the English whilst exchange become gradual. close by Galway become a primary buying and selling city and ships from England and Scotland needed to pass Clew Bay en direction. It was from this that the legend of Granuaile: Pirate Queen of Connacht started.
The 12th-century Cistercian Abbey in which O’Malley was buried in 1603
The 12th-century Cistercian Abbey wherein O’Malley was buried in 1603 (credit score: Peter Lynch)
I strolled west throughout the modest 15-sq.mile island fabricated from hills, bogs and patches of forest, heading for the 12th-century Cistercian Abbey wherein O’Malley turned into buried in 1603. The Abbey became a great deal larger in its heyday, however the unmarried ultimate constructing is the size of an everyday village church. inner became an problematic O’Malley crest depicting the family’s searching, crusing and combating prowess, however O’Malley’s burial chamber was nowhere to be seen. Legend has it that she may be buried in a vault behind the big own family crest, however no one is aware of for certain.
The building had the atmosphere of a medieval barn – difficult stone, huge beams and gravel floor – but contained some extremely good, even though badly broken, wall and ceiling frescos. The frescos could as soon as have protected the whole ceiling in a kaleidoscope of colorful human and animal figures, along with dragons, cockerels, stags, a harper, birds and trees. The diminished photographs seemed distant, like peering via a veil into the beyond.
a look inside the 12th-century Cistercian Abbey
a look inside the 12th-century Cistercian Abbey (credit score: Peter Lynch)
again on the mainland, I made my manner to Carrickahowley citadel at Rockfleet, an inlet at the north side of Clew Bay, which O’Grady had talked about to me. After marrying, her 2nd husband, Richard Bourke in 1566, this have become O’Malley’s principal domestic, and its massive appeal become its inaccessibility and stout defences.
memories say that once just three hundred and sixty five days of marriage she evoked an historical Celtic regulation by putting her husband’s assets out of doors and greeting him on his return domestic with the aid of shouting from the ramparts, “Richard Bourke I dismiss you!” They later reconciled and remained collectively till his death 17 years later.
A view of Carrickahowley castle
A view of Carrickahowley fort (credit: Brian eire/Alamy)
when Bourke died in 1583, O’Malley’s clashes with the English intensified, and her son Tibbot turned into captured. That September, she sailed to England, up the River Thames to Greenwich Palace, and met Queen Elizabeth I, where she negotiated Tibbot’s launch and her very own pardon by using agreeing to combat the Queen’s enemies.
inside the 1603 struggle of Kinsale, Tibbot and other Mayo chiefs fought with the Queen of england‘s forces, assisting to defeat the Spanish and their Irish insurrection allies. This changed into probably one of the reasons O’Malley became disowned with the aid of Irish historians; the other changed into her unladylike behaviour of flouting every potential regulation, culture and social custom of the times.
because O’Malley became written out of official Irish history, little or no written records exists. Irish historians had been normally non secular clergymen, and being a lady, she turned into unnoticed. however there’s usually an opportunity history to general conventional texts, and testimonies and legends approximately her exploits are giant in Mayo. just is going to reveal: never pass up the danger for a pint of Guinness and a few pub banter. You in no way recognize what you may analyze.
