Chapel

The National Monuments Service's description

Ash Street chapel a Roman Catholic chapel of the Carmelite Order in the Coombe is shown on Rocque's 1756 map of Dublin City and Cooke's 1836 Royal map of Dublin City. According to Donnelly (1904, 17-8); 'Ash Street chapel owes its rise to Father Fran Lehy, a friar of the Mitigated Carmelite Order, who for this purpose took the Meeting House in New Row, in 1728, when that congregation removed from thence to Eustace Street. But being reproved for his indiscretion in taking the Meeting House, which might have given offence to his superiors, he quitted it and a place was taken in Ash Street for his purpose, when Father Matthew Lyons came here in quality of Commissary General of the Order, the chapel was removed to another place of the same street, where it now stands, and was built as it now appears. The altar-piece is a painting of the Crucifixion, on each side of which are those of the prophets Elias and Eliseus in Carmelite Habits, the former of whom that Order boasts as their founder. A handsome branch hangs before the altar; near which is a pulpit and four galleries. Adjacent to the chapel is a convenient House, sufficient for the reception of six Carmelites'.
Donnelly (1904, 37-8) recorded that; 'The Order of Mount Carmel was first introduced into Dublin in 1274, and their Convent practically occupied the site from Whitefriar Street to Aungier Street, from which they were
driven in 1542, and which they re-occupied in 1825, and continue to occupy. Their migrations during the troublesome seventeenth century were numerous, but eventually they settled in Ashe Street off the Coombe, in 1728. The Chapel here described served them until 1780, when they moved to the then more retired and genteel neighbourhood of French Street, now Upper Mercer Street, where a nice little Chapel was erected for them in Cuffe Lane with a dwelling house attached in French Street'.

Donnelly, N. 1904 Roman Catholics: state and condition of Roman Catholic chapels in Dublin, both secular and regular AD 1749. Dublin.

Burke, N.T. 1974 A hidden church. The structure of Catholic Dublin in the mid-eighteenth century. Archivium Hibernicum, xxxii, 81–92.

See attached section of Cooke's 1836 Royal Map of Dublin City which shows Ash Street Chapel.

See attached section of Rocque's 1756 map of Dublin City showing the chapel on the W side of Ash Street standing adjacent to the parish boundary of St. Nicholas Without

Compiled by: Caimin O'Brien

Date of upload: 4 July 2023

References

Rocque, J. 1756 An exact survey of the city and suburbs of Dublin. Available at https://libguides.ucd.ie/findingmaps/mapshistDublin Accessed on 5 January .