ASSEY, or ATHSY, a parish

ASSEY, or ATHSY, a parish, in the barony of LOWER DEECE, county of MEATH, and province of LEINSTER, 4 miles (S.) from Navan, on the river Boyne; containing 108 inhabitants. The land, though not rich, is tolerably productive; a considerable portion is under tillage, and the remainder is good grazing land. Bellinter, the seat of the Rev. J. Preston, is situated in a well-wooded demesne of more than 800 acres, stretching into the adjoining parish of Balsoon. The living is a rectory, in the diocese of Meath, to which the rectory of Balsoon was united by diocesan authority in 1826, together forming the union of Assey, in the patronage of the Crown: the tithes amount to £62. 15. 4 ½., and the gross amount of tithes of the benefice is £132. There is neither church nor glebe-house in the union, the occasional duties of which are performed by the incumbent of Kilmessan, who receives £24 per annum, besides the glebe, which consists of three acres, valued at £6 per annum. The Commissioners of Ecclesiastical Inquiry, in 1831, have recommended that the two parishes be formed into one, to be called the parish of Athsy, and that a church and glebe-house for a resident minister be erected. In the R. C. divisions this parish forms part of the union or district of Dunsany and Kilmessan.