Londonderry Ireland
Londonderry more popularly known by its original name, Derry is Northern Ireland's second most important city. Although only 75 miles from Belfast, its position in the northwest corner of the country traditionally has rendered it remote from Northern Ireland's other population centers. This condition has been a disadvantage in some ways, but it has served to slow the rate of change and preserve the city's historic character and appearance. A friendly place for strolling, with quiet Georgian corners, Londonderry gives visitors the feeling of a cozy village.
The history of Londonderry
For those who live in the working city, it's the kind of place, says one bartender, where you can't pretend to be what you're not, because we all know what your grandfather did. It's a cohesive city, even though its very name causes confusion and rankles Nationalists in both the North and the Republic. Some still consider the prefix London added to Derry in the early 17th century during the controversial Plantation period an unwelcome intrusion.
Today, as discussion and dissension about this matter continue, some have chosen to cope with the issue with some humor by using the name Stroke City, and writing Londonderry. Whatever they call their city, its citizens are warmhearted, good-natured people who have remained so in spite of the troubles, both recent and historic.
Progress is, however, now beginning to catch up with Londonderry, which is becoming increasingly modernized. With the worst of the bombings in the latest round of internecine battles now more than a decade past, relative relaxation has returned, and it's back to the economic basics, with everybody most interested in keeping the city on its course of commercial invigoration. Firms are encouraged to relocate to the area in an effort to create jobs for a city that has one of the worst unemployment rates in Western Europe.
A strong civic pride has surfaced in response to extensive redevelopment in the past 15 years, which has resulted in a city that looks and feels attractive, from most angles. Londonderry sports a growing university town atmosphere, as a result of the city's Magee College, now a part of the University of Ulster. The University's College of Tourism, in particular, attracts many students from abroad.
The influx of new people recalls hundreds of thousands who emigrated over several centuries, sailing from Derry's quays, behind the present Guildhall. Most often, it was from economic necessity, and departure was a wrench, as exemplified by the lyrics of the Irish ballad Danny Boy, sung to the Londonderry Air, a poignant melody popularized in the 19th century: '''Tis you, 'tis you must go and I must bide.
Unfortunately, a lack of jobs still forces many Derry sons and daughters to seek employment on distant shores, but, as one young man expressed it, Most want to come back. They get withdrawal symptoms very easily. In all, Londonderry's air today is one of cautious optimism. Not only as a doorway to Donegal, but for its own rewards as well, has the city deserved a visit.
Derry derived from the Gaelic word doire (oak grove) was a densely wooded hilltop when St. Columba (Columcille), fleeing a plague in Donegal, arrived in AD 546 to establish his first abbey. During the ensuing centuries, the religious settlement became known as Derry Columcille.
The abbey was burned down by piratical Danes in 812 the first of a succession of invasions Derry was to endure. Neither the Vikings, who marauded in the area for a few hundred years from the 9th century onward, nor the Normans, who crossed the river Bann and headed west in the 12th century, seem to have left much behind except footprints.
Nevertheless, the city continued to grow in size and importance, and the magnificent medieval church Templemore was built in about 1164. Like other Irish cities, Derry came under English control when King Henry II claimed Ireland in the 12th century. The skirmishes that followed did not seriously damage the city until the 1566 rebellion •Ied by Ulster chieftain Shane O'Neill, during which Templemore was destroyed.
Queen Elizabeth I sent a small army to fortify Derry, but it failed and withdrew. In 1600, an English army led by Sir Henry Docwra besieged and took possession of the city. Docwra called for the erection of huge earthen bulwarks to protect Derry against further invasions, but in 1608 the Irish chieftain Cahir O'Doherty raided the city, and once again it was ruthlessly sacked. O'Doherty was later killed and his lands confiscated.
With the accession of James I to the English throne in 1603, Derry was made a satellite of the city of London, with the resulting name change to Londonderry.
The city fell subject to the policy of Plantation, whereby lands forfeited by vanquished Irish leaders were distributed among English and Scottish colonists. Estates went for a nickel an acre, and the newly created hereditary title of baronet sold for the equivalent of $2,500.
The Baron of Belfast, Sir Arthur Chichester, was given the task of selling the city of Londonderry and the district to the Livery Companies (tradesmen associations) of the city of London, at that time the wealthiest corporation on earth.
Business in Londonderry and airport car hire
With varying degrees of enthusiasm, the big dozen cloth makers, tailors, ironmongers, mercers, vintners, salters, drapers, haberdashers, fishmongers, grocers, goldsmiths, and skinners began to settle the whole area between the river Foyle, the Sperrin Mountains, and the lower river Bann. From 1614 to 1617, the Society of the Governors and Assistants of London of the New Plantation in Ulster within the Realm of Ireland or, more simply, the Irish Society which still is the ground landlord in Londonderry built the famous one-mile-long, 18-foot-thick (on average) city walls, made of earth faced with stone.
Most visitors to Londonderry pre-book a hire car from the airport and make the most of this fascinating region.Today, the fortifications are the most nearly complete city walls left in Britain. The Plantation of Ulster, of which Derry and its history have formed so significant a part, strained the resources of the city of London and its Livery Companies to the limit. This financial drain played a major role in the catastrophic rift that gradually grew between the commoners and the crown, which in turn helped pave the way toward civil war.
The sieges of Londonderry
During the 17th century, Londonderry successfully withstood three more sieges, which added to the veracity of her centuries old epithet Maiden City, given in recognition of the fact that she has never succumbed to the besieging blandishments of any suitor. In 1641 the Irish rose yet again against the English, and in 1648, during the English Civil War, Derry underwent a 4-month attack by Royalist forces. But it was the third siege that was most memorable.
On December 7, 1688, troops loyal to England's deposed Roman Catholic King James II advanced to the walled city of Londonderry to claim it. (James needed a foothold in re-land with which to secure his claim to the English crown.) However, the demand for admission to the city at the Ferryquay Gate was met with hesitation by the city fathers who, although not wanting to oppose James openly he was still their lawful monarch favored the Protestant William, husband of James's daughter Mary as well as prince of Holland's House of Fortune, James waited by Londonderry's walls, but he eventually wearied of the obstinate wretches and retired.
In April 1689, James II resumed in earnest the siege of Londonderry, which was to lat a additional 105 days and become, according to 19th-century English historian Thomas Macaulay, the most memorable siege in the history of the British Isles.
Jacobite troops shelled the city and this time blockaded the river Foyle, throwing a boom across it at the point where the new Foyle Bridge now span to prevent the passage of provision ships.
The strategy was to starve the inhabitants into submission. The only person who deserted the city during its difficulties was the governor, Colonel Lundy, who ended his dishonorable term by advising surrender and then escaping from the city by chopping down a pear tree that stood just outside the city walls.
Provisions for Londonderry's population soon ran short. Hunger enfeebled soldier’s and civilians seized upon dogs, cats, and rats for food. Contemporary price lists show that a lean mouse cost sixpence; a rat, fattened by human flesh, one shilling and two pence; and a quart of horse's blood brought one shilling and a penny. The Inevitable result was disease. More than 7 000 perished, all within sight of a fleet of food filled ships lying at anchor 'just beyond the blockade.
Nevertheless, when James's troops fired a hollowed cannonball at St. Columb's Cathedral that carried a message with the terms for an armistice, Derry's citizens staunchly replied, No surrender which ever since has been the watchword of the city and of Ulster's Loyal Orange lodges.
Finally, on July 30, 1689, the relief ship Mountjoy burst the barrier across the Foyle. In the fighting that followed, high above the thunder of the Irish guns arose the clamor of the Cathedral bells, and the ramparts blazed with on fire. That day the siege was broken, and each year the event is recalled b special celebrations on the city.
Not quite a year later, in 1690, on July 1 which became July 12 when the calendar was changed in the 18th century James II finally lost his throne to King Billy (William III) at the Battle of the Boyne, fought near Drogheda in the Irish Republic.
The port of Londonderry
From early in the 18th century and continuing into the 19th, Londonderry served as the principal port for the wave of emigrants who left Ulster for New World opportunities across the Atlantic. So many Ulster men and women sailed from Derry Quay to America that they became the second most numerous element in the colonial population (the English being the most numerous at that time). Ulster immigrants played a prominent part in the American Revolution as well as in the settlement of the western frontier.
Londonderry also served as a major port of embarkation for the mass migrations from all over Ireland as a result of the potato crop failures and famines of the mid to late 19th century.
In World War II, as the first port across the Atlantic for US and Canadian supply convoys, Derry was tremendously important to the Allies. Many North American troops received early training here for what would eventually be the D-Day invasion of Normandy.(The Republic of Ireland declared neutrality during the war, so its ports were closed to the Allies.)
In addition to thousands of US Navy personnel in port during the war, at least 5,000 US Army staffers were stationed in Derry, which had a major underground communications center at Magee College. US soldiers were active socially in the community, and the army's Springtown camp remained operative until the mid1960s.
Derry's more recent history has been less ennobled. After what can be seen as a classic case of gerrymandering in the creation of two new electoral constituencies in Derry in 1966 which served to exacerbate the conflicts between the Unionists (largely Protestants who wished Northern Ireland would remain part of the United Kingdom) and the Nationalists (mostly Catholics who wanted Ulster to rejoin the Irish Republic) on October 5, 1968, the first confrontation in the city's current round of troubles occurred between civil rights demonstrators and the police.
A period of conflict ensued, which, by August 12, 1969, resulted in a state of siege in the Catholic neighborhood of Bogside. Violence was a sadly familiar face on the community during the 1970s. Bombings resulted in the destruction of some buildings and monuments.
The remains of some of these such as Walker's Monument, erected on Royal Bastion of the city walls in 1828 have been left as memorials to this period and are pointed out by city tour guides. However, visitors to today's Derry generally will find the city cleared of the rubble of the past and its citizens enthusiastically looking ahead.
Things to do in Londonderry
The city within the walls, which are roughly rectangular in shape and about a mile in total length, retains its original 17th-century layout, with four main streets radiating from a center square (called the Diamond) to the original gates: Shipquay, Ferryquay (the gate closed against James II by the 13 apprentices in 1688), Butchers, and Bishop. These have all been rebuilt over the centuries, and three newer gates have been added. The main street of the compact city within the walls begins at the Shipquay Gate.
As Shipquay Street arguably the steepest street in Ireland rises to the Diamond, it exudes a decidedly Georgian flavor, although most of the buildings date from Victorian times. Continuing straight across the Diamond, the road becomes Bishop Street.Along its several blocks before the street reaches Bishop's Gate at the top are many of the city's finest buildings: the Northern Counties Club; the 1830 Deanery, with its fine classical Georgian doorway; The Honorable Irish Society headquarters, inscribed with the date 1764; and the Courthouse. Derry has several good Georgian residential row house terraces, in particular those on Clarendon, Queen, and Bishop Streets.
The Walls Londonderry's most notable physical feature, the walls, form a ace walk around the Inner city. Each bastion has Its own name and story. Coward's Bastion, near O'Doherty's Fort, is so named because it was the safest sector of the city during the siege. On Double Bastion, between Butcher's and Bishop's gates, is Roaring Meg, a brass cannon from 1642 that is' a relic of the siege.
The cannon, which got its name from the violent bang that heralded its use, overlooks the area from which Jacobite troops attacked the city. As we went to press, the walls were being cleaned and refurbished, and it was uncertain whether visitors would be able to walk on the walls after the project is complete.
St Columb´s Cathedral Ireland
St. Columb's Cathedral the Church of Ireland Cathedral is the most historic building in Londonderry. Begun in 1628 and finished in 1633, it has undergone much restoration and alteration, although its facade remains basically the simple, austere, well proportioned Planter's Gothic. The nearby city walls rise higher in this picturesque precinct to protect the cathedral, which fired cannons from its bastions during the 1689 siege.
Just inside the door is the hollowed cannonball that was shot into the churchyard with the proposed terms of surrender; elsewhere in the cathedral and in the chapter-house, other city artefacts are displayed, including locks and keys from the four original gates. Mellowed stones were used to construct this modern castle, which serves as the interpretive center for visitors to the city. The view from the roof is exceptional. Call for details about visiting hours and current exhibitions.
Bishop's Gate Londonderry - The most memorable of the city's four original gates, Bishop's was extended upward into a triumphal arch by William III in 1789, on the centenary of the great siege. Sculptured faces on either side of the arch are river gods of the Foyle and the Boyne. At the top of Bishop St., which rises from the Diamond.
Guildhall Londonderry - The Guildhall was built in Tudor Gothic style of red sandstone from Antrim in 1890. Its richly decorated facade has mullioned and transformed windows and a four faced chiming spire clock that is one of the largest in Britain. Striking stained glass windows throughout the building illustrate almost every episode of note in the city's compelling history.
At the foot of Shipquay St. Derry Quay celebrated in song and story, often sadly, Derry Quay (the popular name for the Foyle Quay), behind the Guildhall, was the embarkation point for hundreds of thousands of Irish emigrants including the ancestors of several US presidents who crossed the Atlantic in the 18th and 19th centuries. A small monument recalls the mass emigrations. Foyle Embankment, behind the Guildhall.
St. Eugene's Cathedral,The Roman Catholic cathedral, with its lofty granite spire, was finished in 1873. Built in Gothic Revival style, it is tall and airy, with exceptional stained glass windows depicting the Crucifixion. In the Catholic district called Bogside; reached from Strand Rd. along Great James St.
Long Tower Church (St. Columba's) Just outside the city walls to the southwest, this church was built in 1784, and reconstructed in 1908, on the site of the former Templemore (one of the great Irish medieval churches, built in 1164 and destroyed in 1566).
The church, which seats 2,000, features attractive hand carved woodwork, an unusual sloping balcony, and stained glass. The splendid altarpiece of contrasting marbles displays ancient Corinthian column heads that were the gift of Bishop Hervey, The edifice is surrounded by a complex of church schools, and the view from the churchyard across grassy slopes to the city walls is lovely.
Strabane Americans find Strabane of interest principally because of Gray's Printing Shop , which dates from the 18th century and is still in operation. In the room where some 19th-century presses remain, John Dunlap and James Wilson served as apprentices. Dunlap was the first of the two men to emigrate to Philadelphia, where he founded America's first daily newspaper, The Pennsylvania Packet.
In 1776 he printed the Declaration of Independence from Thomas Jefferson's original manuscript. He was also a captain in General George Washington's bodyguard. By 1807, Wilson too had emigrated to Philadelphia, where he became a judge and a newspaper editor and, eventually, the grandfather of Woodrow Wilson, the 28th President of the United States.
The history of Londonderry
For those who live in the working city, it's the kind of place, says one bartender, where you can't pretend to be what you're not, because we all know what your grandfather did. It's a cohesive city, even though its very name causes confusion and rankles Nationalists in both the North and the Republic. Some still consider the prefix London added to Derry in the early 17th century during the controversial Plantation period an unwelcome intrusion.
Today, as discussion and dissension about this matter continue, some have chosen to cope with the issue with some humor by using the name Stroke City, and writing Londonderry. Whatever they call their city, its citizens are warmhearted, good-natured people who have remained so in spite of the troubles, both recent and historic.
Progress is, however, now beginning to catch up with Londonderry, which is becoming increasingly modernized. With the worst of the bombings in the latest round of internecine battles now more than a decade past, relative relaxation has returned, and it's back to the economic basics, with everybody most interested in keeping the city on its course of commercial invigoration. Firms are encouraged to relocate to the area in an effort to create jobs for a city that has one of the worst unemployment rates in Western Europe.
A strong civic pride has surfaced in response to extensive redevelopment in the past 15 years, which has resulted in a city that looks and feels attractive, from most angles. Londonderry sports a growing university town atmosphere, as a result of the city's Magee College, now a part of the University of Ulster. The University's College of Tourism, in particular, attracts many students from abroad.
The influx of new people recalls hundreds of thousands who emigrated over several centuries, sailing from Derry's quays, behind the present Guildhall. Most often, it was from economic necessity, and departure was a wrench, as exemplified by the lyrics of the Irish ballad Danny Boy, sung to the Londonderry Air, a poignant melody popularized in the 19th century: '''Tis you, 'tis you must go and I must bide.
Unfortunately, a lack of jobs still forces many Derry sons and daughters to seek employment on distant shores, but, as one young man expressed it, Most want to come back. They get withdrawal symptoms very easily. In all, Londonderry's air today is one of cautious optimism. Not only as a doorway to Donegal, but for its own rewards as well, has the city deserved a visit.
Derry derived from the Gaelic word doire (oak grove) was a densely wooded hilltop when St. Columba (Columcille), fleeing a plague in Donegal, arrived in AD 546 to establish his first abbey. During the ensuing centuries, the religious settlement became known as Derry Columcille.
The abbey was burned down by piratical Danes in 812 the first of a succession of invasions Derry was to endure. Neither the Vikings, who marauded in the area for a few hundred years from the 9th century onward, nor the Normans, who crossed the river Bann and headed west in the 12th century, seem to have left much behind except footprints.
Nevertheless, the city continued to grow in size and importance, and the magnificent medieval church Templemore was built in about 1164. Like other Irish cities, Derry came under English control when King Henry II claimed Ireland in the 12th century. The skirmishes that followed did not seriously damage the city until the 1566 rebellion •Ied by Ulster chieftain Shane O'Neill, during which Templemore was destroyed.
Queen Elizabeth I sent a small army to fortify Derry, but it failed and withdrew. In 1600, an English army led by Sir Henry Docwra besieged and took possession of the city. Docwra called for the erection of huge earthen bulwarks to protect Derry against further invasions, but in 1608 the Irish chieftain Cahir O'Doherty raided the city, and once again it was ruthlessly sacked. O'Doherty was later killed and his lands confiscated.
With the accession of James I to the English throne in 1603, Derry was made a satellite of the city of London, with the resulting name change to Londonderry.
The city fell subject to the policy of Plantation, whereby lands forfeited by vanquished Irish leaders were distributed among English and Scottish colonists. Estates went for a nickel an acre, and the newly created hereditary title of baronet sold for the equivalent of $2,500.
The Baron of Belfast, Sir Arthur Chichester, was given the task of selling the city of Londonderry and the district to the Livery Companies (tradesmen associations) of the city of London, at that time the wealthiest corporation on earth.
Business in Londonderry and airport car hire
With varying degrees of enthusiasm, the big dozen cloth makers, tailors, ironmongers, mercers, vintners, salters, drapers, haberdashers, fishmongers, grocers, goldsmiths, and skinners began to settle the whole area between the river Foyle, the Sperrin Mountains, and the lower river Bann. From 1614 to 1617, the Society of the Governors and Assistants of London of the New Plantation in Ulster within the Realm of Ireland or, more simply, the Irish Society which still is the ground landlord in Londonderry built the famous one-mile-long, 18-foot-thick (on average) city walls, made of earth faced with stone.
Most visitors to Londonderry pre-book a hire car from the airport and make the most of this fascinating region.Today, the fortifications are the most nearly complete city walls left in Britain. The Plantation of Ulster, of which Derry and its history have formed so significant a part, strained the resources of the city of London and its Livery Companies to the limit. This financial drain played a major role in the catastrophic rift that gradually grew between the commoners and the crown, which in turn helped pave the way toward civil war.
The sieges of Londonderry
During the 17th century, Londonderry successfully withstood three more sieges, which added to the veracity of her centuries old epithet Maiden City, given in recognition of the fact that she has never succumbed to the besieging blandishments of any suitor. In 1641 the Irish rose yet again against the English, and in 1648, during the English Civil War, Derry underwent a 4-month attack by Royalist forces. But it was the third siege that was most memorable.
On December 7, 1688, troops loyal to England's deposed Roman Catholic King James II advanced to the walled city of Londonderry to claim it. (James needed a foothold in re-land with which to secure his claim to the English crown.) However, the demand for admission to the city at the Ferryquay Gate was met with hesitation by the city fathers who, although not wanting to oppose James openly he was still their lawful monarch favored the Protestant William, husband of James's daughter Mary as well as prince of Holland's House of Fortune, James waited by Londonderry's walls, but he eventually wearied of the obstinate wretches and retired.
In April 1689, James II resumed in earnest the siege of Londonderry, which was to lat a additional 105 days and become, according to 19th-century English historian Thomas Macaulay, the most memorable siege in the history of the British Isles.
Jacobite troops shelled the city and this time blockaded the river Foyle, throwing a boom across it at the point where the new Foyle Bridge now span to prevent the passage of provision ships.
The strategy was to starve the inhabitants into submission. The only person who deserted the city during its difficulties was the governor, Colonel Lundy, who ended his dishonorable term by advising surrender and then escaping from the city by chopping down a pear tree that stood just outside the city walls.
Provisions for Londonderry's population soon ran short. Hunger enfeebled soldier’s and civilians seized upon dogs, cats, and rats for food. Contemporary price lists show that a lean mouse cost sixpence; a rat, fattened by human flesh, one shilling and two pence; and a quart of horse's blood brought one shilling and a penny. The Inevitable result was disease. More than 7 000 perished, all within sight of a fleet of food filled ships lying at anchor 'just beyond the blockade.
Nevertheless, when James's troops fired a hollowed cannonball at St. Columb's Cathedral that carried a message with the terms for an armistice, Derry's citizens staunchly replied, No surrender which ever since has been the watchword of the city and of Ulster's Loyal Orange lodges.
Finally, on July 30, 1689, the relief ship Mountjoy burst the barrier across the Foyle. In the fighting that followed, high above the thunder of the Irish guns arose the clamor of the Cathedral bells, and the ramparts blazed with on fire. That day the siege was broken, and each year the event is recalled b special celebrations on the city.
Not quite a year later, in 1690, on July 1 which became July 12 when the calendar was changed in the 18th century James II finally lost his throne to King Billy (William III) at the Battle of the Boyne, fought near Drogheda in the Irish Republic.
The port of Londonderry
From early in the 18th century and continuing into the 19th, Londonderry served as the principal port for the wave of emigrants who left Ulster for New World opportunities across the Atlantic. So many Ulster men and women sailed from Derry Quay to America that they became the second most numerous element in the colonial population (the English being the most numerous at that time). Ulster immigrants played a prominent part in the American Revolution as well as in the settlement of the western frontier.
Londonderry also served as a major port of embarkation for the mass migrations from all over Ireland as a result of the potato crop failures and famines of the mid to late 19th century.
In World War II, as the first port across the Atlantic for US and Canadian supply convoys, Derry was tremendously important to the Allies. Many North American troops received early training here for what would eventually be the D-Day invasion of Normandy.(The Republic of Ireland declared neutrality during the war, so its ports were closed to the Allies.)
In addition to thousands of US Navy personnel in port during the war, at least 5,000 US Army staffers were stationed in Derry, which had a major underground communications center at Magee College. US soldiers were active socially in the community, and the army's Springtown camp remained operative until the mid1960s.
Derry's more recent history has been less ennobled. After what can be seen as a classic case of gerrymandering in the creation of two new electoral constituencies in Derry in 1966 which served to exacerbate the conflicts between the Unionists (largely Protestants who wished Northern Ireland would remain part of the United Kingdom) and the Nationalists (mostly Catholics who wanted Ulster to rejoin the Irish Republic) on October 5, 1968, the first confrontation in the city's current round of troubles occurred between civil rights demonstrators and the police.
A period of conflict ensued, which, by August 12, 1969, resulted in a state of siege in the Catholic neighborhood of Bogside. Violence was a sadly familiar face on the community during the 1970s. Bombings resulted in the destruction of some buildings and monuments.
The remains of some of these such as Walker's Monument, erected on Royal Bastion of the city walls in 1828 have been left as memorials to this period and are pointed out by city tour guides. However, visitors to today's Derry generally will find the city cleared of the rubble of the past and its citizens enthusiastically looking ahead.
Things to do in Londonderry
The city within the walls, which are roughly rectangular in shape and about a mile in total length, retains its original 17th-century layout, with four main streets radiating from a center square (called the Diamond) to the original gates: Shipquay, Ferryquay (the gate closed against James II by the 13 apprentices in 1688), Butchers, and Bishop. These have all been rebuilt over the centuries, and three newer gates have been added. The main street of the compact city within the walls begins at the Shipquay Gate.
As Shipquay Street arguably the steepest street in Ireland rises to the Diamond, it exudes a decidedly Georgian flavor, although most of the buildings date from Victorian times. Continuing straight across the Diamond, the road becomes Bishop Street.Along its several blocks before the street reaches Bishop's Gate at the top are many of the city's finest buildings: the Northern Counties Club; the 1830 Deanery, with its fine classical Georgian doorway; The Honorable Irish Society headquarters, inscribed with the date 1764; and the Courthouse. Derry has several good Georgian residential row house terraces, in particular those on Clarendon, Queen, and Bishop Streets.
The Walls Londonderry's most notable physical feature, the walls, form a ace walk around the Inner city. Each bastion has Its own name and story. Coward's Bastion, near O'Doherty's Fort, is so named because it was the safest sector of the city during the siege. On Double Bastion, between Butcher's and Bishop's gates, is Roaring Meg, a brass cannon from 1642 that is' a relic of the siege.
The cannon, which got its name from the violent bang that heralded its use, overlooks the area from which Jacobite troops attacked the city. As we went to press, the walls were being cleaned and refurbished, and it was uncertain whether visitors would be able to walk on the walls after the project is complete.
St Columb´s Cathedral Ireland
St. Columb's Cathedral the Church of Ireland Cathedral is the most historic building in Londonderry. Begun in 1628 and finished in 1633, it has undergone much restoration and alteration, although its facade remains basically the simple, austere, well proportioned Planter's Gothic. The nearby city walls rise higher in this picturesque precinct to protect the cathedral, which fired cannons from its bastions during the 1689 siege.
Just inside the door is the hollowed cannonball that was shot into the churchyard with the proposed terms of surrender; elsewhere in the cathedral and in the chapter-house, other city artefacts are displayed, including locks and keys from the four original gates. Mellowed stones were used to construct this modern castle, which serves as the interpretive center for visitors to the city. The view from the roof is exceptional. Call for details about visiting hours and current exhibitions.
Bishop's Gate Londonderry - The most memorable of the city's four original gates, Bishop's was extended upward into a triumphal arch by William III in 1789, on the centenary of the great siege. Sculptured faces on either side of the arch are river gods of the Foyle and the Boyne. At the top of Bishop St., which rises from the Diamond.
Guildhall Londonderry - The Guildhall was built in Tudor Gothic style of red sandstone from Antrim in 1890. Its richly decorated facade has mullioned and transformed windows and a four faced chiming spire clock that is one of the largest in Britain. Striking stained glass windows throughout the building illustrate almost every episode of note in the city's compelling history.
At the foot of Shipquay St. Derry Quay celebrated in song and story, often sadly, Derry Quay (the popular name for the Foyle Quay), behind the Guildhall, was the embarkation point for hundreds of thousands of Irish emigrants including the ancestors of several US presidents who crossed the Atlantic in the 18th and 19th centuries. A small monument recalls the mass emigrations. Foyle Embankment, behind the Guildhall.
St. Eugene's Cathedral,The Roman Catholic cathedral, with its lofty granite spire, was finished in 1873. Built in Gothic Revival style, it is tall and airy, with exceptional stained glass windows depicting the Crucifixion. In the Catholic district called Bogside; reached from Strand Rd. along Great James St.
Long Tower Church (St. Columba's) Just outside the city walls to the southwest, this church was built in 1784, and reconstructed in 1908, on the site of the former Templemore (one of the great Irish medieval churches, built in 1164 and destroyed in 1566).
The church, which seats 2,000, features attractive hand carved woodwork, an unusual sloping balcony, and stained glass. The splendid altarpiece of contrasting marbles displays ancient Corinthian column heads that were the gift of Bishop Hervey, The edifice is surrounded by a complex of church schools, and the view from the churchyard across grassy slopes to the city walls is lovely.
Strabane Americans find Strabane of interest principally because of Gray's Printing Shop , which dates from the 18th century and is still in operation. In the room where some 19th-century presses remain, John Dunlap and James Wilson served as apprentices. Dunlap was the first of the two men to emigrate to Philadelphia, where he founded America's first daily newspaper, The Pennsylvania Packet.
In 1776 he printed the Declaration of Independence from Thomas Jefferson's original manuscript. He was also a captain in General George Washington's bodyguard. By 1807, Wilson too had emigrated to Philadelphia, where he became a judge and a newspaper editor and, eventually, the grandfather of Woodrow Wilson, the 28th President of the United States.
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