The black carriage’s cultural significance seems to echo that of the legendary banshee. Like the banshee, to see the black carriage signifies impending death or catastrophe. A quick survey of Slatterys patrons will confirm that this is something today's residents of Rathmines still firmly believe. Indeed, one of the most spectacular encounters with the apparition resulted in a near fatal automobile accident on 6 April 1961.
A young man by the name of Padraig O’Heardy was driving home one night from a friend’s house in Clontarf. As he approached La Touche Bridge, heading south on Richmond Street, he lost control of his car. It had been raining that night, and the car skidded across the rain-slicked road towards the bridge, where it smashed through the barrier and went into the lock chamber. Fortunately the lock was nearly empty, and an off-duty fireman who was passing at the time was quick to action. Aside from a mild concussion and a clean break of his left radius and ulna, O’Heardy was unharmed. The excuse for the crash given in the police report was that O’Heardy had too much drink on him. On the surface it is a fairly simple open and shut case. What makes the accident notable is the gossip that developed afterwards - such news travels quickly in Dublin neighbourhoods, and O’Heardy happened to be a local Rathmines man. Kilpatrick later interviewed him for Phantoms and Apparitions of South Dubliny and the excerpt is worth reprinting here in its entirety:
It wasn't drink like the gardai said. I’d always heard of the black carriage from me ma and me grandma, but until I seen it, I never believed it. When I did see it, I immediately had this feeling in my gut like something bad was going to happen. The carriage was just standing there at the top of the bridge. It was black. There were horses - two of them, I remember. It almost looked like one of them horse drawn carriages from that Dracula film a few years back. I knew I was going too fast and was going to hit it. I braked hard, but because of all the rain, the car kept skidding towards the bridge. I thought I would smash into the black carriage for sure. I didn't know what to do, so I flashed my high beams, and I started honking the horn so much it would wake the devil. Just as I was about to hit the carriage, it disappeared. I know you don't believe me, but that's what it did. It just disappeared. The next thing I remember was the sound of the barrier breaking and then everything went black. When I woke up I was in St James' all bandaged up. I was real lucky that day. I always had the feeling I shouldn't have survived that accident. Like that black carriage was there waiting for me. I stopped driving after that night. I take the bus now. Its much safer.
On the evening of 6 April 2006, a full 145 years after the tragedy, I made my way to La Touche Bridge and made myself comfortable on one of the well-lit benches that now sit beside the lock. The water between the sluices was calm and deep black. This was the yawning chasm' and 'black abyss’ described by the reporters, perhaps not even melodramatically. What did I expect to happen in the minutes between 9.20 and 9.30 p.m. when the Favourite No. 7 Omnibus met its fate? Was I waiting for two ethereal horses pulling the black carriage to gallop amidst modern-day traffic? Or for the disembodied din of the omnibus tumbling into the lock? Perhaps I awaited the white and fish-nibbled faces of the dead to stare up at me from the black abyss. But not so much as a ripple broke the surface of the black waters, and the only sounds to be heard were those of double-decker buses rocketing across the bridge, and the water as it cascaded over the lower sluice. The sheet of placid water reflected the old Grand Canal Hotel and divulged none of its secrets. The only thing of note to happen that night was when the lamp perched on the bridges western railing flickered and died.
Instinctively, I took my watch from my pocket. It read 9.24 p.m.
II.
Rathmines Road Lower
La Touche Bridge provides a splendid vantage point from which to survey the vista of Rathmines Road Lower, one of south Dublin’s main arteries. From the bridge s elevated apex you can see many of the neighbourhoods notable features: the mid nineteenth-century terraced houses lining the eastern side of the road like a steep cliff; the verdigris dome of Mary Immaculate, with Our Lady of Refuge perched at the tip of the portico; and the red sandstone town hall with its clock face that on summer nights glows like a low-hanging moon. If weather conditions arc right, you will even see the gentle Dublin Mountains in the distance. Save for a few modern blemishes easily removed with an imaginative squint of the eye, this is how Rathmines Road Lower and its skyline have looked for almost one hundred years.
Meones’ Beast
In the fourteenth century this entire area was presided over by a fortified castle, or rath, that stood somewhere between Rathmines Road and Cullenswood, a once heavily wooded area that is now part of present-day Ranelagh.
The de Meones family came to Dublin from Hampshire, England, with the Archbishop de Derlington in 1279 when the latter was elevated to the archbishopric. In 1326 the great soldier and warrior, Gilbert de Meones, moved into the rath, and consequently controlled most of the surrounding land.
Sir Gilbert was known throughout the land for his strength, courage and righteousness, and over the decades his many exploits developed into legend. One of the most repeated accounts, whether true or untrue, concerns his defeat of a great shaggy monster known as Meones’ Beast.
The beast is said to have lived near a bend in the Swan River close to the old Rathmines highway. From its evil den it killed livestock and feasted on hapless travellers. In the nineteenth century, Meones’ Beast was a popular subject of broadsheets and ballads, including this anonymous example written circa 1840:
‘How Sir Gilbert Slew the Suaine River Beast’
Brave Sir Gilbert met the Beast,
That rumbled near the Suaine.
Said the beast with gnashing teeth,
Til tear your heart in twain.’
Dark yellow eyes and mane of black,
Its tusks were stained with Blood.
Fair Christian souls it would attack,
Crushing bones into the Mud.
Sir Gilbert called unto his God,
With Spear brandished long and true,
He leapt and met that Darkling Dog,
And drove his Spike straight through.
The Suaine didst roil and run with Red,
Above the Clouds abated.
To Meonesrath Hall he brought its Head,
Brave Sir Gilbert thence was feted.
By 1382 Gilbert’s scion William had designated himself Lord Meonesrath after his seat of power. Local tongues corrupted and inverted this name over the centuries until it became Rathmeones and, ultimately, as we know it today, Rathmines. History does not record why or when the de Meones family quit the area, but we do know that their tenancy of the rath was preceded by a man named Richard de Welton. It is easily conceivable that had de Welton been a better monster slayer, we might instead have lived in Rathwelton. The exact location of de Meones’ rath was neither remembered by the yeomanry after the land was divided and sold, nor by cartographers who did not memorialise it as mins’ on any extant map. But the name given by the illustrious family remains, and today more than 36,000 people call Rathmines their home.
Shortly after crossing La Touche Bridge and proceeding south along Rathmines Road, you will notice a nondescript and ultimately dead-end lane stretching to the west. This is tiny Blackberry Lane, as evidenced by a sign bolted to the adjacent terrace, and in days past it was literally neither here nor there. The east-west lane was once a narrow and much lengthier bohreen beaten through the dense foliage between the Earl of Meaths lands to the south and the old Farm of St Sepulchre to the north.
It should arouse no curiosity that neither estate claimed this stretch of ground, as for countless generations it was primarily utilised by the dead. Until 1850, the lane served as a corpse road – a path used not only by funeral processions, but also, according to belief, by souls of the deceased. Prior to 1850, Blackberry Lane terminated in a former Celtic graveyard that once lay just north of where the current church now stands. Like the faerie paths of west
ern Ireland, these betwixt and between roads are only obstructed at the risk of disturbing the entities that dwell in such places. Buildings that are ‘in the way’ or constructions erected in a contrary place often suffer peculiar problems.
And as you may have guessed, one such example is the subject of our next tale.
Quis Separabit
Blackberry Lane meets Rathmines Road at an almost imperceptibly oblique angle, echoing the course of the original corpse road. If you stand in the middle of the lane and angle yourself correctly, you will see that the old path would have continued across Rathmines Road and passed directly through number 44 Fortescue Terrace. The terrace was built in 1850 during a time when families were fleeing the high taxes and urban decay of Dublin's city centre. The first family to live in number 44 reported all manner of disturbances in the house and back garden. It would take ages combing through old newspapers to find all the grievances levelled against the house, but I have heard that the young son of the last family to live there frequently complained of seeing faces in the dark before moving out. After that, the building was run as a lodging house, and no one had to stay there longer than necessary.
Number 44s neoclassical portico and fanlight window are clearly Georgian in style, but the second-and third-storey windows above the door are curiously misaligned and belie the symmetry of which that style is so fond. The decorative latticework that stretches across the lower half of the first-floor windows is reminiscent of the shallow, wrought-iron balconies found in New Orleans’ French Quarter. Although quite common in other parts of the city, no other house in this particular terrace duplicates the feature. Another aspect unique to number 44 is the large stable passage that leads through the ground floor to the stable yard behind the house. Number 44 does not have the same mews access provided to the rest of the terrace by Fortescue Lane, and so this passage compensates by providing direct admittance into the stable yard from Rathmines Road.
For generations of Dubliners this stable passage served as the entrance to a Dickensian-like jumble known as the Blackberry Fair. Although the market closed in 2002, anyone who attended even once will retain vivid memories. You were always met at the front gates by a three-legged and overly friendly black dog. He greeted each shopper with a thick, pink tongue and leaned heavily against your leg if you stopped to pet him. The black dog accompanied you from the footpath and through the stable passage, which was invariably lined with broken rocking horses, battered steamer trunks and old pub fittings. When you reached the end of the tunnel, the dog always stopped and, with a whimper, watched you until you disappeared into the rambling labyrinth of makeshift stalls and corrugated tin shacks. Presumably the nameless brute belonged to one of the vendors, and its seemingly innocuous habit of refusing to enter the market is indicative of what lay within. The sensitivities of animals to the supernatural are always much stronger than our own.
If you ever needed to sell your old records, have your fortune told, buy a chipped porcelain statue of St Patrick, a lens-less telescope or used baby clothes, the Blackberry Fair was your destination. Though venerated by patrons and even by a certain set of non-patrons, the fair never shook off its disreputable status as a junk market. Despite this, prizes could be sought here with some hope and, on rare occasion, even found. Once I found a Victorian ‘Railway Time Keeper’ pocket watch in perfect working order in a bric-a-brac shop in the far comer of the market. The lady who ran the shop had greasy, grey hair and was missing an eye; the empty space had healed over with a patch of thick, fibrous scar tissue. She slurped Lyons tea from a cracked mug while her remaining eye watched me like a sentinel from the moment I entered the shop until the moment I left, prize ticking in hand. She had refused to accept any more than a fiver for the watch - a criminally low price for such an item.
Bibliophiles among you will be envious to learn that, while searching through an old suitcase full of used books, I found an 1863 first edition copy of Le Fanu's The House by the Churchyard, all three volumes, somehow overlooked by collectors. A sign taped to the inside of the lid read ‘hardbacks £2, paperbacks £1.' I went inside and asked the scarf-clad old man to be sure, assuming he would recognise the volumes proper value. But he only seemed upset that I had distracted him from his newspaper. Without a word he pointed to the sign: hardbacks £2 each. Six pounds is what I paid for all three volumes; you will get no argument from me. There may be a hint of gloating in my tone, but I hope I have provided you with some proof that curious objects do turn up in the market from time to time. You have to wonder how such bargains find their way to a place like the Blackberry Fair.
But what of the haunting I promised? Personally I prefer fictional ghost stories to ‘true’ ones. True hauntings tend to leave me feeling unsatisfied and are often narratively mundane: a friend of a friend once encountered an indistinct mist on a staircase; a harmless, if inexplicable, cold spot leaves you reaching for your jumper; or if you are really lucky, something, possibly an irritable poltergeist, hurls a telephone at you. Inevitably these encounters with the unexplained do not develop past statistics and catalogue entries. You may come away perplexed by the incident, but with no deeper understanding of supernatural mysteries. However, this is not the case with the Blackberry Fair.
A sign still bolted to the front of number 44 reads: ‘open from dawn ’til dusk’ - an incidental caveat for the few who do not know that after sundown the Blackberry Fair becomes the exclusive haunt of a particularly violent apparition. This spectre is locally synonymous with the bogeyman and regularly invoked by incensed mothers, who can still be heard to threaten: If you think you’re bold, I’ll go fetch the Blackberry Man on you.’
It seems that the fairs management, either through tradition, respect or genuine fear of the infamous Blackberry Man, has always stringently enforced the dawn ’til dusk rule. A vendor once showed me his lease, which dated back to 1982. He pointed out a clause which stated: All vendors will promptly cease trading before dusk and will not linger about the premises after twilight. Those who do so risk immediate eviction.’ His fathers lease from the mid 1940s contained the same clause, he said.
At closing time the gates to the stable passage are shut and padlocked, as are the front gates along the footpath. Even the local hooligans with their inbred superstitions know that the back premises are strictly off limits. Anyone who enters the fair after the sun has disappeared from the late afternoon sky does so at their own risk.
The Blackberry Fair shut down for good in February of 2002. Those who were around at that time might remember the incident that prompted its closure. It was reported in all the local newspapers, and even picked up by some international ones. On a cold Saturday morning in late February, the market's proprietor discovered the remains of three Englishmen. The bodies of Rex Liebl, Geoff Kendes and Eric Ensine, all in their mid twenties, were found in the north-east corner of the market, propped up against the bookseller's stall opposite a life-size statue of the Virgin Mary. There had been no sign of struggle, and despite the state of their faces and lack of fingers for fingerprints, their identities were not difficult to confirm. In their wallets were numerous forms of identification, including driving licences, video rental cards and laminated memberships for an internet-based ghost-hunting organisation called The International Cold Spot Society.
For those not familiar with amateur ghost-hunting, it has become a popular pastime in recent years, spurred on by a number of US and UK television programmes that purport to investigate alleged hauntings. These decidedly non-scientific shows have but a single purpose: to boost good ratings, with little regard for authenticity. Much to the regret of professional parapsychologists and psychical researchers, amateur groups emulating these kinds of television programmes have sprouted up all around the world. Messrs Liebl, Kendes and Ensine belonged to one of these groups.
According to the police report, the three ghost-hunters hailed from the Toxteth neighbourhood of Liverpool, and planned their Dublin adventure on the Cold Spot Society
message board. Their plan was to gain access to the market after nightfall by scaling the back garden wall from Fortescue Lane. Here the stone wall is not much higher than seven and a half feet. They carried little by way of equipment - torches, digital cameras and note pads — and so the climb over the wall would have been easy. Once over they found themselves amongst the narrow lane-ways and heavy shadows of the market. Had they not brought torches they would have found themselves in thick darkness, for the market is not well lit. There has never been a need for much lighting. As on every other night, the green dome of the church blotted out the moon in the southern sky, while the houses of Fortescue Terrace acted as a thick curtain between the intrepid ghost-hunters and the relative safety of Rathmines Road.
Events leading up to the Liverpudlians’ deaths can be pieced together from the images found in their cameras. Various candid photos show the young trio packing their bags in Liverpool, checking into a dingy hostel on Gardiner Street, posing with James Joyce on Talbot Street, and drinking Guinness in Temple Bar, grins extending past the edges of their faces. Only three of the photos were taken at the Blackberry Fair itself on the night of the incident. The first shows Kendes in Fortescue Lane about to climb the market's back wall. He is dressed in black with a rucksack slung over his shoulder. His face is pallid from the flash, his eyes two pinpoints of luminescent red like the tip of the cigarette dangling from his lips. The second photo was taken just over the wall inside the market. On either side of the photo, illuminated by the flash, are crude stalls lining the narrow laneway. In front of one stall is a church pew, on top of which are piled a number of wooden boxes. Vague shapes can be discerned in the deep background where the lane disappears into blackness. Only the nearest shapes can be identified from their outlines: wheel-less bicycle frames, the bell of an old gramophone; further in the distance is a human form that is probably the Virgin Mary statue. But it is the final photo that is the most curious. At first glance it is quite mundane. A pale and slightly blurry hand takes up most of the foreground. The hand belongs to the photographer, who can be identified by his wristwatch as Rex Liebl. He is pointing, finger then still attached, at something in the darkness beyond. There is some disagreement over exactly what Liebl is pointing at. Some see indistinct and unrelated shapes that they attribute to the market's rubbish-heap topography. Others, however, claim to see the faint silhouette of a figure. Fewer still describe with conviction what they believe to be a man wearing a long coat and a rounded hat.
The Bleeding Horse and Other Ghost Stories Page 4