TEMPLEMARTIN

TEMPLEMARTIN, a parish, in the barony of KINALMEAKY, county of CORK, and province of MUNSTER, 5 miles (N.) from Bandon, on the road from Kinsale to Macroom; containing 2730 inhabitants. It comprises 7423 statute acres, of which about 330 are common; about one-tenth is pasture, one-twentieth bog (affording a good supply of fuel), and the remainder under tillage, being generally poor and stony ground. At Lisnegat is a large power-loom factory for spinning cotton, employing about 100 persons. At Mosstown there was formerly a distillery and it was subsequently a brewery, but it has long been discontinued. Fairs are held at Mossgrove on March 17th, Corpus-Christi day, Sept. 2nd, and Dec. 8th, chiefly for cattle.

The gentlemen's seats are Mount Pleasant, the residence of H. Baldwin, Esq., a handsome mansion on a commanding eminence in a highly improved demesne; Gurrane, a newly erected and handsome house, near the old family mansion, the residence of J. Splaine, Esq.; Mossgrove, of S. Baldwin, Esq.; Scartnamuck, of B. Popham, Esq.; Old Park, of H. Gillman, Esq.; and the glebe-house, of the Rev. F. C. Sullivan.

The living is a rectory and perpetual cure, in the diocese of Cork; the rectory forming part of the union of Templebready and of the corps of the deanery of St. Finbarr's, Cork; the perpetual curacy is in the gift of the Dean.

The tithes amount to £519, of which £500 is payable to the dean, and £19 to the perpetual curate, who also receives £30 per ann. from Primate Boulter's augmentation fund. The glebe-house was built by aid of a gift of £450 and a loan of £50, in 1815, from the late Board of First Fruits: the glebe comprises 16 ¼ acres. The church is a plain building, with a square tower 50 feet high, erected by aid of a gift of £500, in 1793, from the same Board.

In the R. C. divisions the parish is the head of a union or district, comprising the parishes of Templemartin, Killowen, and part of Kilbrogan: the chapel is a small plain edifice. The male and female parochial school, in which are about 30 children, is aided by the dean and local subscriptions, and has a house and an acre of land rent-free from the Duke of Devonshire: there is also a private school, in which are about 40 children, and a Sunday school is superintended by the curate. At Gurrane are the ruins of an old fortified mansion of the Baldwins, who acquired the estate by purchase from the Maskelyne family, in 1612: it appears to have been surrounded by a wall, in the angles of which, and at one end of the house, were round turrets three of which are standing. A subterraneous passage leading from the house to the adjacent bog is still visible, the entrance to which was by an aperture covered by the hearth-stone of a room on the ground floor. There are also many Danish raths in the parish, one on the lands of Gurrane, including three acres, and surrounded by three ramparts and a fosse; another at Castle-Lac, where are four upright stones of clay-slate, respectively 12, 9, and 6 feet high; they are supposed to be druidical, or to have been erected to commemorate a victory obtained here by the Danes in 968. On the same ploughland was formerly a castle, now quite demolished.