By Brian Nolan
A Statue With A Historic Tale:
St. Mary’s Church in the Claddagh has been a Dominican church for nearly 550 years. Well, with a few unfortunate interruptions. It’s located opposite the Spanish Arch, across the river Corrib, and outside the walls of our medieval trading city. The statue of our Lady of Galway that graces the incredibly beautiful side altar in the Claddagh Church forms part of the tumultuous tale, spared the destruction that befell so many religious relics.
Originally, the church was known as St. Marys Priory, or St. Mary’s on the hill, but in more recent times, it is simply known as the Claddagh Church. The Dominican order established an abbey in Athenry in 1241, after they came to Ireland following the Norman invasion, in 1224. Here, they thrived until 1652, when the town and church were destroyed by the invading Cromwellian army. The monks fled to Galway city, to their sister abbey at the Claddagh, founded in 1488.
However, the Dominican community at the abbey in the Claddagh were not to see much peace after the destruction of Athenry. They had settled in Galway to help minister during the Black Death plague that devastated most of Europe.
War and Destruction:
Galway was besieged for ten months in 1651/2 by the Cromwellian Confederate army. In order to deny the enemy using the church as a redoubt from which to attack the city, the beautiful priory was torn down, and the monks took shelter in the city. After the city surrendered in April 1652, the Dominicans built an even more beautiful church on their original site. But there was even more war yet to come.
The Williamite wars of 1689-91 brought more devastation to the city and Galway was reduced to a ruinous settlement. The merchants of old were replaced by a garrison of unruly, vengeful troops and a cadre of vindictive Protestant settlers from the north of England. The Dominicans were once again homeless, their church burned to the ground. When the Act of Banishment came into force in 1697, and the introduction of the Penal Laws, all Catholic clerics were ordered to leave Ireland or face execution.
Faced with certain death, all but three of the Dominican community were forced to flee for their lives. In October 1697, twenty Galway Dominicans left the city for Vannes in France. The Catholic Faith in Ireland was persecuted for the following 130 years until 1829, when Daniel O’Connell forced the British Parliament to allow Freedom of Religion in Ireland.
The banished Dominicans fully intended to return. And so, before they sailed for France, they filled a huge chest full of precious relics from their now demolished churches.
A Hidden Treasure Chest:
This included sacred books, silver and gold chalices, a precious altar stone, saintly statues, clerical vestments and several sets of rosary beads, and the stunning statue of the Blessed Virgin. That ‘Treasure Chest’ was given to a Catholic merchant, Valentine Browne, for safe keeping, in 1697. He had managed to survive the pogroms of the Cromwellians and Williamite armies.
Their beautiful abbey was destroyed and not rebuilt for a hundred years, and their monks operated secretly, under constant fear of being found. They ministered in disguise. Many were imprisoned or worse, executed. By some miracle, the chest, and its precious contents survived. Some of those items are on display in the Galway City Museum, and the rest are at the Church of Saint Mary that was initially rebuilt in 1792, with the current building being opened in 1891.
Tuesday Talks:
The statue of our Lady of Galway now graces the incredibly beautiful side altar in the Claddagh Church. It was hidden in a house in High Street for over a hundred years. Restored in 1922/23, it was brought in procession through Galway. Throughout the month of April, on each Tuesday at 7.30pm there will be a talk on the history of the Dominicans and their wonderful church. The talks are free and should prove very interesting.
