If These Walls could talk: 180 years of the iconic Nenagh Courthouse

Last month marked the 180th anniversary of the opening of the courthouse in Nenagh, located on Banba Square. The courthouse first opened on March 18 1844. Michael J. Reynolds examines the history of the courthouse and its impact on Nenagh to this day.

Originally a small Sessions Courthouse was built in 1696 on Castle Street (Pearse Street).

Due to the lack of accommodation, a Bridewell was constructed on Pound Street (Sarsfield Street) in 1760, which contained three-day rooms, nine cells and two yards.

The first mention of thecourt was in the Clonmel Gazette on February 4, 1788, for the opening of the Quarter Sessions of the Peace.

Most prisoners, however, for north Tipperary in the early 19th century were transported to Clonmel Gaol, a place which was frequently overcrowded.

They were often escorted by the military, as Sergeant George Calladine of the 19th Regiment recalled while stationed in Nenagh in 1836. In his diary, he wrote that “we had some harassing duty escorting prisoners, as great depredations were committed in this part of the country.”

The journey south for the accused was considered to be long and arduous.

The main assizes for County Tipperary were held in Clonmel courthouse, with their trials described as ‘often hectic and rushed affairs’ due to the large volumes of crime.

With the increase in agrarian crime in the early 19th century, landlords in Nenagh District, such as Henry Prittie (Lord Dunalley) were concerned for their safety and demanded a larger military presence in the town and that the assizes for the county should be divided into Tipperary North and South Riding.

This was granted by the Lord Privy Council in 1839. Although Thurles already had a courthouse (still used to this day) and applied for the status, it was decided that the North Tipperary Assizes would be located in Nenagh, and therefore, the town needed a larger courthouse.

Hopes for a gaol and new courthouse for the town can be read as far back as July 1833, when the Dublin Evening Post published a notice to architects to furnish maps, plans and estimates to the Grand Jury of county Tipperary.

John Benjamin Keane was eventually chosen in 1841 to be the architect for the site, as he also designed the courthouses in Ennis and Tullamore that are still used to this day.

Nenagh Gaol was opened in 1840 with a final cost of £18,000 and consisted of seven cell blocks that contained 244 cells. Many of the occupants in the Gaol were put on trial in the courthouse, which opened in 1844 next door on Peter Street (present-day Banba Square) andcost £8,000.

The Assizes in the court was first opened by James Carmichael, Esq. The town’s magistrates who presided over the Sessions were primarily composed of the landed gentry and former army officers, the men mentioned above as the commissioners who were behindthe establishment of Nenagh Assizes.

They used the building for their meetings of the North Tipperary Protestant Orphan Society, established in 1828 in Dublin and inaugurated for Tipperary in Clonmel in 1834.

The Old Bridewell on Pound Street, being in deteriorating condition was renovated and used to accommodate the 34th Regiment Stationed in the town in 1848, the 79th Cameronian Highlanders in 1849 and most notably the infamous North Tipperary Militia during the Battle of the Breeches Mutiny at the end of the Crimean War in July 1856.

The Blackburn Standard reported in December 1845 that between August 1844 and February 1845, there were 16 murders, 16 attempted murders, 52 cases of firing into houses, robberies for arms, grievous assaults and threatening notices in north Tipperary. This was three times the national estimate, with Tipperary having an average of 30 murders per year.

Those convicted could be hanged, transported or imprisoned.

One incident includes Private Andrew Hume of the 38th Regiment, who was found guilty in 1840 of the killing of a fellow soldier’s child and had his sentence commuted from the death penalty to transportation.

All kinds of prisoners were put on trial in Nenagh Courthouse for offences ranging from owed debt to drunkenness, prostitution and assaults to murder.

During the Irish Famine, the number of cases in the town before the courts dramatically increased as more crimes were being committed by people, sometimes out of necessity to survive such as theft.

The defendants brought before the judges could be anyone from elderly women to even children.

One example includes an incident reported by the Tipperary Vindicator on 14-year-old William Grogan, the “young ruffian” who was put on trial on July 3, 1848, for a charge of vagrancy (being homeless).

The magistrate Edwin Sadlier Esq. instructed that the child “must be imprisoned for a month on bread and water.”

While Sadlier was reading out the sentencing, young Grogan reached into his pocket and took out a stone, which he threw at the judge, narrowly missing his face and making an indent on the wall behind him.

As a result, Grogan was further charged and remanded into the Gaol until the next Quarter Sessions.

Although not convicted for that incident, Grogan was later found guilty in 1851 of stealing andsentenced to 10 years transportation.

During the existence of the Gaol, 17 people on trial in the courthouse next door were given capital punishment and sentenced to be hanged at the gaol.

The first was James Sheas (Smith) for killing Rody Kennedy in 1842.

Other examples include Patrick Rice for the death of Patrick Clarke in 1846 and John and Michael Connolly for the murder of Thomas Dillon in1847.

The courthouse became a national story on several occasions for the trials held there. This included the Langley murder trial in March 1850, where Dr Charles Langley was accused of poisoning his wife, Ellen, who died on May 1, 1849, and the Coroner’s

Inquest pointed to a suspicious death. After a lengthy trial, he was eventually acquitted and spent therest of his days living in England. Further details of this case can be read in The Doctors Wife is Dead by Andrew Tierney.

The most famous murder trial in Nenagh was that of the Cormack brothers (William and Daniel). They were accused of murdering an unpopular land agent by the name of John Ellis near Dovea, Thurles.

They were put on trial before Judge William Nicholas Keogh and despite a lack of evidence, a strong prosecution was able to convince the court and Magistrate of their guilt.

They were hanged at Nenagh Gaol on May 11, 1858 for the crime, despiteprotesting their innocence at the gallows that “we are innocent of the murder or Mr Ellis, by thought word or deed, we had neither hand, act nor part in it.”

They were later discovered to be innocent as accounts given by witnesses placing them at the murder were false.

Their remains were exhumed in May 1910 in the presence of a large crowd and laid to rest in Loughmore Cemetery near Templemore, which can be seen to this day.

These were the last people to be hanged in the Gaol.

The Fenian Rising in County Tipperary took place on March 5, 1867. General John Hassett Gleeson served as Brigadier General in the US Civil War 1861-1865 and led 200 rebels through Borrisoleigh but was captured by the military at Thurles after surrendering.

They were held in Nenagh Gaol and 62 of the men appeared at Nenagh Assizes when the trial began in July 1867. Under Judge George and a jury made up of landlords, the accused were found guilty on July 31 and given varied sentences.

Captain William Sheehy was sentenced to 20 years of penal servitude. William Bourke was handed 12 months imprisonment. Patrick Leahy was given penal servitude of 5 years.

General Gleeson after being convicted was imprisoned in Mountjoy Gaol and later released, where he returned to America along with his brother Captain Joseph Gleeson, who also went to the States after being released.

For the 150th Anniversary back in 2017, the trial was re-enacted in the courthouse organised by the Tipperary in the Decade of Revolution Committee with Nenagh Ormond Historical Society, which members of the public were able to watch.

They were the last notable famous figures held in Nenagh Gaol, which was closed down in 1883 and given ownership to the Sisters of Mercy Order.

In the early 20th century the Home Rule Movement was debated in society and it was outside Nenagh Courthouse where Joseph Devlin MP and Dr John Esmonde gave their famous speech supporting the cause in 1912.

Additionally, it was where the Irish Volunteers under Frank McGrath used to gather after mass on Sundays to carry out parade drilling.

These volunteers during the War of Independence who were part of the IRA would be captured by military and police and brought before the Assizes in Nenagh being charged with different offences.

One incident occurred in January 1918 when army pensioner George Sheehan died after being attacked in his home near Silvermines by masked IRA men trying to get his son’s service rifle.

Three brothers (John, Patrick and William ‘Bunty’ O’Brien) were arrested for the murder and indicted at the North Tipperary Assizes in Nenagh. Their trials took place later in Limerick and Cork and they were eventually acquitted of Sheehan’s murder, with nobody ever being convicted in this case.

During the Irish War of Independence, there were concerns that Sinn Féin would use the courthouse for their own Republican Courts.

Sean Gaynor, IRA Commandant for No. 1 North Tipperary Brigade later recalled in his witness statements that ex-RIC Constable Denis Horgan was the Petty Sessions Clerk for Nenagh whose home was used as the IRA Brigade Headquarters and hid their weapons under the Judge’s Bench in the courtroom.

To this day a memorial for the men who died during the Irish conflict can be seen across from the courthouse building in the Square, having replaced the ‘Jamesy’ Statue that was erected in the 1930s.

Even with the foundation of the Irish Free State that attempted to move away fromBritish rule, the Irish government kept institutions such as the courts and their laws unchanged.

The Royal Irish Constabulary was disbanded and replaced in 1922 by the Civic Guards (Garda Síochána), made up primarily of IRA veterans.

These men continued to carry out the arrests and summons to the court of people for the same offences from the 19th and early 20th century as their predecessors including land disputes to breach of the peace.

Today many of these cases are still prosecuted by the Gardaí in Nenagh Court and across Ireland over a century later.

To this day, Nenagh courthouse continues to be used for everything from District Court Crime, Civil and Family Law matters to Circuit Court cases (which involve the use of Jury) to the County Registrar Motions and Coroners Courts.

Throughout its history, it has seen tens of thousands of people and their families go through its doors as defendants, victims and witnesses in the courtroom.

They are there from being summonsed for traffic offences to those beingremanded on murder charges along with gardaí, solicitors, barristers, judges, jury, court staff and members of the public who watch to see how the justice system has functioned in Nenagh for almost two centuries.