Goes to Ireland - Kilkenny to Athy Great British Railway Journeys

In 1840, one man transformed travel in Britain and Ireland.

His name was George Bradshaw,

and his railway guides inspired the Victorians to take to the tracks.

Stop by stop, he told them where to travel,

what to see and where to stay.

Now, 170 years later, I'm making a series of journeys across the length

and breadth of these islands to see what of Bradshaw's world remains.

With the help of my guidebook, I'm discovering how small places

often made a big splash in Bradshaw's day.

I'm reaching the mid-point of my train journey

across the Republic of Ireland, steered by my

Bradshaw's Guide to Great Britain and Ireland,

which in Victorian times formed a single state.

I'm hoping to discover more about how rural Ireland adapted

to the technological and social changes in the 19th century.

On today's stretch,

I'll try my hand at cutting marble, Victorian style...

It just suddenly fell away!

..uncover 19th century Ireland's surprising industrial heritage...

It's a monumental mill, isn't it?

Really impressive. It looks like a fortress.

..and learn how the railways

helped bring motorsport to the masses.

They estimated that there would have been almost a million people

-spectating on that event.

-You're not serious?

The first time there was ever

a gathering of that amount of people in Ireland.

Having sampled the pastoral charms of the Irish Republic's south,

I'm now continuing along some of its most important Victorian tracks.

I'm heading north, towards the heart of Ireland,

before veering west to the spectacular Galway coast.

Today's stretch takes me through counties Carlow and Kildare,

finishing up in the market town of Athy.

My first stop is Kilkenny, where this region's rich

and complex history has left its mark.

My Bradshaw's recommends Kilkenny Castle,

the seat of the Marquis of Ormond.

"Finely situated on a rock above the river, it contains much old

"tapestry, as well as a gallery of the Butler portraits by Lely

"and other portraits of Charles I, Charles II and James II."

It was evidently a magnet for Victorian tourists,

and I feel attracted too.

According to my 19th-century guide, Kilkenny is,

"the old capital of the pale, or limit, of English authority.

"The Ormond or Butler family

"have held possession of the town since 1,400."

I'm going in search of their ancestral seat.

Are you from Kilkenny, by any chance?

-Yes.

-Well, I'm here for the first time.

What should I see whilst I'm here?

What should you see? The castle.

-Are you from Kilkenny?

-Yes, I am.

So what do you think of the castle? You must be very proud of that.

Oh, I love the castle. It's the first place I send tourists.

You do get an unbelievable amount of tourists here, don't you?

Absolutely. We depend a lot on tourism.

And how would I say welcome to Kilkenny?

Failte roimh Cill Chainnigh.

That's in Irish.

Well, I guessed that.

That's very, very nice. And how shall I say thank you to you?

-Go raibh maith agat.

-Lovely to see you. Thank you so much.

And I'll say that to you, "Nach bhfuil ag gach".

Does that mean, "Come back again"?

No, that means, "Not at all".

Oh, not at all! I was hoping you were asking me to come back!

-God bless.

-Bye-bye.

-Take care.

After such a warm welcome, it's high time

I saw Kilkenny's famous fortress for myself.

Bradshaw's tells me that one of the best views

of the town is from John's Bridge,

and certainly the castle on its mount above the river

is imposing and impressive.

In Bradshaw's day, the noble Butler family still lived here,

and tours were strictly for only upper class visitors by appointment.

My guide today is Frank Kavanagh.

You're very welcome, sir.

Thank you very much, and what a glorious castle you have here.

Magnificent. The Windsor of Ireland.

-I believe it, I believe it.

-Yes. Oh, yes.

There's been a castle on this site for 700 years,

but following my guidebook, I'm heading straight for the gallery,

added as part of a major refurbishment in the 19th century.

Absolutely magnificent

Wonderful Long Gallery. How long is it, Frank?

It's 45 metres long, that's 150 foot long.

ten metres high, 30 foot high.

And nine metres wide. It's everything you expect in a castle.

And this wonderful hammer beam ceiling?

It was the work of John Pollen in 1858.

So actually, just before my Bradshaw's guide,

a Victorian masterpiece.

There must have been a flow of tourists coming here?

Yes, there would be. Indeed, you had many visitors coming here,

by train, as it was the most convenient way of travel.

The railway had reached Kilkenny in which year?

The railway reached Kilkenny in 1848 to 1850.

So absolutely perfectly timed for the whole thing.

In the 1800s, a fashion for historical

novels and paintings offered a romantic view of Britain's past.

The Civil War of the 17th century was a popular topic,

and the castle's collection of portraits would have fired

Victorian imaginations.

Following my Bradshaw's,

I'm looking for Charles I, Charles II James II. Where would they be?

Right behind us, looking upon us. King Charles I and King Charles II.

The Butlers were staunch supporters of the Stuart cause,

hence you have, of course, James Francis Stuart,

father of Bonnie Prince Charlie.

While the British Isles were torn apart by civil war, the Butlers,

or Ormonds, stayed staunchly loyal to the British crown.

Here in the Long Gallery,

Victorian visitors could steep themselves in the story.

All around you there are members of the family.

James Butler, first Duke of Ormond,

the most eminent member of the family,

buried at Westminster Abbey, right close to his arch enemy, Cromwell.

As well as admiring the paintings, tourists could marvel at the lavish

19th-century restoration, which included a rather unusual material.

This is the essence of our city, black marble.

Bradshaw's talks about

"Good stone and dark marble are abundant in this locality.

"Most of the houses are of this material."

This is what he's referring to?

Exactly what he's referring to,

the entire city of Kilkenny is built upon this marble.

I'd love to linger in the Long Gallery,

but this remarkable stone has sparked my curiosity.

A Victorian favourite, it found fame around the world.

And the story starts just east from Kilkenny.

My search for the Irish black stuff, I refer, of course, to Kilkenny

marble, has led me to Butler's Grove Quarry.

In Victorian times, this was a thriving source of marble

and building stone.

However, when concrete increased in popularity

in the early 20th century, the quarry was forced to close.

It was resurrected in the 1970s by Jim Harding's father.

-Hello, Jim.

-Michael, how are you?

-Good to see you.

I've come in search of Kilkenny marble,

-and I guess I've come to the right place?

-You have.

You've come to one of two old Kilkenny marble quarries.

This is actually the only one that's left open.

Marble was first quarried commercially in Kilkenny

in the 1730s, and when the rails arrived a century later,

they quickly became vital to the industry.

The railways were extremely important in Victorian times.

It was actually quite difficult

to transport heavy blocks anywhere other than by rail.

So they would have been brought from here to a railway station,

then transported literally everywhere.

Most of the bigger blocks that came out of here would have been shipped

to Liverpool and then delivered by rail again out of Liverpool.

The Victorians used the stone for everything from fireplaces to

gravestones, and it was even employed to build railway stations.

In geological terms, this particular marble is a sedimentary limestone,

formed from a fine black mud 370 million years ago.

And what is the quality of this stone that makes it so special?

It's a really, really dense black material.

That's actually quite scarce.

There's not that many markings in it, and it's really good quality.

Jim discovered a fresh seam of this rare stone a few years ago,

allowing production, paused since the 1900s, to begin again.

Methods have moved on since Bradshaw's day,

but he's going to show me an old-fashioned technique

used by Victorian quarrymen to split the blocks of stone.

What do you do? Drop the two side ones in?

These side ones have to go in one at a time. One down.

Second one in.

And now the actual wedges.

This cunning system of pins and wedges should mean a gentle tap

is all that's required.

Now we move round to the back of the stone

and we literally start to tap them.

It just suddenly fell away.

That's it. You hear it cracking first.

I heard a little sound and then off it went.

So, what have we done there? We've made quite a clean break.

What you've done is you've cleaned it all the way across.

Look at that!

These days, machines do much of the work that was once done by hand,

but the real magic occurs at the polishing stage.

What you do is, you go up and down along it here,

and you try and get as much of that heat and wax into that as possible.

-Let's give it a go.

-OK. That's it.

Isn't it lovely how the black appears through the blue wax there?

It is. That's what actually brings up the black polish on it.

-Such a lovely stone.

-It is a fabulous material, yeah.

The best marble is still

highly prized for fireplaces, just as it was in Bradshaw's day.

-Well!

-You're really getting into that.

I think that's just about got it.

Isn't that the most beautiful piece of stone?

It is lovely, isn't it?

-That would grace any fine house or castle.

-It would and does.

Sadly, I can't stay and hone my skills, as it's time for me

to continue my journey.

My next destination is something of a riddle.

As I travel north from Kilkenny, according to my Bradshaw's guide,

we soon reach Bagenalstown.

But there's no trace of it on the map,

so I'm going to alight at Muine Bheag and investigate further.

With no Bagenalstown mentioned on the railway map,

I'm going to have to dig deeper to find the spot described in my guide.

-Thank you very much.

-You're welcome.

-I'm looking for Bagenalstown.

-You're in it.

-Doesn't say so.

-Muine Bheag.

-Ah, that's the Irish.

-That's the Irish for Bagenalstown.

What does that mean? Is that a translation of Bagenalstown?

Small wood.

-Small wood, OK. Do you know who Bagenal was, who had the town?

-No.

-Well, OK. So I'm in the right place.

-You're in the right place.

-I just have to find Bagenal now.

-That's it.

-Thank you.

-No problem.

-Bye.

-All the best.

It seems the locals are as in the dark as I am.

I'm hoping historian Pat Nolan can unravel the mystery.

-Pat!

-Hello, Michael. Welcome to Bagenalstown.

Well, you call it Bagenalstown. I thought it was called Muine Bheag?

Depends who you talk to, really.

It was Bagenalstown because the Bagenals were here

since 1585, and they built a lot of this town.

By the 1920s, the idea of naming a town after the local landed

gentry had begun to seem outdated.

I imagine the name was changed after Irish independence?

Yes, well, the attempt was made, after Irish independence,

in the mid-1920s.

A chap called Cleary got quite heated about the whole thing,

and he wanted to be changed from Bagenalstown,

which he felt had the wrong connotations,

and call it Muine Bheag from an old Irish name, a very old Irish name.

What happened, anyway, was nothing.

Because people who used to call it Bagenalstown continued to do so,

and people who called it Muine Bheag continued to do so.

In the 1950s, there was even a public vote on the matter,

and the locals opted to stick with Bagenalstown.

But surprisingly, a few years later, the station was officially named

Muine Bheag.

No-one is quite sure why that is,

but there is a tradition that our Irish national rail system

tend to use the Irish forms of names quite considerably.

It's the use of the Irish language rather than anything else.

And Muine Bheag is accepted as the name in Irish of this town.

It's not just the name of this place that confuses visitors.

Back in the 1700s,

one of the Bagenal clan left behind an incongruous legacy.

To see it, you have to walk through the public library.

What a transformation from one side to the other.

Yes, it's quite something.

-It is amazing.

-This was part of his grand plan.

Bagenal had the idea of creating another Versailles

here in Ireland.

He had terrific ideas,

and indeed he created some of them,

and then, guess what, the money ran out.

It doesn't look anything like Versailles!

-No, it doesn't.

-It's modelled on the Athens Parthenon.

So he was somewhat geographically confused, you might say.

And so here this mini-Parthenon sits, amongst the suburban houses

and the municipal buildings, and the sheds with their tin roofs.

Quite a contrast, really.

It is, but at least it's now serving a practical current,

present day use as the library, so you know, some good came out of it.

The curiosities that I uncover with my Bradshaw's guide

never cease to amaze.

And just up the road from this charming town,

I've found the perfect place to break my journey.

Walter Bagenal did not succeed in completing his new Versailles,

but many people still think that their town bears his name,

and certainly this inn does,

and this is where I shall spend the night.

I'm now rejoining my route along the Waterford branch of the famous

Great Southern & Western railway,

built to connect the rural hinterland with Dublin.

Its engineer was the Irish Brunel, William Dargan,

born and bred in these parts.

I find myself on a very busy train, and I'm just going one stop

to Carlow, which my Bradshaw's tells me is the capital town of the county

with a population of about 9,900, who return one member -

Bradshaw's loves to tell us

how many Members of Parliament are sent to Westminster -

and are employed in the grain and butter trade.

It's built on the east bank of the River Barrow.

Now where you get grain, and where you get a river,

you'd normally get mills.

And mills were a source of wealth, and of jobs.

I'm bound for a mill which was once

so important it had its own station, Milford.

Sadly, the stop went out of service in 1969

so I'm leaving the train at Carlow.

-Morning! How are you?

-How was your trip?

-Very nice, thank you very much.

And I've spotted some very important work going on.

Oh, wow, you're putting in the signs saying you've got to

-stand behind this line.

-Yeah.

-In Irish.

-Are you only doing them in Irish today?

No, Irish and English.

Now I've often seen this sign in Irish, how do you pronounce it?

Fan Taobh Den Line. Den...Li...

We just put it down!

My Irish lesson over,

I'm heading up the road to the banks of the River Barrow.

In the early days of the Industrial Revolution,

forward-thinking landowners sought to make the most of this

valley's fertile countryside.

Here at Milford Mills, their legacy is unmissable.

-Hello, Shay.

-Michael, welcome to Milford.

Thank you. It's a monumental mill, isn't it? Really impressive.

-It looks like a fortress.

-Absolutely.

You wouldn't expect to find a major industrial site

in this quiet rural setting,

but at its peak, it was the largest mill complex in Ireland.

Historian Shay Kinsella has been researching the story.

Well, this is an enormous and impressive building,

but am I right in thinking there was even more than this, originally?

Absolutely, this is only one of three buildings.

This is the only one that's survived.

This was the oatmeal mill,

there was also a massive flour mill and a huge malthouse, as well.

The mills were the brainchild of John Alexander,

a Belfast man who, by 1790, had brought together

the power of the river and the area's agricultural riches.

By the time the railways came half a century later,

his son was running the thriving mill.

The second John Alexander of Milford

was a great believer in the power of the railways.

When the mill started to become extremely successful here,

he decided that a railway would be the best access up to Dublin

and down to Waterford, for transporting the goods from here.

And that railway station was named Milford railway station.

John Alexander II invested £6,000 in the Great Southern & Western

railway, and soon the trains were taking his business to ever

greater heights.

Mr and Mrs Samuel Carter Hall, the travel commentators, visited here

in the early 1840s and said these mills were fitted to astonish

Englishmen, that Milford was laying down the gauntlet even for

the cotton mills and the flour mills of Manchester,

and that the capacity of the river

and hydropower that should be harnessed across the UK.

From the early 1800s, British and Irish producers got a further boost

from the Corn Laws, which protected them from international competition.

Then, in the 1840s, famine struck Ireland, and the government's

response marked the beginning of the end for Milford's heyday.

The idea was to flood the market with cheap accessible flour

so that bread could be produced for the population in distress,

but at the same time it put huge pressure on the milling

industry here to compete with these foreign imports, and unfortunately,

the Milford mills here

definitely went into decline from that date onwards.

What happened to the mill after that?

From the 1860s up to 1890, this building was left idle,

the plant was left idle,

and the building started showing definite signs of decay,

until another John Alexander decided it was time to give this building

a new lease of life and make history for Carlow and Ireland at same time.

Towards the end of the 19th century,

the best minds in science and engineering

discovered how to harness the power of a new technology, electricity.

The world's first power station was built in 1882, and

just nine years later, the invention gripped even this sleepy town.

In 1890, then, John III was approached with an idea,

to install a dynamo here

which would have generated electricity by hydropower.

A very pioneering idea at the time.

John III was himself a bit of an innovator, a pioneer,

a very progressive thinker, so he latched onto this with both hands.

Carlow was the first inland town in Ireland

and Britain to be lit throughout by hydro-electricity.

The plant ran for a decade,

but closed when a new generator was built, closer to the town centre.

But that wasn't the end of Milford's energy story.

Hello, Michael. Come on in.

Hello, John. Lovely to see you. Thank you, sir.

The latest in this line of remarkable men

is John Alexander V, who still lives in the ancestral home.

So, John, I imagine this is a display of your ancestors, is it?

Yes, the ones lived in Milford, yes.

Which one first put an electricity turbine in the mill?

My grandfather, who I remember well.

He was born in 1850, but I can remember him well growing up.

This house, I suppose, being very close to mill,

-must have benefited from electricity.

-Yes, it did.

Was this one of the early houses?

I think it's one of the first, certainly in rural Ireland,

to be electrified, yes.

In the 1980s, John decided to build a new turbine in the old mill hall,

which still generates enough electricity

to power nearly 200 lightbulbs continuously.

You're still putting electricity into the grid?

Absolutely, right now quite a lot,

because we've had quite a lot of rain today.

It's an amazing history, isn't it?

Five of you here in Milford called John Alexander,

five of you wedded, in various ways, to the mill.

Absolutely, yeah.

Well, you're a very worthy John Alexander.

-A great pleasure to meet you.

-Well, thank you.

I'm now embarking on the last leg of today's journey, and there's

just time to see how Carlow's sprucing up is coming along.

Smell of fresh paint. They've done the line,

but they haven't yet redone the words.

My next stop is just 20 miles north.

I'm now heading for Athy,

which my Bradshaw's tells me is on the Barrow,

where there is an old castle built by Lord Kildare in 1506.

In fact, he gave his name to the county.

But I'm attracted to Athy for something that happened there

long after my Bradshaw's was published

which made it internationally famous.

In the last decades of Victoria's reign,

a new rival to the railways emerged from the workshops

of the Industrial Revolution, the automobile.

The age of mass motor travel was still a long way off,

but for the elite,

this new machine opened up a fresh world of pleasure and excitement.

Veteran car enthusiast Laurence Roe can tell me

how this small Irish town played a big part in the story.

Laurence!

Michael, nice to meet you. Welcome to Athy.

Thank you very much.

What a beautiful collection of vintage cars.

What is the connection between Athy and cars?

Well, Athy's connection dates back to 1903,

when the first closed circuit race ever

to take place took place here.

Prior to that, the previous

races were on open roads, where there was other traffic, little

control of spectators,

and this was actually the first closed circuit ever.

It subsequently became known as Grand Prix, really.

The groundbreaking event was the fourth in a series of international

races sponsored by newspaper baron James Gordon Bennett Jnr.

Famous for his passion for adventure,

he backed everything from polar expeditions to balloon races.

Is this THE Gordon Bennett?

It is THE Gordon Bennett, yes.

So when one says, "Gordon Bennett!",

-one's referring to this gentleman?

-Yes.

Bennett was known for his playboy lifestyle,

and the story goes that it was a New York party that saw his name

become an expression of incredulity.

He arrived at the party slightly inebriated

because Gordon Bennett lived on lamb chops and champagne.

And when he arrived in the house,

he decided he wanted to use the facilities.

And the facilities in these old houses were

usually down a dark corridor.

So he decided to do what he had to do

in the front room into the fireplace,

So his friends said, "Oh, Gordon Bennett!"

I've often used the exclamation myself

with no idea what I was getting myself into.

Well, there you are now.

The first Gordon Bennett races were held on the continent, on the open

road, but in 1902, the event was won by Selwyn Edge representing England.

So it was down to the United Kingdom of Great Britain

and Ireland to host the next event, but with strict speed

limits on the British mainland, it was decided to hold it across

the Irish sea, where restrictions were temporarily relaxed.

The area around Athy was chosen for its convenient location.

The railways were important to bring in the drivers or the spectators?

Bring in the spectators, because they estimated there would have been

-almost a million people spectating on that event.

-You're not serious?

The first time there was ever a gathering of that amount of people

in Ireland, and the railways played a big part from all over the country,

bringing people to see this amazing scene.

-I had no idea it was on that scale.

-Absolutely.

For safety, the roads were closed off to other traffic,

setting the template for the Grand Prix, which began in 1906.

And the race also gave birth to another tradition.

Each country had a colour. America was red, Germany was white,

France was blue, and the British chose emerald green.

Partly as a gesture to

Ireland for hosting the race

and this subsequently became British racing green.

So it was a tribute to the host nation, to the Emerald Isle.

Sadly, racing green failed to triumph, as the trophy was

won by a German car.

The '03 Gordon Bennett race was won by Camille Jenatzy,

driving a 60 hp Mercedes at an average

speed of 49.2 mph, which was remarkable speed at that time,

over a circuit which was 327.5 miles.

I can't believe they were averaging nearly 50mph

-over 300-and-something-mile circuit in 1903.

-Yep, absolutely amazing.

And to get those speeds, they would have had to do over 70mph

in some of the straight stretches to try and achieve that.

Much of the original course can still be

driven on the roads around Athy, and the race is commemorated

every year by members of the Irish Veteran and Vintage Car Club.

And they're out for a drive today.

The first thing we have to do is pump up the fuel.

-Here?

-Yes.

These days, a turn of the key is all that's needed to send fuel from

the tank to the engine.

But in the 1900s, it was rather harder work.

OK!

Laurence takes the wheel of his 1906 Wolseley

to give me a taste of the race that attracted

a million awe-struck spectators.

I'm guessing that, at the beginning of the 20th century,

the population of Ireland can't have been more than five or six million.

It's impossible to think of any sporting event now

that would gather a fifth or a sixth of the population.

Absolutely.

I suppose when you think about it, most people hadn't seen a motor car.

They didn't know what they looked like.

To have this piece of machinery travelling at amazing speeds

would have been really spectacular.

On the open road with Laurence, you begin to realise

how extraordinary the sight of a speeding car must once have been.

First locomotion, then the internal combustion engine,

the 19th century truly brought transport revolutions.

This part of my journey has made me

think about the role of great men in history.

The Dukes of Ormonde, of Kilkenny, Walter Bagenal of Bagenalstown,

five generations of John Alexander, and Gordon Bennett.

And I'd like to add one more name, the railway engineer who built

this line, and many others, a native of Carlow, William Dargan.

On my next journey, I'll visit the Irish National Stud.

A bucking experience!

Oh, the horse is going very fast now!

This is absolutely exhausting!

I'll discover how harsh life was for the Irish poor.

When you came in here, you gave up everything

and you signed up to a life within the workhouse.

And I'll uncover an astronomical feat of Victorian engineering.

-What a construction.

-It was known locally as The Monster.

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