Jeanie Johnston
Dublin, Ireland

One of Ireland’s most famous ships is the Jeanie Johnston which is moored off the Custom House Quay in Dublin along the River Liffey. It is a replica of the three masted barque that was originally built in 1847 by Scotsman John Munn in Quebec, Canada. The original ship was bought by the Tralee merchants John Donovan and Sons from Kerry County as a cargo vessel that traded between Tralee and North America for many years bringing emigrants from Ireland to North America and timber back to Europe. Her first maiden emigrant voyage went from Blennerville in Kerry to Quebec in 1848 with 193 emigrants on board due to the Potato Famine that ravaged Ireland. From 1848 until 1855 she made 16 voyages to Quebec, Baltimore, and New York. On average the trip was accomplished in 47 days and her largest number of passengers were 254. No crews or passengers were ever lost on board thanks to the captain James Attridge who would not overload the ship and made sure doctor Richard Blennerhassett was on board for every journey. In 1855 the ship was sold to William Johnson of North Shields in England, but during a 1858 trip to Quebec from Hull carrying timber became waterlogged and slowly sank – crew was rescued by the Dutch ship Sophie Elizabeth. This replica ship, is reduced in size by 30%, and is only licensed to carry 40 people. The replica was made from indepth research of the original, and took from 1993-2002 to build. It was constructed by a international team of young people who linked Ireland North and South, the U.S., Canada, and other countries costing approximately 16 million Euro (4 times the original estimate of 3.81 million Euro) which was paid for by the Irish government, Kerry County Council, Tralee Town Council, the European Union, the American Ireland Fund, Bord Failte, Shannon Development, Kerry Group, the Training and Employment Authority Foras Áiseanna Saothair and the Irish Department of the Marine, most of which later agreed to write off their losses. It was built with larch planks on oak frames and was altered to apply with current international maritime regulations by adding some modern concessions including two Caterpillar main engines, two Caterpillar generators, and an emergency generator that is located above the waterline in the forward deckhouse fully compliant to the highest standards of modern ocean-going passenger ships, with steel water-tight bulkheads, down-flooding valves, and fire-fighting equipment. The replica shiped sailed in 2003 from Tralee to Canada and to the U.S. She raced in the 2005 tall ships race and finished 60th out of 65 from Waterford to Cherbourg. The replica is owned by the Dublin Docklands Development Authority who bought it in 2005 for 2.7 million Euro. Today it is not in seagoing condition. Today she is primarily used as an Onboard Museum and evening venue.

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Ireland’s First Mythical Inhabitants: The Fomorians

By JILL LAWLESS | AP – Thu, Dec 22, 2011
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LONDON (AP) — The skeleton of an 18th-century celebrity nicknamed the ‘Irish Giant’ should be removed from a museum and buried at sea in keeping with his last wishes, two experts have argued, reviving a debate about the ethics of handling human remains.

Writing in the British Medical Journal, medical ethicist Len Doyal and legal researcher Thomas Muinzer said there is no good scientific reason to display the skeleton of Charles Byrne, who died in 1783, and a strong moral case against it.

“What has been done cannot be undone but it can be morally rectified,” the two men wrote. “Surely it is time to respect the memory and reputation of Byrne.”

Byrne stood about 7 feet, 7 inches (2.3 meters) tall as a result of acromegaly, a condition caused when a tumor on the pituitary gland stimulates an excess of growth hormone.

He became a celebrity in 18th-century London as the star turn in a museum of curiosities but died aged just 22.

Despite Byrne’s wish to be buried at sea, his body was purchased by pioneering surgeon and anatomist John Hunter, who often hired grave robbers to supply him with corpses. For two centuries Byrne’s skeleton has been on display at the Royal College of Surgeons’ Hunterian Museum in London.

Doyal, of London’s Queen Mary University, and Muinzer, of Queen’s University Belfast, said that while Byrne’s skeleton had been of use to medical research, that was no reason to put it on public display.

“Moreover, now that Byrne’s DNA has been extracted, it can be used in further research,” they wrote.

The museum’s director, Sam Alberti, conceded Thursday there was a “powerful moral argument” for respecting Byrne’s wishes. But he said that was outweighed by the skeleton’s continuing benefit to medical research.

“Patients with the condition today live long and much happier lives,” Alberti said — in part due to knowledge gleaned from Byrne’s DNA.

Byrne’s skeleton has helped scientists identify several dozen people in Ireland with the same genetic mutation — all believed to be related to Byrne through a common ancestor.

One of them, Brendan Holland, says the skeleton should remain — and he thinks Byrne would agree.

“What would his view be if he knew what we know now?” Holland said in a video for the British Medical Journal website. “He would almost certainly agree with my view that this is the right thing to do today.”

Gorse

Ulex europaeus or common names: Gorse, furze, furse, or whin

Taxonomy: Kingdom: Plantae; Division: Magnoliophyta; Class: Magnoliopsida; Order: Fabales; Family: Fabaceae; Subfamily: Faboideae; Genus: Ulex; Species: U. europaeus; Binomial name: Ulex europaeus L.

Gorse is a common name for the Ulex europaeus, a genus of roughly 20 species of spiny evergreen shrubs that are native to Western Europe and Northwest Africa. It is closely related to the ‘Broom’ Family hosting green stems with small leaves. The plant is extremely dry in its branches and leaves – making it a severe fire hazard with an explosive burst with wildland fires. Because of the quick fire explosions and passing on of the waves of flames – gorse is very good at withstanding fire damage and spreads its seed pods best when torched by wildfire. Burnt stumps will sprout new growth from the roots. The branches host extreme spininess with shoots branching out 1-4 cms long. It can grow up to 2-3 meters tall (7-10 feet). Leaves of younger plants are trifoliate resembling a small clover leaf before they evolve into scales or small spines. All of the species host yellow flowers. Many of these species grow in sunny sites in dry, sandy soils. Flowers bloom from late autumn throughout the winter season with flowers strongest in the spring. Some gorse is always in flower and host a coconut-like scent. Gorse is the perfect environment for wildlife nesting and protecting its inhabitants from predators due to the dense thorny cover.
Culinary: The flowers are edible and often used in salads, tea, and in the manufacture of a non-grape based wine. It is high in protein and commonly used to feed livestock as fodder.
Common uses: Used as livestock fodder. Bundles of gorse used to fire traditional bread ovens. According to Jasmine ( jasmine@archaeosophia.co.uk / http://www.archaeosophia.co.uk ) “Gorse may also used in the vitrification of Iron Age hill-forts in Scotland; experimental archaeology has shown that the temperatures it can reach are high enough to turn rock to glass. The fires would have to be kept burning for about a week to maintain the process… In 1934, Vere Gordon Childe and his colleague designed a test wall that was 12 feet long, six feet wide and six feet high, which was built for them at Plean Colliery in Stirlingshire. “They used old fireclay bricks for the faces and pit props as timber, and filled the cavity between the walls with small cubes of basalt rubble. They covered the top with turf and then piled about four tons of scrap timber and brushwood against the walls and set fire to them. Because of a snowstorm in progress, a strong wind fanned the blazing mixture of wood and stone so that the inner core did attain some vitrification of the rock”. Modern foresters can attest to gorse fires raging across hillsides well in excess of 800 degrees centigrade on open ground – a covered, stoked fire fed over time would be capable of vitrification and gorse not only freely covers most Scottish hillsides, but is one species which seems to actively flourish after fires – the perfect renewable resource.” [Thanks Jasmine!]
Folklore: ‘When gorse is in flower, kissing is in fashion” is a common rhyme.

Gorse
The Curraugh, Kildare, Ireland

Our Official Page on Gorse is now located at: http://www.treeleavesoracle.org/treelore/gorse/.

Our Official Page on “Foxglove” is located at http://www.treeleavesoracle.org/treelore/foxglove/.

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