Where a storyteller was moulded

Within the cold, cobbled walls of a modest Clogher cottage, one of Ireland’s most famed chroniclers of rural life first drew inspiration.

Hidden among the quiet Tyrone townlands, the Carleton Cottage nods to a time long past. Now a museum, it stands as an evocative reminder of how the other half lived in days gone by.

This single-storey, three-bay, lobby-entry thatched house – its harled, whitewashed stone walls facing west over Springtown Road – sits just over a mile east of the Augher
Monaghan road. A rendered chimney stack rises through the thatch, which shelters the concrete parapet gables. The timber sheeted door, complete with door blocks, is flanked by one plain sash window to the north and two to the south.

The cottage’s true distinction, however, lies in the gifted young man’s upbringing: William Carleton, born in 1794, later one of Ireland’s most renowned writers.

Whilst the house Carleton was born in lays as little more than rubble, his later childhood home remains preserved for visitors and tourists alike.

Carleton grew up helping his father James, a tenant farmer who worked many acres. James possessed an extraordinary memory – he reportedly knew the Bible by heart – and was a native Irish speaker steeped in local folklore. Many an evening, he shared these stories by the fireside.

William’s mother, a noted singer who performed in fluent Irish, would later inspire the character of Honor, the miser’s wife, in his novel ‘Fardorougha’.

Living in such a rural location in the 19th century, coupled with frequent travel with his father around different farms, William gained a basic education in various ‘hedge schools’, which were illegal schools for Catholics and Presbyterians during the penal law era.

This aspect of rural life was too an inspiration for William’s works as it featured in the sketch called ‘The Hedge School’ included in ‘Traits and Stories of Irish Peasantry’.

However his later education was gained from a curate, Fr Keenan, who taught a classical school at Glennan (near Glaslough) in the parish of Donagh, Co Monaghan, which Carleton attended from 1814 to 1816.

Carleton once hoped to pursue further study in Munster as a poor scholar and ultimately enter the Church, but an ominous dream – recounted in ‘The Poor Scholar’ – sent him back home. After a pilgrimage to Lough Derg, he abandoned the idea of a clerical life altogether and later converted to Protestantism.

These experiences, coupled with William’s upbringing in Clogher, would form the foundations for his literature career. In 1830 he published his first feature-length book, titled ‘Traits and Stories of the Irish Peasantry’, which he dubbed his ‘best work’.

In many of his works, often drawn from his south Tyrone roots, he stereotyped the ‘Irish Paddy’ in sketches such as ‘Phil Purcel The Pig Driver’, which would later draw criticism of his ideology.

He was alienated by the Catholic population for his hatred of the Catholic Church and his letter to the Home Secretary Robert Peel to suppress activism for the Catholic Emancipation.

In his autobiography of 1868, written shortly before his death, Carleton describes his birthplace as ‘a long, low house with a kitchen as you enter, and two other rooms, one at each side of it’, but also says that ‘it has not had one stone upon another for at least 40 years’.

William’s later years were characterised by poverty and alcoholism after becoming hated for his political work. He died in January 1869 at his house in Sandford Road in Ranelagh, Dublin, and is buried at Mount Jerome Cemetery.

As for the house in Clogher it was occupied in 1858 by a John McKenna, who leased it from Jonathan P Richardson and remained in residence until 1929 at least.

In 1964, a commemorative blue plaque was unveiled in dedication to William’s life work, and formative years in the Clogher house.

In more recent years, it has become a public museum for visitors and tourists to see where the renowned, yet controversial, writer first hailed from over 200 years ago.