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‘In Castletown graveyard there is a grave with wall built around it. This grave is of the Pirate Byrne who live on the banks of Castletown river about four hundred years ago. When he died he was buried in Castletown graveyard. There was a roofed house built over him. But no sooner would the roof be built than it would be blown off again. There were five or four roofs put on this house but each time the roof came off. The ruins can still be seen in Castletown graveyard‘

Other reports from what must be remembered is a folklore collection, mention that unbaptised children were buried on the western side of the graveyard, likely under cover of darkness after scaling the high walls built to keep both grave robbers and others out. One source states that the church was once referred to as Dundalgan Temple, which would make sense considering its proximity to Dún Dealgan Motte. Such an aesthetically haunting sloped graveyard is obviously a source for countless ghosts stories such as that of ‘Old Murphy’ whose chains could be heard rattling on the road that passed the church to the bridge. This final story which I think gives an example of Irish wit comes from the Schools Collection also,

‘One night there were men sitting at a fire and a man said, ‘I will give a half-crown to the man who goes out to the graveyard and take back a skull’. There was a man who went out and when he got to the bottom of the graveyard he picked up a skull and a voice said, ‘don’t touch that, it is my mothers’. He picked up another and the voice said, ‘don’t touch that it is my fathers’. He picked up another the voice said again ‘don’t touch that it is my sisters’, he said, ‘they all can’t belong to you’, and he went home and he got the half-crown’.

GPS: 54.0156, -6.42569

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