Down by Athea

On the Sunday afternoon of April 29, 2018, I wandered into Dick White’s pub, in the village of Athea, County Limerick. There I found Jimmy Sorohan, Johnny Mullane, and Pat Gleeson, who filled me up with Guinness so that I didn’t stumble back to my bed and breakfast until the next morning. The highlight of the evening, however, was Mullane reciting a poem that exalts the brave deaths of two Athea men: Con Colbert and Paddy Dalton, both of whom had Woulfe connections. Colbert, who was executed after the Easter Rising, had a sister who married Richard B. Woulfe, an Abbeyfeale pharmacist and IRA member. Dalton’s grandmother was a Woulfe. An IRA man himself, he was killed by British soldiers in 1921. Thank you to Amy de Faoite and her father for help with the transcription.

Here it is:

One fine summer’s morning, as the sun it shone bright
The dewdrops were clinging to the roses all night
The skylark was humming as I wended my way
To the banks of this river that flows down by Athea

As I stood on that spot having nothing to do
Sure I gazed on the mass rock at the foot of Gale view
Where that hero, Con Colbert, saw the first light of day
By the banks of this river that flows down by Athea

Standing on that spot, so verdant and green
O’er the bridge to this village stepped the blue-eyed cailín
Saying, Come you from Cnoc Bán of the veils of Dirreen
Oh, no, then she said, I don’t live far away
From the banks of this river that flows down by Athea

She said my whole life in the hills of Coole West
Where that martyr young Dalton was raised on his chest
But for his young gentle soul I will play night and day
By the banks of this river that flows down by Athea

In lone Gortaglanna brave Dalton sure died
And Colbert faced death by the sweet Liffey side
But with a smile on his face to those once he would say
Fare thee well to my home and my friends ’round Athea