Milestone outside 247 Armagh Road Tullyhappy Newry Co. Armagh BT35 6NL

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

Painted, granite, milestone, approx. 450mm high with rounded top, located to south side of former coach road between Armagh and Dublin. Bears the inscription “Newry 3½” on west face; “M’Hill 5½” on the east face and to the North, it bears the partially effaced number 54 (presumably distance to Dublin). An increasingly rare type of roadside feature which lends interest to this locality and is symbolic of the pre internal combustion era.

Historical information

The milestone, lying on the former mail coach road between Armagh and Dublin, can be tentatively dated to c1770, as the route between Newry and Markethill along this road was completed between 1760 and 1777. The milestone may, therefore, constitute a rare survival of 18th century road furniture in Armagh, and is part of a unique heritage relating to presentment roads in Ireland.

The granite stone bears an inscription ‘Newry 3½’ on the west-facing side and ‘M’hill 5½’ on the east-facing side, while the side of the stone that faces towards the road, bears the partly effaced number ‘54’ (the distance to Dublin). The distances are given in Irish miles (2.048 km) a unit of measurement used in Ireland from the time of plantation until the early 19th century. The use of Irish miles was largely abolished after the passing of the Weights and Measures Act 1824, after which ‘statute measure’ based on English measurements including the English mile (1.609 km) was generally used, with some exceptions.

At the time of Rocque’s map of County Armagh (1760), the main route from Newry to Markethill, was a turnpike road which ran to the west of the current road and passed through Mountnorris. The current road via Loughgilly was not complete at the time of Rocque’s map. Sections of road between Markethill and Loughgilly are depicted by Rocque, as well as the road between Tullyhappy and Newry, but the connecting section had not yet been constructed. Rocque’s map does not meet OS standards but appears credible in relation to the absence of a through road in this location.

Taylor & Skinner’s maps of the Roads of Ireland dating from 1777, show the current road between Newry and Markethill (which later became known as the Armagh Road) complete and in its entirety, as well as a ‘Turnpike’ at the head of the earlier road, to the south of Markethill. The map marks mileage along the current road and there is a ‘4’ shown at the approximate location of the present milestone (the distance to the 50 mile marker at Newry).

The position of the milestone on the current road is consistent with the distances stated on each side of the stone and it is therefore unlikely that it has been moved any great distance, since first being placed. If we can assume that the stone was erected at the time of the road’s completion, or shortly afterwards, this would give a likely date of between 1760 and 1777. Taylor & Skinner’s map may, in fact, indicate the presence of the actual milestone in 1777.

The old turnpike road between Armagh and Newry was noted by at least two late 18th/early 19th century travellers to be in very poor condition, and the condition of the road was likely the motivation for constructing an alternative route between Markethill and Newry, using monies raised through the presentment system. Arthur Young’s memoirs, in which he describes travelling along the old road to Armagh in July 1776, are scathing:

‘This road is abominably bad, continually over hills, rough, stony and cut up. It is a turnpike, which in Ireland is a synonymous term for a vile road; which is the more extraordinary as the bye ones are the finest in the world. It is the effect of jobs and imposition, which disgrace the kingdom; the presentment roads show what may be done and render these villainous turnpikes the more disgusting’.

Grand Jury presentment books for County Armagh have survived but are not sufficiently detailed to identify specific sections of road with certainty. However, separate amounts of £44.3s.6d, £48.14s.4d, £44.12s.8d and £19.2s.5d were paid to various parties in 1777 for works to the road between Markethill and Newry and it appears likely that the through road was completed, and the current milestone erected at around this time.

The presentment system, which began to be formalised from 1710, empowered Grand Juries for each county to undertake the construction and repair of roads, using monies drawn from the county cess or rates. The system was unique to Ireland and drew praise from visitors, such as Arthur Young (quoted above). Legislation during the course of the 18th century, especially the 1765 Act, consolidated the authority and increased the financial capacity of the Grand Juries in relation to road building. The period 1750-1850 in Ireland witnessed the peak of road construction by the presentment system, driven by economic expansion (Rynne, McCutcheon).

When mail coach routes were established in Ireland after legislation of 1784 which set up an independent Irish post office, the mail coach service from Armagh was routed along the current road between Markethill and Newry rather than the turnpike road, traffic increasing along the road as the mail coach network developed. A newspaper advertisement of 1804 states that a mail coach was soon to commence running from Dungannnon to Newry and, as a consequence, a meeting of interested parties was to be held in Newry ‘to determine on the improvement of the post road from Markethill to Newry’. OS Memoirs (1837) confirm that the mail coach road at Markethill was maintained by the county, through Grand Jury Presentments.

References:
Primary Sources

1. PRONI ARM/4/1/1 County Armagh Presentment Book – Spring and Summer Assizes 1758-1797
2. PRONI D1594/291 Rocque’s map of County Armagh (1760)
3. Taylor, G and Skinner, A (1778) Taylor and Skinner’s Maps of the Roads of Ireland, surveyed 1777, Dublin: Wilson, W.
4. Young, Arthur (reprinted 1887) A tour in Ireland, 1776-1779 London: Cassell & Co
5. Coote, Sir Charles (1804) Statistical Survey of the County of Armagh Dublin: Dublin Society
6. Day, A and McWilliams, P (eds) (1990) Ordnance Survey Memoirs of Ireland: Vol 1 Parishes of County Armagh 1835-8 Belfast: Institute of Irish Studies, Queen’s University
7. Belfast Newsletter 28th February, 1804
8. PRONI OS/6/2/26/1 – First Edition Ordnance Survey Map (1834-35)

Secondary Sources

9. McCutcheon, W A (1980) The Industrial Archaeology of Northern Ireland Belfast: HMSO
10. Rynne, C (2006) Industrial Ireland 1750-1930 Cork: Collins Press

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

H-. Alterations detracting from building
J. Setting

Criteria for listing: historic interest

R. Age
S. Authenticity
Y. Social, Cultural or Economic Importance
Z. Rarity
X. Local Interest

Evaluation

Painted, granite, milestone, approx. 450mm high with rounded top, located to south side of former coach road between Armagh and Dublin. Bears the inscription “Newry 3½” on west face; “M’Hill 5½” on the east face and to the North, it bears the partially effaced number 54 (presumably distance to Dublin). The position of the milestone on the current road is consistent with the distances stated on each side of the stone and it is therefore unlikely that it has been moved any great distance, since first being placed. If we can assume that the stone was erected at the time of the road’s completion, or shortly afterwards, this would give a likely date of between 1760 and 1777. Taylor & Skinner’s map may, in fact, indicate the presence of the actual milestone in 1777. The milestone is a significant survival of a granite free standing milestone within an increasingly rare network of way markers across NI.