Castlebar Old Post Office - a short history

By Alan King

WORKS are progressing on the restoration of the former post office at Mountain View, Castlebar, as part of a €2.2 million investment. This will result in its conversion to a new community youth resource centre.

The post office, a protected structure, has a long and proud history in Castlebar.

The distinctive red-brick detached five-bay two-storey building, with a care-taker's residence, was designed in 1902 by John Howard Pentland, Senior Surveyor, architectural Dept. of Public Works. The cost of the building was estimated at £3893 17s.3p and the contractor was John Mulligan, Castlebar.

Several sites were looked at for the new post office, and it was decided that the site at Mountain View (then known as Church Hill/Street) was the most suitable.

The site was owned by Anna Grace Brewster - she was the daughter of Henry Brewster (1820 - 1883) who held the position of County Surveyor for many years and lived in the house to the right of Christ Church where doctors Matthew and Sal Moran later resided. The site was leased for 150 years at £27 per year rent.

The first caretaker appointed in 1904 was a Lawrence Walsh who had a secret. No one knew that over 30 years before (1873), his father Edward Walsh had murdered Lawrence’s mother at their home in Bridge Street (where KM Kelly later had a drapery business). He was convicted and was the last person to be hanged in Castlebar Gaol, now the Mayo University Hospital.

Lawrence then left town to stay with relatives but after making discreet inquiries, he ascertained that the incidents relating to the murder and court case were still vivid among the old residents. He resigned and left town for good.

The last caretaker to reside and live upstairs in the post office (known as Post Office House) was Jack McMahon (died June 1940), who lived with his wife, two daughters and one son.

The first old age pensions were given out on January 1, 1909, when over 200 senior citizens turned up at the post office to collect them. Miss Nancy Hughes, aged 90, who lived at ‘The Marsh’ (Marsh House) and who had been in the employment of the Sheridan family for years, was the first to collect a pension in the town.

The post office was the official recruitment office in Castlebar for men to enlist and fight in the Great War and following the signing of the Treaty in 1922, the IRA attempted to destroy any buildings associated with the British regime and set fire to the gaol, military barracks and the post office. The intervention of local priest Fr. Geoffrey Prendergast and several locals prevented it from being burnt down. There was outrage when they discovered that the hydrants were turned off and they had to quench it with buckets of water.

A date stone (1904) carrying the royal cipher of King Edward VII (1901 - 1910) used to be erected above the front door - see the gap between Post and Office - and was removed following Irish independence. It was later donated to the National Museum of Ireland - Country Life, Turlough.

The famous opera singer Margaret Burke Sheridan (1889-1958) had a close connection to the post office - her grandfather Thomas Cooley was appointed to the position of postmaster in 1853. Cooley, a building contractor and auctioneer, owned several properties in the town, including the whole east side of Lucan Street. He operated the post office from his residence, believed to be located on Ellison Street where Chambers House is today.

He was succeeded by his son Charles Cooley (Margaret’s uncle) who sold off most of his father’s properties, including the premises used by the RIC as a barracks (now the residence of the Beirne family). He was succeeded in 1874 by his brother-in-law John Burke Sheridan (1844-1901), Margaret’s father, and moved the post office to his residence on the Green.

The building at Mountain View saw a lot of changes - telegrams, a postal strike and even a robbery in 1978. It shut its doors for the last time in October 2012 and hopefully, the new youth centre will be a huge success, and the building will thrive once more in the future.

(Alan King is a member of staff at Mayo County Library)