Fifty years of boarding at St. Joseph’s

IT is 103 years since St. Joseph’s Secondary School in Castlebar was opened by the Sisters of Mercy to provide second-level education for teenage girls in the town.

Seven years later, in 1924, the Sisters took the bold step of opening a boarding school.

It was after the Civil War when the nuns purchased the Lawn House, home of Lord Lucan, and the 92-acre demesne for £2,900.

They converted the house into living accommodation for boarders attending the adjoining convent and the nuns continued with the farming activities.

The original Lawn House was gutted by fire on October 15, 1935, and thankfully all the boarders escaped uninjured.

When the house was rebuilt, so was a tunnel under the road, from Rock Square, leading to the military barracks, to provide pedestrians access between the Lawn and the school and convent.

I recall the tunnel. It was inside the gate and to the left of the entrance to the now St. Angela’s National School, off Rock Square. It allowed boarders, wearing bonnets, to walk to the school without going outside the convent grounds and likewise, the nuns, in back-and-white, full-length habits, could go from the convent to The Lawn. As the boarders emerged from the tunnel on the national school side, there was a small chapel to their left, where the nuns attended Mass. The convent chapel was open to the public for Sunday Mass. Behind the elaborate marble altar, there were two narrow lancet windows with beautiful stained glass, and a six-sided circular window above these, also with stained glass.

A grotto to Our Lady stood against the gable wall of the chapel, where newly professed Children of Mary were photographed.

Prior to 1964, when the nuns built St. Angela’s in The Lawn, both the national school and St. Joseph’s were accommodated in the buildings behind the convent, off Castle Street.

This allowed all buildings attached to the old convent to be devoted to the secondary school.

The boarders were part of the educational history of Castlebar for 50 years. However, in 1974, financial considerations made the boarding school uneconomic, and it closed. The secondary school moved into Lawn House, where it remains to this day.

According to Sr. Cecelia Hession - a former teacher of the school - in January 1845, Fr. Richard Gibbons, Parish Priest, with a view to bringing the Sisters of Mercy to the town, convened a public meeting in the parish church. The Grove House, on Charles Street, where Miss Faulkner lived, was secured as a temporary residence.

In the meantime Fr. Gibbons approached the third Earl of Lucan to purchase a site for a permanent convent, but the Earl was opposed to the idea.

However, a few gentlemen came to the rescue. These included Sir Frederick Cavendish, editor of The Connaught Telegraph, Matthew Gibbons, Michael Walsh and Martin Sheridan, and with the help of local solicitor Edmund MacHale, who made a donation of £538, Rock House was purchased for £1,375 in 1852.

The convent was built by 1853 and the foundation stone for the primary school was laid that year.

Five Sisters with Mother Tereasa White arrived from Galway in the same year. The pupils paid a penny each week. The Sisters later established a private school for post-primary pupils and all subjects were taught. There was also a special school where lace making was taught.

The offices at the back of Rock Square were converted into temporary classrooms. There, the poor and illiterate learned their education and adults were prepared for the sacraments.

In addition the Sisters started a private school for the better off pupils and music, painting and languages were taught in addition to the ordinary subjects.

In 1853, a little group of pioneer Sisters bade farewell to their Alma Mater, St. Vincent’s, Galway, and arrived at Rock Square in an old lumbering stage coach. The house in Rock Square commonly known as Lord Lucan's Bank was soon put in order.

At that time Castlebar was still struggling through the Great Famine. Tragedy, poverty, malnutrition, illness and disease were rampant in 1853.

The Sisters visited the sick in the town and county infirmary, where Áras an Chontae is now located on the Mall, and also the inmates in the workhouse and prison where Mayo University Hospital is located.

There were no benevolent societies then and great were the demands made upon the Sisters for the relief and consolation of the poor, sick and dying. Orphans were taken into Rock House and cared for by the Sisters. Three Sisters with Mother Mangan in charge opened a day and boarding school. Everything was done in the classroom to advance the children in their care.

Then a new national school was an urgent necessity and His Grace Rev. Dr. John McEvilly laid the foundation stone of the new building on September 10, 1894, and St. Angela's National School was officially blessed and opened on May 31, 1897.

In the 1920s the Sisters were able to devote their attention to a wider sphere in education. The old primary school was renovated and equipped as a secondary school and in 1917 it was registered under the Intermediate Board. In 1924 the 5th Earl of Lucan sold his residence and demesne to the community. The Lodge was fitted up as an up-to-date boarding school - St. Joseph's. The accommodation was not sufficient for the number of applicants requesting admission and a large wing was built to meet the requirements.

* Pictured by Wynne Photography in 1959/’60 are the first to Leaving Certificate students of St. Joseph’s Secondary School. They are pictured beside St. Joseph’s grotto on the right and to the left is the tunnel going under the Military Barracks road. This tunnel was used for the boarding school girls who lived in The Lawn House.