NEWTOWN-BUTLER

NEWTOWN-BUTLER, a town, in the parish of GALLOON, barony of COOLE, county of FERMANAGH, and province of ULSTER, 4 ½ miles (W. by S.) from Clones, on the road to Enniskillen; containing 412 inhabitants. In 1641, the Enniskilleners defeated the army commanded by Mac Carthy-more, about one mile north of the town, in retreating through which the latter set fire to the church and burned it to the ground, together with several inhabitants who had sought refuge there; they were afterwards totally defeated at Kilgarret Hill, half a mile to the south, and their leader made prisoner. The village consists of two streets, and in 1831 contained 76 houses: it has a penny post to Clones and Lisnaskea. There is a market on Friday; fairs for yarn and butter are held on the second Friday in each month, and on May 12th is a large fair for cattle. General sessions are held four times in the year, and petty sessions on alternate Wednesdays, in the courthouse, to which a bridewell is attached. A constabulary police force is stationed in the town. Here are the parochial church, and a large R. C. chapel; a handsome meeting-house was recently erected for the Primitive Wesleyan Methodists, one-half the expense of which was defrayed by J. Butler Danvers, Esq. The old meeting-house has been converted into a school for gratuitous daily instruction, and is also used as a Sunday school; a national school is held in the chapel; and there is also a parochial school. This place gives the inferior title of baron to the family of Butler, Earls of Lanesborough, and it was once the seat of that family, of whose mansion no vestige can now be traced.