Enclosure

The National Monuments Service's description

In reclaimed grassland. Carrigan (1905, vol. 2, 377) refers to a penal chapel (KK012-026002-) which was built by Lieutenant Wood of Woodsgift, 'about 500 yds. north of his own residence'. He relates that on Wood's death the chapel was turned into a stable and that 'At present [c. 1905] nothing remains of the chapel but the bare foundations, 42 ft. long and 20 wide, within a little area enclosed by a low earthen fence and known as "the chapel yard". This site is about 100 yds. to the west of the modern Woodsgift House'. There is no cartographic evidence of this chapel. Healy (1874-9, vol. 1, 43) describes, 'A little to the west of Mr. Keating's residence, Woodsgift, there is an oval mound 130 yards [c. 119m] long, and 40 yards [c. 36.5m] at greatest width. It is thickly studded with tall-growing larch, and in the centre of this clamp is still traceable the foundation of the old ruin'. This feature is indicated on the 1st (1839) ed. OS 6-inch map and subsequent 1900 revision as a D-shaped enclosure, with the roughly semi-circular area extending to the SE (dims. c. 94m NE-SW; c. 49m NW-SE), c. 250m WSW of Woodsgift House. This appears to be a tree plantation associated with Woodsgift Demesne but may encompass the penal chapel and its yard. When visited in 1955 it is described as, 'a bank round a grove of trees' (OPW Correspondence). The feature appears to have been levelled in the 1950s as part of a Land Project scheme (OPW Correspondence) and neither it, nor any remains of a building, are visible at ground level.

Compiled by: Jean Farrelly

Date of upload: 10 June 2019

References

Carrigan, Rev. W. 1905 (Reprint 1981) The history and antiquities of the diocese of Ossory, 4 vols. Kilkenny. Roberts Books and Wellbrook Press.

Healy, W. 1874-9 Notices of ecclesiastical ruins. Ossary Archaeological Transactions 1, 41-56.