Church
Island (Taoide, Thaddeus, Toit or Toide are other versions of the name
Tida)
Church Island on Lough Beg, which is really a wide
part of the Lower Bann River, has the ruin of an old church complete with a
spire which was added later by the Earl of Bristol (Bishop of Derry, also
known as Bishop Hervey) around 1788. He desired to see the location of
the ruins better from a grand
palace which he also built on the grounds of what is now 'Ballyscullion House'.
This palace which cost £100,000 to build was started in 1787 and almost
finished in 1805. It was reputed to have had the best Italian marble and
notably 365 windows. Later, when it transferred to his nephew on the
Bishop's death in 1803, the government of the day reputedly applied a
punitive window tax and the 'palace' was demolished in 1813 after
standing for only some 8 years! Much of the rubble was re-cycled to
build the present day 'Ballyscullion House'. Some palace remains can still
be found in the woods and were recently used as a film set for the
"Game of Thrones" series. Interestingly, the portico was carefully
dismantled, ferried by barge and re-built in Belfast as the entrance to
St George's
Church.
The
spire on Church Island is known locally as Hervey’s Folly. During World War
II an American aircraft based at the nearby Creagh air-base hit it with its
wing tip and put a pronounced kink in it. It has since been partially
straightened by the Department of the Environment who now look after
it.
Around the wall-steads is an old cemetery
containing about fifty known graves, and the site of the ancient monastery
which St Patrick is credited with establishing in the 5th
century..
It
is known that the old Church was in ruins by the year 1603 having apparently
been burned down during the ‘Plantation’ period and that in the year of 1798
during the Rebellion, many women and children were forced to take shelter on
this and other islands of Lough Beg.
Visitors can walk in the summer months across the water meadows to
the island from the County Londonderry side. Church Island is not an
'island' as such, insofar that only its eastern flank is adjoined by water.
After the dredging of the River Bann in the 1940s, the water on the west
side of the island receded - although after really bad weather the swollen
waters again completely surround the place.
The
water meadows known as ‘The Strand’ stretch to over 300 acres and are alive
with bird some of which reside here permanently and some of which
migrate in from other parts of the northern hemisphere. Birds such as snipe,
redshank, peewit, mixed with black-tailed godwit, green sand piper, wood
sandpiper, greenshank and knot. Thousands of geese and ducks fly in during
the winter from Russia and other northern sources to take advantage of the
excellent feeding available. Many rare plants
including Pennyroyal and the Irish Ladies' Tresses orchid share this habitat
with the birds.
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